Once the weak applause for Elis’ victory over Morgana had died down, the announcer spoke quickly.

“A truly surprising conclusion, folks! Hopefully next year Miss Le Fay will show us more of what she has to offer. For now, let us sate ourselves with that small taster and move on to the next match!”

The display orbs complied at once and began cycling through names again.

Oliver Vinari VS. Mark Tempor

Cadmus blinked, and beside him, he heard Oliver mutter.

“Ah… crap.”

Mason Vinari had three sons: Jason, his oldest; Lucas, his middle child; and Oliver, his youngest. Out of the three, Jason and Lucas had both chosen to follow the easy path he had laid out for them: the career of a merchant in the family business.

Mason had honestly expected the same from Oliver as well. Though Oliver had always seemed a little taken with mages, his easy-going behavior, his average work ethic, and his lack of ambition all served to make Mason think that he would simply want to coast by life. To do so, the easiest way would simply be to join the family business like his brothers.

But then, a few months after Oliver had turned twelve, when he was imitating one of the mages he had seen in the latest Twin Peaks Magical Tournament, a glowing white line suddenly poured from his fingers. It was confirmed then that Oliver had the ability to use magic.

Now, that wasn’t without precedent; His mother, Vanessa, and both Jason and Lucas also had the ability to use magic, but they had all chosen not to cultivate it. Everyone knew how dangerous a mage’s life tended to be after all.

However, what surprised everyone in the Vinari family was when Oliver went up to Mason and specifically asked to be enrolled into the Laurucian Academy of Magic, claiming that he wished to be a mage. Mason didn’t think this resolution would last: it seemed far too impulsive, made in the excitement of discovering his newly awakened magical powers. Mason figured that once the excitement died down and the difficulties of being a mage revealed themselves, Oliver would quickly abandon it and turn to more practical pursuits.

That is, until a few weeks ago.

The day had started off without any significant deviations; Vanessa had made him a larger than usual batch of breakfast to help him store up on energy for the hectic day that lay ahead (the Twin Peaks Magical Tournament always brought in a significant boom in business), and Jason and Lucas were already looking over their current stock logs to lighten his workload slightly.

They were interrupted when a knock rang out from the door. Lucas went to check, and his voice drifted from the entrance.

“Oh, it’s you, Oliver,” he said disdainfully, “What? Finally got tired of eating up dad’s money and come to help him out?”

Mason resisted the urge to sigh and thanked whatever gods there were that Vanessa was still in the kitchen; She would hate to see her children like this. The two entered the living room, and Jason looked Oliver over with a critical eye.

“Oliver,” he greeted curtly, “I hope you’re at least making a few meaningful business connections in that school of yours. We can entertain this magic nonsense for now, but you’ll have to come work in the real world someday.”

“Boys,” Mason warned.

Jason and Lucas both fell silent and got back to work, but the latter still had a rebellious look on his face. What was surprising though was that Oliver hadn’t seemed to have paid them any attention at all; he had kept his eyes fixed on Mason, some sort of hard resolution shining through them.

“Hey, dad,” he said, “I need to speak with you and mom.”

His quiet but hard voice was so unlike him that Mason felt a small ball of wariness grow in his stomach.

“Vanessa… can you come here for a second?” He called into the kitchen.

“What’s going on?” Vanessa asked as she arrived. Her eyes fell on Oliver and a smile lit up her face, “Oh, Oliver! It’s been so long since you’ve come to visit.” She wrapped him in a tight hug, “Have you been eating well? Have you made any new friends? I hope you haven’t been overworking yourself!”

Oliver smiled slightly as he hugged her back, “Hey, mom. I’m doing fine, don’t worry. I just came by because I needed you guys to sign something.”

He let go of her and placed a piece of parchment down on the dining table before taking a seat opposite of Mason. Mason pulled the paper towards him as Vanessa took a seat beside him and looked at it curiously.

“What is this?” Mason asked.

