Chapter 33

  War Skills

  You ever enter a place, and realize that suddenly the stakes are real. As if everything you have done to this point was the equivalent of just practice, just auditioning for this one chance to shine?

  That is how I feel at this moment.

  Walking down the long descending ramp that leads to the arena I see a crowd of people. So many people that they are just specks of dirt and noise in the background. Fortunately for me Lucia and Luna are there to grab me and steadily guide me down the ramp. Otherwise I would have easily stumbled over my robe that suddenly seemed far too long and cumbersome to make the journey down.

  Realizing that I almost fell from looking up and being blinded by the lights and trying to make out some of the spectators, I instead just looked down at the long ramp, only to find that I was captivated by the fact that it was a bright dark orange color. Like a pumpkin that had a dark rich tan. Suddenly my mind wanders to visions of pumpkins tanning at the beach before their fall finales.

  Then before I know it, we are at the bottom of the odd ramp.

  “Don’t worry, that ramp is tough for everyone,” Lucia stated reassuringly, as she clapped the back of my left hand and rubbed my arm up before grabbing her sign to run around the ring with.

  “She’s right, you did great,” Luna also stated reassuringly, gently gripping my right arm before letting me go. Though she did stay half a second longer, long enough for her to make sure I caught myself. Once she was certain I wasn’t going to fall, she too grabbed her own card and began sprinting around the ring.

  While Sal, Lucia, and Luna got everyone excited I had a moment to pause and collect myself. I for a moment tried to look up to see how many people were here. But fortunately, all I saw was a dark polarized protective lens overtop of us. At least, that is what my mind associated with the effect. I assumed it was some type of one way shielding that would protect the audience from any errant attacks that went wild, while also causing the front row spectator to be completely hidden from our sight. If I went up further, I could see people hundreds of feet up, over top of the long dark protective one-way glass. Only once I looked up, did I realize how this place was made. It seemed as though the excavators dug down to build the wide opening where the Arena would sit. While only building up the higher walls to allow for more seating for people hundreds of yards away. A marvel of engineering that would have been comparable to one of the larger stadiums of my old world.

  Worse, judging by how even the back rows were slowly being filled by people waiting in lines to go up, it seemed that every seat was packed.

  “This is going to be epic!” Markan exclaimed excitedly.

  “Indeed,” Mr. Yi commented while stroking at the small tuft of a silver beard he was growing.

  Perhaps seeing something in my gaze, Mr. Yi got closer and tried to speak reassuringly to me. “Do not worry, trust in your abilities, and if anyone dies, then know their death is on their heads. For Pride is the number one sin that will take any combatant’s life here today.”

  And now I see that Mr. Yi is apparently philosophical about death. Still, he does make a good point. The contestants here don’t have to fight. Meaning their being here is all up to their own personal preferences. Hopefully no one does die, but if they do, I will do everything I can to save them.

  “Yeah, just have her worried about death, before the matches even start.” Markan cuts in sarcastically.

  “It is a fair comment to make, and hopefully by making this comment, we will not need to put its guidance into action.” Mr. Yi again spoke more words than he had all day in my presence yesterday. Who knew all we needed to do to get him to speak, was to let him bring up death. Kind of morbid, but as a Weapons Instructor, someone who taught others to kill, it was likely something he had to deal with a lot on his own.

  Then as if not caring about anyone else’s thoughts or ideas, Mr. Yi continued with his instructions.

  “For today, I want you to look at the footwork, the movements of each combatant. See what works, and why some techniques do not. Focus only on seeing the movements you can make and copy and take the best ones for your own. Create a mental library of actions you see and can do. Mark them all down in your mind. Then mentally imagine yourself performing each. During times like these, between matches, focus on the movements and imagine your own body performing the same movements. Even perform a few of the ones you feel confident with completing, but only after you have them mastered within your own mind.” Mr. Yi stated.

  Yeah, last thing I will do is come out here and perform a snap kick wearing a flowing graduation gown that can slide up over my head at any point. That said I do understand his comments. I need to be using this to see moves that work, moves that I can mirror and try to make everything my own that I can.

  I nod.

  “Very good. Now let us see how a true battle of Skill users can go,” Mr. Yi commented.

  At that, I realized that Lucia and Luna had apparently walked in the first two contestants, both males. Meaning the next match should be a male versus male, then a female versus female match. I am curious about the differences between males and female fights, when they are using all available Skills and Class bonuses.

