The Domain, Part 2

Either way, now to go over our preparations for the first match, and the ones that would follow it. These usually lasted only a few seconds, and seeing as we would have a full hour of those in a roll, the goal in picking only the first one is mostly to give you all an idea of what a fight between mages at our level looks like. We usually also placed some restrictions on how the engagement would take place, in this case regarding my application for my magic, seeing as I had something of a lead on her in aspectual magic. That said, we were using the five points ruleset. Hey, sometimes the basics are handy even at the very top, and though the rules of our sets usually varied a lot this was more or less what we considered as the standard. 

In case you've never heard the term, as the name might imply, the first mage to score five points in the match would win. There were three ways of scoring. Normal hits, strong hits and strong blocks. Normal would contain spells that would be capable of hurting through each of our passive defense, but not dealing severe enough damage to be potentially disabling, resulting in 1 point. If attacks that could normally be ignored hit a target in volleys, they would count for a normal. Strong hits would count as three points, and they were called as such because those usually come from more potent types of magic. Like, stronger, you could say. Disabling a target of our level in one strike wasn't exactly easy, but these weren't blows you could realistically recover from in a matter of seconds during a fight. Strong blocks were hits that might have been strong though were partially blocked through defensive magic, scoring 2 points. These would still sting, however in a less urgent manner. If surviving a spell in a normal fight might be unrealistic, it would just end the match, yet landing those wouldn't be easy in this type of scenario. 

Though a match between two aspectual beings is hardly something just anyone can have access to, isn't it? Perhaps a bit of context might aid some of you, then. Firstly, ascension ranks. Basically these are the means through which ascended beings can pursue unlimited growth, by pushing their capacity beyond the limits of master level magic. Getting a structure to Master A is necessary to ascend it beyond that point, and though it is possible to make ascension happen within the Master level, it is impractical to the point most would never seriously consider it an option. Not all structures have unlimited room for growth, but basically each rank tells how empowered the spell would be in comparison to this same magic in the rank of Master A. The rate at which magic scales also changes every twenty ascension ranks, but that would be irrelevant in this particular case. 

Developing these isn't exactly a quick process, though. Even at the early rankings, having to go through a few years of Guidance before a single improvement isn't exactly an uncommon experience. This is part of the reason why in a sense, fights between Minor Aspects greatly increased in scale when compared to a fight between Archmages, but some of the variety in magic usage is temporarily lost. A temporary focus to your practice is more or less mandatory for your rankings to develop at a sensible pace, even with all the improvements an Aspect gains in regards to Guidance. 

As a result, it is somewhat simpler to summarize a Minor Aspect's magic than it would be for a Lesser Aspect. These often don't have the opportunity to prepare hundreds of different victory conditions, after all, or at least not when fighting an even foe. The general advice for Minor Aspects is the following: Pick a central attacking method from within your favorite choices for magic, alongside some structures that can enhance this plan; Then, you choose one or two offensive options as countermeasures against tactics you know to be effective against your main option, though covering everything is known to be impossible within these restrictions; You then select a method of passive and active defense, preferably ones that compliment each other's gaps and finally, you choose some form of magical mobility that fits in nicely with the restrictions the other requirements place on you. The goal being to restrict the amount of structures you need to develop while your strength as an Aspectual Being is still solidifying. 

Ralzelis was an example of someone who made really effective use of these restrictions. Her main pools of power are in Thalgignir and Favighea, an example that is often paired due to how well these Greater Areas work together. Favighea covers passive defense, mobility and her central attacking needs, while Thalgignir acts to make her active defense more solid, give a few supporting options for mobility and cover both enhancing her main offensive needs and covering one of their main weaknesses simultaneously. Pure Favighea is only effective between medium and short range, but the combination both offered more options for long range, it functioned as a method of pushing that range further through methods I'll elaborate on later. 

And I was the perfect example of someone who ignored those rules completely. For a very simple reason of course, the girl you're reading about is none other than the most special little shit to ever have been born in this universe. As the one and only brat to reach the level of Master before hitting puberty, my magical affinity has always been absurd to the point of feeling like a joke. Normally, when you reach this high in magical practice, the effects of affinity have already mostly been nullified, but mine is so hilariously high, even at that point I was making laps on people who were supposed to have comparable practice. 

