The crowd made all sorts of comments. I for one, just tried to keep my breathing even.

  I saw Granny Qi in the crowd who gave me a small smile. Right - I had already done pretty well by getting this far and securing second place at the very least. No need for me to be afraid.

  “Alright, let’s begin,” the referee said after making a long introduction about this being the final round, and thanking all the participants up till now.

  My opponent was a Rank Three Liberomancer, but that by itself didn’t grant anyone advantages when it came to duels like this. Of course, he would likely have a larger mana capacity, would have more experience with making grimoires, and as such would be more likely to make something successfully, but I wasn’t out of the game simply because of my low rank.

  “The first word is: Medicine!”

  I began writing without thinking twice - describing how modern medicine had developed with a short section at the beginning describing Hippocrates’s theory of humors, a bit into naturopathy and homeopathy, and ending with modern pharmacy.

  As I finished it, I held my breath in as it seemed to take forever for it turn from blue to green, but when it did, it felt like the weight of the world had been taken off my shoulders.

  By then I was sweating profusely - I was pretty sure that my pits were visible, but I wasn’t worried about that now.

  Master Jiah Pei finished twenty seconds after me. “Well, well, looks like I’ve been bested.” He said so with the mildest shock, but the crowd couldn’t help themselves now.

  “No way - Master Jiah Pei lost a round?!”

  “It’s his only loss this tournament till now.”

  “Maybe the other guy has a chance - Master Jiah Pei’s fifteen-year streak might be coming to an end!”

  “What’s the other guy’s name again?”

  The crowd was in a frenzy after the result.

  Master Jiah Pei up till now had looked rather relaxed, but upon losing he got up, adjusted his seat, and then adjusted his posture ever so slightly.

  He was fully alert now, as if he had been half-asleep till now and was just now getting serious.

  Despite the fact that I had won, I couldn’t help but gulp.

  This duel was far from over!

  The referee told the crowd to shut up before we started with the second round.

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  The next word was: ‘Furniture.’

  I began describing my furniture at home and any memories I had associated with it.

  About three-fourths of the way in, I found myself at a loss for words and had to pause, which ended up being my downfall as that gave Master Jiah Pei the lead he needed to win that round.

  We each had a single victory. So it came down to this…

  “I’ve never seen the crowd so heated in a long time!” the referee said. “Still, I request you all keep quiet so that the contestants can focus on what they’re doing. Alright, everything rides on this - the next word is: ‘Volcano.’”

  I thought of volcanoes back on Earth, and settled on writing about Mt. Vesuvius and the eruption that buried Pompeii.

  The words were flowing without resistance, and I found myself in a strange trance-like state where I no longer felt so nervous. No, there was just me, the pen, and the paper.

  And so I finished.

  Only for the words to turn a bright red…

  I sighed. No matter how much you practiced and thought you had it in the bag, there was always that small factor of uncertainty.

  Why had this grimoire failed? I couldn’t pinpoint the exact reason at the moment, but if I thought over it, I’d likely find something in common with it and the other failures I’d made.

  Master Jiah Pei had no such issues and finished his - marking him as the winner of the duel.

  I sank into my chair as I shook his hand. “Thank you for the duel.”

  He looked at me with newfound interest. “I should be the one thanking you. I can’t remember the last time I had a duel that made my blood boil like this. You say you work here, in Arconia, lad? How about you come work for me in my shop? I can already see you have outstanding talent.”

  “Oh, I already work with a bookstore,” I told him. “Here, I mean, in Arconia.”

  He frowned. “No that can’t be true - when did you join? I would know if that were true….” How high up was this guy when it came to the equivalent of the Liberomancy corporate ladder here in Arconia? Well, he was a Master Liberomancer, and I guessed he figured he would’ve heard of someone like me joining a human Liberomancy shop. “Ah, I work under a lizardman,” I told him.

  “Oh, yes, that makes sense,” he said. “Otherwise I would’ve know that we had a young phoenix in our midst. Well lad, thank you for this duel, and luck be with you!”

  With that he turned away.

  I still felt the sting of defeat, though Granny Qi had a wide smile on her face. “Excellently done! I told you to have more confidence in yourself.”

  “I uh, didn’t win after all,” I said.

  “I think that’s where you’re wrong,” she said, pointing to the crowd. All of them were muttering about me, and sure, most of them were talking about Master Jiah Pei naturally, but many of them were talking about me as well. “You’ve earned the admiration of the crowd. And you’ve gained experience. And you’re better for this. There are a thousand lessons in defeat but none in victory. You have yet to grow- and a defeat will teach you much. But there is no need to be disheartened, the fact that you could hold your own against him was already fairly impressive.”

  That made me feel a lot better about myself. If my parents had been here instead… they definitely would’ve said something like “You did great- absolutely you did, but if you’d won first place, it would’ve been even better, no?”

  Granny Qi said nothing like that. No one in the crowd seemed to be looking down on me for losing either, if anything, they were quite excited and told me how great I’d done and how I’d probably win next year.

  I sincerely doubted that.

  The gap between Master Jiah Pei and myself couldn’t be expressed simply as me being second best and him being the first; it was far more enormous than that statement implied. I felt like I wouldn’t be fully confident of dueling with him without having at least five more years of experience under my belt.

  Even the round which I had won, I could only do so because I had some amount of luck on my side.