Though Melanthina was certainly eager to get onto what was in her mind the main event, things simply weren’t set up that way. It was a joint training exercise with the Combining Luster Sect and the Tenebach and Brandle clans, and while her position certainly afforded her some benefits, Melanthina was not able to demand to fight someone specific right away. And she knew it well enough to not try, though she certainly looked as if she were going to.
The first battle John thought was of note involved Tirto, notable partly because he was John’s son but also because he was the first member of the Brandle clan to go up against the Combining Luster Sect. Before that, only a few of the younger disciples from the Tenebach clan participated.
The triplets were most certainly the youngest participants, but they were not the weakest. They were in the late Foundation Phase, putting them in a similar position as those who had trained for several years as an adult. Their previous restrictions in how they were allowed to train were being lifted as it was determined there were no ill effects unlike most cultivators beginning too young.
Tirto just happened to be positioned in an optimal state where he could provide some variety in both style and cultivation level. Those who were watching were trying to learn, after all, and while the individual participants should learn just about the same if they were matched appropriately, the watchers would do better without so much repetition.
His opponent was Madelen, somewhere around twenty years old and one of the sect’s promising disciples. Both were matched at the sixteenth rank, the first rank of the late Foundation Phase. Though it was an oddity to have such an age gap in the earlier phases of cultivation, ages would generally diversify in later phases as those who were quicker and slower matched each other in rank for a time.
John watched the arena from the viewing platform, having already determined that it was about as close to fair as a sect could provide on their home turf. Various pillars covered the battlefield, ranging in shape from round to anywhere between three and six flat sides. Not all of the pillars were precisely vertical, and more importantly the battlefield had rises and falls that varied things up. There was cover for those who would use it, but not all of it was easy and predictable. There was little spiritual energy making its way into the arena, though between sect disciples it would be left to its natural inclinations towards light.
The favored weapon of the Combining Luster Sect seemed to be scepters or staves. In either case, a crystal would be embedded in the top of the weapon to aid in focusing their attacks. When using a scepter they tended to also use a shield in the other hand, polished to a mirror sheen for more than just looks.
The battle began somewhat predictably. Madelen had no reason to hide her abilities when they were much the same as all of the other disciples, firing a beam of light from her scepter towards Tirto. The young man calmly took cover nearby as he sensed the attack on the way. It wasn’t quite clear if the attacks actually reached light speed, but they could be avoided by both time required to form them and the sustained contact required to cause significant damage.
After the initial attack the battle rapidly became more complex. Madelen didn’t just aim her attacks directly at Tirto, but instead at any of the surrounding pillars or the floor itself, rebounding the beams of light. The pillars themselves hardly aided the process- they were only made to be sturdy. Instead, it was the Combining Luster Sect’s techniques that made everything possible. The arrangement of the battlefield was irregular not to empower them, but to set them apart. Those who had the skill to make use of difficult angles could fight on nearly any battlefield to great effect, whereas those who could only deal with regular patterns would be greatly weakened.
Tirto kept track of his surroundings, accurately predicting the easiest angles to target him and staying on the move so that they couldn’t be used to great effect. A few beams from Madelen grazed him as he worked his way towards her, but ultimately neither had used much energy yet. Madelen had maneuvered herself into an area with greater open space such that Tirto would have to expose himself to her to approach. That also meant she had fewer opportunities for tricks inside the area, but it was still advantageous to her.
As Tirto slid around a triangular pillar, Madelen was waiting with her scepter pointed, requiring only minute adjustments to her aim. Tirto broke into a sprint, his spear ready, while she gathered energy for her attack, unable to simply hold it ready indefinitely. He was at most a third of the distance between them when her attack was ready, then a powerful beam of light struck Tirto in the chest. Or it would have, had he not prepared himself for just that.
His defensive energy wasn’t just formed around his body, but instead a bubble of water was extended. That could have scattered the light to some extent, but he also had a nearly invisible prism of pure, transparent ice within the bubble. The water itself would have slightly scattered the light, no doubt accounted for to some extent by Madelen, but the prism split the power around Tirto, the parts that still struck him barely relevant.
If Madelen could have sustained her beam in one continuous attack she might have adjusted for his defense, as it was she could only angle to either side where the curvature of the water did the job as much as the hidden prism.
She wasn’t done just because Tirto reached her, however. Their weapons could focus light, but were also usable for blunt force in melee combat. She deflected Tirto’s spear thrust with her shield, her own counter swing slowed by the sphere of water Tirto sustained.
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A battle between light and water was much less destructive than light and darkness which were mutually explosive, neither having any sort of specific advantage or disadvantage besides their own skill. Ultimately such a battle would go to whoever had more talent or experience, and Madelen would have been reasonable to assume that would be her. Yet Tirto had been training himself in some form since he was able to move about on his own, and had an almost unfair amount of natural affinity for his element.
