It was the next day, my core was back to normal, and I was ready to go, but there was something I wanted to do first. It is necessary for me to know just what everyone can do, I don't want to just hear about it, I want to see it.
Today, I will be sparring with the other mages, of course, I won't be using my blood magic, that will end the match way too quickly. I'll be sticking with ice and wind only, this will allow me to defend and attack, just not with my full force, I'll still dial those spells down.
I was in my tent alone, Callias was setting everything up for me, I had just finished a meal, it was a cold stew which wasn't awful, but it wasn't good either. I would say it was about one o'clock in the afternoon, so we had plenty of time.
I got up from my bed, and made my way out of the tent, and into the camp where people were up and about, most making their way over to the field Callias had made for us to spar in. The non mages would just be watching, I didn't care what they did, I'm not trying to be rude, but they are kind of useless in these types of battels.
"General." The soldiers said as they bowed while I walked past them, towards Callias in the middle of the field. It seems we are ready, everyone is near the field, it's a big crowd, I hope these mages can entertain them.
The field was about forty by forty yards, so it was big enough to cast whatever spell you wanted. I don't think anyone here will be super strong where they can hurt someone outside the field. The soldiers moved out of the way so I could make it to Callias, he was smiling at me as I got closer.
"You ready?" He asked me, and I nodded my head. "Okay, then let's get started." He pulled out the list of mages we made yesterday with their element on it. "First up, I would like Damian Vinseal, fire elemental." Callias shouted to the crowd, and the man named Damian stepped up, he was a skinny man, maybe in his thirties, but he used a spear that he augmented. He also had blonde hair, which to me, didn't really match his whole face, but I won't judge.
"Lance Virion, it's an honor to be sparring with you." He spoke horsely, like he was slightly nervous, and bowed his head.
"Did you already explain to everyone what was going on here?" I asked Callias, seeing if I needed to speak to the three hundred soldiers currently watching us.
"Yes, I said that you wanted to test the mages here by sparring with them." Callias answered, then went on. "I also told them you wouldn't be using your blood magic, and that they should take it seriously, but at the same time, try not to get hurt."
"Did you tell them the other thing?"
"Yes, I did tell them that the mage that surprised you the most would be helping us plan our attacks out in the future." Callias nodded, then backed away from us. "When you end the battle, I'll send another mage out for you to fight."
I gave Callias a thumbs up and faced Damian. "Remember, take this seriously, try to kill me, I won't let you, I just want to see your strength in a battle." I conjured an ice sword in my right hand.
"Yes sir." Damian said, drawing his spear from his back, and then surrounded it with his fire mana. The soldiers around us chattered, none of them have seen me fight, only heard the stories. Damian got into a fighting position, then launched himself at me, he was moving so slow, it was so easy to dodge his first stab of the spear.
I swung my sword at his head, and he brought his spear up, our blades crashed, he sent a kick at me, and I shot a stream of wind at him, knocking him backwards, away from me. He then launched himself at me again, and I parried his blow, spun, and sent my blade towards his neck.
The man back stepped, and I shot another stream of wind, sending him backwards, and then kept on applying it, he couldn't move forward at all. I vanished and appeared next to him, canceling the wind spell, and held my sword to the side of his neck.
"Not bad." I said, it was over already, but that was to be expected. "You need to work on your offense, if you come across a Conjurer, you won't be able to get close to them if they are using a spell like I just did."
"I'll work on it, thank you." Damian bowed, and then started to walk away. The soldiers clapped their hands, but I waved it off, I didn't want this to be some show, I needed to know who I was going to be fighting with.
"Next up, Liam Betford!" Callias shouted, and an elf stepped out toward me. Liam was a very kind person, he was a water conjurer, mid orange, around the age of thirty like Damian, he had blonde hair, and a skinny frame.
"General Virion, it is an honor." He bowed, and then water started to surround him, he then got into a fighting stance as soon as he got close to me.