  “In the near corner, we have the challenger, a Dark Horse from the greater Unknown. Weighing in with nine active Skills, seven Skill Badges, and an Uncommon Class, we have El Penumbra, the Shadow.” Sal began, as he spoke, I realized that this was a lot more information than was given out last night.

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  Questioningly, I looked up at the two. Fortunately, Markan was quicker on the uptake as to what my question would be.

  “They offer more insight now, as they didn’t have time to print off a full report for all challengers that arrived today. Thus everyone that is new to the system has to have their details read out for the betters to have an easier time placing their wagers,” Markan stated. And like that, it made sense. The number of Skills active and the Badged skills meant that this fighter could effectively call upon sixteen total Skills. Though I figured most of the Badged Skills were likely Common or Uncommon at best. Meaning those Skills would likely only be best noted for having a higher Attribute pool. Each Common Skill badge brought in around 15 Attributes per Badge. Uncommon around 20 Attributes per badge, meaning that if he had all his badges scaled towards the same Attributes, a min-max effect he could be looking at having a few Attributes at around 145-ish, if all seven were of Uncommon rarity, with a few others at much lower levels. Though likely he had a few badged Skills all over. The Uncommon Class also pointed to the fact that the Class was not likely magically attuned as those didn’t start appearing until the Rare or Epic ranges. Rare for very specific types of elemental usage, and Epic for focused, but often covering multiple elements that are of the same type. Then like a rising scale, the more powerful the class became the broader its capabilities became, until it maxed out, at which point it went back to a singular focus.

  “His opponent should need no introduction, but for betting purposes he is A1 on your cards, aka the Golden Flare!” Sal shouted.

  With that, I looked at the challenger, and saw the same stomach hair waxing guy from earlier. While he had managed to remove those strips of hair that he missed his first time, I still couldn’t help but get revolted by his smug look.

  Then to make matters worse, he apparently spotted me off to the side and came over and commented, “watch closely princess, I dedicate this win to you.”

  BARF!

  I thew up a little in my mouth at that. He was so sick and arrogant, but unfortunately I almost knew that he would be able to back up those boastful claims.

  “This is going to be bad,” Markan commented, seemingly backing up the exact thought I had been thinking a moment ago.

  For his part, Mr. Yi was just sitting in quiet contemplation, not making a comment about what was happening. Not that it mattered, as the fight was soon beginning.

  “Fighters take your marks!” As that happened both contestants got close enough bump fists with each other. Only the Golden Flare had a cat caught the canary grin on his face that just caused waves of revulsion to form within me.

  “Begin!”

  Then in a matter of seconds I saw the differences of what a Magically attuned Class can offer against an Uncommon Class. While both fighters seemed relatively close in age, that didn’t seem to matter with the number of Skills a Rare or Epic Class seemed to offer. Also it was clear that almost all of the Skills had some type of fire attunement.

  Fire was fast, but only in straight bursts, it couldn’t move or bend as easily as Water or Air could. That was what I learned from watching Jade and Leah fight last night. Fire also had explosive bursts forward, and while his opponent El Penumbra did manage to sidestep the initial forward flame fueled thrust of Golden Flare, that thrust was only a feint. As Golden Flare stopped mid lunge and using both of his hands shot out bursts of flames in a way that would capture El Penumbra between giant bursts. Then once caught, it only took a second for Golden Flare to bring his hands together and effectively bisect his opponent with flames.

  “AHH!” El Penumbra cried out in pain almost immediately and dropped to the ground, desperately trying to put out the flames that were engulfing his body. With a sick sadistic smile I could see how Golden Flame took delight with burning his desperately rolling opponent.

  “Learn your place,” Golden Flare hissed. Seeing him, I felt disgusted, and almost imagined the sick look of the Necrotic Fireball caster from the park earlier.

  I was already moving towards the stairs before the match was called.

  “I yield,” El Penumbra cried out, his voice muffled by flames. Yet, Golden Flare either didn’t care, or pretended not to hear the muffled cry.

