Andrew Rowe - Sufficiently Advanced Magic

The important part was that the walls were opaque, meaning Sera and Derek wouldn’t be able to see anything behind them. From my vantage point above, though, I could see each individual section in advance.

It was hard to tell from a distance, but I estimated each section to be about fifteen feet across, meaning a fast monster could close the distance between sections within a couple seconds.

The effect?

Tension, for both the people inside the arena and the watchers.

I drew in a sharp breath as the monsters began to appear and the musicians began to play.

“Contestants…Begin!”

The first wall lifted — and a dozen clawed monstrosities rushed the defending pair.

The creatures were humanoid, roughly four feet tall, with reddish brown hide. I’d never seen anything like them.

Sera stepped backward and raised her hand, firing a blast from the gauntlet into the onrushing crowd. The mana sphere tore straight through one of the creatures, downing it instantly, and burned the arm off of another.

My eyes narrowed. I’d built that thing. I knew it wasn’t that powerful. Was it more effective because these creatures were summoned figments of monsters, rather than real ones? I’d never fought a figment. I didn’t know how resilient they were.

Regardless of that early success, the other eleven were nearly on top of them by the time Sera recovered to fire a second blast.

Derek stepped in front of her, drawing his sword and swinging it in the same motion. A wave of flame swept out from the blade, incinerating four more of the creatures. He spun left, physically slashing one of the onrushing creatures in half, then unleashed a vertical shockwave of flame with an upward cut. The wave of fire tore another of the creatures asunder, while Sera fired another two blasts, eliminating two more threats.

The remaining creatures pulled back, looking wary.

Derek rushed forward with an expression of manic glee on his face, cutting the last few creatures apart in moments.

I joined in the ensuing clapping, but my mind was whirring in several directions. This seemed too easy, but then again, Derek had seemed very confident.

I noticed Sera rubbing her right hand with her left. She wasn’t used to using the gauntlet, but she’d been practicing with a dueling cane for years. I assumed she had a significant amount of mana to work with. I’d never asked. I hoped I hadn’t given her a tool that could potentially harm her.

“Stay back here and support me from range.” Derek’s voice was being amplified somehow. I could hear it clearly from my location in the box. One of the parts of the spectacle, I presumed.

“No problem,” Sera replied.

The next wall vanished, revealing a group of green and blue slimes. Sera whispered something.

Interesting, she must have been so quiet that the sound-amplifying spells didn’t pick it up.

Four spheres of ice appeared around Sera, rotating in orbit.

A defensive spell? I haven’t seen that one before.

Derek pressed forward, swinging his weapon with reckless abandon. The slimes never managed to get close; his blade tore them apart like paper.

I noted a long vein of crimson running through the center of the blade, meaning that the flames I’d seen before probably came from the weapon itself, not one of Derek’s attunement abilities. Or perhaps some combination of both, like how I’d learned to manipulate the aura of my own sword.

What is his attunement, anyway?

Derek was moving fast, but not the kind of faster-than-sight movement I’d seen from Keras. And it was consistent speed, not short bursts like I’d seen from Marissa.

I glanced ahead at the next few walls. Two barghensi would be next, followed by a single huge humanoid carrying a club.

An ogre.

My hands shook as I processed what I was seeing. Ogres were hideously strong, and dangerous enough that entire groups of experienced climbers would often avoid confronting them directly.

The next wall vanished, revealing the two barghensi. I balled my hands into fists as Derek advanced, dispatching the first one with a single slash to the head.

The other rushed past him.

“Ice, answer my command and form a wall!”

A glacial barrier stretched across the stage at Sera’s command, blocking the barghensi’s path. As it spun around, Derek leapt atop it, driving his burning blade into its back.

The creature slumped to the ground, twitching for a moment before it vanished.

As he rose, the last wall flickered behind him — and the ogre loomed behind him, ready to strike.

“Look out!” Sera yelled.

The ogre’s club descended with bone-shattering force.

Twin blades flashed upward to catch the strike. Derek, without even looking behind him, had parried the blow.

The swordsman spun on a heel, slashing with both weapons and lacerating the ogre’s front leg.

The titanic creature roared into the air, slamming its club into the arena floor with a reverberating crack.

Derek hopped back, glancing at Sera. “Think you could slow the big guy down for me a bit?”

Sera cracked her knuckles. “I have just the thing.” She waved a single hand at the creature. “Bind.”

A swirling matrix of symbols manifested around the ogre, wrapping around it and vanishing as the runes touched its skin.

It howled in response, charging forward, with no sign of being slowed.

Sera raised a hand above her head. “Frost, I invoke you to block his path.”

A waist-height barrier of ice appeared between the ogre and its prey.

It crashed into the barrier heedlessly and tripped, falling on its face. The frost showed no sign of damage.

“Not bad.” Derek walked over as the ogre began to pick itself up. “Never seen an ice barrier that could stop an ogre before.”

Derek jabbed one of his two weapons toward the ogre’s fallen form—

—and the ogre raised a hand, catching Derek’s blade between two fingers.

“Stupid humans.” The ogre muttered. “Always try the same tricks.”

Using two fingers, it pulled.

With its other hand, it slammed a fist right into Derek’s chest.

The swordsman flew backward, slamming into the first ice wall that Sera had made. He dropped his second sword on impact, and the ogre was still holding onto the first.

Oh, goddess. That’s bad.

…at least Sera’s safe on the other side of the wall?

Sera snapped her fingers. The wall of ice separating the pair disappeared.

“Oh, come on Sera,” I mumbled.

As Derek put a hand on the floor in a weak attempt to push himself from the floor, the ogre rose, looking barely injured from Derek’s earlier strikes.

The ogre flicked its hand and Derek’s captured sword flew straight toward his chest. Derek rolled to the side, snatching his other fallen blade as he evaded the throw.

Derek looked as if he was going to stand, but he fell back to his knees, coughing as the ogre retrieved its club and advanced.

Sera grimaced, raising both hands.

“Child of the goddess, I call upon your aid.

Rain frost from the skies in a Permafrost Cascade!”

Shards of ice materialized in the air above Sera, flashing through the air and piercing into the ogre’s flesh. It howled as the projectiles continued to bombard it, raising a hand to shield its eyes and charging at Sera, club poised to strike.

Derek slashed the ogre’s ankle as it ran past him.

It didn’t slow down.

Sera remained still, looking oblivious to the danger as the ogre neared striking range. Her summoned shards of ice continued to bombard the monster, but they were insufficient to strike a killing blow.

The ogre raised its club.