Haddral, being the veteran combatant that he was, knew the ins-and-outs of magical combat. In particular, he knew the big “secret” about magical duels: when two magic-users clashed, actual fight in the physical world was mostly just a distraction. The real battle was fought between minds. Why was this? There were two major reasons:

First, magic didn’t work well over ranges. Haddral had learned back when he was a squire that magical effects—from blessings to simple spells—decrease in power far faster than one would expect at range. The example that came to his mind was the classic “Lantern” blessing which formed a small globe of light with which to see by. His old instructor, a grizzled veteran, had asked him and all the other trainees to form a light in their hands and then attempt to form a second light on the other side of the training yard.

Forming the first Lantern had been trivial—it was one of the first blessings that was taught to recruits—but forming the second light on the far side of the yard had been incredibly difficult. When he’d finally accomplished it, the light that sprung into existence was pathetic; nothing compared to the brilliant globe floating above his hand. This relationship between distance and power requirements was unintuitive to Haddral, but whenever he was unsure, he recalled what one of the more erudite clergy had told him once: “Basically, if you must cast your blessing ten times as far and you’ll need one hundred times the power to achieve an equal effect.”

This limitation meant that unless you had a whole conclave of priests or coven of witches, long distance magic was almost completely off the table. That’s why most ranged magical attacks relied on throwing things: for example, once an accelerated stone left the magic-user’s sphere of influence, it wouldn’t simply stop: it maintained its kinetic energy. Similarly, if Haddral used the blessing for a blinding ray, he could manifest the starting point close to himself but then the actual ray of light could blind people hundreds of paces away. Unfortunately, while these ranged attacks could be debilitating to regular people, an accomplished magic user like Haddral or Mike could easily bat high-velocity stones out of the air and their visors had enchantments which shielded against intense light.

Secondly, once one had control of an opponent’s mana, it was all over for them. Living beings were positively saturated with the stuff, but it was under tight control by the creature’s soul—at least that’s what the Paladin had been taught. Haddral couldn’t simply reach out with his strength and stop someone’s heart or squeeze their brain with telekinetic force. No, first he had to bring the opponent’s unruly mana under his control and that meant achieving mental dominance. Then, he could telekinetically pulp their gray matter.

To win this mental battle, Haddral had his sword among other weapons in his arsenal. If he got a cut in, distracted the opponent, or made their focus waver, his mind would pounce on their distraction. Then, it would be over. Once he had a solid beachhead in their mind or found a chink in their mental armor, the conclusion of the physical battle was forgone.

Of course, as Haddral charged towards the Demon, none of this crossed his mind. His mind was blank and burning with a single-minded focus. His fighting was almost completely done by instinct: parries, thrusts, and slices he’d practiced so many times that his arms swung the sword by themselves.

The blankness and instinctive fighting were also a part of Haddral’s mental defense. An opponent wouldn’t be able to latch onto any inner thought processes or complex thoughts when he was in such a state. In fact, if an opponent spellcaster were to attempt to attack Haddral’s mind at that moment, they would have quite a hard time, finding only killing intent and nothing else on his mind. Short of magical shielding, single-minded determination or focus is one of the most effective forms of mental discipline and therefore protection.

His metal sabatons clinked against the slight incline and he charged towards the figure which was now rapidly lowering their hands from their attempt at deception. The Demon’s expression was now different, now it appeared concentrated. Still though, it wasn’t pulling a weapon or moving, so Haddral’s combat instincts had him draw his sword back, and just as he was closing in on the target, give a mighty horizontal decapitating slash.

Then Haddral’s concentration slipped a tiny bit, because something happened that his instinctive combat skills weren’t expecting: He’d missed, and more importantly, the Demon had moved. It should’ve been impossible; his slash was quick, and the creature had been still just a moment before. Now though, it wasn’t. It stood, looking intently at him, just beyond his reach. Strange, Haddral thought, it hasn’t capitalized on my distraction to launch a mental attack.

Then, although he was loathed to do so, he realized that he had to switch weapons. The opponent he was fighting clearly had some sort of speed-enhancement capability or was a skilled illusionist—both of which were the distinctive hallmarks of the more cunning Infernals. He’d never be able to keep up with his heavy slab of a sword. Mentally cursing the sharpening and care his blade would need later, he dropped it, and in the same smooth motion, reached for his whip-blade and drew it.

Well-oiled and cared for like all his weapons, the flexible blade spooled out of the cylindrical case at his hip and he infused his Strength into it. This weapon was tailor-made for these types of encounters: A grip with a long wire just a bit longer than he was tall and capable of achieving truly incredible speeds at the tip while remaining securely grasped in his hand. Furthermore, unlike ranged weaponry, the wire-like blade would be difficult for another magic user to affect while in his grasp due to his mana’s influence on the metal.

