The Magic Competition

" Stop the match!" I heard vaguely and the visage of blurry people entered the ring retrieving the both of us. I couldn't move my legs, or my arms anymore. I just wanted to sleep, this competition took a whole lot more effort than I had anticipated. I couldn't stay focused, the warm blood running down my face and the ragged breathing. I couldn't stay awake. Before I even made it off the ring, I had fallen asleep.

~~~~~~~~~

Slowly stirring from my slumber I am greeted with the sight of a room I don't really recognize. The room looked like a medical room, similar to a school nurses office. There were a collection of a few beds that honestly weren't comfortable at all, as well as a desk in the corner accompanied by a simple chair and an assortment of books and writing utensils strewn across them. There was a bookshelf in the corner that had a collection of vials and books on the various shelves, and the room was actually really cold.

I wasn't alone in the room, however. There was Kon, who was sitting on the bed beside me brushing her tail, Jack was on the one across from me he was still asleep, there were also a few other people who also got some pretty serious injuries, from what I could tell. I don't know them or recognize pretty much any of them at all.

I rolled over onto my side to try to get up, and a creak in the bed seemed to have been heard by Kon, because she stopped what she was doing and turned my way. Standing, she walked over to me. From how she was walking her leg and stomach were all patched up, but she still had some bloody bandages wrapped around where the wounds were.

" Sorry about our fight." I said as the image of seeing her covered in blood being carried away appeared. I did feel a little bad still.

" It's alright, I hurt you pretty bad too?" She responded and sat beside me.

" Mn. It hurt like hell." I laughed a bit. " Still, I went too far, I should have stopped short. I'm sorry." My gaze turned down, away from her.

Kon started playing with my hair. " It's fine. I nearly killed you too."

I suddenly felt a sensation trail up my tail, causing me to jump and remove my tail from whatever was touching it. I spin and look towards Kon's guilty face. I was a little angry, the way my tail was stroked made me feel weird, but I suppose I was mostly surprised. I decided to let it go.

" Sorry, it looked so soft ..." She timidly apologized. Hesitating she continued " You can touch mine if you'd like." She was blushing a little bit, and I found myself doing the same thing. Tails are really sensitive things. I hate having mine touched and I've only touched Lyrics once after an annoying amount of coercion. It is a little uncomfortable, and weird, but I suppose it's not horrible.

I stared at her tail intently. It was fluffy and it looked really soft I realized that I really did actually want to touch it. "I mean only if your ok with it." I finally replied.

Getting back on the bed I crawled over to Kon, her tail moved side to side in nervous anticipation. I laid my hand and on her tail and she flinched a little. I lightly stoked it and immediately fell in love with how soft it was, the fur on her tail was soft, fluffy and gentle, it made me wonder how she made it hurt so much when she hit me with it.

I Picked it up and gave it a hug, causing Kon let out a squeak, and I pulled away after a moment. She seemed rather appreciative. I understand completely. It is still a mystery to me how I am able to fight using my tail as basically a third arm but I can't stand a simple pet. It was weird, but I just kind of accepted it and moved on. The door opened and a woman wearing a priests outfit made her way into the room and started walking around to the people lying on the beds. She left the ones asleep alone and gave a very rudimentary checkup to those of us that were awake. Taking off all the bandages that were on us she brought all of the children in the room, that she had cleared, back to the arena.

When we got back, Kon and I said our goodbyes and parted ways. Each of us going back to our groups. I started wandering the stands trying to find where everyone had gone, the battles in the center of the arena seemed pretty heated so I looked in to see what all was going down. Before me, I witnessed a match between Julien and another individual that seemed like a borderline psychotic pyrokinetic the way fire was snaking across the arena.

I had never really fought Julien all that much, he never really used any weapon other than the bow, and while he was pretty dangerous with one, I was one of his most illusive targets. He could never hit me. I'd get in close and it was over. Since he couldn't use a bow I was curious of how he had decided to go about fighting. I heard that he was being privately trained by Miss Hemiko and she seemed really proud of her work so I was curious with what they came up with.

The hot head that Julien was fighting didn't relent sending wave after wave of attacks in Julien's direction and who didn't seem to be doing anything other than dodging his opponents attacks. Narrowly dodging every attack that came within an inch of hitting him. He had more guts now than I was used to seeing, and he seemed focused. Considering he hadn't forfeited yet I was pretty proud of him. He seemed like a completely different person from the shy scaredy cat I was used to.