For one, considering Ralzalis was a dragon, a species with mythical levels of affinity, had almost two hundred years on me and frequently abused Great Sister guidance, you would expect her to have a lead on me. Yet the lead I had on her was wide enough that even despite me ignoring the specialization rule I just explained, I still needed to restrict my magical access to match up well to her. I'm the only being in that realm that wasn't using Greater Aspect guidance, by the way. When you're the most special chick in the universe, the default of what you do is what other people need to cheat to accomplish. If I was taking more sips from my parents Throne or accepting help from the Greater Ones, I probably would already be a Lesser Aspect by that point. Not that it mattered much, even with that delay I still hold the title for youngest Minor, Lesser and Major expect to ever exist, so its not like someone like me ever had a need for haste. 

If I had to summarize all of my tricks, it would go something like this… I was extremely dangerous at any range, so for most people the only real choice would have been how close to this beauty they wanted to be while dying. My passive defense was absurd enough that I rarely needed to use active defense, despite bordering on being unkillable to anything below the Lesser Aspect rank if I had been trying to stay alive. I was quick enough to make rounds on old Aeyxos in less than an hour without even using my fastest shape, and since one of my specialties was full blown Shapeshifting, I could do all that within the safety of a pocket dimension while sipping some booze. All of that brought to you by the fact I basically been born with almost every type of corporeal magic nearing its limits and developed most of the remaining ones a few centuries into my life. Some of the extremely specific types hadn't reached me by that point yet, but that was more or less just a matter of wanting, since assimilating that type of stuff came really easily for me. This all is also part of the reason why an implicit rule of this type of match up is that I never use my corporeal magic in full, because dear, my existence is bullshit. 

That stuff is relevant, but since discussing it fully would be madness, I will just go over the specific things for both of us. For Ralzelis, the most infamous type of corporeal magic would be the breath attack, a trait of dragons so notorious I sort of doubt I even need to explain much about it. The specifics for it aren't that complicated either. Dragons have magical amplifiers in their throats that can multiply the output and magnitude of their conjuration spells when split from their mouths. Different kinds of them have slight variations to this ability, but Ralzelis was a type of dragon with pretty standard breath functioning. In her case, the breath could vary between the following modes: Frost, sound, lightning, light wave and plasma, though that last one was her weakest. Restricting their potential functions tends to strengthen a dragon's breath, and generally when a type of breathing was still weak for them it was far less of a problem. The other classic for flying dragons she was gifted on were all the things facilitating their flight. Ralzelis was of the smaller variety of flying dragons, but even for that type, they were way too big to fly the normal way. 

For the specific ones associated with my species… Well, the list is a bit long? Like, I'm the descendent of four Demon Lords, right? Grandpa and grandma are both parts of the ancient Demon Lord circles, and both dad and mom managed to ascend after then, only to then have the very dangerous idea of mixing Demon Lord blood to see the results. Between the highest magical affinity ever recorded and all the other shit I've mentioned, I shouldn't need to tell you the results were a bit beyond their expectations. Normal Demon Lords already have the tendency to manifest extreme manifestations of their specie's corporeal magic, and in my case the list is both wide and pretty absurd as a whole. Demons who are peers in terms of power always tend to create crazier offspring, after all. 

The real short of it is, grandma's side of the family grants me some hilarious shit connected to Yealmyrn, like automatically assimilating any living thing around me, automatically copying corporeal magics I'm not yet familiar with, or some shit that borders on cheating about my control over my Essence Stream. On grandpa's side, the madness is connected to both of the Material Arts. Insane magic detection, automatically enchanting any thing in contact with me, automatically exerting influence in all magic surrounding me, extremely casual access to space bending magic… Just about the least regular set of skills you could ever think off. 

And since I've already disclosed this much about my family circumstances, maybe now is a good time to say it directly. Both sides of my family have very infamous starters, after all. Granddad, as I call him, was someone you may know as the Abyssal Emperor Yallurketh, the instigator of the Abyssal Wars and former lord of the biggest demonic domain in the inner world. Among the Demon Lords, he was known as the Lord of Conquest for his feats, and even past his annihilation none ever tried taking that title away. I think that should say enough as is. Dad isn't as infamous in the surface world, but in the modern days he might be just as well known as granddad. He is known as the Lord of Dominion, both for his ability to hold onto grandad's massive domain post his final death, and due to how much improvement he brought onto their lands since taking them over. Before grandad was severed from his throne, it was said the two of them complimented each other perfectly. 