  Charging into the ring, I did something I likely wasn’t supposed to, but felt the need to do so anyways, as I ran forward, and gave a jumping snap kick to Golden Flare’s fully extended arm. My mind and eyes focusing solely on his locked elbow. I even feel my body and mind instinctively using many of my Skills all on their own. Eagle Eye for focus, Improvised Weapons for my foot, Basic Strengthening to grant my blow a bit more power, and Strategist* to somehow fuse all the Skills together in one quick and efficient chain attack combo.

  Crack!

  I felt bone rupture from the force of my blow as I got the flames to stop, before spinning down to try to save the downed patient with massive burn marks. Burn marks that were still ablaze, as apparently the flames were hot enough to begin to use his skin as fuel for the flames.

  Trash.

  Waving my hand, I let my mind and body take over, suddenly glad I had taken all the time earlier this afternoon to practice this exact scenario. Using Trash, I removed the mana derived fuel for the flames, causing them to get snuffed out almost instantly. Then getting close, I reached out and trying to find a still intact patch of skin, I tried to use my Rejuvenation Healing Skill on him. Making sure to continually pump my recently acquired Golden Life Ratio Mana Regeneration* Skill.

  I was so focused on keeping my two Class related Skills working in conjunction with each other, that I failed to notice the activity behind me. Well, I mentally noted it, but I relaxed seeing the distinctive boots of Markan, in my peripheral vision when I happened to glance behind me.

  Seeing that my protection was in place, I focused on healing the victim, El Penumbra. Fortunately, the damage was mostly superficial, requiring only a few layers of skin to be regenerated and replaced. I even used my trick with aging the melanin in his skin to make it appear to be the same age as the rest of his skin.

  Once his back was fixed, I tried to roll him onto his back, so I could see the damage on his stomach and chest area.

  “No, it—” El Penumbra cried out, but I just grabbed his face and forced him to look up at me. I don’t know why, but this once again seemed to work, as he calmed down and then with my aid, gently rolled over on his back. He even winced, half expecting his pain receptors to work overtime, but again the wounds were still new, but they should be fine within a day or two.

  “Oh, wow, you are as good as they say,” El Penumbra began speaking, hearing him I just nodded. “Are you single?”

  Then when he continued to speak, I just held my finger up in front of my lips, or at least where my lips would have been had they not been covered by my mask.

  “Right, you are the quiet stoic type,” He continued, I just shook my head, but chose that time to go over each spot on his chest and torso area. His arms, and finally his legs. Overall, it looked a lot worse than it likely was. Then the trick with the melanin to give him a solid bronze look all over, and he was done.

  Getting up, I realized that my dual use of Golden Life Ratio Mana Regeneration* and Rejuvenation Healing while slightly taxing on my mind, was relatively light in terms of wear and tear. I just used a bit of Rejuvenation Healing on myself and the stale parts of my mind that had been slowing down were finally cleared.

  As I arose, I saw Markan’s hand move just under me in an attempt to catch my left side, should I fall. Fortunately, I didn’t embarrass myself after my first heal of the night. But it had been intense. I know I would have needed a long break, like last time to regenerate more Mana, but I oddly felt great.

  Turning to face the opponent, I was about to leave, especially as he had been untouched in his battle. Only his clutching his left elbow, made me harumph to myself as I went over and tried to heal him.

  However, his first reaction was to spin away from me.

  Seeing his obvious reaction to me, and the fact that I apparently bruised his little ego by kicking his now pain filled elbow, I just raise my hands in a what can you do shrug and am about to leave when he shouts.

  “Wait, please heal me,” Golden Flare pleads, his voice desperate as he drops to his knees while holding his cradled left arm.

  Seeing him like that, and realizing it would look bad for me not to heal someone I injured, while my job was healing, I sigh to myself. Then I go forward to heal him.

  Rejuvenation Healing.

  A hairline fracture. Not life threatening, but would have taken him out for a few weeks minimum. This is of course assuming he had been arrogant enough to continue fighting without getting his wound checked out.

  After having to reattach and heal a broken hand back into place, fixing a hairline fracture like this was nothing.

  Finally, I stand up straight, realizing that both contestants are good, and I’m about to head back to my spot when I hear Sal, the Announcer say four words I never expected to hear.

  “You’re out of here!” Sal shouted, his voice reverberating throughout the entire arena.

  Silence.

  A hushed pause cascaded over the arena as suddenly every noise seemed to die down.

  “Wait me?” I ask, pointing to myself. Wondering if my kicking a contestant was really worthy of being expelled.

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