"The first rule for survival is to never overreach. Limits are a law of the universe; they are iron chains, wrapping tightly around the living and the dead. Attempt to resist will assure suffocation."
- Voidsong, 'Maxim of Life': I
*****
Torna tensed, stopping in his tracks, and nervously scanned his surroundings.
'Already? No. Impossible. She can't have locked onto me in...how long? Twenty? Thirty seconds?'
Sweat had already soaked Torna's thin shirt, coating his body in an uncomfortable maze of rapidly evaporating rivulets. His throat was dry, but not parched thanks to 'Moderation', which helped to regulate his condition, and his lips were already cracking in the scorching, sand-laced winds. Luckily, the makeshift hoodie turban protected him from the main adversary of the trial; the blazing sun, which, despite lying on the edge of sunset, still blasted the immense desert with abnormally unforgiving heat.
'I'm barely able to think in this heat, and with the constant sand in the air flying into my throat. Iron Soul should be facing similar conditions...even with her famous armour, she must be struggling. So how the heck has she had the time to track and target me?!' Torna's thoughts ran frantically, and he gritted his teeth in annoyance, before his eyes widened suddenly.
Coughing fiercely, eyes watering, Torna stood doubled over, choking a few grains of golden sand out of his airways, and gasped, wincing simultaneously as a flare of pain burst from his chest.
"H-hot..." Torna wheezed hoarsely, straightening, and waving a flat palm over his mouth and nose.
[Cantrip 'Membrane' has been cast.]
'This should help with breathing. After all, the last thing I need in a head-to-head fight against an elite young mage is to die of suffocation...' Torna thought, grimly curling his lips upwards in a dark grimace, before steeling himself, quelling his anxiety, and re-entering his usual state of clarity.
'Think. You're going up against 'Iron Soul'...you don't have to kill her; just injure enough to ensure that you can. Now, let's see...'
'Iron Soul is known primarily for her fancy suit of armour. High-grade kyanite, with enchanted steel plating and likely a stellar generator for a power source. Prototype military model, magic amplification...all the classy addons.'
'Damn it, and then there's her stupid talent. She can already use the elemental fire spells at Stage 1, so the heat probably won't even make her break a sweat...'
'This is really bad. I'm in decent condition, but I'll only deteriorate over time without water or shelter. If she attacks now, I'm as good as dead!'
[Spell 'Inventory' has been cast!]
A deep sense of foreboding suddenly swamped Torna, and his magic surged reflexively, leaping swiftly from his fingertips, into the air around him in tendrils of greyish light, emerging into somewhere unknown and unseeable.
"Retrieval! 'Hadal Bones' and 'Kef-Isfet'!" Torna yelled, hairs standing immediately on end, and slipped seamlessly into a strange fighting stance, his hands raised before him in loose claws, feet planted strongly in the sand. Sweat dripped unpleasantly down his back, and countless whispers suddenly burst into his mind, swelling and drowning out his thoughts, almost sending him reeling.
[Retrieval successful.]
[Countdown to confiscation has begun.]
The grey streams of light stiffened like bowstrings, and flowed back into Torna. Most of the streams gathered in his left hand, moulding themselves into the shape of an obsidian knife, leaf-shaped and wickedly sharp, and the rest rushed towards his neck, forming a stringy necklace, decorated with three bone-coloured fangs of some creature, ridged and crudely pierced.
As the mystical teeth faded into existence, a dark, ominous feeling blanketed Torna, and his magic rumbled restlessly in response, sending a shiver along his body.
['Hadal Bones' respond to the call of the suppliant.]
*****
[Spell 'War Song' has been activated.]
A surge of incredible power burst through Jessica's body. Her limbs felt immediately lighter, and her thoughts more clear, and her magic hotter. Despite the depletion of more than half of her reserves, the radiance of the twilight sun was quickly absorbed by the panels on her suit, refreshing her channels with new power to replace the lost.
The girl's fingers deftly spun through the air, settling in two loosely extended fists, and her magic twisted with incredible speed around her hands, sparking with scorching orange light, and gathered in two fiery gauntlets around her metal-clad gloves alongside the blazing blade projecting from her wrist.
Her helmet display sent a crosshair sweeping out over the desert, searching for her adversary, and quickly flashed green, locking onto Torna.
[Adversary 'War Savant' targeted. Magic amplification complete.]
"Mar-kesh-siqh-r'yon." Jessica chanted flatly, planting her feet firmly beneath her, and calmly staring at the spinning circle indicating the boy's direction. She exhaled slowly, relaxing her thoughts, entering a dreamlike stance akin to an athlete's immersive 'flow'.
'Don't miss, now.' she thought absent-mindedly.
"One shot, one kill. Rise of a setting sun."
[Spell 'Winged Fire' has been activated.]
[Array effect 'Firebird' is synergising with 'Winged Fire'.]
[Amplification is exceeding maximum capacity!]
[Initiating overflow...]
Jessica exhaled, her eyes flaring suddenly in rings of blazing light, and spun gracefully, the flame leaping from her arms in large clumps of orange, and roared in Torna's direction with terrifying speed.
"Die quickly," she muttered quietly.
In a corner of her mind, the wicked-faced elder smiled.