Grandma and mom sort of have a similar relationship, just a little quirkier. Grandmother's name is Gyhanjarith, and she is known as the Lord of Combat. The second oldest Demon Lord, almost counting to 9000 as of now, and for a long time known as the strongest demon in existence, until I took that title from her. She is almost as infamous as grandad, but in different crowds and for different reasons. Grandma really likes fighting, to a dangerous degree to everyone else who is somewhat strong in either of our realms. This is why she held a habit of regularly going on rampages across other demonic domains and even in the territory of mythical kinds that gained her attention. A habit which made her a source of terror for many of this world's strongest beings for a very long time. Hence why I said her infamy depends entirely on who you speak to. 

Grandad was more feared as a whole, yet being feared by the very strongest is something grandma is far better at doing. Her most known appearance in the physical world happened during the celestial war, when she got interested in a particularly complicated front of the battlefield and crashed upon it with the intent of challenging all sides competing there. For about 3 months straight, she constantly engaged in skirmishes against all sides combating there, slowly but surely claiming dominance over the region the fighting was centered on single handedly. 

After determining that fighting off the Demon Lord in separate groups wasn't functional, the various groups at war created a temporary truce to try to vanquish grandma, and even directed forces of different fronts to join that particular battle. The fighting then lasted another two months before they managed to drag grandma's soul back to the Forge, but in her short presence in the war, grandmother claimed the most casualties any individual fighter had during the war, a feat that got her the nickname "The Heavenly Terror". And a fun fact, even back on those days grandma had the habit of avoiding killing during fights, since, by her words, "If you kill a rival, you can never get to fight them again", which is all to say, in a world she wasn't being restricted by the Angels and had been fighting with full seriousness, that killing spree would have been much larger. There is a chance she would have forced the war to a stop simply due to how much damage her presence was doing. And remember how I said Demon Lords can't really die by normal methods? If she really wanted to, nothing was stopping her from rushing back into the battlefield as soon as she recovered her shape. Situations like this is why the strong fear her almost as much as the Greater Aspects. 

Which nicely fits into talking about mom, known as the Lord of Nurture among demons. Other than the fact everyone in the inner world knows mom is the one who tends to both hers and grandma domains while grandma was going on her rampages, mom is also known as the one who tamed grandma, being seen as one of the main causes behind grandma slowing down on the rampage deal over the centuries. It sounds nice on paper, like the daughter convinced her mother to mellow out of her violent youth, but the true story is far more forceful. Lets just say it wasn't familial love, but force, verbal abuse and the stress of covering for an irresponsible parent for thousands of years that led to the real conclusion. 

That aside, with that conversation over as with my information dump, let's go over each of our preparations. Ralzelis, like usual, chose to return to her true form, as she considered fighting like that more comfortable. As I mentioned already, she was on the small side by dragon standards, and her coloring mostly reflected the shades you might expect to see on the skies or the clouds. The shine of her power lines also followed some kind of pattern like mine though not one as elaborate, and she had some level of control over their brightness. This could also have some effect on her scales, as for a mythical kind, hers was relatively good at natural camouflage. From head to tail, she was slightly shorter than a bus, but if we're measuring by wingspan it would be nearing four times that size. Even if they are mainly meant for soaring, those things needed to be huge to be of any use. Her horns extended to the sides of her head, and about down the middle of them each had a bifurcation which pointed upwards in a more direct manner. Their tips had small sensors that amplified some of her magical senses, and could be used as exit ways for magic, just as well as her tail. 

And while she took her normal form, I shifted into one of my combat ones. These usually made me some fyetrij taller, and that particular form was no exception. Usually what distinguishes each form is how many extra limbs they get, whether it is bipedal or not and even the shape and size, seeing as my flight forms were meant to be more aerobic than the others, of course. Things like the format and extra members of the form also could help with ground mobility of course, and in the case of that particular form, I classified it as Ground Dueling Form Version 2. 

My ground dueling forms, as the name might suggest, were specialized for combat with one or few opponents. There were four of them, and what mainly separated each was the difference in mobility and base defensive properties of each. Basically, the main thing that led me to choose one was the kind of attack an opponent specialized in and what our starting distance from each other would look like. That particular challenge would have a considerable gap between us and I would be locked from beating her with my own long range magic, so it needed both to be durable enough to block her softer projectiles and mobile enough to cover that distance in a matter of seconds, if I were to find the opening for a full speed sprint*. 