The disadvantage of the whip-blade was strength and mass. The blade could achieve incredible speeds but against plate, chain, or even heavy leather armor, it could only leave bruises barring a lucky hit. Against bare skin though… Weaving the long ribbon of metal through the air in front of him in a classic defensive pattern, he advanced, threatening his demonic opponent with the lightning-quick tip of the blade, and slowly advancing forwards. Now, maintaining his focus, all he had to do was wait for the right moment to strike, and then launch an all-out mental attack.

Meanwhile, Mike hadn’t been idle. He’d seen Haddral charge into the fray—as was common—and realized before the veteran’s sword even began its great swing that they were facing an extremely nimble adversary. Furthermore, when Haddral then drew the whip-sword, Mike knew that stepping into melee range wasn’t an option. Yes, two against one in a direct duel often had the advantage, but the whip-sword was notoriously hard to control and stepping into the fray now would just foul up the elaborate pattern that the wire-like blade was making through the air. No, Mike would provide ranged support, making sure that their adversary, the Demon, wouldn’t be able to catch a breath.

Holding his sword in a guard position, Mike spoke one of his most-used combat blessings and loosened the drawstring on one of the bags at his belt. Inside were shots: small metal spheres of lead. Focusing his mind on the pattern that the blessing had helped him form, he levitated one of the projectiles out of the bag and began to accelerate it. Doing so, he kept it close, and like a weight on an invisible sling, he swung it around himself in a circular pattern. This way, he could pour his body’s Strength into the projectile’s rapidly building speed without paying the exorbitant cost of using magic at range.

Then, a couple seconds later, when the projectile was positively thrumming through the air around him in an indistinct ring and Mike couldn’t push any more speed into it, he released it towards the foe. The marble-sized sphere whipped through the air, with perfect aim, and then missed. Where the Demon had been a second ago, it wasn’t anymore. Mike cursed quietly in his helmet—a very un-paladin thing to do—but simply began spinning up another projectile. No matter how good the opponent, their preternatural awareness and dodging skills wouldn’t let them last forever. With intermittent shots from Mike and the constant dancing of Haddral’s blade, both the Paladins were confident they would win eventually.

Haddral’s single-minded focus was beginning to be replaced by frustration. This fight was lasting far too long. Obviously, he’d been to several large-scale conflicts before where the “fighting” took several hours or even a day, but an actual engagement never took very long. Unlike the fanciful plays that nobles put on which consisted of duelists doing minute-long performances of elaborate parries, thrusts, and inter-combat banter, in Haddral’s experience, any direct encounter between two armed and armored opponents typically lasted less than twenty seconds.

During the first exchange of blows opponents would measure their skills, and during the second exchange, one of them would brutally capitulate on the mistakes or weaknesses of the other. What was frustrating to Haddral was that he hadn’t been attacked yet. All that the Demon was doing was dodging, weaving, and occasionally repositioning itself to stay away from Mike’s projectiles all while blathering away—which he resolutely ignored—in its strange accent in, what he assumed was, an attempt to distract him. This happened no matter what pattern he used, and by his estimation, the fight’s duration was nearing a minute now.

Furthermore, his opponent had recently gained this calculating look, as if it was staring into his soul or reading the next move he was going to make—and the one time that he’d repeated one of his whip-blade patterns, the Infernal had instantly noticed, and jumped through a gap, only aborting its attack to avoid one of Mike’s well-timed shots. After that, he’d begun to dig deep into his memories of training and started dusting off every unique whip-blade pattern that he knew.

Fortunately, and for some reason that he couldn’t understand, the opponent wasn’t making any magical attacks. Clearly, as indicated by its camouflage ability, speed, and supernatural awareness, it was a magic user of some caliber, yet it hadn’t launched a single mental attack nor had any wards that he could sense. Even more unusually, it went to the trouble of dodging Mike’s projectiles—which were something a mage of the aforementioned caliber should be able to magically deflect.

Any moment now, his hand would be forced. He’d run out of patterns, and he’d have to make a mental attack. Quickly, his mind flashed through the possibilities of what he could do: Usually, Haddral was staunch supporter of “overwhelming force”-strategies. He’d injure the opponent with a weapon or distract them with a hit and in their moment of pain, panic, or confusion, he’d simply attempt to crush his adversary’s mental defenses and subsequently their mind through brute force.

Haddral wasn’t stupid though. He suspected that brute force against a mage of this caliber—not to mention an Infernal—wouldn’t go over very well. As for the other school of mental attack? Well subtlety, control, and precision in mental combat weren’t what he was good at. No, he’d need to cheat to turn the tables; he needed something Miraculous to secure a victory.

Uttering the incantation and channeling his faith, he prayed for a Miracle, and when it came, he directed it towards his target. Surely, he thought, the power of a Demon should crumble under the divine glory of a Saint.