“It’s getting easier, but it is not enough… I wonder why is this kid so hard to connect with. But remember, you are en route already.”
“Are you ready, kid?!” The imposing figure of the royal guard captain woke me up from remembering my last dream, making me hurry with my new equipment. New equipment, I add, I had just read the manuals a moment ago. Not that my head worked very well this soon in the morning either way.
Why call me this early only to see how well I could fight? I mean, I’m the one who called it all because, in all honesty, I wanted to see if I could manage the Divine Judgement thing, but still... It wasn’t necessary, and I’m sure no one expected me to go with it, but it would be cool if I ended up being a super good fighter.
Not that it would happen, but I could dream.
Either way, we were at the royal guard fort. A miniature castle at the back of the royal gardens, connected to the outer wall and with the royal guard's quarters in it. It also acted as the back gate of the palace, leading to a middle-class district where the families of said royal guard lived.
The building itself wasn’t anything special. Stone walls in a rectangular shape and a huge open ground in the middle. An open ground that acted as training grounds and was surrounded by the armory, the stables, and some other support facilities. These open grounds also had a dozen weapon stands that seemed dragged here, but I don't think these were always there.
Lastly, it had a sandy area in the middle surrounded by a stony boundary with glowing runes. Probably something magical, but I'd need to be more awakened to read them. Who captained this place was much more impressive, anyway, so I was more focused on him. Especially since he was towering right next to me right now.
The gargantuan old man known as Neil Languire, the royal captain, and the person organizing my tryout. He was pretty much two meters tall, covered in muscles and plate armor, but with a dandy-like face with a well-groomed, and quite big, blonde mustache. I could very well see him taking tea, even if his size made the situation a little weird.
He looked very impressive, which was a contrast with me.
My armor wasn’t much more than a random assortment of multi-colored plates and leather sets. More than that, neither of them had the same style of seemed part of a set. I made them look awesome still, of course, but getting all I could from the armory made it a little hard to perfect. Even the tiara in my head, which was from Elen’s personal collection, needed some work to make look good.
"Ready, kid?" The big knight asked again.
“As much as I could manage…” I answered while rushing ahead and trying to organize what I knew of my items. “But it will work.”
From top to bottom, I had: Elen's tiara that I didn't know what could do (she had no papers on it), a leather cuirass that was exceptionally good at keeping the wearer warm, a thick metallic chainmail with the ability to create simple barriers, a white gauntlet that could shine, and a pair of greaves that made the remaining pieces of equipment fell light at the cost of feeling heavier itself.
None of them were very powerful on their own, even the barrier one was weak compared to real barriers, but with my silver magic, they could be quite something. Just the two most useless-looking ones, the heating-up cuirass, and the make-things-lighter greaves, could very well be S-rank in my hands. As long as I had the mana for it…
They weren’t very protective, though, so I had some pieces of armor too, like a pair of leather bracers and a thicker skirt with plates underneath. It was on the medium height side if I were to say, but it was already getting too heavy for me, especially on the feet.
I ended up looking like a mix of princess knight and evil general in the end, which was fun since I had two princesses close by. Two princesses that didn’t look like a knight one at all right now…
One was wearing full-plater armor like a normal knight and the other was straight-up a ranger. They were very ready for a real fight, which I thought was a little too much considering they were here to help test my skills.
“Are you sure this is a good idea, Illia?" The ranger one asked while staring at my set. "Your equipment seems more like something for parading than for fighting…”
“I agree. There are too many weak points on this set, Ms. Illia.” Elen’s sister also commented. “It’s understandable that you would want to have the most artifacts possible, but I can’t even see the use of many of these. Wouldn’t it be better if you wore proper armor and asked for the artifacts that weren’t forgotten at the armory instead?”
She had a point. It would be more efficient if I had powerful artifacts to play with, but that had its own problems in my eyes. More so, doing so would mean leaning off my plan. A lot.
Either way, Valiria was currently wearing a set of armor very similar to the one from when I saw her at the waystone, but without the chirping and the blood. A full plate set made in silver and decorated with blue runes and ornaments. Very noble-looking, but not very princess-knight, but I said this much already. She also had a very heavy-looking shield and an arming sword, both of which had runes in them.