What every one of my forms had in common was the following, though. One, my power marks were visible on the skin of my shapeshifted forms, not entirely voluntarily from my part. The tree was more predominant in it, and it typically grew more spikes in the process. Two, each and every one of them had some form of an exoskeleton around its skin. It was mainly formed from bark of demonic trees, from some of the insect demons I had assimilated before and scales of some demonic dragons. Making armor for that size would have been a pain, and conjuring a set of it every time also looked like a wasteful usage of essence and concentration, hence I sort of incorporated the defensive traits of it into each of my Personal Echos. 

None of those forms had a mouth, or any hole for that matter, since that would serve no combat purpose, and something akin to eye sockets. Those obviously didn't lead into my real eyes, as my actual body wasn't inside the shape, but in a pocket of conjured space centered within it. Many of my overly specialized detection methods operated through those spots as well. It looked similar to a pair of glowing eyes. 

(*Not that a skilled opponent would ever allow that, of course. The thing about going hyper sonic in this setting is that regardless of how quick I'm sprinting, if the trajectory is predictable enough, my own speed would make opposing spells both harder to avoid and more dangerous, a rather unpleasant combination. Even in speedier ground forms, it was hard to pass the mach 4 line without taking flight, though. Quicking dirt isn't that convenient a method of gaining speed, after all, and other methods of propulsion are much harder to achieve when close to the soil.)

As for that particular shape, Ground Dueling Form Version 2 (which I will from now on refer to as GDFV2 because I value the space in this page a bit) was the second most mobile ground combat form*. The main point of it was not only to approach long ranged foes, like GDFV1 (my fastest form in this variety), but specifically to approach foes from which I knew I couldn't be expected to dodge or block their every attack with barriers. There were two more GDF, being that GDFV3 was specialized in beating down direct fighting specialized foes and GDFV4 was my most defensive dueling form, and at times I picked it for long ranged duels as well. Some of the other forms were better suited for that, though. Oftentimes just using an evasion oriented mobility form or adding attachments to my real shape already did enough in those cases. 

(*Already explained part of the problem with running full speed, but there is also the matter of overkill and that made me less threatening in a direct brawl. Less limbs to hold weapons with, if the goal was to reach my speed limits, and though I could swap shapes in an instant if one was previously readied, that would reduce the concentration I would have available for other things during the gallop. I did have a form that mixed combat and mobility, through the usage of a quadruped's lower body and the upper body of a biped, but it wasn't that well specialized for single combat yet. It belonged within my Ground Suppression Forms.)

GDFV2 had four arms, a pair of wings and a tail, which split into two points. The tail could be altered mid combat for many uses, like gaining a point to be used as a sting, growing in length to tie others down or hardening the tip to be used as a whip. As for the wings, they could be used for flight, or at least for gliding (I would need to push my levity infusions pretty hard to sustain my body mid air only by using those things), though their other main purpose was to function like natural shields. The scales on the outer end of it were particularly resistant to heat based attacks, and depending on what kind of foe I was facing I could adapt them to take on different types of attacks better. That, and the flapping of those things could generate enough of a gust to help out in the usage of wind casting. Not to mention, they could be used for striking, and a punch from them would have been pretty effective, though I didn't expect to get to use them that way in this type of match. There was a lot of stuff I could add to cover momentary needs that wouldn't require the usage of Personal Echo as well.

By that point, the judge had arrived and we each took our positions in the training grounds. That was also the point where I armed myself. My right upper arm was carrying a double bladed sword, one that had almost as much height as I did in that form. Since I doubted I would be getting close enough to my foe to actually use it directly, it was mostly picked due to the fact having a weapon in hand would have made it easier to use Kinetic Strikes defensively. This kind of sword was helpful for this purpose, since at just about any way I swung it the shock waves created probably would have blasted away any projectile launched towards me. My other choice of weapon was a shield, which I held in my bottom left arm. It wasn't that big compared to the body of that shape, seeing as it would be serving a similar purpose as that form's wings, but not only could it be used as a means of shaping my Kinetic Blasts and other spells similarly to the blade in one of my hands, it was enchanted to be more effective at dispersing the energy of projectiles. It could amplify barriers as well, but I had locked away my access to some of those to begin with, so there would be less options to utilize it. 