“A permission form,” Oliver said, “To allow me to participate in the Twin Peaks Magical Tournament.”

Jason and Lucas’ heads whipped round, and Mason’s eyebrows climbed in surprise.

“You don’t mean…” He gestured vaguely towards the direction of the Coliseum.

Oliver nodded, “The very same.”

Mason stared at him, his thoughts running a mile a minute, trying to understand what could have possibly caused Oliver to want to take part in such a high-profile event.

“‘Th-the Academy takes no responsibility if the participant suffers injuries, or even death, throughout the duration of the tournament and its qualifier rounds,’” Vanessa read out loud, her voice growing fainter by the word, “O-Oliver, this tournament is dangerous! Why would you ever want to take part in it!”

Oliver’s expression remained hard and unchanged, “Because this is something I have to do.”

“No, you don’t!” Vanessa said firmly, “There’s no way I can allow you to participate in something like this!”

“Very few people actually die during the tournament,” Oliver said, “They just put that clause in there in case. I think it’s been several years since the last person died.”

Vanessa did not look comforted, “Even so! For the Academy to talk about death like this must mean that it’s a valid possibility! My answer won’t change!”

“Y-yeah,” Lucas interjected with a forced laugh, “I was just kidding around; you don’t need to participate in something like this to prove anything.”

Oliver spared him a glance, “I’m not doing this to prove something to you. I’m doing this because I want to.”

“Why?” Mason asked after a few moments.

A complicated expression passed through Oliver’s face, “…Because I want to be a mage—no, because I am a mage, and this is what I need to do to become a better one.”

Mason grimaced, wondering how to quell that sudden surge of warring pride and disappointment within his chest. He had always wanted Oliver to work with him in the family business as well, but to see him so unusually determined and focused on his own goal…

“…Fine, I’ll sign it.”

“No!” Vanessa protested.

“Didn’t you hear him?” Mason asked as he scribbled his name upon the indicated line, “He said that he wants to do this—that he has to. What kind of parents would we be if we stopped him?”

“Sensible ones!” Vanessa said, “We have to protect our child!”

Mason shook his head melancholically, “We can’t protect him forever. If this is something he says he has to do, then I trust him.” He handed the form to Oliver, “Good luck, Oliver. Make us proud.”

Vanessa glared mutinously at him.

In all honesty, despite everything, Mason hadn’t really expected Oliver to get very far; He had more signed the form because this seemed like an important step for Oliver to take. So, when the news came a few weeks later that the entire Vinari family would be granted front row seats in the Twin Peaks Magical Tournament due to Oliver passing all the qualifier rounds, Mason felt it was understandable that he had thought that one of his friends was playing a prank on him or something.

But here he was now, watching as his youngest son took to the stage to the cheers of the entire world. Vanessa was beside him, cupping her mouth and crying, and his two other sons were down the row from her, gaping in shock.

“I’m excited to present the combatants of this match,” The announcer was saying, “On one side, we have Oliver Vinari—a student from the Laurucian Academy of Magic! Though he may not have any fancy titles or accomplishments under his belt, he was still able to make it through the qualifier rounds to get here! Could today be the day we witness the beginning of yet another legendary career?”

Mason watched as Oliver twitched. It was subtle, but he knew his son well enough to know that he was resisting the strong urge to bury his head in his hands out of sheer embarrassment. He was trembling with nervousness as well, but that was far less subtle.

An old memory of Oliver making excuses for his sub-par grades suddenly crossed Mason’s mind.

‘It’s fine, dad. That class doesn’t teach anything useful anyway, that’s why I didn’t pay that much attention to it.’

Below, Oliver took a few deep breaths to try and calm himself, and, perhaps to stop the onslaught of hot tears, Mason suddenly raised his arms and shrieked.

“GO OLIVER! YOU CAN DO THIS!”

The cheers were deafening, Oliver thought, and the pressure was enormous. The sound from the crowd almost seemed to take on a physical presence and pressed down at his body, as though a herd of elephants were somehow standing on his shoulders and lungs.

