Pre-Chapter A/N: Welcome to October, guys! Let's smash whatever goals we've set ourselves this year. More chapters on my patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga)— same username as here and link in bio. Experimenting with two chapters a week, we'll see how long I can keep this up for.
"It's been one hell of a ride, hasn't it?" Russo said, taking the stage as the applause died down. Now that I knew this whole thing had been engineered to get people to feel as many strong emotions as possible, it was all beginning to make perfect sense. All the showmanship, the bits of the tournament that hadn't made complete sense. What did unique elemental environments have to do with showing who the best duelist was? Very little. The environmental additions had probably ended up unjustly favoring or hindering quite a few duelists as things went. But then what did it matter when the goal wasn't creating the fairest or best tournament, but the best spectacle? And this was a spectacle par excellence. Even the final was going to be a spectacle in a way duels rarely were. The rules guaranteed that.
"Yeah, I can just hear how excited you all are. But I wonder if we can get even louder?" he prompted, and the crowd heeded. At this point, it was likely that if there was a ceiling, they would have blown it off already.
"Before we get to the finalists, I have something special lined up for you. It is my pleasure and honor to introduce the Weird Sisters," he said, bowing to the side as the musical act took the stage. I turned to look at the other box on the other end of the stadium to find her already staring at me. Ifeoma Okonkwo, my opponent. Her hands were running over the totem necklace—a nervous tick, or a feigned one to make me think the totem was more important than it truly was. There were all sorts of magical foci she could be relying on. Each one with its own strengths and weaknesses. She had four rings on her fingers—any of them could be a magical focus. She had a bracelet on as well. That could be it. But the necklace was the largest thing she wore. And it was easily the most unique.
She tilted her head to the side, still observing me from her position. I had a strategy in mind for dealing with her. In truth, I had many strategies in mind. All I had seen so far was prodigious transfiguration and the ability to conjure a magical plant of some sort. It had been able to create flames that had near-overwhelmed Cece's shield with their force and power. Then there were the things that she had in the tank. The small tricks she would have kept in reserve for this duel. The things she would have learned from watching me fight, and the countermeasures she would have prepared for it. That was the part I looked forward to seeing the most. She would have gotten the chance to watch me the most—to see what I could do, to see what I favored, to study my dueling more closely than anyone else. So what would she come up with to deal with me? What were my blind spots?
"Whew, is it hot in here? Those sisters sure know how to bring the heat, don't they? If you enjoyed that, then just wait to see what we have for you in the first half-time show. It's going to be a doozy," he said to the applause of the crowd.
"Now, we can welcome the finalists to the stage for what is sure to be the duel of the century," he called out. I turned my neck from side to side, working out any stiffness or soreness. This was it. The big one. The one we've all been waiting for.
"In the blue corner, all the way from Africa's Uagadou in Uganda, we have Ifeoma Okonkwo. A budding mistress of transfiguration and herbology. She has set hearts, and quite a few duelists, on fire with her fiery personality and even more fiery dueling. Please give it up for Ifeoma Okonkwo," he said, stepping back and allowing the applause of the crowd to get louder again, reaching a crescendo. Ifeoma walked out of the hallway, dressed in the finalist's robes, waving in all directions. She even blew a few kisses, which got an even more intense reaction from a few members of the crowd.
"And her opponent in the red corner, we have Harry Potter from Britain's premier school, Hogwarts. The Boy Who Lived, Triwizard Champion, Winner—the number of titles we can refer to Mr. Potter by are endless, just like the variety of magical skills he has been able to keep us on our toes with. Now give it up for Harry Potter." I walked in with my shoulders held high. I had made some alterations to my robes. Just small things to make them more form-fitting and, dare I say, stylish. When I dropped my cloak to the ground and jumped to the platform, the sounds from the crowd amplified.
"Now, the duelists have been informed of the rules ahead of time. The duel shall be split into three thirds, with each third lasting five minutes. If any of the duelists are knocked unconscious or otherwise yield at any point during the duel, then the whole duel shall be over and declared in the favor of the other party. However, if both duelists are still standing at the ringing of the buzzer, then they shall split up for fifteen minutes to strategize, heal, and whatnot. Don't worry, my lovely audience. I, Julian Russo, have taken steps to ensure that you remain entertained throughout the intermissions. Just trust me," he said with a charming wink.