With the judge already there, we each took our positions. For the sake of fairness, it was decided that for that round the distance between us would be chosen as medium to long range. The restrictions placed on this set basically locked me from staying at long range, and since my win condition was basically just getting near her, it wouldn't make much sense to place us right besides each other. The open battlefield was a somewhat neutral factor but at that distance, it also meant aiming at me became easier, thus serving as the additional edge in her favor. There were a lot of restrictions placed on me about what I could use and score with, though that didn't erase the fact there was a massive gap in our ascension levels. As for the exact distance between us, it was over 4 vraistrij, I believe. Any shorter and dashing across it would have been too quick for the disadvantages I mentioned before to matter. It would simplify the scenario way too much*. 

(*Some of the civilians reading this might be questioning, "Couldn't a mage your level just teleport through that distance?" The answer is yes, but doing that mid combat is a horrible idea. There is a small delay between the initial preparation to a teleportation spell and the point your body shifts through it, and this type of magic isn't known for being easy to mask either. A normal being wouldn't notice it, though an Ascendent Spellweaver could plan their diet for half a year during that delay. The foe would just immediately aim their most potent magic at the spot the teleportation is leading towards, and time it just as the other side is arriving. Only two cases, then. Instant death or defeat, depending on the seriousness of the situation, or being forced into extreme defensive action. The less bad option is a lot worse when you consider that in the time it might take you to recover, the opponent could have just teleported in the opposite direction, immediately gaining again the distance you supposedly closed. Teleportation is handy, but it isn't a universal answer to distance.) 

Anyways, the match started as one might expect from my part. My most powerful trick at long distances involved Familiar Echos, as Life Echo was the center of my practice as a whole. Normally, the swarms of familiars I can create would eventually overwhelm her if I simply kept my distance, yet the limitations I mentioned plenty already explicitly forbid me from using them as a method of finishing the match. Not that I am complaining, of course. I suggested that limitation most of the time precisely due to how limiting to the match up this fraction of my strength can be in this scenario. Even so, Familiars are an excellent method of harassment as well, and I just so happened to be excellent at using them for this purpose. As I started charging, the ones I produced fell in four different categories: Interferers, to make her shots on me harder; Harassers, to keep her from getting to comfortable; Nest Seeds, to make it possible for me to continuously generate familiars from a location closer to her; and finally, Defenders, to protect the vulnerable and tactical targets in the Seeds during their flight. 

As for Ralzelis' actions, both the plan behind it and themselves are somewhat on the simpler side of things, which in this case is absolutely a compliment. Simple methods offer a manner of reliability that is often very effective over this level, after all. Her main one being ice. In her surroundings, dense clouds of white began taking shape almost as soon as the battle started, and wherever they passed, the air itself was frozen, often sculpted into the shape of missiles as soon as the freezing clouds were past them. These freezing winds kept slowly swirling around her, carefully drawing a perimeter of frost in her surroundings yet solidifying anything in contact with it almost instantly, demonstrating both the power and accuracy of her application in Thermal Nullification. 

It was a curious area, mainly because despite it being connected so thoroughly with Heat Amplification, the limitations of true zero meant it operated in a completely different direction after a certain level. The main aspects to the scaling of freezing magic was how much mass it could solidify at once and how effectively it could nullify thermal attacks, after all. This made it likely one of most effective fields of magic for volume based attacks as a result. Other mages centered on physical projectiles were limited to their rate and concentration limits for conjuration, after all. With freezing spells, though? Her magic didn't wasn't the frozen air itself, just the act of freezing it. Considering her artificial tundra sustained itself once it was shaped, this meant the projectiles she would be using didn't require concentration to be sustained, effectively making their numbers infinite, so long as she had sufficient time. 

Of course, saying the act was concentration free ignored the detail that launching, producing and infusing the ice required. If those things were tossed towards me without any hardening or force magic into it, I would simply brush it aside, even if each missile was bigger than a train cart. And even then, doing more than simply staggering me wouldn't be very practical. A direct hit from one of those wouldn't even count as a point by itself. There was no comparing the danger in it to a construct generated by one of the Spiritual Areas, Earth or Water Conjuration. Yet as I said, it was an area that specializes in volume, as I said plainly. Once she spent a few seconds preparing, the expectation was for hundreds of those train carts to fly at me every second. Being staggered wouldn't threaten me by itself, though the goal was to use that to control my pacing, and eventually slow me down enough to bury me in ice. That sort of volume could only be reproduced by a Wind Caster or a Water Caster fighting on the ocean's surface. 

