“Mordred, Aidan is here. Do you want me to stall so you can come get him?” Fanciful private messaged. Despite all her bluster about having no respect for him, Fanciful was just the tiniest bit uneasy about facing him. There was a weird confidence to him, and if she was being honest, she wasn’t sure her pride had completely recovered from getting humiliated by Raven yet.

“I really want to, oh do I.” Came the terse reply.

“Busy then? Mind if I take the points?” Fanciful smiled slightly, thinking that Aidan was actually kind of cute. Right now he looked like he was having a stroke. One of those cartoon characters with a dozen invisible arrows sticking out of him.

“Be careful.” Was the reply.

“He good?”

There was silence for a moment and a grudging, “okay.”

“You good there?” Fanciful wanted to be at the Square before it got overrun by Rebels. There was no point in being flashy with her fight if all the attention was elsewhere.

“The roads aren’t big enough to take true advantage of our numbers. We’re trying to knock a building down but it just keeps repairing. The fog isn’t helping us at all. Just sending in people and hoping for the best.” Mordred sounded frustrated. “And they are resurrecting and just running back from nearby, and from where you are. We tried to take over the closer cathedral here, but when that gets blocked we get hit from the people coming from the other one. Each thing we try is countered like they already have a contingency plan. That Shadow Fall girl is pretty good.”

“What a whiner.” Fanciful said out loud, wishing that she hadn’t asked Mordred her last question. Well, it sounded like she had plenty of time before the fight in Keristrazly Square was over.

“Of course, it’s just a punching match now. The plan is to hold our all-out attack for when Amelia intends to break through in a few hours. I can’t micromanage all the people playing for themselves. I wouldn’t want to anyway, doing it this way is choosing chaos, and fun!” Fanciful made a face. He was still going. Some people just couldn’t stop talking about themselves.

“What?” Aidan seemed to be recovering. “I haven’t whined at all. I’m a world class whiner, mind, but I’ve been very sporting about listening to your hurtful comments. You’re going to make me cry if you keep it up! Ever fought a grown man while he was crying?”

Fanciful blanked for a moment, wondering what he was talking about. Oh. He thought she was talking about him. “Not everything is about you, love.”

“I beg to differ.” Aidan nodded to her side. “On your right.”

“Hah. I bet that work--” Fanciful stopped speaking abruptly when she caught movement in her peripheral. Twisting to her right, she blocked a sword that was headed for her face. Aidan had actually been telling the truth! He really just threw the swordsman she was fighting under the bus, ruining his sneak attack!

“[Spike].” Aidan called out behind her in the same helpful tone.

Her expression turned to a frown for a moment even as she swung hard, knocking the swordsman back into the throng with a follow-through that would have done a major leaguer proud. “What now--?”

Fanciful hadn’t even started recovering from her swing when a spear of earth shot out from the ground. Overextended from the swing and still twisting, she was definitely going to impale herself on that spear! Dramatically twisting at her hips at the last second, she spread her arms out wide and watched the sharp tip pass a milimeter from her nose. The spear stood proudly straight in front of her for a moment before slowly sinking into the ground. The timing made it seem like the spear was discouraged that it had been so close, and was retreating for now.

“Whoops.” Aidan said blandly as she turned back to face him. His shoulders were still slumped, like he hadn’t quite recovered from the trauma of the verbal attack she’d used on him earlier.

“I thought you were being chivalrous for a second. You were just using your own guy as a distraction!” Fanciful pointed the end of her staff at him.

“I don’t need my plans explained to me.” Aidan offered helpfully. “But I’m glad you’re keeping up.”

“You made a big mistake!” Fanciful was trying to pscyh herself up. There was just something about this clown that threw her off. “I’m more than built to handle wizards and spellcasters. This’ll be over in a heartbeat. You have no idea the number of--”

“Mmm.” Aidan’s eyes were starting to wander to her right. “On your right.”