"Liam, you're a conjurer, so I won't attack you straight up, just try to hit me with a spell of your own." I told him, knowing he wasn't going to be able to touch me at all, no one here could. Callias would probably be the closest, but that is if I am not using blood magic.
"Okay." He answered, and I waved for him to start, water shot at me, but froze as it got close to me, falling to the ground like it was nothing. He started to move around, shooting water scythes towards my body, but again, they froze as they got to close.
His spell wasn't weak, it definitely would do damage to a normal mage, I shot an ice ball at him, and he rolled out of the way. He also was pretty agile, that's nice. A scythe of water came for the back of my head, and I spun, froze it, caught it, then shot it at Liam.
His eyes widened in my movement, and fell down on to his ass, and I spoke up. "That's enough, Liam, well done." I nodded at him. "You were better than I was expecting, a normal mage would be killed by that."
"Thank you, that means a lot coming from a Lance." Liam bowed and left the field, and I turned to Callias again, waiting to hear who he was calling on next. I cracked my neck, getting ready, even though I wasn't really doing anything special.
"Next up, Melody Tremaine." Callias sent me a smile, and the female known as Melody walked out to me, she was a wind elemental. Everyone eyed her up as she stopped before me and bowed.
"General, it's good to see you again, and thanks for letting me spar with you." She nodded, and I felt the wind around her start to shift. I sent her a smile, and motioned for her to begin, not knowing what to expect.
The wind shifted, and started to come at me, pushing me backwards. I allowed it to happen, instead of jumping out of the way, I wanted to see what she could do. I felt the wind outside of the stream pushing me shift as well, forming into blades, and they launched at me.
I shot backwards, letting the current push me away, and the blades missed me, but as they entered the stream, the blades kept on coming, but the speed of them increased as the current pushed them.
She was combining her two spells, very nice, she might be one of the strongest mages here. I stopped moving, and as the blades were about to clash into me, I manipulated the wind in front of me, pushing the blades into the ground before me.
The wind current stopped, and Melody stood about thirty yards from me, and I shot an ice ball at her, making her dodge the attack. I shot closer to her, and shot another ball, and it collided with her chest plate, knocking her down to the ground.
The ice ball didn't do much, I made sure of it, I didn't want to kill my own soldiers. "You okay, Melody?" I asked, walking up to the girl as she sat on the ground, gathering herself.
She looked up at me, and I reached out a hand for her to take. "Yes, I am fine." She took it, and I helped her up to her feet. "You are something else, no wonder they made you a Lance at your age." I shrugged, laughing slightly.
"Melody, you may be one of the strongest mages here." I spoke honestly to her. "I have to admit, the way you combined the two spells was nice."
"Thanks, but you haven't seen anything, my sister and I, usually combine our magic." Her sister was Cassandra, they were twins, and she was a water elemental. "We've been trained that way ever since we were young."
"Oh, I'll take that into consideration when planning, thank you for letting me know." I wonder how dangerous the two of them are together. I don't need to see Cassandra fight then; I'll just use my imagination. "Go rest up."
"I will." Melody nodded and walked away from me.
"Alright, next, Casel Bunker." Callias shouted, and a dwarf walked out into the field, he was part of the demolition team. He was an augmenter that used a stone hammer to shatter the ground. He was around my height, kind of fat, not that much though, I bet he packs a punch when he lands a hit.
"Lance Virion, I am excited to do this." He bowed his head, and a big hammer formed in his hand. I still had my ice sword in my right hand, even though I didn't use it in the last two fights, so I was ready to go.
He launched himself at me, swinging his hammer, I ducked under it, sent a kick into his ribs, knocking him backwards.
He gathered himself, launched himself at me once again. He was slow, but his attack had power, I rolled to the side, spun, brought an ice spear out of the ground that stuck into his stone hammer, holding it in place so that he couldn't move it.
I then held my ice blade to the side of his neck and sent the dwarf a smile. "You need to work on your speed." I know he was older, and that may not be something he can do anymore, but he couldn't hit shit if the person was fast.
"I know, Young Lance, that's been my weakness for a while now." At least he knew that already. "I appreciate your words." He bowed to me again and walked back to the crowd.
