Pitfalls And Spikes

"Winds, tear through my foe!" It's been a while since he used chanted magic, but he needed to go all out now that he knew his opponent was a mage. A torrent of wind blew out from Kies empty hand, decimating everything that was in front of him. The man created a wall of earth in front of him to block the attack but the winds broke it apart in a matter of seconds. Magic flowed from his core to his palm, also a feeling that he hasn't felt in a long time. He had been using the magicless winds for so long that he forgot this sensation.

Since the wall broke so fast, the man had to move. He quickly escaped away from the radius of the attack, and immediately upon making it to safety, he pressed his hand against the sand and a giant earthen spike erupted from under Kies.

"..."

Kies predicted the attack before it even happened after seeing the man place his hand on the ground, and jumped out of the way before the spike could impale him. He turned towards the man and fired a Wind Blade at him, expecting him to dodge it right away, but to his surprise, he didn't. Kies saw the man smile from underneath his hood, continuing to plant his hand against the ground even though the attack was coming his way.

"What..." Kies' eyes shot open as he realized the mistake he made. The man jumped out of the way just as the attack was about to hit him. Kies quickly moved out of the spot that he was too in but it was too late. All around him, walls emerged from the ground in an instant, blocking out his vision and trapping him inside it.

"Winds!" Kies called the winds to gather around him and he jumped up into the air, and not a moment too soon either. Spikes shot up from the ground under him as he jumped. He landed on one of the four walls and jumped down as the walls crumbled.

"I was hoping I'd get you with that attack..." the man said disappointedly.

"Pierce!" Kies pointed his finger at the man and a thin stream of wind flew out.

"Hm?!" The man wasn't prepared for Kies to instantly attack him after getting out of the trap like that, especially when he was talking to him, and was almost hit by the attack. But luckily, his arms were fast and he blocked the attack with the flat of his sword. He was pushed back by the attack a little and he started running when he regained his stability. Kies fired more Wind Jets at the man as he ran around the arena, each one as thin as a needle.

The contestants who were still in the arena watching the fight ducked and took cover to avoid getting hit by Kies' magic attacks. They couldn't see the attacks at all since they were too small, and that, combined with how fast they are, made it seem like Kies was firing bullets. To the spectators up above, they couldn't see a thing and had no clue what was happening. To them, it just looked like the hooded man was running away from Kies, like he would die if he pointed his finger at him. Unless one had magic, they couldn't figure out what was going on.

"Interesting..." Nyana remarked.

"What's going on?" Sirks turned to her, uncertain as to why the man was running around like that.

"He's firing off magic that is thinner than an arrow. To be precise, I believe that it's less than a hundredth of the width of an arrow..." Nyana guessed.

"Wow, you can sense that!?" Iris looked at the elf in surprise. "I only feel magic leaving his hand. I can't see the attacks at all..."

"At least you can sense them..." Sirks mumbled. He and Wompa could neither see nor sense the attacks... "But... Can attacks that thin even do anything?" Sirks asked. They were like tiny splinters of wood at that point.

"Not sure, but if his opponent is avoiding them, then it has to be dangerous," Nyana pointed out. And she wasn't wrong. Although the attacks were so thin that it didn't look like they would do much harm even if they hit, Kies had a little surprise.

For those who did get hit by it, the needle would travel through their body and explode midway. It was a very dangerous attack that can easily blow away one's limb and take one's life.

The man didn't dare let one of the Wind Jets hit him, sensing the potential danger, and proceed to run around the arena. Kies tried predicting his trajectory and fired the attacks where he was running towards, but the man kept changing directions to prevent him from doing so.

Forget it! Kies stopped firing Wind Jets and charged at the man. The man saw that Kies stopped firing attacks and turned and charged at Kies. The two of them collided head-on, locking swords with one another. The man overpowered Kies and broke the lock, pushing his sword out of the way. He then went for the kill and thrust his sword forward, but unfortunately for him, Kies knew that this would happen and fired a Wind Jet at the man as he was wide open trying to execute his attack. At this close range, there was no way he could dodge in time.