Meanwhile, Elen was the usual. Grey cape and some armor beneath it, but as she mentioned before, these looked heavier this time. Still only the breastplate and some odd pieces around, but she should be in the same weight class as me already. She had no weapons I could see still, for some reason.
“I don’t think I’d manage to wear plate, Your Highness…” I finally answered them. “Even the mail is already heavy enough as is...”
“If the problem is weight, we could get you something like mine, or even something like the maid’s wear." Elen continued with a different idea. "What you say, Eve?”
“We do have spare sets still, Your Highness. Wouldn't be as effective as metal armor, but they work best against magic and are sturdy enough.” The dark-haired maid answered while raising a part of her clothes to show the thin chainmail woven under the cloth. “The clothes alone are no better than simple leather against blades and piercing weapons, so the mail with need to stay. It can get very heavy.”
“They look much better too!” The other maid shouted out from her place on Eve’s side, but her happy expression soon changed when her companion started glaring. “I mean… Most wouldn’t expect armor from this, right? They looking better is a perk, yes?”
“That is a point… Either way, Ms. Illia is quite taller than the other maids, so we would need a while to adjust the clothes.”
Clothes of a magical material, is it? Wouldn't say I wasn't interested. I read about these when I was trying to see if I could make alchemy… Which I couldn’t, by the way. It ended up being related to using spells with their own element, so a no-go for me.
Either way, magical clothes would be fun, but removing artifacts felt wrong. My intuition was telling me that I would need these things or even more of them.
“You can think about this later, you all. We have to see how far you can go and have no time for it. You also have to duel everyone here, so I would like to be done before we lose dinner.” The shadow of the captain covered me again as he approached our little group more, now with a huge crystal in hand. “It’ll be the same as I had the boy do before, so no worries if it’s possible. Just fight us all and see how far you can get. Anything less than total victory means you won’t be winning a Divine Judgement, though I think you can manage something.”
Such a waste of a good face this guy is… He’s not wrong, though. I said all that about being considered in the king’s plans, but Mr. Hero was a little more powerful than I am right now. Juuuuust a little. Yeah, a little.
It also was a little bothersome that this captain seemed to think I wasn’t a total useless in a fight like I kinda am. Somehow, he decided I had the posture already even if the most I did was some sports and martial arts back in my world.
I mean, fencing and kendo should help a little, but they should be different from fighting for real… I think. I should’ve played around with HEMA a little more… Never got away from being average in any of them, but who knows? Maybe it would be the time a teacher would say I’m good at it.
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Kinda got me depressed now that I think how many teachers I had...
Well, better ignore all this for now. It’s not as if my main plan is fighting my way through anyway, so I only needed to have a good idea of how well I could pretend to. For safety and curiosity, yes?
“Sorry about that, sir.” I stood in a very straight stance and answered in a clear tone that should please the soldier. “How it’ll work?”
“Oh? So you can manage it too… Good. You'll need it since you're against some of the strongest fighters in the palace.” He nodded and then moved his eyes through the group that, as weird as it was, was pretty much only girls. “You will choose someone and then another and then another until we're done, got it? Fight them, win or lose, fight the next. Very simple.”
“Sir, yes, sir!” I saluted by reflex, which in turn caused people to look at me as if I was being weird. But I remained! Backing off now would be more shameful than staying as is, so I did so without a problem. I also noticed that, by what he said, many of the strongest warriors around were either princesses or maids… That’s funny.
Very funny how thoroughly I’ll be beaten up too, but alas. Maybe I can trick my way to a victory or two with my new toys… It would be nice if that happened. Better than my current plan, at least.
Again, for later.
“Well… I’m not sure what you’re doing, but moving on. I had the training grounds cleared off and got all the training weapons I could, so you can go all out.” He concluded before turning to the open field surrounded by stone buildings. “I’ll leave to you the choice of who goes first. Don’t worry about getting hurt, the weapons won’t even connect for real and we can patch you up if you take some hits.”