*****
Torna shuddered in terror as a disgusting, crawling sensation ran across his flesh, and he hissed in agony as his left eye was stabbed with a piercing pain like a hot knife.
Unknown to him, the sclera rippled with waves of elusive grey, and the hazel iris paled for a moment, before returning to their normal state in an instant.
A sound like burning twigs suddenly crackled behind him, and as his head snapped towards the noise, his eyes catching sight of a rapidly approaching orb of blazing fire, Torna's magic suddenly exploded with power, and a burst of brilliant orange flashed before his eyes as the fiery missile slammed into his stomach.
[Charge depleted.]
[Strike 'one'.]
Torna was thrown back violently, rolling back through the sand, but before he could regain his footing, another crackle sounded near him, and he dived desperately to the left just as another orb exploded behind him.
'Tracking! Damn her, she's still too far away for me to engage!' Torna hissed in annoyance, and dashed rapidly forward, avoiding yet another missile as his intuition flared darkly.
"Speed it up..." he mumbled, eyes unfocusing, and mouth hanging open as he devoted his mind to extreme concentration. His arms hung loosely in front of him, the obsidian blade gleaming darkly in the gradually diminishing twilight, and his magic flowed turbulently through his channels, nourishing every one of his muscles in preparation for dire battle.
[Cantrip 'Panorama' has been cast.]
Casting a mental cantrip, Torna felt the world around him slow drastically for a moment, and his peripheral vision sharpened suddenly.
He saw twelve more flaming orbs flying languidly in his direction, crackling menacingly, and in the distance, about 500 metres away, he noticed a dark figure, blurred in the sandy wind.
It was, of course, Jessica 'Iron Soul'!
Torna's lips curled upwards in a small smirk.
"Found you..." he muttered melodiously, and threw his blade suddenly into the air as the world rushed back into real time with the deactivation of 'Panorama', crossing his arms at his shoulders, guiding the magic through his body and in tendrils around him from the ends of his slender fingers.
[Art of Magic: Transcendent Taekwondo]
"Flowing feet, hand of death. Esv'ath."
[First skill: 'Nagare - Flow'.]
Torna's body suddenly blurred, and he leapt with inhuman speed from his current position, twisting acrobatically through the air over two 'Wings of Fire', grabbing the knife, and slashing with deadly force through the orbs.
[Attribute of 'Kef'Isfet': 'Peshesh' activated!]
[Spell 'Flicker' has been activated.]
'The skill of severance and sacrifice from the knife, and the shield of the 'Hadal Bones'...these will be my lifelines!'
Torna's eyes flashed with pale grey light, and he vanished completely. Without warning, the flying orbs were sliced into fragments, dispersing with mournful crackling, and the howling of the rising wind. The boy's faint silhouette flickered around the area, clouds of sand bursting from his forceful steps, and he began to sprint towards Jessica, breathing ragged and mind crystal-clear.
[Warning! Continuation of 'Flicker' will result in damage to the vessel!]
"I can kill her."
*****
Jessica's eyes narrowed as she felt her orbs of fire dissipate, destroyed by some unknown force.
[Targeting...]
[Target 'War Savant' has exceeded the 'magic potential' of his vessel.]
[Increasing amplification...]
The helmet display flashed with lines of bright text, but Jessica simply disregarded them, focusing her power in the thin blade, already red-hot from the infusion of her magic.
'Slow and steady. He'll definitely go for a fatal strike, since the environment and conditions are unfavourable to him in the long-term. Unfortunately for him, however...'
Bursts of sand suddenly rose up in front of her, and a yellow heat signature sped rapidly towards her.
[Magical artifacts detected. Skills: severance, dispelling, weakening, protection. One's drawbacks appear to be severe reduction in physical durability, and the other seems to have limited usage. Once the uses are all expended, a terrible fate will overtake the user.]
[Plan formulated: extreme defence.]
[Array amplification transferred from 'Firebird' to 'Steelskinned'.]
Jessica felt her skin toughening, and just as she steeled herself, rigidly assuming a blocking stance, her blade tilted diagonally across her torso, Torna's knife whipped through the air, and easily shattered the metal.
Jessica's eyes widened in surprise, then smiled arrogantly, throwing a rapid punch at his head as the knife connected with her armoured torso, bouncing off with a loud 'clang', leaving a shallow scratch.
Torna ducked instinctively, barely dodging the vicious strike, and slashed again, towards Jessica's throat, slamming the solid stone of the blade into her windpipe.
She coughed roughly, concussive force driving the breath from her airways, and let her neck loll limply, as if dazed by the shock of pain.
Torna leapt at the chance, firing a roundhouse kick at her jaw for a swift knockout, but was instead met with the edge of a thin metal blade, extending from Jessica's wrist.
[Charge depleted.]
[Strike 'two'.]
A shudder ran along Torna's body, and an unknown force blocked the strike yet again, and he leapt backwards, out of the range of her reformed blade, red-hot with orange magic.
"Nice suit, Tin Can. Got one to spare?" Torna quipped, a playful smile flickering across his face.
Jessica tilted her head indifferently, and raised her blade above her head, power surging through the metal, and leaping wildly off the sword in orbs of blazing light.
[Spell 'Winged Fire' has been activated.]
Torna's smile grew forced and awkward.
"Crap."