“And, on the other side, we have Mark Tempor—a student from the Carmenian Institute of Sorcery!” The announcer was saying, “You may recognize his name, for he is one of the only people in the world to make great strides in the field of time magic! For someone to follow the Lady of the Lake’s footsteps from such a young age… there’s no one word more suited to describe him than ‘genius’!”

Another roar of cheers rang out across the Coliseum, louder than they had given for Oliver’s introduction, and somehow, he felt worse.

The arena-wide shield was quickly set up, and after the referee made sure that they both knew the rules, he retreated to the edge of the battlefield and raised his arm.

“READY YOURSELVES!”

Oliver winced, having never realized how loud the referee’s voice truly was from this close. Then, Mark descended into what looked like a combat stance, with his knees bent and fingers ready to draw, and Oliver scrambled to follow. He didn’t actually know what a combat stance fully consisted of however, so he simply imitated Mark—or at the very least made what felt like a decent attempt at it.

“AND—BEGIN!”

Oliver’s mind blanked, and he froze.

It was the strangest thing, ever since he had passed the second qualifier round, he had known that he would have to fight in the Coliseum at some time; however, now that he was actually here, and the battle had begun, everything he had prepared simply flew out the window.

He couldn’t move, and worse yet, he couldn’t think. Dully, he noticed Mark snickering as both his hands blurred, leaving trails of dully glowing white lines behind. The sight of him quickly building a complicated magic circle sparked a sort of panic in Oliver, and he blindly drew one of the only formulas he knew well: Fireball.

Even though Mark had had the head start, Oliver finished his far simpler (one of the simplest actually) magic circle first, and fired it at Mark wildly, hoping against hope that one of them would somehow luckily connect and end this match before it truly began.

But, of course, Mark easily dodged all the flaming orbs flying towards him and continued his quick, structured drawing nearly uninterrupted.

“I can’t believe it!” He laughed, “I expected nothing from you—you only made it here because of a fluke after all—but even then, I’m still disappointed!”

A heat of defiance suddenly blazed in Oliver’s chest, and it seemed to burn through the stopped gears in his mind, allowing them to turn smoothly again. Mark finished his circle just then and aimed it at Oliver, and the circle shined, releasing a strange, slightly purple shimmering cylinder into the air which rapidly elongated and sped towards him.

But, with the return of thought came memory, and with memory came a plan of action. Oliver leaped to the side, barely avoiding Mark’s attack, and took off running towards him.

“Time magic may sound daunting, but at the end of the day, you’ve already revealed it to enough people for me to know that it still needs to hit its target like any other projectile to work!” Oliver yelled.

Mark’s arrogant expression wavered slightly, and he tried to catch Oliver by moving the circle towards him. The shimmering, faintly purple cylinder was still present because the circle was still active, so it moved like a giant beam, but Oliver wasn’t worried. Because, as expected, the spell moved through the air slowly, like Mark was trying to swing a giant bat underwater.

“Of course, I already know that your time magic is slow to move once activated!” Oliver said, “That’s another thing that you’ve already revealed to enough people for me to know as well!”

He fired a few more Fireballs at Mark from as high as he could, and ducked under Mark’s oncoming spell to dodge to the other side as Mark switched targets to the Fireballs above. As soon as the Fireballs were caught within Mark’s shimmering cylindrical spell, they slowed to a crawl.

“Time Dilation… the result of all your research into time magic…” Oliver recalled, “It’s cool, but, like I said, it won’t do much if it doesn’t hit me!”

Mark silently stepped to the side, making sure to keep his Time Dilation fixed upon the Fireballs, and once he was safely out of their path, he stopped feeding his circle mana. The Fireballs regained their original speed, and harmlessly sailed past him.

Then, he aimed his circle at Oliver, and fired again. Oliver once again leaped to the side in time, having been prepared for this as well.