Ultimately Tirto expanded the influence of his water sufficiently to slow Madelen more than just a little. First he controlled her attacks, then her movement, then at a key moment he froze her to the arena floor. His spear pressed against her throat as her shield failed to reach in time. The defenses of the arena activated, protecting her, though Tirto had been ready to stop his attack regardless.
“A good match,” he inclined his head politely. Madelen responded in kind, but she couldn’t deny his victory had been legitimate despite it being somewhat embarrassing to lose to someone much younger. That was something the Combining Luster Sect would have to get used to, though. John was expecting each of his children to win more matches than they lost.
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To Melanthina’s continued annoyance, she was not the next of the triplets to fight. That honor went to Ursel, the one stand out oddity in the matches. She was sort of part of both clans while also being a member of neither, but nobody could say she didn’t belong. And for the sake of training, having diverse opponents was good. It was just unfortunate for her opponent who had no prior knowledge of her abilities except that she was an earth element combatant.
Erle was close to the same age as Madelen, though he favored the larger staff instead of opting for a shield. He was also the seventeenth rank- exact matches for every opponent weren’t always possible. When he opened the battle with a beam of light at Ursel, he could have easily expected several options. Logically she could have dodge, seeking cover or simply sidestepping his attack. Blocking with her heavy stone club would have also been reasonable. Even amping up her defensive energy would have made sense.
Instead, she just ignored the attack, charging forward without any actual response. She wasn’t crazy, and while she was sometimes reckless in battle John knew she at least thought about things at some point. She’d seen plenty of battle so she should know what sort of damage the attacks could do. And that was why.
The attack wasn’t completely ineffectual, poking a hole in her flexible armor that John was going to make Ursel repair for her carelessness. However, when the beam got to her skin it made it no further, the beams of light even reflecting slightly. Diamond Defense came into play, showing the drawback of sustained attacks. There was a reason Ursel only wore the lighter armor she had on when she could clearly wear something heavier.
Ursel continued to charge straight forward, accelerating her motion with the Emerging Bamboo Sect’s techniques, propelling herself forward and into the air slightly. Erle dodged her downwards swing easily, stepping to the side, but clearly didn’t expect the shockwave in the ground to reverse its course after it went behind him, shoving the ground up and towards Ursel as her club rebounded towards him.
Despite the surprise, Erle was still a rank ahead of Ursel. He met her club with his staff, absorbing some of the energy and letting himself be thrown back. That was the perfect time to make use of another beam of light, but Ursel had managed to convince him it was pointless. To that end he charged up a more powerful attack, his beam splitting apart into a rainbow with the intention to recombine into a more powerful attack. It was just a bit too slow, and Ursel brute forced her way into the splitting part, where each individual part of the rainbow was individually less intense.
She only needed to land a single solid attack to win, and her pretend invincibility kept Erle on the back foot until he was finally taken out. After the match, Ursel quietly complained to John about her burn from the first beam. It wasn’t bad, and looked like even less, but sustained effort could have definitely made it into something serious. Diamond Defense was only decently powerful. John was afraid of the expenses required to make use of a more powerful version. He didn’t think the Tenebach clan could afford that as they were now, such would have been the required materials.
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Melanthina could be described as more than a little bit put out that her first opponent from the Combining Luster Sect was not Nik. However, instead of complaining about it she simply dealt with it. John wasn’t sure if it was in a healthy manner, but she did go through with the match. John didn’t get to remember her opponent’s name, but he was the sixteenth rank.
The opening salvo was generally quite effective against the Tenebach clan, who had no choice but to avoid it. Defending with their spiritual energy was just asking to get injured in an explosive reaction. Yet when the match opened, Melanthina didn’t dodge or seek cover, but instead pointed her finger directly towards her opponent.
A beam of light met a sharp dart of darkness, destabilizing the attack and creating a flash of light and darkness, impossible for any vision to see properly through. That was where Melanthina took cover, slipping behind pillars once her position was properly hidden for a moment. Her opponent tried to catch sight of her or pick her up with his senses, but she was quite good at stealth and had trained against the light element in particular. Where normally a wave of light element would strongly react if it passed over her and reveal at least her general location, the sweeps of her opponent reacted as if she didn’t exist.
Then Melanthina stabbed him in the spine, just below the skull. Thankfully the arena’s formations were able to override her attack, or they would have had some difficult explaining to do. But she had likely been counting on it. Her opponent could only freeze as he felt cold metal touch his skin and the formations activate, but when he turned around she really was there. Instead of any sort of proper reaction, Melanthina stomped off.
That wasn’t necessarily good for future relations with the Combining Luster Sect, but hopefully Melanthina would control herself better later. And maybe if she were up against a stronger opponent she’d have to act more appropriately.