Fanciful hissed in frustration and hopped left, turning to meet empty air. Furious at being so easily led, she rocked back on her heel and started to spin. She would gap the distance and--

“[Don’t Look Up].”

Fanciful froze for half a second, her brain crunching hard. Of course she would just sneak a quick peak up and, nothing! Her eyes, having only left the field for a fraction of a second, noticed something swiftly approaching her body from below.

“Agh!” A shriek escaped her lips as she spread her stance wide and jerked her spine back. Both arms went wide as she barely kept her balance. Wide-eyed, she looked at the four earthen spikes that were all inches from skewering her in different places. One of the tips was only a few inches from her left eyeball.

Once again, after a moment passed, the earthen magic slowly dissolved back into the ground in the same slow hangdog manner.

Fanciful straightened up and glared at Aidan. She jammed the butt of her staff in the ground and then began slapping both her cheeks, giving a little strangled scream as she did so. She reached out for her staff, moving her neck around in a slow circle to loosen up.

“Ok! I’m ready now! Bring on your nonsense!” She growled.

Aidan had merely tilted his head slightly and watched her down his nose with narrowed eyes. “You’ve made it precisely one step. By my calculations, at your current rate, I’ll cast 50 spells before I’m required to move.”

Fanciful blinked rapidly and eyed the distance between them. She wasn’t that far away! There was no way that he could cast that many spells before she got over there. “You’re making crap up!”

“You could always try to take that extra step into my attack?” Aidan smiled slightly. “Then it would only be 25. If I’m being honest, I’m probably going to start backing up while I cast at some point. So consider these conservative estimates. Also, I have no problem ganging up on you, so you might want to hurry it up before the next wave of ressers wander by.”

Fanciful opened her eyes as much as she could, doing her best to get a sense of the battle nearby without looking away from him. The Rebels that had stormed the area because of the lowered Imperial presence were still fighting strong for now. Aidan was right in the sense that the longer the fight dragged on the worse it would be to fight him one on one. However…

“Why are you smiling? Having a daydream about how this is going to go?” Aidan asked curiously.

“I was just thinking, I don’t mind if you gang up on me. I don’t care how many of you Imperials there are. You’re all so weak. The only thing that increases is the amount of time I spend, not the difficulty.” Fanciful laughed. More opponents? Bring them on. Even Raven had been forced into trickery to deal with her, and she had been the most powerful person Fanciful had ever crossed weapons with.

Khiafin didn’t count because he was an asshole. Also, a once in a lifetime fluke of a person that humanity hadn’t somehow gotten to squashing yet.

“Ah.” Aidan put a hand up to his face, covering half of it like he was angry. She could swear that he looked like he was about to fall down. Like there was something wrong with him.

“It’s just the truth.” Fanciful shrugged, feeling the slightest twinge of guilt.

“No, sorry… I’m just… trying not to wander off. You’re so boring. I’m having trouble focusing.” There wasn’t a hint of teasing in his explanation. Like he was telling her why he couldn’t go to the movies because something came up. It was so casual that for a moment she didn’t know how to feel about it.

Fanciful’s expression turned stormy and her eyes narrowed to slits. “I am going to kill the crap out of you.”

“Hold onto that intensity,” Aidan replied somberly. He gave her a weak smile. “You can do it.”

Fanciful wanted nothing more than to just run straight at him, pick him up, and bash his body to bits against the ground until that face couldn’t smile even if it wanted. Instead, she looked at the ground carefully and lowered her shoulders. She would go fast. She would dodge everything she could and keep moving forward. Some of the attacks would hit her, but when she was a handful of steps away she would using profound winding steps and bridge the last few feet. As close as she would be, his perception would make it look like she’d vanished. Whatever backstep he took wouldn’t matter. He would be hers.

“Good plan.” Aidan smiled helpfully again. “A bit obvious, but that’s okay…”

“Just noise!” Fanciful spat. There was no need for complexity. Simplicity and power would be enough.

