As soon as the countdown hit zero and the barriers disappeared both fighters sprung into action. Mark used a Mighty Leap to leap 20 meters and avoid the spell that Olivia had been building during the last few seconds. Unfortunately for him, Olivia hadn't been aimin at his starting location. When Mark landed, he landed in the middle of a Firefall.

Activating his Iron Bulwark skill, reducing all incoming damage by 20% for thirty seconds, he charged forward. He managed to get all of three feet before a Fireball slammed into his chest sending him stumbling back and almost toppling him over. Gritting his teeth, Mark activated one of the effects on his shield, reducing elemental damage, before activating another effect on his boots sending him hurtling forward at three times his normal speed. He wouldn't usually be using this many of his trump cards this early on but the smoke and flames from the Firefall spell reduced his visibility to almost nothing. The sooner he was out of the spell radius the sooner the fight would be over.

Mark was almost out when an Earthen Wall sprung up in front of him, stopping him in his tracks both physically and mentally. Mark may have thought little of Olivia but he still kept track of her spells and skills and as far as he knew Earthen Wall wasn't one of them. Olivia was a Fire Mage, her spells having overwhelming damage in exchange for a lack of versatility. Fire mages were good at attacking, and terrible at defending.

Despite the sudden upset, Mark grinned. If this was her trump card, the thing that made her think she could beat him, then she was dead wrong and soon she would just be dead. What few knew was that Mark had been preparing for this fight. Not this specific one, but one like this. If the Earthen Wall was Olivia's trump card then the sword in his hand was his. It was a Rare Quality blade with only one effect but that effect was completely worth the Rare rating.

Mage-Killer Blade

Tier 2, Rare Quality, 24/25 Quality

100 Damage

Passive effect: Magical barriers are considered to have 1% of their original strength when being attacked by this blade.

The description was a bit technical but it essentially meant that the blade could cut through any magical barrier with laughable ease. The grin on his face stayed as he slashed through the Earthen Wall, though it faltered a bit when he saw the second wall just behind it. The grin faded when he saw the third wall, he got angry at the fourth. By the time he got to the sixth he stopped feeling angry and started getting worried. No normal mage could pull up ten Earthen Walls, the spell had a cooldown.

By the tenth he had calmed down, realizing this was likely some new spell or item effect. Which is why, as the tenth wall broke and he finally caught sight of Olivia, he stopped completely. Because it wasn't just Olivia that was waiting for him on the other side.

Challenging Mark wasn't the only thing Olivia had done when she got to the console. Thanks to Michael, whom she was definitely going to pay back just as soon as she figured out how, she used an Upgrade Token on her Advanced Boon Skill, Summon Elemental. When she got the information on the new skill she almost groaned, she was never going to pay Michael back.

Summon Elemental General

Level 1:

Spend 500 Mana to summon an Elemental General to do your bidding.

Level and Skills of Elemental increase in relation to affinity.

Elemental General can summon up to ten Elementals of the same element.

Elemental Generals are capable of carrying out advanced directives and can control summoned elementals.

Elementals last until killed.

Number of Summonable Elemental Generals are limited to Skill level.

Non-transferrable. Non-Upgradeable.

On the bright side, Mark was toast. If it wasn't a literal life and death situation then Olivia might have let the Elementals do all the work whilst she relaxed. That being said, she was going to have some fun with it.

When the countdown reached the last few seconds she started her Firefall spell, aiming for the area in between her and Mark. She hadn't expected to catch Mark, she just wanted a smokescreen of fire to hide her summons, so when he suddenly lept directly into the spell area she almost laughed.

She didn't though and summoned an Earth Elemental General instead. The General was wildly different from the normal Elementals. The average elemental looked similar to blurry ghostly figure, no details or distinguishing details except for their color. The General on the other hand, was far more solid and looked like an eight foot tall man made completely out of dirt and stone.