Even if the man continued with the attack and stabbed Kies with the sword, he would be fine. The cloak would reflect the attack and he would only be pushed back by it, like getting hit by a spring. It was his win... Or was it? Kies celebrated way too early. The man saw the attack and promptly canceled his own, moving out of the way to dodge it.

"..."

The man jumped back, putting distance between himself and Kies. "That was close!" And he wasn't the only one thinking that. Kies had been so close to winning but the man was better than he thought.

"Well, enough games... I better step it up a notch. After all, I almost died there..." the man's tone became stern. He spun his sword around in his hand. "Get ready!" With a wave of his hand, the entire battlefield shook. The contestants all began to panic and ran around. Even Rui and the soldier, who were in the midst of their fight, had to stop and look at what was going on.

Fissures began forming all over the ground and one of them also swallowed Kies. He looked down the hole. It was pitch black and went deeper than the eye could see. Kies didn't need to send his wind down there to know that if he fell, it meant certain death. The other contestants who weren't a part of the fight quickly fled while they had the chance to. They didn't want to risk getting caught up and getting hurt or even die when they weren't even involved in the battle.

"Okay... Now that they're out of the way..." the man put his sword away and raised both his hands. Giant pillars of earth shot out of the ground, each towering tens of meters tall. A total of five of them appeared around the arena, forming the ends of a pentagon if they were linked together. "I can start fighting for real!" he said, ignoring the fact that Rui and the red scarf soldier were still in the arena with them.

The two of them stopped fighting and started paying attention to their fight since they were getting caught up in it. It seemed that man either didn't care or completely forgot about the two of them and thought that Kies and he were the only people left in the arena. The pillars cracked and pieces of the rock broke off, hitting the sand.

This was Kies' first time seeing something like this so he had no idea what to expect, but he knew one thing for sure and it was that his magic was original magic. This was not something that all earth mages could do. This was something that the man created himself, meaning that he was on the same level as him...

Kies kept his eye on the rocks that fell to the ground. He wasn't sure what they did, but it couldn't be anything good. "Don't get distracted!" the man shouted. Kies turned to see the man's sword coming down on him. He parried the strike, but the man didn't jump back or do a follow-up attack. Instead, he pushed down on his sword, pressuring Kies and forcing him to stay at the spot. "Rupture!"

"What-" Kies felt something grab his leg and he glanced down to find that it was shackled by rocks. So this was what they did. This wasn't good! Kies couldn't break them since the man was preventing him from taking his hand off his sword. The pillars began shaking but Kies couldn't take his eyes off his enemy. He heard something whistle through the air towards him and immediately knew what it was.

"Winds!" he called on them. They rushed to him and formed a barrier around his body, and just in time too. Several stones smashed into his barrier, shattering into tiny pieces upon impact.

"Not bad..." The man applauded his quick thinking.

"Burst!" The winds around his body dispersed outward all at once, creating an explosion that destroyed the rocks restraining him and also pushing back his opponent.

Kies wasted no time, and while the man was recovering from the sudden attack, he fired Wind Cannons at the pillars. He needed to get rid of these things first before they create any more problems for him. Kies managed to take down two of them by tearing a hole through their base, causing them to topple over due to the lack of support for their weights.

The man saw what Kies was doing and stopped him before he could destroy a third one. Actually... Before Kies could destroy a third one, he destroyed the rest himself, making them crumble. The broken rocks then began to move towards Kies. Another attack he has never seen before... His opponent had great mastery over earth magic...

The winds wrapped around Kies and he leaped into the air right before the rocks reached him. He heard a loud crunch and saw the ground beneath him open up into a giant pit, leading to darkness. This hole was bigger than the other ones that were created around the arena. Unable to stay afloat any longer, Kies started falling back down to the ground, or in this case, the hole under him.

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