Who should I get first, eh? Hmmm… Lemme think… Wait! Why are you taking a huge ass lance and looking at me? Do you mean that you too…? Yeah, it makes sense actually. This place has regeneration potions around, right? I’ll need them…
Anyway, Elen and Eve scare me, but dealing with the armored princess or the knight captain sounds even worse. Asking the healer to fight me would look too bad?
Yeah, it would…
Fine, I’ll go with the one I’m more curious about first. Not sure if I’ll be able to get to the others later, but alas…
“Let us have a go, Elen! I’m a little interested to see you fighting…”
“Oh? Really? You sure about that?” She asked me a little surprised but still moved towards the weapon stands while doing so. “I mean, I’m not the best at magic and all, but I’m very strong.”
She was packing as many daggers and small blades as she could see on the ‘floor armory’, setting them around her clothes. And even though I was inclined to agree that starting with her wasn’t the best idea, she was making me even more curious. I really wanted to have my most important question about Elen answered: Was she a ranger or a rogue?!
“Get ready to work, Dorothea,” Eve muttered as I moved to get a weapon of my own (using the very real black saber wouldn’t be right), and I got more worried. I also ignored the understanding expression of the redhead and the worry in the eyes of the other princess while at it.
Should I pray a little? There are gods for sure here, so…
“Are you two ready?” Captain Neil shouted out from his corner while setting the head-sized crystal on the pedestal of the arena. It made the stone circle flash in silver for a moment too. “Not to hurry you, but we won’t be eating until these duels are finished. And I’ll count the time to recharge the barrier.”
That’s mean! I get to be beaten around and then can’t even eat whenever I want?! Heck, I’ll have to put on more effort than usual in this. More effort than what I have to use even!
“Looks like you’re ready to go, Illia…” Elen noted my expression and smiled. “I’ll be starting then.”
So, without giving much of a signal other than her words, the ranger princess rushed towards me with a single short blade in hand.
She was… Too fast to be honest.
I could see signs of magical circles here and there, but she moved too fast for me to read them. My perception could barely keep up and the parry I managed was by reflex alone. It even forced me to try and open some space between us right away.
This was a little more than I was expecting, and that was only the beginning…
Almost right after the first hit, Elen was already in front of me again. Her blade didn’t reach me right away because I hurried to get a barrier and block the attack with my left gauntlet. A very small barrier that I concentrated on the gauntlet as a way to make it more resistant, and that even so, still broke on impact.
It ended as enough to block it, but I could see that trying to use these barriers as the wide defense they were meant to would likely get me killed very fast unless I poured a lot of mana into it. And even after taking my best defense in a hit, another attack came right after.
A right-side swing that I dodged in a hurry. One from the left that pushed my saber away. A thrust that I barely could notice coming before parrying by a hair width. And then an instantaneous overhead swing that I had to roll away.
The attacks weren’t that complex, a mix of wide and short swings with a few sudden thrusts from time to time, but they were fast. More than that, they seemed to always come from a blind spot or from nowhere. Her sword seemed to vanish away even. I was even starting to think that she was capable of getting invisible and that was why all the hits came from nowhere!
Without the thick greaves and how I could summon small barriers due to my artifacts, I would be very wounded already.
I could manage to keep up for now, but the dodging would tire me in due time. And it only got worse when she took a small break only to draw one of the daggers and start a dual-wield assault on me. Something that only messed up my pace even more as each fast swing and strike was peppered by an almost invisible follow-up.
Panicking all the time while trying to survive was getting old fast here. In barely a few seconds of conflict, I was already covered in dust from all the jumping around. A real pain if you ask me.
“Good, good.” Elen happily nodded at my state while getting some of the knives she had set around. “You’re better than you give yourself credit for, you know? Few can keep up with me…”
“Thanks, I guess… Not that I’m doing that well.”
I wasn't talking about my fighting, by the way. I was talking about the fact I couldn't figure out what her magic was and what it had to do with her fighting style. I mean, it had to be light, but it would bring a weird problem: Elen burned the wasps the first time we met. I was sure of that, but if that was so, I had no idea how it fit.
