He moved.
The silver lance screamed through the space where Notch had been standing. Sand exploded behind him, superheated into glass by the concentrated mana. The crowd gasped—some at the near-miss, others at the sheer power of the opening attack.
Aelira didn't wait to see if she'd connected.
She was already moving, hand raised again, another spell forming. This time three smaller lances—splitting the attack vector, forcing him to choose which to dodge.
She's not testing me. She's trying to win immediately.
Notch's enhanced perception slowed the world to manageable frames. It wasn't as fast as the first time, but it was something. He saw the trajectory of each lance, calculated angles, predicted impact points. Viktor's factory-floor reflexes merged with his supernatural awareness, creating something greater than either alone.
He dropped low, rolling left. The first lance passed over him. He pushed off the sand, pivoting right. The second missed by inches. The third—
He raised his hand.
He managed to cause flames to erupt from his palm, not a lance but a barrier. The silver attack slammed into it and simply ceased to exist — the black flame behaved like a devouring pattern, unmaking the silver as it touched. The Abyss was the essence of all things; pouring magic into it was like pouring water into the ocean—patterns dissolved and lost themselves in the whole.
The crowd went silent.
Even Aelira froze for half a second, shock flickering across her once-stoic mask.
Roger leaned forward in his seat; a tiny reflex tightened at the corner of his mouth, and his fingers flexed almost imperceptibly on his knee. His smile widened.
"Interesting," he murmured, though his voice carried across the suddenly quiet arena. "Very interesting."
Notch didn't give her time to recover. He closed the distance—not running, but moving with the hard, efficient purpose Viktor had learned in the factory's bruising hours. Close the gap. Don't let the ranged fighter breathe.
Aelira backpedaled, hands already glowing for another spell. She was fast. Trained. But she'd never been in a real fight where losing meant death.
Notch had. Twice now, counting the bandits.
He feinted left. She bought it, spell tracking his movement. He broke right, inside her guard, and threw a straight punch at her solar plexus—pulled, controlled, but carrying enough force to hurt.
It connected.
Air left Aelira's lungs in a whoosh. The spell in her hands flickered and died. She stumbled backward, gasping, one hand clutching her chest.
The trainees erupted—some cheering, others shocked into silence. Crystal's hands were over her mouth. Even Rennik, watching from the infirmary section with his bandaged face, leaned forward.
Aelira's eyes blazed. The stoic mask shattered completely, replaced by pure, incandescent fury.
"You hit me," she said, voice low and dangerous. Not a question. An accusation.
"It's a duel," Notch replied, defensive posture already forming. "You were trying to hit me first."
"With magic." She straightened, breathing hard but controlled. Silver light crawled over her skin, hardening into a glittering carapace—turning muscle to steel. "Not like some peasant throwing fists."
The word 'peasant' carried venom unrelated to class. It was about pride. About the proper way to fight. About the line she thought he'd crossed.
Notch's jaw tightened. "If it works, it works."
"Then let me show you what works."
The silver aura intensified. Notch's enhanced perception screamed warning—this was different. Not a projectile. Not a barrier. This was reinforcement magic, boosting her physical capabilities beyond human limits.
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She moved.
Fast. Impossibly fast for someone who'd never trained in close combat. The magic compensated, turning her body into a weapon as refined as any blade.
Her palm strike came at his face. He barely got his forearm up in time, blocking. The impact sent shock through his arm—she's stronger than she should be—and drove him back two steps.
She pressed the advantage. A flurry of strikes, each one carrying silver-enhanced force. Palm. Elbow. Knee. Movements that spoke of drilling, of forms practiced until muscle remembered what mind forgot.
Notch gave ground, blocking and deflecting. Viktor's experience helped, but fighting an opponent who could hit like a grown man while moving like quicksilver was something else entirely.
A palm strike slipped through his guard and caught his ribs. Pain bloomed, sharp and immediate. He twisted away, gasping.
The crowd roared.
Aelira pursued, relentless now, silver aura blazing. She'd found her rhythm. This was what she'd trained for—the elegant integration of magic and martial form, the proper way to fight.
Notch retreated to the arena's edge, boots scraping sand. His ribs ached. His arms were already bruising from blocked strikes. She was faster. Stronger with her reinforcement. Better trained.
But she was also predictable; every strike traced the same drilled lines, beautiful and efficient but mapped in ways Notch could read.
Viktor had learned to fight from men who had no forms. No elegance. Only desperation and the will to survive.
The next time Aelira came in—silver palm strike aimed at his chest—Notch didn't block.
He stepped inside it.
Close. Too close for her long-range magic. Too close for her drilling to compensate. He trapped her extended arm, locked it with his own, and drove his elbow into her exposed side.
Once. Twice. Three times in rapid succession.
The silver aura flickered. Her breath came in short gasps. She tried to pull away, but he held the arm lock, kept her off-balance.
"You fight like someone who's never been desperate," Notch said, voice low enough only she could hear. "Like you've always had the option to stop."
Her eyes widened. Then narrowed dangerously.
"I don't need to be desperate." She wrenched free with a burst of silver-enhanced strength that nearly dislocated Notch's shoulder. "I have power."