“You can’t move Time Dilation very quickly when it’s already activated, but in your practice battle a few months ago with Elis Holland, you learned that you can simply deactivate the spell and activate it again when aiming it at your enemy, especially since the initial activation is quick enough,” Oliver recited, “It’s a good tactic, but I already know of it as well. And besides, I also already know that you’re not too keen to use it very often because it takes way more mana to activate the spell again and again!”

Once again, Mark’s arrogant expression faltered slightly. He deactivated his circle before shooting Time Dilation at Oliver again, but again, Oliver dodged and fired several Fireballs back.

And with that, the battle entered a new pattern: Mark constantly deactivated and reactivated his Time Dilation at Oliver, while Oliver himself kept peppering Mark with Fireballs every time he dodged. The problem was, the activation for Time Dilation was quite quick, so Oliver wasn’t able to close the distance between them as quickly as he would have liked, but every time Mark activated his spell, his mobility was decreased, so Oliver’s Fireballs kept him on his toes as well.

The advantage was clearly on Oliver’s side though, because even though it was slow going, he was still nonetheless steadily closing the distance between them. Mark must have noticed this as well, because his other hand began drawing a similar circle to his Time Dilation.

Oliver knew that Mark had only developed two spells in the vein of time magic: Time Dilation and Time Acceleration. Both spells were similar in nature, the only difference was that Time Acceleration sped up the time within its spell instead of slowing it down.

It was simple enough to guess that the new circle Mark was drawing was for the Time Acceleration spell, but what Oliver didn’t understand was how a spell that sped up time would be able to help Mark in this battle.

What he did understand was that nothing good would happen if things went Mark’s way, so he redoubled his efforts into reaching Mark before the circle was finished. Through the storm of Time Dilation and Fireballs, Oliver inched closer and closer; and, just when he managed to get close enough, Mark finished his second circle and pointed it at him.

The circle shined, and Oliver leaped to the side in panic, but nothing left the circle.

A misfire?

And Oliver could see it now, the perfect opportunity: Mark was just a few steps in front of him, and his spell had failed. He had no way to defend himself at the moment, so, Oliver charged in, and pointed his circle for Fireball at Mark.

“My spell may be slow, but let’s see you dodge it from point-blank range!” Oliver exclaimed.

The orb of flame erupted from the circle, and victory was but a scant few split seconds away. Jubilation rose like a crescendo in Oliver’s chest; for someone as unremarkable as him to come this far, to actually manage to win…

But then, suddenly, Mark sidestepped the attack, his body moving with an unnatural speed that seemed almost beyond human. His leg lashed out, and struck Oliver right in the chest, sending him sailing back—

He was coughing and gasping for breath, he idly noticed. That single kick had somehow knocked the thought out of him and he was simply laying there on the ground, as though the Coliseum and everything to do with it had just disappeared.

Then came the pain. It trickled in slowly, but soon it overwhelmed his senses and felt sharper than anything else he had felt in his life. It had only been a single kick, it should not have hurt this much, but he had never been hit like this before…

And then, with pain returned awareness, and even though his body was screaming at him to simply lie there and let the match end, he forced himself to his feet.

But it was too late.

A shimmering cylindrical attack tinged with purple caught Oliver’s body below his neck, and suddenly, it felt as though he was trying to move his body through particularly viscous liquid. He struggled with all his energy to break free, but it made no difference.

Then, Mark’s smirk turned smug as he slowly walked closer, “You look disappointed. Did you really think that you stood even a shadow of a chance against me?”

Oliver grunted with effort, trying to break free of Time Dilation again.

Mark continued, “Scurrying about like that, looking so determined… you disgust me. We both know that you don’t belong in this place, so stop trying so hard and getting in the way of the people who do.”

His words struck a chord within Oliver, and his body slackened as the particular dream from before he had decided to join the tournament suddenly played in his mind.

‘Hm? Who are you, and what are you doing here?’