The fire kept coming until his opponent paused for a second charging his next attack. In that moment Julien pulled out what seemed to be talismans and threw them out in front of him. He focused and one of his hands and it glowed a faint white light as his hands moved and wrote in the air. Symbols connected the talismans and the opponent launched his attack. Julien had picked up a stone in his attempts to dodge and threw it at the center of his little formation. At first I was confused at why he would throw the stone since he wasn't strong enough for that to do anything, but the rock flew forward and as soon as it hit the formation, it started to glow and accelerated in a split second at Julien's' opponent. Rocketing forward towards the massive fireball the opponent had created, it cut straight through it and Julien's opponent. The fireball ignited and imploded into a plume of smoke and ash his opponent collapsing, from the veritable bullet hole in his stomach. That looked like it hurt.

I was rather impressed by the progress he had made in the last week, he was never weak but he was too scared to use it to his advantage. The only reason he was ranked eighth was because his marksmanship was impeccable, and he could put is opponent to sleep, but once that tactic failed him he was essentially useless. I was happy he was actually growing.

He returned to the group and I hopped into the ring to follow him, I wasn't interrupting anything so I think it was fine. Either way I guess I don't really care.

" Congratulations on your win." I popped up behind him and he squealed like a little girl. He was still lacking his masculinity in that area I suppose but I'll let him off the hook this time. He impressed me so I'll be nice.

" Alice!" He cried out.

" You must have been terrified in your last fight." I said sarcastically, teasing him only a little. The only reaction I got from him was a hug however.

"Your alright, we all though that you were hurt. All we saw was you collapse onto the ring, after you and Jack went at it. Then we weren't allowed to see if you were ok because they wouldn't let us in the medical ward, I was so worried." His voice was coated in concern.

" Woah, now calm down, I'm fine now. Though speaking of the fight, who won? I don't really remember." I inquired

"Neither of you, actually. The match was called short. The king said that this event was to be a demonstration of skill. In the end you two were fighting like wild animals so he said there would be no victor until you two fought again. This time in a more civilized manner."

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Laugh at the fact that we actually tied, or cry at the fact that it was all for essentially nothing. Believe it or not that match was actually painful.

" So, do you know when I'm going to have to fight him?" I asked as we finished getting back to everyone.

" No, that's still yet to be decided I think." Julien said

"Alice, Your alright!" Emmy ran down to me

" Told ya, Emmy." Caroline followed

" Yeah, I'm fine. Good as new in fact."

" Are you sure your not hurting anywhere?" Chloe voiced her concerns

"Positive." The constant reassurance I had to give was getting annoying, but it was nice to know they cared.

" Your pretty strong aren't you Alice?" Ethan asked

" Yep! That's why I'm number 1." I said with no shame whatsoever. " By the way who's up next?"

" I am." Ethan said, and as if on cue. The announcer called Ethan to the stage for his fight.

The contenders breezed through the next few fights. In the end it was once again a competition between Fort Atlas and Elysium. It seemed that the biggest issue with the magic competition wasn't power but mobility and speed. The matches ended quickly because the contestants didn't move fast enough and were easily hit, by the opponents fast firing or AOE attacks. The first one to hit typically won either because the attack could immediately be seen as fatal or it interrupted their opponents flow and it was a clean sweep from there; after the rug was pulled out from under their opponent. Emmy had the biggest advantage here because her magic was practically cheating, it allowed her to protect herself and attack the other person at the same time. She can also control and reshape her creations if she is touching them so it was a clean sweep. She would create a shield and block all of the opponents attacks and attack with chains, made by her ability, to defeat all her opponents. It was cheap but effective.

Needless to say she won first. Followed by Korona Chevall from Fort Atlas in second, Cobalt Cyllas from Providence in third, and Caroline in forth. Korona was similar to Emmy in many respects. Their fighting styles were very similar. Korona used a unique type of fire magic that had a physical form. Unlike normal fire magic it was darker and didn't defuse on contact. Essentially she could solidify fire magic, and that was a scary thing, especially if it maintains it's heat and energy for extended periods of time. Emmy managed to win though because her weapons were able to withstand the heat not getting destroyed. It was an exhilarating fight. Light blue and dark red formations of swords, whips, blades and shields moving around the arena in a fast paced dance of danger and death. It was beautiful, but terrifying.