Fanciful pushed off and took the first step forward.

“[Don’t Look Down].” Aidan smiled and waved his staff. After casting he already started to open his mouth for the next spell. “[Don’t Look Up].”

She vaguely heard him incanting as the roar in her ears from moving so fast started to drown out all the noise, but her eyes didn’t leave him. Fanciful kept her eyes opened as much as she could, warning herself not to look at anything other than the prize. Fanciful had always been athletic with freakishly good reflexes. Multiply that by the bonuses of her stats and the ability of her class, and she was a god of agility.

The first two spells he cast were actually the same spell. Four spears came out of the ground and then four more a step later. She twisted her body like she was moving between traffic cones at a spring track training camp, gingerly stepping through the deadly barrage of sharpened dirt. She didn’t bother twisting maneuvering her weapon, and the pole that was being dragged slightly behind her shattered several of the spears as she passed without slowing her down.

“[One]. [One].”

She arched her back and slid on her knees, throwing her head back as lightning poured from his hands. She couldn’t avoid the first one entirely, but had managed to dodge the second one with her slide. She had bridged about a quarter of the distance but didn’t feel proud that his estimate had been off.

“[Floor]. [Floor]. [Parry]. [Parry]. [Nice].”

What the hell was up with these spell names?!

Fanciful jerked to the right, and spun to the left to avoid hands made of sand that grasped at her feet. Globbules of smoking liquid came right on the tail of those grabbing hands, forcing her to parry both of them, first left, and then right. The liquid splattered against her weapon, for the most part deflecting cleanly. Several drops splattered across her face and chest and began to sizzle. An acid dot appeared in the lower right corner of her screen, calmly alerting her to the fact that she would take some damage over time. Despite keeping Aidan largely in her view, her eyes had been drawn to the icon for a fraction of a second. It wouldn’t normally have been a huge deal, except that was all the time it took for the miniature meteor shower that crashed down on her from her upper left to be unavoidable. The miniature missile barrage staggered her, forcing her to lose some of her momentum to stay upright.

This guy is ‘okay’? Fanciful thought, a horrified feeling of dreading starting to spread through her body.

Aidan was starting to take a step backward, just as he said he would, and Fanciful’s face began to fall. This guy.

Fanciful started running zigzag, not caring anymore how dumb she looked. With an expression of delight she started veering directly to the right for an Imperial near the back of the herd. She ducked close to him, ignoring the look of shock on his face when he realized that she’d come up behind him.

“[Don’t Look Up].”

Fanciful quickly scanned her left and right, waiting for the spikes to appear on either side of the Imperial. Once she determined where the attack would come from she’d dart around the other sid--

Four earthen spears lanced through the Imperial player’s body, two of them directly skewering her through the shoulder. For a brief moment, Fanciful’s mind completely blanked.

Aidan didn’t know or didn’t care. “[Don’t Look Down]. [Don’t Look Up].”

Fanciful fell to the ground on her hands and knees. She dropped her epic weapon and started jerking back and forth, managing to narrowly avoid the eight spikes that came up through the ground.

The imperial guy turned and started screaming at Aidan. Aidan actually stopped and scratched the side of his nose, having the good grace to look sheepish. He nodded and bowed several times. The Imperial looked back at Fanciful and then hiked up his robes and headed away.

She had no idea why he left. Did she look that bedraggled?

Fanciful leaned back on her knees and stared at Aidan, brain still momentarily scrambled. She had felt so brilliant with her plan to use his allies against him. The zero hesitation to use them as a blind for his attack… was so cool.

“Are you going to get up?” Aidan frowned.

“Why aren’t you attacking me?” Fanciful asked slowly, trying very hard to keep her voice composed.

“You’ve got another five steps before you’re dead.” He replied bluntly.

EEEEEK. Fanciful turned away from him, scrambling on her knees toward her metal pole.

“Should I be doing a call out for you? Left Foot Red? Do you kids even play Twister anymore?”