These soldiers are pretty weak, but that is to be expected from normal soldiers. The only one that surprised me was Melody, and I bet when she fights with Cassandra, they are stronger, but that is it so far.
"Next...." Callias shouted.
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It took about an hour and a half to get through everyone, even if the soldiers were weak, I had a nice time sparring for fun, examining them.
At the moment, it was Callias and I in my tent, just talking about the mages, trying to decide what we should do.
"The strongest three mages had to be Donte, Melody, and Cassandra." Callias told me, and I nodded my head, agreeing.
"Yeah, Donte was a conjurer as well, with fire, all the augmenters were pretty weak, but that might have just been me. They all moved so slow; it was hard to judge them." I responded, kicking my feet up.
"They weren't." Callias shook his head. "You are just that much faster than them." That's what I figured. "I think I could take all of them down as well, but not as fast and fluent as you did."
"All right, I think we can move out soon." I was thankful Arthur trusted me to do this, I'll make him proud.
"Yeah, I agree, I say we head west or either north, but you think they are underground, so they can be anywhere." Callias didn't know what I did exactly, and I mean, he and I were really close, but I can't tell him the truth.
"They can be anywhere, and in any size, there is a chance they number over three thousand, or more." I shrugged. "Even at that number, I think we can take them out if they didn't know we were coming."
"Three hundred verse three thousand, I don't think the element of surprise would help us."
"I know, but if we play it smart, trust me, we could take them out." I didn't care what I had to do; I would come up with a plan to win. "Alright, I think we should head north towards the Elven Kingdom; I have a slight feeling we will find a lot of them there."
"Slight feeling you say?" He sent me a smile. "How far does you blood magic reach so that you know where they are?"
"I would say with some concentration, three to four miles." I didn't know exactly; I usually know the location and can picture the people there. "However, it's not like they are going to be on the surface, they are going to be underground, so most of the times we won't know until we are almost over top of them."
"True." Callias responded. "Not all of the camps are going to be underground though, and those are going to be the bigger forces."
"We can always avoid them." I had no intention of avoiding a battle. "So, I think we make a small council for decision making, I'll have final say, but I will want some advice."
"You want me to get Melody, Cassandra, and Donte?" I shook my head at him, and he went on. "Then who?"
"For starters, I think Melody, not Cassandra, we don't want both of them." I paused, thinking about who else. "I liked Daryl, he seemed pretty smart, and he was a fierce fighter." Daryl fought with two axes, augmented with wind. "Finally, I want you to find a non mage that seems smart, I want someone without magic here, helping to make decisions."
"I can do that." Callias stood from the seat he was in. "What a wise young man." He said sarcastically, and I rolled my eyes at him. "I am happy to be back fighting with you, Veer."
"Likewise, Callias." He left the tent and went to give word to the people I had just spoke of.
I like being here without Arthur, I feel more, I don't know, like I am being depended on. I don't know how to explain it, but for some reason, I kind of missed being around Sylvie.
I shook my head, I can't be thinking that way, but it's hard not to. I had a good time with her the other night, that I remember, but even before that, I always liked to be with her.
I need to be thinking about these upcoming battles. If a Retainer shows up, I should be fine, it's only that I now have to think about the other soldiers' lives, but some of them are expendable.
If a Scythe shows up, I could be in trouble, but I'll figure that out as we go. I doubt Agrona has the balls to send a team of Wraiths, he won't show weakness at this time.
I wish I could say I was scared, but right now, all I was feeling was happiness. I had my own force that I could do anything with, and I was all by myself, it was exactly what I wanted.
Another thought came to mind, I was going to be sitting inside of this tent for a while, having nothing to do except thinking and practice magic. I need to take precautions, I know Agrona can manipulate the mind, so I need to make sure I have a way to counter that, which I think I did.
I wanted to use blood magic to suppress my thoughts and memories, I didn't know if it was possible, but I was going to be testing it out, if it worked, it would mean my memories of the novel could be protected from Agrona.