In the dream, Headmaster Capitis had said so because not only did he not even remember who Oliver was, but was also wondering why someone as forgettable as him was standing among the shining stars of this generation.

And, despite everything, despite hardening his resolve and coming to a number of realizations, he couldn’t help but question the same thing. Why was he here? Why had he ever thought that he could somehow gain the right to stand upon this stage if he just pushed himself to try?

“Your place is up there,” Mark said, pointing at the stands, “Cheering remarkable people on. Why in the world would you ever think otherwise? You have no talent, you have no power, you have no knowledge… and you really thought you could just barge in and compete among us?

The referee was waiting anxiously now, waiting for Oliver to just surrender and end this spectacle, and Oliver was so close to just complying…

And then, Mark was above him, his ugly smirk twisting even further, and Oliver felt the need to defend himself.

“It… should have worked…” He muttered, hating how close to broken his voice sounded, “My Fireball… it was cast from point-blank range…”

Mark’s eyes narrowed, “Let me give you a free lesson, right here and now,” he drew a stylized circular symbol with his free hand, “This here is known as the symbol of Reversal, also sometimes known as the Biteback symbol. Usually, if you see this symbol inside a formula, it means that the spell will be cast from the opposite side of the circle—the side facing the caster.

“Now, look here,” he pointed at a specific point in the second circle he had drawn, “What do you see?”

Oliver, as if in a daze, followed Mark’s directions.

“It’s… the same symbol…” He noticed after a second, “But… you should only have two spells…”

“I did, until a few months ago, when I created a formula that would allow me to apply Time Acceleration to my body, thereby speeding up my movements,” Mark said, “That was how I dodged your Fireball from point-blank range. The symbol of Reversal is near-beginner knowledge, and can be easily spotted by experienced practitioners of magic. Maybe you should have practiced your magic more instead of snooping around for rumours and expecting that to make up for your shortcomings.”

Oliver’s remaining energy finally abandoned him, and he let his head hang, too ashamed to show the world the hot prickling of tears in his eyes.

Mark noticed though, and he laughed, “Are you actually crying? You can’t be—”

“VICTOR: MARK TEMPOR!” The referee declared, and Oliver felt a rush of gratitude towards him.

Loud cheering shook the Coliseum, and the announcer roared above them, “Harsh words from Mark Tempor, truly harsh words! But it’s undeniable that he has the ability to back up his words! Let us all watch and see what more he has to offer for us!”

And, as the medical staff took Oliver away, the cheers continued to ring in his ears.

Cadmus watched silently as Mark made his way back up to the contestant’s box after a cursory check. There was a pounding in his ears that he didn’t quite understand, and a wild thrumming in his chest that he wanted nothing to do with.

“Gotta ask,” Mark laughed as soon as he entered the contestant’s box, “Who was it that put the idea in that guy’s head that he could compete with us?”

Candice had covered her mouth with her hands and looked near tears, and Alice seemed just about ready to attack Mark.

“I mean, did you see him out there?” Mark was talking to Cadmus now, “The way he was running around so desperately, like he thought he even had a shot at winning. Man, he had to know that victory was just about impossible for someone like him—”

“Would you please be quiet?”

The words had slipped out of Cadmus’ mouth before he even had a chance to stop them.

“Cadmus…?” Alice asked in a small voice, looking up at him as though she could not comprehend what was happening.

“Or what?” Mark asked, narrowing his eyes menacingly.

“This isn’t a threat,” Cadmus said, the words still escaping him beyond his volition, “I’m simply asking you to be quiet because I find you annoying.”

Mark looked taken aback, “Wh-what did you say?”

“Did I not make myself clear enough?”

Hundreds of magic circles were flying through Cadmus’ head now, and he itched to use them on Mark.

Mark’s fingers twitched, “Y-you—!”

Gale yelled, “Mark, stop! You’ll be disqualified!”

Mark froze, then slowly turned away with a final glare, and Cadmus wished he hadn’t.