Watching the remaining battles of Round 2, Jude was beginning to have a better idea of how magic worked for others. He was also obtaining a more solid understanding of the elements used in magic.

At first, Jude had assumed that there were five prime elements, wind, earth, water, fire and metal. But this assumption was based on a vague idea from his previous world. He couldn’t even remember if that was the original lineup. But by seeing first hand all the magic going around him, he was able to compile a better understanding of it all.

Elemental Mages were the most evident in their use of elements, and they did indeed use these elements. However, instead of five primary elements there seemed to be six. The element Jude seemed to miss was wood. There were also a few other elements, like lightning, but they were considerably rarer than the primary six.

The addition of a new primary element threw Jude into deep thought. When he started designing his staff, he wanted to core of it to be all the prime elements. By doing this, he would be able to connect the rarer elements to their primary roots creating an overall stable platform for processing complex magic but now that he was missing one of the primary elements in his mana processor.

Jude slowly sank into deep thought as he contemplated how he would change the structure of the mana processor.

***

A dark shadow flickered across the ground; it moved as if only the shadow existed and not the thing that cast the shadow. Indeed, this was true, for only the shadow moved across the ground.

It had taken a long time for Guudnash to heal his wounds. Regrowing half his body was an extremely arduous and painful process, but in that process, he found unexpected rewards. He now had powers that he had only seen the True Demon use, this Shadow Movement was one of them.

But his hatred of Jude had only grown. Not only had Jude killed Abaud, who was like a son to Guudnash, he was also cut in half by Jude. But until the sand storm over Arkess fully dissipated, Guudnash could not return to Longdale and seek his revenge.

In the meantime, Guudnash would slowly take over the Riwa Kingdom. He wouldn’t fall into the same trap as the previous Demon Lord fell into. He would work behind the scenes and corrupted the government from the inside out.

This way, when it came time for revenge, Guudnash wouldn’t have to face Jude personally. Jude was too much of a wild card, and it almost seemed as if the had given Jude its favor. But Guudnash knew that wasn’t possible. The was impartial; it didn’t have a conscience or personality to favor someone.

But there was another person, the old man that he had seen talking to the previous Demon Lord.

Guudnash put all these thoughts out of his mind. He needed to concentrate on the mission at hand.

He, as a shadow, moved like a blur through the Core City of Geonar, bypassing guards and protection magic like it wasn’t even there. Riwa had never seen a true demon invasion and because of that Geonar didn’t have any defenses against the all mighty powers of Guudnash.

He passed an arena that was blazing in light and sound. These things held little interest for Guudnash. He continued to make his way forward until he came to a grand castle.

This was the most fortified place south of the Beast Lands, the seat of the monarchy, the palace of the summoned hero. Only the descendants of that hero lived here, and only one remained. The last king of Riwa.

Guudnash took a moment to determine if there was anything that could detect or block him here. But as he suspected, there wasn’t.

His shadow continued forward and flashed over the wall faster than most eyes could see. It was night, so even the guards stationed there didn’t see a thing.

After passing, even more, walls and fortifications, Guudnash finally reached the inner palace. Like someone who knew their way, Guudnash’s shadow went directly to where the king's chamber was. But before he entered he noticed a powerful magic foundation that could block him.

“Well this will take a while to break through,” he said to himself.

But as he started the process of breaking through the foundation, he smirked. He had underestimated his own powers. Not more than five minutes later, the shadow entered the room.

The attendant standing near the door didn’t notice as a shadow merged with his own. The attendant was there to aid the king with whatever he requested, day or night, and always stood still as a statue. But now, as the shadow merged with his own, he started to turn gray, just like the statue he was imitating.

The king lay in his bed asleep. His gray hair and long beard were clean, but he still exuded a sickly air. A low cough would escape him every now and then, but it didn’t wake him up in the least. He had suffered from this illness for nearly his whole life; it was the Arkess Curse.

When his forefather, the hero, usurped the Arkess Kingdom and established the Riwa Kingdom, the great king of Arkess cursed the hero and his family line. As long as the Arkess line existed, so too would the hero’s line live. But once all heirs of Arkess died, so would the line of the hero die as well. For the king to still be alive meant that there was at least one Arkess heir left. But since there was only one left, the curse took its toll on the last heir of Riwa.

It was unfortunate that the current king didn’t know about the Arkess curse. Otherwise, after the fall of the Arkess family due to the creation of the Aquifers destroying their land, he would have prevented the man hunt. Now after so many years, it was not surprising that there was only one Arkess left.

Of course, Guudnash had done his research and knew all of this. He didn’t know who the final heir of Arkess was, but that didn’t matter to him.

He left the shadow and his form fully manifested. He looked human, though not a hair grew on his body, and he wore dark clothes trimmed in gold like a noble. While he looked human, his presence said otherwise.

The king, sensing this presence woke up with a start and then a cough. When he saw Guudnash, he didn’t shout or look surprised. His tired eyes were resigned to the fate of death and anyone who made it this far could kill him before he even attempted to call for help. Besides, death might just be the release he needed at this point.

