Chapter 20 — Sparring Match

  William locked eyes with Evon Mudd, refusing to back down from the snobby earth mage’s challenge.

  The female instructor patted his shoulder to comfort him. “Don’t worry too much about the fight. You’re not expected to win against a rank four. Just treat it as a learning experience, a friendly sparring match,” the instructor said to him as he walked towards the rectangular shaped arenas that were designated for sparring. “One of the main lessons that we’re trying to convey is just how big a difference in power can be. Not all fights are meant to be won, and sometimes your best option is to simply dodge like we practiced today, and try to stay alive.”

  Although the instructor didn’t mean it, William felt like her comments were an extension of Naver’s, which was particularly annoying because of how right both of them were. Still, he’d made up his mind. He’d rather take a proactive approach in his own demise than a reactive approach, and that was a principle he could stand by with both his mind as his heart.

  “How many rounds are we doing today?” he asked.

  “Everyone will be doing two rounds.”

  “Same opponent?”

  “You’ll get a different random opponent next.”

  Great. So he could possibly get his ass beaten twice in one day. He quickly scanned the crowd, assessing the rank distribution of the recruits in this training group. The majority were rank two’s, then about a dozen or so rank threes that seemed pleased with their rank, and a handful of rank fours that looked more than satisfied overall. William could count only two other rank ones, and both of them seemed miserable.

  Was rank one really that rare? So he was not only bottom of the bucket, but far below average too. Shit.

  As for the high ranking group of four students that were getting specialized training out on the field, they still appeared to be occupied with private lessons from the guild generals and would not be sparring with the rest of them.

  The old man from Jormungandr was personally teaching Evelyn Moon now, parrying her sword swings with his arm gauntlets. Evelyn’s movements were refined, almost like a dance—he still remembered how she loved to complain about her family making her take swordsmanship lessons.

  Now that she was an unapproachable rank five, he probably wouldn’t get the same opportunities to talk to her much anymore. That was life, though. Time to move on. Maybe if he worked hard, he could eventually get onto her level.

  Funny, how things happened. William knew that fighting was far from her dream job. She’d always wished to work a desk job at a prestigious company, where she could chase her perfectionist dreams with numbers and charts. He almost felt sorry for her in a way. But then again, level five… yeesh. The only person who needed pity now was him, and the other two sad level ones.

  He hopped down from the demonstration stage platform and moved to the sparring area, where Evon Mudd was already waiting for him. Since there weren’t enough sparring arenas available for everyone, people waited by for fights to resolve, and waiting behind Evon were a few of his friends.

  “I’ve been hearing that you’re also from Trinity. Please, enlighten me on how you managed to awaken at rank one,” Evon Mudd asked in a snide tone. “Did your parents never buy you a single tincture for your development? Forgot about you, maybe?”

  William didn’t reply, although now that Evon mentioned it, none of the other two level ones were Trinity Academy students, while a good portion of the rank threes and fours were.

  “Let’s just get this over with,” he said, irritated by Evon’s words but biting back his tongue, since he knew the severity of his disadvantage. Shit talking and then losing the spar to this rank four asshole would just be embarrassing for him.

  “Shall we, then?” Evon extended a handshake, which William took.

  He squeezed as hard as he could, and felt quite satisfied seeing Evon’s grimace. Despite the level difference, they were both mage type awakeners, and William had the hard hands of someone who scrubbed grease off the Kicken Chicken kitchen counter for six years straight.

  “You’re really asking for this,” Evon said angrily, spinning back around after pacing from the middle of the arena. With a gesture, gravel from the ground began to levitate up into the air, forming a jagged boulder. “You know how outmatched you are, rank one?”

  He had to react quickly. William concentrated all his focus on extracting out the mana needed to fuel his flame ability. He reached inwards, searching for that tendril of mana, when a piece of stone broke off from Evon Mudd’s boulder and came hurtling towards him.

  He barely managed to twist to the side, avoiding the stone which then crashed against the empty crates instead of his chest, but his concentration was broken. The grasp he had on the mana disappeared.

  Evon looked particularly smug seeing him struggle. “You can’t even cast? Your parents must be awfully disappointed to have such a weak son.”

  Parents this, parents that… just hearing that snobby voice pissed him off. William yanked the tendril of mana that had escaped him, summoning the flame. He felt a rush of exhilaration, finally getting the hang of connecting with the mana. But just like before, all he could muster up was a fist sized ball of fire.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  Several of Evon Mudd’s friends bursted out laughing.

  “Are you serious? That’s pathetic,” jeered one of Mudd’s friends.

  “Why don’t I show you what level four magic looks like,” Evon Mudd said casually, balling up his hand as he made a sharp downward motion. The packed debris rock launched towards William as if it had been launched by an invisible catapult.

  William directed his flame against the rock, which did absolutely nothing against the rock, dissipating as the rock easily passed through it. With no other options, he sidestepped again, quickly evading the pile of debris projectile which crashed into the ground behind.

  “You’re really good at running and dodging like a monkey, aren’t you?” That’s all you’ll ever be good at, rank one!”