This skill more or less defined the dynamics of our matches with this particular set of limitations. After a certain amount of time passed, the rate at which Ralzelis froze air and the size of her reserves would grow too much for avoiding her attacks to be possible, yet it remained true that my victory condition was tied to getting close, within these rules. Thus, my plans were tied to buying time through long range harassment and getting close as quickly as possible, while hers was stalling me for long enough that I wouldn't have any method of safely getting close to her. Nothing was stopping her from moving away either, as could be observed in the fact that some of her structures were positioned in a way to act as coverage for an escape route. Of course, if either side got too careless there were methods for ending this competition outside those main plans, but generally these were the conditions implied by this ruleset. 

Different rules would change things greatly. For example, if I had the ability to use my familiars to finish this fight for me from a distance, there would be nothing stopping me from sitting out of this frozen fortress' range and just continually harassing Ralzelis until I got her. I beat her in both maximum range and movement speed, after all. Limitations such as those and restriction to winning methods were both meant to balance as well as add variety in how these matches would develop. 

With that being enlightened, for the charge itself. My plan of action through it was quite simple. Prioritize momentum above all other things other than attacks that would immediately eliminate me. She wasn't dedicating her entire concentration to making her tundra, so there was a lot of harassment heading towards me as I moved. My spiritual arts were also being partially restricted, but even then, a mage at our level has a ton of different defensive options to pick from. Evasion, barriers, space manipulation, interference, using attacking methods effective against a certain type of projectile or simply pushing them out of the way through some method of altering their path… Each option has their distinct advantages and issues, and which would be the most effective depended on the type of attack thrown in my direction. 

If a single massive projectile or a group covering a small area, evasion either through the ground or air worked best. Against smaller projectiles, often perrying was easier. Depending on how they were placed around me trying to alter their trajectory through magic could also work, or even be mandatory if enough of my space was taken. If matched against energy, either a type of magic that is effective at nullifying it, interference or the occasional usage of barriers. Melting those ice blocks wasn't difficult for me, as an exemple, and attacks utilizing various types of light couldn't realistically be dodged, so those often required an active defense. If a wave of attacks combines too many different types of magic, Alternate Space could be used to phase through it, though the area needed far more concentration than most other options I described. The applications of Spatial Severance and specialized interference oftentimes proved helpful as well, depending on how she attempted to vary her attacks. The charge didn't last too many seconds, but mages of our level could have thousands of interactions in that time frame. From both sides of the spectrum, knowing how to plan within this time frame was a necessary ability, both to draw the optimal attacking methods for any situation and effectively dealing with it. A general rule applied to my decisions in this particular rule set, however. 

Slowing down wasn't a choice, so even if I needed to give her some points to keep up my pace, my entire strategy required a fast approach, making it so keeping speed up was the core factor to measure the efficiency of a defensive method. Getting to the finishing stretch too late would immediately result in failure, after all. It's not like just sprinting in a straight line would be enough either. I've mentioned my application of familiars already, and the whole point of harassment in this case was to keep her entire concentration devoted to pummeling me. My creations had the specific intent and specialization of melting stuff after all, so if they were neither dealt with or defended against it would end up giving me too much time for the extra pressure to be worth it from her perspective. 

Of course, Ralzelis also had the means to place obstacles I needed to cover over the path. Mainly Domains of Control and Elemental Cores placed along my path, in this case, as simply sprinting by those carried a ton of risks with it. Those not only greatly boosted the threat she posed, but made it easier for her to make high potency, multilateral attacks. These offered her additional winning methods, as well as made the possibility of being staggered by an odd hit far more threatening. As a result, I needed to devote some of my familiars to interfere with these, and trace a route that would enable me to destroy some of them without going on too much of a tangent. It was in that process that I needed to take a couple of hits, all to accomplish this goal while maintaining speed, which ended up placing her on 3 of the needed 5 points. The score only really mattered once it reached 5 though, and this type of trade made my odds overall better, so it could hardly be called unmerited. 