“SHUT UP!” Fanciful bounced to her feet and brushed off her legs. She was doing her best not to look embarrassed. It was incredibly hard to look at Aidan right now. She was very close now. Maybe within 10 steps if she was lunging. Her weapon was long enough. She just needed to take one or two big strides and then she could use her movement ability.

“Ok! Game on…” Aidan sounded resigned. He picked up his foot and started to take a step backward--

“You’re mine!” Fanciful burst forward, eager, anxious, and a bit flustered.

“[One]. [One]. [One].” Aidan’s eyes widened in shock, the words spilling out as fast as he could cast.

Did he only now realize she only needed to get in range of him for a few moments for it to be over? Fanciful almost felt disappointed.

The lightning passed on her left as she jerked her whole body away, managing to keep her feet and her momentum like a tightrope walker. One stride. The next lightning bolt struck her head on, dropping her health to less than half and almost taking her off her feet. Second stride. He might be in range now but she couldn’t afford to be wrong. Fanciful let out a loud grunt as the third bolt hit her, smiling viciously through the sudden swinging camera feeling. She was no stranger to the discomfiture feature. She took that final step, and then an extra half-step just to be safe.

His mouth was opening up to cast one last spell, his hand lifted and pointed the Unfair stick straight forward. His heel was lifting off the ground. He looked desperate to take another step away. It was over. Time was over. He was over.

“[Curtain Call].”

Profound Winding Steps.

Fanciful had a brief feeling of disorientation. She prepared to brace herself for the first swing. She would just beat him to death as fast as she could. There was nothing graceful about how this was going to go down, but she was far beyond caring.

Her vision slam back into focus… The series of motions necessary to end him appeared in her mind. She would take the first swin--

Nothing happened.

Confusion settled on her features. Her lifebar was empty. Aidan stood a companionable few feet in front of her with a gentle look in his eye. The Unfair Stick was pointed straight at her chest.

“What?” Fanciful looked down. Had he hit her with the stick? No. The tip of the staff was still a good arms length away from her in front.

“Bye now. Go bother someone else.” With the same gentle look, Aidan pulled the Unfair Stick back in a practiced motion.

Fanciful immediately fell off-balance as a result, like she was tied to the end of that staff by a rope. There was the discomfiture feature, but this feeling was different. “What?” She tried again.

Schwip.

The sucking noise was the first clue.

The screen started to fade to black.

[You Have Died].

“What?” She said again, desperately trying to understand.

Seeing her look of unwillingness and confusion, Aidan held out his hand near the end of his staff.

A dragonfly orb appeared. There was fog, and the sky was overcast, but it was still daylight. It took a moment for her to realize that with the extra wisplight she could see a thin line extending from the staff. The added illumination revealed a paperthin translucent blade that extended from the end of the Unfair Stick by a foot.

She had used profound winding steps to get in the perfect range to strike him and had reappeared in the same space where the magical blade was held. The game physics engine had likely done a check to see what the outcome was. It had decided that she had impaled herself. She had died before her video display had updated. The rest of her game client was just catching up.

The mage blade. An incredibly low-level spell that novice mages could cast for free. It was, ostensibly, for situations where they didn’t have any useful spells available or ran out of mana. With the agility and strength stats of wizards being, well, puny -- it was a meme spell.

Fanciful had never seen a translucent mage blade. What mastery was that? Profound? No, he’d called out a spell. Grandmaster surely? A Grandmastery of a meme spell?

[You Are Being Transported To the Cathedral Near Blutonsi Park!]

Fanciful sat on one of the benches in the cathedral, closing the death losses screen. Still too stunned for words. The look on his face. The casual goodbye.

You’ll be dead in five steps… or something like that?

Fanciful hugged her arms to herself, shoulders shaking. A low-pitched scream started to escape her lips. If her game avatar could have blushed she would have been honeycrisp red.

So cool!