Guudnash looked at him keenly, and it almost seemed as if he could read the kings thoughts.

He said, “Don’t worry, I’m not here to kill you. I am here to release you from your pain. What do you think? Are you interested?”

***

The second round matches were nearly done by the time Jude decided what he was going to do with his staff. He had come up and thrown away a number of ideas for implementing a wood glyph with the current structure of the staff. Unfortunately, there was no way to do it without impeding the mana conversion to different types of elements. He concluded that he would have to scrape off the current glyphs and re-engrave new ones.

He knew this would upset Ellie; she had worked hard to engrave the current glyphs and harder still to forge out the inlays. Hopefully, she could salvage the inlays, but he wasn’t sure if that was possible yet. This was the first item they had done inlays for after all.

But all this could wait. Jude’s real problem was that most item skills used charges. He hadn’t realized this and inadvertently told Jorgan about his items. Longdale was a low-level newbie town, how was he supposed to know that items with skills would have charges? The best thing he could get there were scrolls. He figured that the scrolls low-level was why they could only be used once. He didn’t realize that this was the typical thing for almost all scrolls.

Now he had to make a choice, either pull out his epic staff, which he didn’t want to do just yet. Or rely on his innate Spell Analyst magic. The competition forbade the use of scrolls, so that option was out. Not using scrolls made sense for other classes as they would probably buy the scrolls. But for Jude, it was a problem as it was his classes primary attack magic.

He still had the level 30 magic , but he hadn’t had enough opportunities to train this magic to be of use.

He could also use Disruption Magic, but in this situation, it would mostly be defensive rather than offensive. The way he disrupted the ground to create attacks wouldn’t work on these white stone cubes that all the contestants stood on. Besides, it was a very unpredictable attack which was not to Jude’s taste at all.

If only he could figure out a way to use scrolls-Wait! Maybe he did have an idea.

Jude’s four cubes slid in front of another person with four cubes. It looked like the next round was about to start.

***

Jorgan was excited, really excited. He had finished his fight in nearly an instant to see how Jude fought and wasn’t disappointed in doing so. But what surprised him, even more, was the conversation with Jude afterward.

Somehow, Jude and his craftsman friend were able to create items that even Elite Classes like an Archmage would drool over. Jorgan was truly glad he had struck up a friendship with this fellow.

It was too bad that Jorgan was now stuck in this competition. was only a line of sight skill and he couldn’t contact people back at his estate. He would need to quickly assess what rare materials he had and figure out a way to get Jude to make him an item or two. Most high-level crafters and wizards who were involved in crafting endlessly craved good materials to either craft new items or to practice their skills. Money for them was usually meaningless as they would have earned more than they needed. Only rare items along with a massive amount of platinum would move a crafter that could make Legendary items.

At least that was what Jorgan assumed. People who could create legendary items were so rare that Jorgan himself didn’t even know the name of a living one. That is until Jude showed up.

The next round was about to start, and Jorgan couldn’t help but look over at Jude. He wondered what this special character would come up with next. Jude didn’t disappoint as he put away his sword. Jorgan completely focused on Jude. What amazing item would he take out next?

Would it be a shield?

Would it be a bow?

Would it be an axe?

Or perhaps he had made some sort of legendary staff?!

Then Jude took out his next weapon. Jorgan’s jaw dropped. It was a brush.

Why? Jorgan thought.

***

Jude looked up to watch the old man in charge speak yet again. This time he was talking about the third round, there was a lot of bluster and fanfare in his words to make the contestants happy, but Jude could care less.

But that ended as soon as he heard Yorik say, “And now the third and final round will commence! You may begin!”

Jude looked at the person in front of him. His outward appearance was dull as he was dressed in gray robes. But unlike the necromancer, there wasn’t the presence of death, but there was a certain aura of sharpness about him. This feeling was insinuated even more by the crisp straight lines of his eye brows and the angle of his gray eyes.

This person felt like he was the same as Jude, someone who traversed all the way from the outer city. One who overcame the enormous advantages those who were residents of the inner and core parts of the city. Jude felt a little sorry for him, if this fellow hadn’t met him in the pre-qualifying rounds, he might have had a chance to make the top thirty-two.

The gray wizard across from him seemed to be eyeing Jude with the same temperament that Jude eyed him with.

Now that they had four blocks to stand on, Jude and the gray wizard both centered themselves in the middle of their own territory. Now that they had readied themselves, they initiated the .

Jude had thought this through and it ‘should’ work. But testing it in real life was very different that coming up with it in theory.

Invisible to all but him, Jude controlled his into a thin sheet directly ahead of him. Using , he copied a scroll that he had already made inside his . His hand blurred as it wrote out a script in runes within a few seconds. To others, these runes just hung in the air like magic.

Meanwhile, the gray wizard began his own magic. He threw large scales of metal into the air like sand, after which they hung in the air as he began another chant taking direct control of them. Once his control was established, they rotated around him like a billowing storm.