About that point my charge started crossing into the closer ranges as well. That changed up the dynamics quite a bit. The intensity of the magic being tossed towards me escalated quite a lot, since this was the ideal distance for one to use Favighea in. That meant more care was necessary in my dash, meaning my speed was somewhat reduced while combining that with the changes in terrain. This also meant I had more means of counterattacking, though. My familiars could act as an annoyance regardless of the distance, yet in that setting only the attacks coming from my central shapes would count for points and thus as threats, and the closer I got the more of my strengths I could show off. And even if my attacks didn't land, getting to disturb her setup ended up giving me more time for the final stretch, hence prolonging the timing I had to get to my ideal distance. 

My main pick for that was heating up this play by a few thousands degrees. Heat attacks were rather unlikely to reach the center of this tundra, but when it came to reducing her ammunition, what better way of dealing with mountains of ice than bringing down the might of the stars atop it? It's not like I could nullify it immediately, but in a war of attrition between Heat Amplifying and Nullifying magic, the tendency was for me to slowly gain footing, especially considering how spread out her zone of control had been getting. Of course, if I played around too carelessly all it would take were a couple of Elemental Cores and a breath attack to take me out of the game by that point, though we were slowly getting to the zone I preferred to play at. Both of our endgames were quickly taking shape. 

Mine started just as I was about to cross the close range marks. Based on her preparations to run away and the amount of ice missiles that still were staring me down, forcing a frontal clash wouldn't have been easy. I had vaporized much of her greetings as I had been growing closer to her, but that didn't necessarily eliminate the space she had to flee. And while I could outrun her and close the remaining gap on a few leaps, rushing at full speed in that situation would leave me too vulnerable to a multidirectional bombardment. Ralzelis wasn't in a state in which she would be invincible or anything, though saying she didn't have enough ammunition to bury me by that point would be inaccurate. My victory was reliant on landing the final plays accurately. If a plan that made my chances one sided existed, she had already long grown used to playing around its activation, after all. 

The first step was to divide her concentration. Considering how many stabilized traps there were lying around Ralzelis, counting on mine to beat her straight while I was crippled wasn't reasonable. So I took a page out of her specialties book and prepared a multidirectional attack of my own, just one that was far more heavy handed. To begin with, my remaining familiars shifted their aims. Instead of harassing, they gathered the energy I placed within each to create an attack meant to pin her down. If ignored, they would greatly delay any escape attempts and weaken the pressure she had prepared for me, as well as enabling one of my potential gambits to finish the match. This meant some of her power needed to be dedicated to destroying or defending against their attacks. 

Next, the Personal Echo that had been carrying my body split into two, sort of. Think of those as familiars which mimicked the power of a Full Shifting shape. Of course, they didn't completely match my usual output, despite me needing to prepare the second one ahead of time, but the goal wasn't that, necessarily. Either one of those could be carrying the Spatial Core hiding my real body, and they had been intentionally made to make identifying which had it difficult. Not only that, though the space between each Echo was connected through a Bond, meaning at any given moment the space containing me could shift between either. This meant both had to be considered as the potential final threat. An additional trick involving these same methods is that one of the familiars leading the upper assault could also be used to transport my core through, so if the grounded assaults were halted yet the flying ones ignored, there still existed the possibility of me manifesting from above her and ending the game from that direction. 

With the tools for my gamble prepared, there was also the matter of their location. The familiars aimed to restrict Ralzelis' routes for taking flight, limiting her control over the air and the directions from which she could flee. Then, one of the Full Shapes would prepare a lethal attack from the front, while the other aimed to cover her other paths to escape, ready to finish the game if she tried backing away from the central threat. By splitting her power, my chances for an opening increased, and depending on her response my final play would also shift. 

Ralzelis began by firing waves of smaller ice shards against the familiars raining down on her. These wouldn't do shit against my fully shifted forms, but familiars couldn't always cover all bases, and in this case their defensive specs weren't as high as it could be. This didn't eliminate all of them, though it narrowed their numbers enough to make blocking their attacks less of a hassle. Next came the punishment aimed at my flanking shape. The vast majority of her frozen mountain was tossed in its direction, aided by both Earth Casting and Gravity Manipulation to offer the launch more speed. Between the frozen blocks, the occasional harder metal spike and explosive spirit construct was placed as well, to make sure that the front would fall quickly. With that out of the way came cornering the frontal shape. 