As soon as the general was summoned Olivia had it summon the rest of the elementals while she launched a Fireball at Mark. She could see exactly where he was due to her passive skill Eyes of the Flame. It seemed he hadn't realised that he was only a few feet inside the Spell radius and had simply charged ahead.

Once the Elementals were summoned Olivia told the General to put up as many walls in front of him as possible. Almost immediately ten Earthen Walls sprung up directly in front of Mark, stacked one in front of the other like dominoes. The coordination astonished Olivia, if human mages had tried to do the same thing it would have taken hours or maybe even days of practice to do the same thing with the same speed.

As Mark tore through the walls with surprising speed Olivia started her Solar Devastation spell. The spell was a single target spell with a long casting time and devastating damage. Olivia rarely used it as the spell not only required her to stay still whilst casting but the spell entered cooldown whether she finished casting or not. Since the cooldown lasted a full 24 hours it was not something she used often.

The spell still had 50 seconds left before casting when Mark broke through the final wall and caught sight of her, and her Elementals. The look on his face was priceless.

"Give up Mark, you're both outmatched and outnumbered." Olivia said.

Mark paused for a few seconds, the shock of what he saw making his mind go momentarily blank. Then his face turned grim, and Olivia realised he wasn't going to give up.

Reaching through the bond to the General she ordered it to keep her safe as she prepared the spell. The Elementals started putting Earthen Walls when Mark activated a skill.

Each class had a unique skill, unlocked when reaching level 21, that gave those who used it extreme, if momentary, power. Fire Mages had the Solar Devastation spell, Rangers had -Redacted- and Shield Warriors had the Avatar of the Undying.

Avatar of the Undying reduced damage by 90% and healed Mark by 2% of his maximum Health per second for 30 seconds. In terms of life saving skills it was right there at the top. For Tier 2 at least. Mark also activated Berserkers Strength, a relatively rare skill that enhanced a his Strength by 50% but also sent him into a mindless rage.

For most it would be a potential death sentence, constantly attacking with no thought for defence, but for a Shield Warrior with Avatar of the Undying? It was a lethal weapon. Olivia watched as Mark smashed through wall after wall with a frenzied look on his face, his eyes never leaving her face.

Se started feeling fear, wondering if she should cancel the spell, right up until a boulder smacked him in the face. As it turns out, the Elemental General came with stronger skills than the average Elemental. Unfortunately Olivia hadn't had the time to explore what skills the summon had but the Boulder Toss, or whatever it was, was a pleasant surprise.

Mark didn't seem to like it though, judging by the shout of anger. Olivia still had another 34 seconds left before the spell finished, plenty of time for Mark to stop her, but she wasn't worried. The General beside her, along with the veritable horde of Elementals forming a blockade between her and her frenzied opponent was more than enough to buy her time.

And if that wasn't enough, there was always plan B.

Earthen Wall was still in cooldown for the Elementals so they were taking on Mark physically. Despite their appearance the ghostly figures could withstand a lot of damage but Mark was still tearing through the as if they were made of clay, his high Strength making every hit devastating. The coordination between the Elementals helped massively, along with the occasional assist from the General, but Mark still managed to take out six of the elementals by the time his buffs wore out an he regained his sanity.

Things were not looking good for Mark, he had been relying on the buffs to force Olivia to stop her spell or at least get rid of her Elementals but their coordination was too good. Grimacing, he pulled a scroll from his inventory and activated it. Scrolls were rare, single-use items that allowed whoever used them to perform the skill inscribed on them. In this case, the skill inscribed on the scroll was called Silencing Scream.

On the Oblek planet in the Uthrix solar system, located three and a half million light years from the Milky Way galaxy, there lives a species called the Ulnek that bears an eerie resemblance to the mythological creatures humans know as Banshees. Similar to Banshees the Ulnek have remarkable vocal capabilities, to the point of creating their own unique classes based on this attribute. One of the unique skills available to one of those classes is the Silencing Scream. The skill in of itself is not all that unique, there are plenty of silencing skills available in various different forms, but the origins of the skill make it extraordinarily rare and make the odds of some Tier 2 idiot on a recently Systemized planet obtaining the skill scroll for it even rarer. To the right collector the scroll would be worth millions of System Credits.