That was how a lot of the matches went. Magic is typically most effective at killing not protecting. It is far easier to restrain one's self physically than magically, as well as killing someone with magic is the only way for a mage to ensure that they won't get killed. Fighters that are up close and take attacks all the time can react if something goes wrong, but for a mage, a single mistake and you could have just gotten yourself killed or worse with no way to escape. There is a certain point at which no matter your skills you need to rely on your body alone, and mages are not able to afford getting into such situations. This is the first rule mages are taught, and this resulted in quite a few injuries.

The others didn't get too banged up however. Chloe got eliminated in the preliminary round, thanks to a suicide attacker that took them both off the edge. Once it was realized how immensely dangerous the wind magic users were in such a confined space. They were immediately removed from the equation by practically everyone else. There were five of them and they managed to knock the 40 contestants down to twenty or so in about a minute, so they were definitely doing something right. It was unfortunate for Chloe, but I didn't see any sadness in her, only exasperation from all the people who charged her. It was unfortunate I missed that part it sounded like it would have been hilarious to watch.

Once the matches for the first years finished the next group started. They were the second years. This group included Johnathan and Lapis, as well as a few others I've never met before. Those matches were interesting as well. I hadn't ever seen either Lapis or Johnathan fight. I was excited to say the least.

From what I heard Lapis used both fire and Ice magic and I was curious as to how they could be used together. Then there was Johnathan. I heard that he was a physical fighter but his true terror resides in his ability with Sunfire magic. I wanted to see if I could potentially copy some of his moves and make them my own.

This one started the same as the others, with the preliminaries, only this time the area was slightly larger to make room for larger more dangerous attacks. That's when I saw the true terror that Johnathan was capable of.

As soon as the battle started he immediately moved to the center of the arena, and did a really big flashy attack. Pillars of light rained down from the sky and positioned themselves around the field. The pillars then condensed into small orbs and sank into the ground leaving small burning circles on the ground.

In the commotion caused by the flashy effects the rest of his team had arrived at the center. A wall of earth immediately was erected around the entire group and Ice covered the entire construct. In a flash the pillars of light returned filling the sky with a brilliant light before a deafening sound reverberated throughout the arena.

An explosion ensued and a crater appeared in the arena. The place the light pillars landed had been reduced to dust. There were students who were supposed to be fighting scattered around the stands, and even the people in the center weren't unscathed. They were all covered in dirt and ash as the barriers they had erected even caved from the proximity from the blasts. Everyone was not quite sure what they just witnessed. I can tell just by the overall feeling that this was not supposed to happen. I was terrified by the amount of power Johnathan held and I immediately believed the rumor I had heard about him being a champion like me. Nothing else could justify that to me.

The best part was I don't think Johnathan even knew that that was going to happen. If I had to guess he holds back too much in practice to not destroy things, because though explosions are not uncommon in the school grounds. To put it simply one that big was not normal at all, in the slightest. I could sense about as much mana in that attack as I did in the attack Natalia used to kill the bear, and from what I could tell she was supposed to be a veteran hunter.

"Well, It seems that there are only five people in the arena now. Unfortunately due to circumstances we are unable to determine the people who will be continuing on. Therefore we will have to redo the preliminaries. I will also be disqualifying Johnathan Vermillion from the competition out of concern of the safety of the other students. It is clear who the victor here would have been." The king once finally out of his stupor, Spoke to the crowd.

Johnathan didn't seem overly concerned about what the king said because he was currently being harassed by the other three in his group aside Lapis who was just staring daggers at him. My fear of the guy calmed a bit as I saw how he just took the abuse from his team without retaliating, despite the fact he could easily end them.

The event progressed as normal once everyone recovered and it was miraculous how no one died. Some came close but everyone was saved in the end. Johnathan was of course not allowed to participate, but it was still us who ended up winning in the end. Lapis completely dominated the competition. Her abilities were really strong. When her fire and Ice were used together a steam was created and the steam made her Ice more effective because she could soak her opponents in water, block their vision with mist and hinder their movements with the cold. Then she could use fire to keep herself warm since she wasn't immune to the cold and have a counter against opponents who aren't hindered by the cold. And the shock caused from the rapid change from hot to cold really screwed with a person's body. It was an almost perfect composition that could only be beaten by someone with cheating powers like Johnathan.

That being said, compared to the first years, with the exception of Lapis and Johnathan, the second years weren't all that impressive given the time they have been training and the third years were even more of a disappointment. It was as if the average strength of people in this world had been increasing exponentially over the past year or two.