The remaining frost was used to try to restrict the potential roots that one would take. With so many split attacks, punching the blocks to bits would remove too much of its momentum, and it wasn't quite at range to make full usage of Nairsylvir yet either. Once it was sufficiently restricted, her goal likely was to fire her breath at full intensity, probably while resonating with Wave Amplification. A close range shot from a breath firing Gamma Rays would both be impossible to avoid and too difficult to block considering how divided my power was at that point. I did say making a multilateral attack could be a gamble for me as well, didn't I? And the answer for it? 

For the flanking Shape, the one beneath a hailstorm, I simply dedicated all concentration that could be devoted to its attacks to prolong its existence, and hence to prolong the attention she had to devote to it. For the familiars, I made most begin acting even more aggressively to hasten their push, while keeping a final batch on the back, to support with a different type of attack. And for the one heading the frontal assault, since it was already on a timer, might as well have it act as aggressively as possible. 

Remember how I said moving at full speed could be very dangerous in this scenario? In a moment, that shape took the fastest leap it could manage in the direction of Ralzelis. As good old triangulation might tell you, when there are multiple dimensions of distance between you and something else, crossing both at once is often helpful. While part ways through that leap's arc, that Full Shape tossed the two bladed sword it carried against my foe at full power, while also starting one of my final tricks for that match. After the launch was done, a massive crystal of condensed magic began taking shape. I wasn't quite in range for Nairsylvir to reach her yet, but there were ways of making that thing reach closer to my target. I mentioned some of the familiars were serving a different purpose, and that was to assist in creating a portal between the position of that shape and them. A case for how teleportation can be implemented without risk, some might say, even if not totally accurate. As the portal took shape on both ends, I tossed the crystal through it, even if it couldn't cross it entirely. 

Ralzelis did manage to detect it, of course. As soon as the portal was shaped, she simply aimed a light wave shot at it. It wouldn't do much damage even to my familiars, but against Crystallization Magic, it didn't really take much to make it detonate. The close proximity to the portal did mean the Full Shape that tossed it got caught in that blast, as did many of my familiars, though it also managed to stagger Ralzelis, which ended up making the sword toss hit more cleanly, scoring me 2 points as a strong block. It was shortly after this that the flanking Shape I had on stalling duty began losing ground as well, causing it to collapse. And yet, the match didn't end, immediately prompting Ralzelis to try to take flight, even if a bit too late. 

Remember my explanation about how the core within those particular Full Shapes worked? In this case, it was centered on a small physical core, which didn't even have the size of a grape. Combined with the fact I was pretty good at masking its presence… Well, where could it have gone? Hitting a Full Shape only counted as points so long as my real body was connected to it, after all. And the answer to that was below her, the final flank for this variety of attack. When I noticed neither Full Shape could safely handle its duty, I simply used one of the many smokescreens I had risen by that point to push that core below the sandy surface of the arena we were sparing on, before carefully and swiftly placing it directly below the frozen throne she had been sitting on. 

Hence why, upon confirmation the match hadn't ended, Ralzelis immediately tried fleeing. We've fought each other enough times to have long since memorized what plays each preferred in any given ruleset, so she already knew this underground attack was a possibility. The whole point of this strategy is that any of these four fronts could be carrying my real self when the time was needed, after all. I was already too close for her to flee from my fists, though. Phasing through the ground via Alternate Space, my real self burst through while melting anything in my path, all the while utilizing Spatial Movement to reject the need to accelerate in that instance. Her concentration had been scattered all around the battleground, while mine had been freed when each of my creations lost their shape. And so, I closed in the gap, before claiming my final point through a solid yet playful jab to her thorax. There was no need to deal that particular blow seriously, as we all knew this match would always end immediately if I got into melee range, even if without any Full Shift covering me. 

With the match over, we had a brief break to discuss it before the next one. That type of stuff usually helped process the thinking parts of a fight better. Though in our case, we already had a lot of familiarity with how we battled. The sparring partners in this place varied a little, but she had been a consistent one for more than a few decades already. In a sense, we were very familiar with the options for gambits we had, almost like in a professional game of Tactics Stretch. That particular version of my attack had simply been the most fitting for the board situation in that instance, and each of the four fronts represented one of the potential plays I could make, though there were additional varieties in that same state. Despite all the obstacles, I saw that my main edge in that particular group of restrictions was that the initiative was usually in my hands, due to how defensive the optimal plans for Ralzelis usually were in it. With that covered, we had a few more matches in that same setting, before also alternating rulesets a bit. This process continued until the time reached another section of my schedule.