  As Evon began to coalesce another giant pile of debris—his power was strong, but even William could tell that he did not have the best control or imagination—William pinched his fingers together, trying to imagine the dissipated flames coming back together again.

  He noticed something odd about his fire ability. For some reason, the moment he connected to the stream of mana, he could completely forget about maintaining the connection and focus entirely on controlling the flame itself. The mana flowed out from his body and into the flame at a consistent rate, almost like plugging a vacuum into the outlet in his apartment. It honestly made no sense to him, because this kind of interaction went against everything he’d ever read online about fire type abilities, which were supposed to come in short bursts of mana expenditure, rather than a sustained expenditure. He chalked it up to the influence of that other mana.

  Where the rest of the light mana went… no clue, which meant that he had to rely on this single flame ball as his entire mana-fueled offensive arsenal for the foreseeable future.

  But even a small weapon could be effective when applied at the right time, in the right way. Pinching three of his fingers closer, he began to collect the flames behind Evon, setting a trap in his blind spot. The process took a while.

  Evon had already conjured up a full boulder again, and tossed it against him. The casting speed difference between rank four and rank one was no joke.

  William dodged, but as he was trying to maintain his concentration, he messed up his footing and got hit in the hip by the heavy boulder. The reinforced fabric of his uniform held, but he felt his skin bruise underneath.

  “We can do this all day!” Evon shouted.

  Trying to ignore the pain, William continued the process of coalescing the flames back into a ball in Evon’s blind spot, but as it finally formed, his friends spotted it.

  “Hey, he’s making some fire behind you!”

  Those damn cheaters. As if fighting from three ranks up wasn’t enough, they had to call out his tactics? Did they have any shame? Thankfully, his friends noticed too late.

  Evon Mudd turned after being tipped off by his friends, but William already sent the fire ball towards him. Unfortunately, the fire ball couldn’t even be described as ‘flying’ towards him like a normal fire mage’s spell—it kind of just casually gilded towards him at a leisurely pace, reminiscent of a grandma driving a car down the road.

  Still, the distance to travel was so short that it managed to make impact. To William’s dismay, the fireball barely singed Evon before it dissipated once again, leaving a temporary black mark on his uniform that faded after just a few seconds.

  “It looks like I’m resistant to level one magic,” Evon Mudd sneered, looking cockier than ever as he brushed the dark specks off his uniform. “That felt mildly hot.”

  Damn. So even with the surprise factor of the flame ball’s unusual characteristics, a direct hit from his fire spell barely did any damage. This was the true difference in their ranks.

  High level awakeners possessed a slew of advantages over lower ranks, including increased resistances and slight regenerative abilities. It wasn’t an exact science by any means, but as far as he could tell, his level one fire spell was about as strong as a slap in the face to Evon.

  If magic couldn’t cut it, then maybe he’d better just use his fists… William charged forwards with an intent to simply punch Evon in that smug face of his, only to take a stone pebble to his mouth. Pain surged from his front teeth and lips, and he even felt one of his teeth had become slightly wobbly as blood dripped down his cut upper lip.

  Stone after stone immediately followed, pelting him in the neck, the eye, and he knew that if he didn’t have an awakener’s strengthened constitution and regenerative abilities, he might actually be in trouble.

  He ran forward again, gritting his teeth through the pain as he covered most of his eyes with his elbow, as stones now cut into his arm. Right when he was about to reach Evon, a thicker rock slammed into his stomach, knocking the wind out of him and sending him sprawling onto the ground.

  He struggled to breath as he stared up into the sky, his forehead hot as a stove, his eye swollen, neck bleeding, tooth hurting… but above all, he felt hot, flushed with pure, unadulterated frustration. Frustration at the fact that even now after the awakening, he still ended up being this pathetic. His frustration stewed until it became a burning conviction—that porter mission, and the one after, and the one after that—he’d risk anything to get stronger.

  Evon Mudd stepped over him, a large stone levitating over his head that he seemed to be ready to drop on him. “Did you really think that you could beat me—”

  “Stop!” called a healer, rushing over to William. She cleared the arena as Evon Mudd’s friends laughed and congratulated him for the victory.

  The healer placed her hand over his forehead as a warm, calming sensation flowed into his body, and all of his injuries began to recede. The swelling from his eye died down, the bruises and scratches around his body healed, and even his tooth felt better.

  “There. How do you feel?” she asked, helping him up.

  William groaned. “A bit of a headache, but otherwise fine. Thank you.”

  She smiled. “Just doing my job,” she said, before leaving to attend to another student.

  William walked away from the arena, avoiding eye contact with Evon Mudd or any of his friends after the rather humiliating defeat, still sulking. Was there anything he could have done better in that fight? Then, the realization hit him. He still had round two to go through, with another random opponent!

  Although he hoped that it would be another lower rank, knowing his shit luck lately, he’d better expect the worst.

  On another note, 5 chapters a week really is hard. I can write after work, it's really tough on me but it's doable, but when I 'just write' I kind of lose track of the stuff that makes a story that I like in the first place.