They both finished their preparation at the same time, but the next step was in Jude’s favor. All Jude had to do was to activate his script while the gray wizard, no metal mage, would need to cast another spell.

Jude enabled his script, and a wave of fire burst forth like a tsunami. Since he wasn’t using the required parchment for this type of script magic, he had to activate the full potential of the ink. This meant that it could only be cast one time rather than several, but it wouldn’t lack any of the original power of a real scroll.

The metal mage’s floating metal shards seemed to have a default nature of defense and quickly organized themselves into a scaled shield that enveloped him like a bowl. The fire wave washed over him with little damage taken. Then he countered with his own magic.

Jude watched his magic fail to penetrate his opponent’s defenses. Whatever joy he might have felt for a successful test application of magic died down quickly as he realized one critical point. The ink he had was primarily for fire magic, and the attack scrolls he had in his inventory were all fire based.

Metal seemed to be a great counter to fire. He could write out another one, but that would take minutes, and he doubted this metal mage would allow him to do so. If he continued to use his fire script magic, it was possible he would lose.

After his attack, Jude saw that the metal shield reformed into half a dozen swords. The swords flashed and moved at an incredible speed.

Jude dodged as best he could and activated from his bracer. He only managed to avoid one sword, the other five clashed with his shield, shredding it to pieces. Jude focused on his and pushed three others off course. The last two came into contact with his put was still powerful enough to drive through and leave two wounds on Jude’s body.

Jude ignored the pain with the rush of adrenaline and quickly copied out anther script that hung in the air. Thankfully, the metal mages spell ended there, and the swords broke apart into the scale like shards they were made of and returned to the mage. But as they returned the metal mage was also preparing his next spell.

The next script that hung in the air was much longer and much more complicated. It might not be the best choice, but Jude really wanted to win with script magic.

Both of their magic’s activated at the same time, this time the metal mage held back a little but he didn’t create swords this time. Instead, he created three sharp boomerangs. On the other end, Jude activated his script, and a spring of fire erupted before him which quickly spread out creating which created a large flaming wall around him.

Since his time in the Shinswanie Village, Jude’s ability in had increased, and he was able to fully utilize this script, unlike the time back in the Arkess Aquifers. The only difference this time was that the spell wouldn’t last nearly as long because the correct parchment didn't back it.

The boomerangs shot forward, but now the metal mage couldn’t see Jude clearly due to the fire wall in between them. Jude managed to dodge two boomerangs and brush the third into the ground with . Assuming that they would turn around and attack him again from the back, Jude kept an eye on them as he started the second part of the script.

The firewall was his own magic, so Jude could easily see through it. Fireballs started to form and erupt out of the firewall, but not randomly, they were all targeted towards the metal mage.

The remaining metal that floated around the metal mage coalesced into another shield, but this time it was much smaller as his attacks contained a portion of the metal. This time the metal mage took some damage, but it was still not enough, he managed to defend against the majority of it.

.

A purple film covered Jude just as two boomerangs banged into him. This time the shield held firm as two weapons weren’t enough to penetrate its defensive barriers.

At first, it seemed that the metal mage was at an advantage, but now Jude had even the playing field. If this continued, the one who would lose would be the first person to run out of mana.

The flames around Jude died, but he was already writing the script to activate it once again. Jude was confident that he could outlast the other mage, but he really didn’t want to win that way.

If one was fire and the other was metal, all Jude needed was Ellie. He couldn’t use here even if she was here, but perhaps Jude could do some metal forging on his own.

Casting the script magic and renewing Jude quickly moved and disregarded his defense to write more scripts. Three large spears burst through his firewall, narrowly missing him.

Outside the fire, the metal mage couldn’t see Jude but knew his attack missed. He shouted out another chant that activated a secondary effect on the magical metal spears he had just sent. The spears transformed mid-air and turned into boomerangs that rotated back towards him. He hoped that this trick would get Jude, but then started feeling nervous as the firewall didn’t start shooting the fireballs like last time.

Jude could see the boomerangs and forced his out to merge with the

Jude had to admit that these boomerangs were quite powerful. The metal mage must have done something special to these as they were far stronger than the previous boomerangs. They just managed to defeat his combined defenses and Jude used his own body to block them from damaging the floating scripts. They did enough damage to affect his HP but not enough to draw blood this time.

Jude attacked now, knowing that the metal mages defenses were only half they would be if the metal from the boomerangs fully returned to him. The firewall burst forth with dazzling fireballs, but they were nothing as three fire wave scripts were activated at the same time.

This time it wasn’t a simple wave of fire coming at the metal mage, but an ocean of fire. While he could dodge a single wave with his full power relatively unsaved, he had no dilutions at what would happen if all three waves hit him while only at half defense. And knowing his opponent after fighting with him this long, he suspected that the attack wouldn’t just end there.

“Well played,” the metal mage said as he jumped back and off the blocks. To him, there was no reason to go through all that pain for such a slim chance of winning.

The metal mage would take this fight and use it as inspiration for years to come. He would hone his tactics to become a person that could thwart all who opposed him.