Mark knew nothing of this, and likely wouldn't have cared if he did know, which is why his use of the scroll was marked down in some obscure part of the System as the 2,381,476,309,574th worst tragedy to have ever occured.

The effects of the scroll were immediate, a scream of pure silence that overrode all the other sounds within the arena blasted out. The Boulder Toss that the Elemental General was about to launch fizzled out, along with the general itself. Worse, Olivia's Solar Devastation vanished, the glowing ball of Mana dissolving into nothingness a mere three seconds before it unleashed. Silencing Scream was an exceptional skill that removed any Mana based skill or construct in 200 meters. The original skill also placed everyone in the radius under a Silenced effect, preventing them from using any Mana based skills for a full minute.

Fortunately for Olivia, the skills often lost power when being inscribed into scrolls which meant that Olivia could respond with a Quickfire, an instant cast blast of fire that had an additional knockback effect. Marks passive skill, Steady Feet, reduced the effects of knockback skills but had a caveat that he needed to actually be touching the ground for the skill to take effect. As he was currently descending from a mighty leap, sword raised to cleave Olivia in two, he did not benefit from the skill. If it weren't for his high bodily Attributes then Mark would have gotten severe whiplash from the sudden and forceful reversal of directions. As quickly as he came he returned, flying backwards 20 meters to land

As he landed chains of solid fire burst from portals all around Mark an wrapped him up tightly. Fire Mages had little in the way of control skills but the Chains of Fire spell was one of them. Olivia needed time to summon another Elemental General and it as unlikely Mark would give it so she had to take it.

Mark only took seconds to break free from the chains but it was more than enough. As he stood there, looking at Olivia with her General at her side and the elementals arrayed in front of her, Mark felt a sense of deja vu. The only difference between then and now was the color scheme, the Elementals being red rather than brown.

"Give up Mark, I don't want to kill you but I will if I have to." Olivia said. She didn't expect it to work, but she had to try.

Mark laughed but the laugh was hollow. "You haven't been paying attention have you? You're either powerful or you're stepped on. I am not going to be stepped on, ever again."

Olivia frowned, she tried to ask what he meant by that but Mark was already charging. Olivia sighed and ordered the Elementals to attack Mark.

At the start of Marks charge he had 78% of his Health. The charge may have looked reckless but he had calculated everything. Even including the Elementals higher attack due to the change from Earth to Fire they wouldn't be able get his Health below 30%. To ensure his safety he activated all of his remaining defensive skills.

What he couldn't predict was that the power of the Summon Elemental General skill came from the wielders elemental affinity. Olivia's Earth affinity was at 23%, but her Fire affinity was at 59%.

Mark reached five meters before he realised something was wrong, the hits he was taking was stronger than they should be. He doubled down, slamming a Health potion and charging ahead. This was the end, he would either win or ... he would no longer care.

In the end, the fight didn't finish with a bang. Mark didn't make some sort of comeback, there was no surprise weapon or hidden trick. In the end Mark died as he lived, charging headlong into a fight despite the odds. Whatever may be said about Mar,k no one would ever say that he was a coward.

Olivia stared down at his body, announcements sounding out that she ignored as she stared. There were so many thoughts running through her mind it was all a blur. The System announced her victory, but it didn't feel like a victory to her. It felt like the end of Old Yeller, a hero who saved everyone but had to be put down when he turned rabid.

Sighing, Olivia looked up from the body to find herself surrounded by her team. At some point she and everyone else had been transferred back to Turkton. She smiled, finally, as she remembered why she fought in the first place.

In the coming months there would be times when she doubted herself, when she looked back on the fight and wondered if she made a mistake. She would think of what she could have done differently, she would agonise over every mistake. But in that moment she just smiled, and celebrated with her friends.