"Now, I'll hand it over to the referee," he said, stepping back and waving another man forward. It took me a second to place the face, but he was the same man that had refereed my qualifying matches.
He directed us to bow to each other, and once we did, he blew the whistle—when did they start using whistles in duels?
"Begin!" his voice rang out, and I struck first.
I went tried and true, using a spell that I hadn't used all that much in this tournament but I had practiced to perfection all the same. A flick of my wrist, and a thick bolt of red light as wide as a galleon left my wand, aimed center-mass. She stepped back, backhanding the spell into the wards and ceding the initiative to me, to allow me to begin to work my magic. Of course, I accepted the advantage.
I twirled my wand, each spin ending in a bludgeoning curse. She backed away further, opting to dodge these spells. I sent a wave of magic into the ground itself as she snapped her fingers. The ground around me erupted into shards as I shattered it to prevent anything from forming. It seemed to work, as I did not see the telltale green of the vine she'd used against Cece begin erupting.
'Dao,' I mentally incanted, sweeping my wand from side to side. She splayed out her fingers, forming a shield that caught my spell in the middle of its arc. I watched it, the dark purple arc of magic that marked the Chinese cutting curse being held in the air between her fingers, the color of the spell shifting just at the edges as the only sign of the shield she had formed. And then she pushed, sending the spell back my way at double the speed. I ducked underneath it, barely managing to avoid the spell without using my full speed.
Closer to the ground, I took the chance to slam my wand into it, creating earthen spikes across the ground that erupted in a straight line from my wand to where she had been standing. Of course, she had moved away the second the first of the spikes shot out. But that was only half my spell; a twist of my wand forced all the spikes to explode, peppering the both of us with tiny bits of rubble. Of course, I directed the baked-in explosion in such a way that it would do as little damage to me as possible, so I just lifted one arm to cover my head while the few stones that came my way bounced against my robes or the arm I covered my head with.
I looked over at her to find that she had caught all the pieces of the debris that had gone her way with some variant of the impedimenta curse. She snapped her fingers, and the small stones turned to arrows. Another snap and they were spinning around and shooting at me, aiming to turn me into a human version of a porcupine.
I took a deep breath, and fire bloomed into being. Not Fiendfyre—that would have gotten me a warning. No, this was a lesser spell that created easily controlled flames. But I liked it because, just like the disarming charm, it responded phenomenally to the amount of magic used in conjuring it. The blue flames caught the approaching arrows and in a matter of seconds had turned them into naught but cinders, and then I shaped the flames into a fireball I fired right at my opponent. She slapped her hands together in a clap, and the ground beneath her erupted, water streaming up to fight the fire with its elemental superior.
This was no ordinary fire though, and it managed to boil a good portion of the water into steam. Still, she kept at it, calling upon more and more groundwater until even my fire could do naught but yield. Still, that meant a good portion of the platform had been flooded. A flick of my wand froze all that water, creating a layer of ice over the ground. A layer that she shattered, reaching down and punching straight through the ice.
Vines grew from all around her, reaching out and coming straight for me. I took a shallow breath before pushing my wand out. I banished the first few vines away, but more and more of them began creeping towards me.
As I prepared another fire spell, I froze mid-motion as a buzzer rang. "Round One Complete: Draw," I heard the referee's voice say, and I looked over to Okonkwo, looking at her practically scowling. An expression that did not last longer than a second, it turned out, as she turned to the crowd, wide smile on her face and waving in all directions.
I turned and jumped off the platform, heading back to my box. Russo was introducing the next act to begin performing, but my attention was on none of that. Because Ifeoma Okonkwo had been holding back in all her previous duels. That level of water manipulation was not something she had ever displayed. A fact made all the more surprising considering she'd fought two duels in the water arena. I'd never even considered that she could have been holding back just the same as I was. So now the question became, was that it—the limit of her power, or was she capable of more still? Was there still a point I was yet to push her to?
I wanted to get back to it already. I walked into the box and found it had been stocked since I was last here. A feat considering that hadn't even been seven minutes ago. I ignored the food, not wanting to risk anything, and made a beeline for the water. I chugged down a bottle before settling down to watch the boy band perform.
As I did so, I decided on a strategy for the next round of the duel. She'd proven that she had enough power to hang on for the short term at least. What I would test next would be her speed. How quickly could she adapt to a barrage of spells and transfigurations? I'd focus on precision over power, and quantity over quality. I wasn't going to give her the time or space for those big spells.
