Ariadne Tideborn's POV
I scurried through my pouch, my fingers shaking, as I struggled to bring out a vial and gourd. The vial contained an elixir to relieve slight strain I got from exerting myself like that. I took it, before taking a sip from my gourd, which contain a potion to restore energy. Nora had insisted I take them before we began. My friend was deeply concerned and I didn't want to worsen her worries.
'Clovis magic had enhanced faster than I had anticipated. I wouldn't be caught off guard again.'
I realized how good Kalon's healing abilities were as I stretched in preparation.
'Surely he didn't think he'd be able to best me just because I finished a duel with Jared and Clovis,' I thought.
This was a chance I had long been waiting for. I could barely noticed any fierce aura around him the fjrst time we might. But since the day we visited the menagerie, Kalon felt like a different person. He had always had this confidence but only a warrior could tell ifbut were baseless. Seeing him now, I was more than certain the duel would require my seriousness.
Nora must have anticipated this moment as well. The way she remain fixed in place.
Kalon's magic was something I'd seen only in glimpses. I knew him to quick-witted, able to decipher complex theories that would take the normal celestial a year to untangle. I'd never seen anything like it, and it bothered me more than I cared to admit.
I am a Noden, born of the deep tides and the freezing currents of Lemuria. I was regarded as a genius by my kind from the moment I first froze a pond at three years old. I immediately took the liking of our benevolent Matriarch, and I was set upon the 'Path to Mastery' earlier than most.
The Path to Mastery is tradition, practiced by we Celestials. A journey that predated the Great War.
We believe that to truly gain enlightenment, one must leave their home. A Noden must leave the cold fields of Lemuria and the Lamian must leave Stygia. By encountering the customs of other races and journeying through the brutal wilderness of Enoria, we are meant to dive into our inner primal instincts.
It is in this struggle against the unknown that we gain enlightenment. Since peace has reigned under the leadership of the Oracle, this pilgrimage is the only way to ensure the new generation doesn't grow soft and magically stagnant.
Before arriving here in Stygia, I had already traveled to the flying mountainsof the Aeolians. There, I learnt and trained with young Aeolians that made use of mana effortlessly. It wasn't forced, their mana blend through wind, air, and sound continuously without the mental pressure hindering them. I had spent months trying to replicate that shift, gaining an enlightenment that allowed me to refine my savage, raw mana control into something efficient and more lethal.
Then, I journeyed to Goldstone City, the land of the Typhons. There, I gained enlightenment on the purity of the element. I learned how to achieve the purest state of my ice and water mana, stripping away the impurities until I could touch the threshold of absolute zero. I am one of the few in Lemuria who can freeze the very intent of an opponent.
But as I stood across from Kalon, all that experience felt... insufficient.
Kalon was an anomaly. Within those blood red eyes lay a mystery that dared defied the history of Enora. I found it hard to associate with him at first, and it only got worse when he began declaring the principles of magic as faulty.
To any other Celestial, such words would be heresy. We have been taught for eons that mana is the beginning and the end. There is no deviant from the path. To suggest otherwise is to spit on the face of the Oracle.
Kalon's perspective made me think of the unknown, and that was a terrifying place to be. If his theories were true, it would damage the entire history of our people. Worse, I feared for him. If the council or the monarchs of the other race heard his beliefs, they would prosecute him as a heretic.
Mana-shift had already taken so many lives. The world was on edge. If he ventured too far into these possibilities, he would be killed.
And I... I didn't want a friend to die. Yes, I want to become a Pantheon, a master of magic who served the Oracle and saw Enora through to even greater heights. I want my friends to be there with me.
I dropped into my combat stance, the ice mana pulsing from my heart. I decided to end this quickly and so did he.
The air around me went cold, moist air turning into ice as I prepared an assault against Kalon. When it near his figure, it dissolve. Not of my control.
I couldn't make sense of it.
A barrage of blood spikes shot towards me. Kalon had manifested thirty of them. I cut through them with my axes, the metal shimmering with blue light as I parried the onslaught in a circular motion.
Through my connection with ambient mana I senses graupels behind Kalon heat up.
'He's planning a sneak attack?' I pondered mid-fight.
It rose behind him into something I didn't expect. A grotesque, nightmarish construct. Its skin seemed stitched together from raw flesh. Red eyes followed my every move. I felt a chill that had nothing to do with my own magic.
'Could this be the nature of his mana form?' I wondered. It looked like a golem, yet it felt primal, as if he had pulled a piece a breathing beast to fight for him.
The beast lunged at me, its arm heavy. I slid beneath its swing, my heart hammering against my ribs. I launched myself skyward, cleaving my axes to cut the creature's neck. It release a defeating roar, my body recoilong and my ears in pain.
As I tried to dash forward, I realized I couldn't move. My boots were snagged by a thickened, dark substance.
'He's recycling his arsenal,' I realized. He had changed the phase of the spikes I had shattered, turning them into a pool of adhesive blood that was now grabbing unto my limbs.
I flared my ice mana, sending a nova of frost across the court, freezing everything within range. I willed the ambient mana to converge into a pillar of pressurized water, slamming it down on his position with enough force to crush a mountain troll.
I watched the impact. I expected him to be broken. I expected the duel to be over.
But as the mist cleared, Kalon remained standing. He was unharmed. Not a single drop of water had touched him.
Shock filled me. I realized what had happened now and with my very furst assault. He had sensed the shift in the ambient mana before it took form, managing to jammed the magic by blocking the flow.
'He's a monster.'
I realized then that I had to fight him at close range. I couldn't anticipate his magic jamming if I wasn't on top of him.
I willed my mana into my axes, the carvings shimmering.
I sent both my axes flying toward Kalon, trapping him in a dome of ice to lock him in place. I closed the distance, ready to deliver a final, blow to claim my victory. My axes inches from his throat.
Kalon was calm. Only his heavy, labored breathing proved he'd fought in a duel.
The duel ended there, a stalemate of sorts, though by the rules of the court, I had pinned him. But as I stepped back, the victory tasted hollow.
I looked at my friends. Jared's jaw was practically on the floor. The jovial Sol couldn't even hide his disbelief that a scholar like Kalon could match a combat specialist. Nora looked shaken, as if the very ground beneath her feet had shifted. She had feared for Kalon, but now she seemed to fear something else, that made me want to question her.
Clovis was watching Kalon with an amused look. Rarely had I seen such a happy smile on the Phantom.
And Damon... rubbed his chin in deep thought.
"To use Blood Puppets, a technique believed to be extinct among the younger generation... " I listened to Damon's assessment.
Damon was a genius in his own right, but he looked at Kalon as if he were more.
'Damon isn't one to get jealous. He must just be curious.'
I looked back at Kalon as he wiped a bead of sweat from his brow. He had forced my hand. He had matched me, a young veteran of three city-states, using only the theories he had found in a library. And I knew, with a sinking feeling in my gut, that he hadn't used all his abilities. He couldn't, not in an intense duel like ours.
'But if he ever did? If he ever fully mastered them.' My body shuddered from the thought.
I realized that the Path to Mastery was not just a journey through the Enora. And to Kalon, his might have more meaning.
As we walked off the field together, I found myself wondering if the Oracle's peace was strong enough to survive the Lamian standing beside me.
He was an enigma. And for the first time in my life, I felt that my ice wasn't enough to keep the world from burning.