Unless, of course, she was actually…
“No, no, you doing well… But let’s see how far you go, okay?!”
Before I could finish my line of thought, the battle-crazed girl threw her knives to the sky and came with another assault. An assault of half-visible attacks that I could hold out for a while, but that started to come with throwing knives hidden in them. She was pushing me closer and closer to the edge, and that was while I had to keep an eye on the delayed attack she sent above.
I would lose very fast if I kept defending like this... Which was why I wouldn’t bother to.
It was time to pull some tricks of mine.
“Wha…?!” Elen exclaimed as my next dodge went head-on into her instead of away from her blades. It gave me a hit on the corner of my belly, but the training blade didn't pierce, as they told me. It blunted me hard, but I could hold it. It still made me lose stance and trip forward, but it got me away from the falling knives.
Falling knives that fell to the ground right after I got up and smiled smugly at the ranger princess.
“Pleased?”
“A lot!”
“By the way, how strong you are in comparison to everyone else?”
“Me? I’m maybe the second here, or even… Wait! You’re trying to buy time now, aren’t you?” She somehow saw through my trick and started to actually laugh at the idea. “Ahahahaha! Damn, you like doing it a lot, don’t you? Time to up it a little then…”
Hell.
That was all I could think before a small light flash blipped beneath the princess and, the next moment, I was already dodging by reflex.
A double head-high swing that sunk on the ground where I was a moment before was all left. And as she smiled and rushed again, I was forced to block head-on for the first time. Not parry or even weaken the attack, just blocked it with my own weapon and got pushed away by the impact.
Then, before I could do anything else, a flash came from the princess and I hurried to cover my eyes against the light. It wasn't enough to panic me, but it got me blind for a moment. A moment that, as it could be dangerous, made me roll away again in a hurry.
But as I got my stance and opened my eyes, I understood that my suspicion was sadly right...
“You have a few seconds to protect yourself or surrender, my friend,” Elen spoke as she watched my distorting expression.
That’s bullshit!
I could read most of it, so I knew it was pure bullshit. It made sense why she was so stealthy and tricky, but it was bullshit still. Saying that they actually called things like redirecting and concentrating light as a light element was a lot, but... Firing lasers is too much, isn't it?! Being stealthy by using light and dark tricks is complex enough, but she was going to burn me to a crisp now!
I hope it won’t hurt too much, though, for I’m not backing up. If it was anything like I thought it was, then there was no fleeing or dodging here anyway.
So, I only hunched down and forced out my cuirass' spell to spread around while getting some wind going with the saber and putting whatever else I had into my ring. And a moment later, the whole area around me got filled with dust and I was bathed in a hyper-concentrated light beam.
The whole area was filled with a burning smell and it was quite hot, but I was almost unharmed as I rolled away. Some burns, but good enough to continue, and on the path for Elen's follow-up attack.
Which was exactly what I wanted.
"My turn, princess."
Her attack went through my image as the princess also noticed that she hit an illusion. An illusion that made her posture break, making my secret weapon more effective as I threw it from behind the illusion.
“What the hells?!” The blinded silver-haired girl shouted as the mass of sand I kept in my pocket had her blinded for a while. A while I used to jump up and rush to force my way to a finishing strike, and then…
Then I slipped on one of the knives dropped around and ended with my head on the ground and my butt pointed to the sky… I couldn’t even bother to get up before there was a blade at my neck.
Using both my sand and illusion tricks in the first fight made them close to useless in the next fights, so I ended up beaten in all the other bouts. The match-ups were worse for my side too when I left the territory of speed-fighters and my skills didn't do much without the surprise, so it was very bad. Got me some ideas for next time, though. All I needed was preparation... Not that I would like to deal with these bulldozers ever again.
I’ll only say that being punched into kingdom come by a maid is a very weird experience.
At least all the tryouts were done before it was time to eat, and the food was quite nice. Thank you, Kaith!
Sadly, I got called by the big boss right after finishing my food. It would be good to have some extra time to rest, but what could I do...