"Round two: Begin!" This time, she managed to strike first. Her snapped fingers created a spark that traveled across the space between us. It was relatively slow-moving, and I was tempted to just ignore it and focus on pressing the attack. The only issue with that was that I could feel just how much magic was in that spark. Ignoring it would be stupid, so I slashed my wand to the side, creating a massive golden shield that caught the spark just as it got into range, and like I expected, the spell turned out to be a tad more complicated than it had seemed, exploding into a massive conflagration the second it made contact. I felt something travel through my bones themselves—the force of the explosion?
I took a step back as she snapped her fingers twice more, each time creating massive explosions that made me feel like I was being held and shaken by someone with little regard for my dignity. She moved to snap her fingers again, and I tore down my own shield, sending three piercing curses at her so quickly that they almost appeared to be a single spell. She completed the motion, and I tracked it carefully while sending more and more spells.
I twisted my wand, shooting bombardment curses at her that curved through the air to strike her from the side rather than head-on to bypass the shield she had created. I noted that the spark had traveled about half the distance between us, and I shot a piercing curse at it. The second it came in contact with my magic, it exploded outwards, creating a wave of concussive force that near-tossed me off my feet. I dug into the ground to prevent myself from moving.
Okonkwo had her hands stretched out behind her, and that somehow was enough to keep her from falling out of the platform. She turned those hands towards me and then pushed forwards. Only instincts had me rolling to the side. A wave of wind tore through where I had just been standing. I scowled. Just how many things did this infuriating girl have up her sleeves? I twisted my wand, sending a barrage of cutting curses at her. She clapped her hands together to form another shield. This shield I smashed through with a shield breaker, forcing her to take a step backward, and then I hammered her position with a pair of bludgeoners. She dove underneath one and slapped the other away with her backhand. Then she slapped her hand into the ground. It began to shake and shiver, and then from the ground came near a dozen plant bulbs, each one a deep red and closed at the top.
Not keen on wanting to see what they would do so close, I aimed a rendering curse at the one closest to me, cutting it to pieces. But that was the only one I was able to destroy before they began to open.
From each of them came a yellowish gas. I scowled, casting a bubble-head charm around my head, knowing full well just how the spell would limit me in combat. Still, all that meant was that I had to stop holding back as much.
I allowed the gas to spread as it wished, ignoring it in favor of assaulting her with spell after spell. She dodged the first two before backhanding one away. I swept my wand from left to right, turning the ground around her to mud. She pressed her hands to the ground, managing to restore a small circle around her to solid ground. Good. But not enough.
I twisted my wand, and the mud came alive, reaching out for her. She snapped her fingers, and one of the tendrils exploded. In that time, the gas I'd been ignoring finally reached me. With dragon-hide gloves and boots, the only place I had exposed skin was my neck. And that was why I didn't notice until it was too late. I cursed up a storm as I suddenly felt a stinging feeling in my neck. I took a step back, but the feeling did not leave. Fuck. It was so itchy. I lifted my hand to begin itching, and in that time, Okonkwo had dealt with my animated creatures and was now facing me more fully. The bulbs bowed and turned towards me, and instead of spraying fire like they had against Cece, they began to spark and sizzle. Oh, hell to the fucking no.
"Ventus Maxima," I whispered, blowing away the yellowish poison powder and granting myself some temporary relief from the pain before I began to carve runes in the air. There was no need in keeping a trump card for the future if I wouldn't be living to see it, and I had no doubts that so much lightning had the power to kill me.
She snapped her fingers as I felt my shield spell snap into place. I twisted it, making it omnidirectional, even as that tripled the magical cost. The bolts of lightning from her plants smashed against my shield. They managed to make no headway until they ran out of juice, and then I dispelled said shield. I turned to send a spell at her, but then the buzzer rang once more. She fell to her knees, shaking, once it did.
Well, at least I knew where her limits lay. Still scratching my neck, I made my way back to my box while Russo presented another musical act.
A/N: The duel ends next chapter, I promise. And after that we move to the next arc of this story. One that should tie in a lot of the divergence that has been going on and hopefully answer a few pressing questions. Next four chapters up on patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga)(same username as here and link in bio), support me there and read them early.