Both hands came up. The silver aura condensed, concentrated into her palms until the light was almost blinding.
The crowd leaned forward. Roger's smile had evolved into something predatory.
"Enough playing," Aelira said. "Lumina Burst."
The spell name meant something. Notch's game knowledge supplied fragments—high-tier light magic, area denial, meant to overwhelm through sheer output rather than precision.
The silver light exploded outward.
Notch raised both hands.
This time black flame erupted to meet it.
Where the two forces collided, reality itself seemed to scream. Silver and black twisted together, neither consuming the other, locked in mutual annihilation. The air crackled. Sand beneath them crystallized from the heat.
The crowd had gone utterly silent. This wasn't entertainment anymore. This was witnessing something that shouldn't exist—two children wielding power grown mages trained decades to achieve.
Notch felt his core straining. The limiter the Abyss had loosened helped, but this output was still enormous. Sweat ran down his face. His vision tunneled.
Across from him, Aelira was faring no better. Her silver aura flickered. Blood trickled from her nose—mana exhaustion's first warning sign.
They stood there, locked in stalemate, pouring everything they had into the conflict.
Then Notch did something Aelira didn't expect.
He smiled.
"You want power?" His voice was steady despite the strain. "Let me show you real power."
He didn't increase his output. He didn't pour more mana into the black flame. Instead he did something infinitely more dangerous.
He stopped resisting.
The black flame didn't surge — it folded, condensing inward until it hung as a point of absolute darkness between his palms.
Aelira's Lumina Burst rushed forward, no longer opposed—
—and the point of darkness swallowed it.
All of it.
Every ounce of silver light, every fragment of her mana, simply ceased to exist. Consumed by the hungry void Notch had created.
The arena went silent.
A noble hissed under his breath; a guard straightened as if expecting trouble. Somewhere high in the stands, someone swore softly.
Aelira stared, face pale, hands still raised but empty. Her mana reserves were tapped. The spell she'd poured everything into had vanished without trace.
The point of darkness pulsed once in Notch's hands, then dissipated.
He lowered his arms slowly, breathing hard, trying not to show how much that had cost him.
"Yield," he said quietly. Not a demand. An offer.
Aelira's hands trembled; the fingers quivered, one small reflexive twitch betraying the humiliation she refused to voice. Pride warred with pragmatism across her face. She had no mana left. No spells. No reinforcement. Just a physically exhausted body and the knowledge that the boy she'd dismissed as "not even a good fighter" had just consumed her best attack like it was nothing.
Her hands dropped.
"I yield."
The words came out barely audible, choked with humiliation and shock.
The arena erupted.
Cheers from some nobles, shocked murmurs from others. The trainees were on their feet, shouting, arguing about what they'd just witnessed. Crystal was crying—relief or fear, Notch couldn't tell. Even Rennik looked stunned.
Roger stood, clapping slowly, deliberately. Each strike of palm against palm rang across the arena like a judgment.
"Well done," he called out, voice carrying that edge of delighted menace. "Both of you. That was..." He paused, savoring the word. "...educational."
Notch swayed slightly, exhaustion finally catching up. His core ached. His ribs throbbed where Aelira had struck him. His shoulder screamed from her enhanced strength.
But he was standing.
Svenn appeared at his side, Sly draped across his arms. The serpent immediately wound around Notch's shoulders, warm and reassuring.
"That was reckless," Sly's voice whispered in his mind, audible only to him. "And brilliant. And terrifying."
"I know," Notch whispered back.
Aelira was being helped from the arena by attendants, head down, refusing to meet anyone's eyes. The proud, stoic high-grade who'd killed nine bandits without breaking stride had been undone by a "mediocre" village boy.
Notch didn't feel triumphant. He felt exposed.
Because every person in this arena had just seen what he could do. Roger had seen. The nobles had seen. And judging by the way some of them were already whispering urgently to one another, the implications were being calculated.
Roger descended from his seat, still smiling that unsettling smile. He approached Notch with the casual confidence of someone who'd just won a bet.
"You surprise me," he said, loud enough for nearby nobles to hear. "That technique at the end—consuming her spell rather than opposing it. Where did you learn that?"
Notch met his gaze, too tired to lie effectively. "I didn't learn it. I just... did it."
Roger's smile widened. "Instinct. Natural talent. The kind that can't be taught." He turned to address the crowd. "Ladies and gentlemen, I believe we've just witnessed the emergence of something extraordinary."
The nobles applauded, some enthusiastically, others with reservation. The trainees looked at Notch like he'd transformed into something other than human.
Maybe he had.
Roger leaned closer, voice dropping so only Notch could hear. "Tomorrow you'll meet my brother," he said softly. "Malric's been watching. He likes to sharpen things that survive."
Notch's stomach sank. The grey-haired swordsman. The child weapon who moved like death itself.
"But that's for tomorrow," Roger said, pulling back to normal volume. "Today, you've earned rest. And attention." His eyes gleamed. "So much attention."
He walked away, leaving Notch standing in the center of the arena, Sly around his shoulders, surrounded by stares and whispers and the weight of what he'd just revealed.
The sun was high overhead now, casting harsh shadows.
And Notch wondered, not for the first time, if hiding had ever been possible at all.
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