The bald guy’s eyes widen as I approach, but instead of calling for a retreat like I half hoped he would, he settles into a boxing stance. As he does, stone from the alleyway floats up and adheres to his body, gathering around his fists, shoulders and upper chest, and shaping around his brow.

Another mage? What are two mages doing playing bridge troll in a random alleyway?

All this I perceive in the moments of my approach, and I do the only thing I can think of. I run a thread of mana into each of my gauntlets, and let them gather into a knot at the end. That knot is imbued with the idea of pressure, of bursting with the slightest impact.

Once I’m a single step away from him, the stone mage takes a quick step forward and throws his right fist at my face. I could dodge, I’m more than fast enough for it, but I remember something Armsmaster mentioned called offensive defense.

I launch my right gauntlet into the side of his hand, and with a pulse-crack, the stone covering his hand is ripped away both by my mildly enhanced strength and the blast of Stellar mana.

Shock overtakes his face, but he steps back fast enough to evade my follow up strike. As he does, the two on either side of him step in to relieve the pressure, one striking low, the other high. It’s clear they’re used to working together, but one thought occupies my mind.

These guys cannot be common thugs. Not with teamwork like that, not with two mages.

Backpedaling to evade their hits, I step back in before they can leave my range. I kick the guy who went low in the face, launching him back several feet, face savaged by Stellar mana. Then I block the second man’s attack with a knife he had hidden away somewhere with my gauntlet. He keeps up the pace, attacking three more times with short, efficient thrusts into vulnerable areas, but he’s too slow to cause me any trouble. I step around his final thrust and punch the outside of his elbow, breaking it with a crunch I find disturbingly satisfying.

Movement out of the corner of my eye is all the warning I get as the earth mage returns to the fray. Reflexively, I bring my left gauntlet into a block.

The force of the hit still throws me back a few feet.

As I land, I use the momentum to roll back onto my feet, cradling my left arm, which isn’t too sore, but was jostled pretty hard. The earth mage’s skin is now the same colour and texture of the stone covering his hands, chest and head.

He took the time to enhance himself. The fact it took the few seconds I was distracted is encouraging. He can’t be too experienced otherwise. Or maybe he’s the type to think strength beats control.

I decide the latter as he approaches, and plan accordingly.

From summoning my gauntlets, the few blasts from my hits, and the short time I’ve been enhanced so far. My mana has taken a bit of a drop. I’m down to three quarters, but that should be enough to take him down.

From the few lessons I’ve had so far on other Affinities, the enhancement from Earth is primarily strength and durability, with a small boost to speed and reflexes, but nothing for agility. He may be a little quicker and more reactive, but his turns and finer movements will be impacted.

I can use that.

The guy whose elbow I broke is still reeling, so I slip by him towards the Earth mage. Once again, he swings his right fist at my face, showing little imagination. He’s probably expecting a repeat of last time and prepared for it, but no dice. I duck under the blow, use my momentum and his extra height to slide past him and punch him in the ear.

Armsmaster said that it’s a great way to destabilise someone who's tougher than me, giving me the time to either regroup or lay some more hurt in before he recovers. With the extra Stellar mana in the hit, I may have blown out the ear too, considering the way he’s now swaying slightly off balance.

Good.

I step in again and punch him in the ribs as many times as I can. My mana falls further as I manage two strikes into each side before he roars incoherently and swings his elbow at my head. I let myself fall into a roll to both evade the blow and give myself space to plan my next move.

“You little bitch. You are definitely not worth the pay for this,” he growls.

What?

Caught off guard by that, I’m too distracted to react before his next swing comes in. He’s still a bit disoriented by my strike to his ear, so I manage to dodge, but it's far too close for my liking.

He attacks again, and this time I step through it again and come out the other side from last time. I don’t hit him in the ear though, as he’s likely already planned how to react to that, so I let him think I’ve changed tactics again.

I have, but probably not how he thought.

The guy with the broken elbow should be right behind me, which would normally be a bad thing, except the earth mage just sent a haymaker to the face again. He’s almost too predictable.

I step outside his strike once more, and just as I hoped the other guy was charging in to grab me as the mage threw his punch.

Again there’s a disturbingly satisfying crunch from him as his face is almost caved from the blow.

Part of me wants to throw up from the fact that I very likely indirectly caused his death, but thankfully I have something to distract me.

I am once again in prime position to punch him in the ear, and I take full advantage of the opportunity with as much force as I can manage. This time it’s much more effective, and actually causes him to lose his grip on his mana.

Seeing his enhancement fall away, I launch a roundhouse kick into the back of his head, and he crumples to the floor.

Once the earth mage is down, I turn to the last man, the one who started having doubts about this whole thing before my assault began.

He backs away, hands raised placatingly. “You just handled Sawyer like a toddler, I know when I’m outmatched. I’ll just go.”

He turns, and runs away.

I stand there a moment, adrenaline flooding my veins, before I hear the sounds of fighting behind me.

“Sophie,” I say in realisation, and turn around.

We have made a tactical mistake, I realise.

I remember Sophie saying how long she’s been learning the spear, but I don’t think she’s ever mentioned being taught to fight unarmed.

I look over her fight and almost call out, but she can’t afford the distraction.

The three men, or two men and a rather buff woman I reconsider, are keeping Sophie occupied with that same teamwork my opponents used, but to much greater effect. They’re harrying her, keeping her off balance similar to how I do when we spar, and it’s likely that experience with me that’s let her hold on this long. Sophie’s movements are rooted in her training as a spear wielder, and are poorly suited to unarmed combat. What’s more, it doesn’t look like her Slayer Aspect is much help here, and it takes me precious seconds to realise Slayer has a fatal flaw: It only works on a single target.

The moment Sophie starts focusing on someone else, the ‘insight’ she’s accumulated falls away, and Slayer has to start all over again.

To make matters worse, she’s forced to evade the fire mage’s attacks, lashing whips of flame and bursts of heat.

It’s likely that only her greater speed and whatever small dregs of insight that Slayer is able to give that she’s lasted this long.

I need to take up some of the pressure.

All this I process in a few seconds, and that time taken proved costly.

The fire mage has now retracted his flame whips and has stepped back, letting the other three take all of Sophie’s attention. As he does, he’s gathered a ball of fire between his hands, and is now just about to release it.

My mana is a little under half at this point.

It’ll have to be enough.

I dash forward towards the mage, but before I reach him he’s managed to let off his attack. With only moments to spare, I have no time to think.

I step between Sophie and the flame, gauntlets raised to block.

It’s quite possible that my gauntlets being Relics is the only reason I survive it.

The mana in my gauntlets scatter the flames, but the heat still passes through. A flood of pain assaults me, but I push through as best I can and rush the fire mage.

Fire Affinity enhances strength and speed, if I recall correctly, so this will be a different fight to the last one.

His eyes widen in surprise, clearly not expecting me to either appear in front of the attack or survive it. He steps back as I approach, flames gathering around his hands. Just as I reach him, he throws a blast at me but I manage to dodge. I can still feel the heat, though, and like before it sends a wave of pain adding to what I’ve already taken.

Teeth grit, I push through, and get within reach of the mage. I throw a punch to the stomach, but he steps to the side, and lashes out with a flaming punch of his own. I block with my gauntlet, and send a kick in retaliation, but he skips back and sweeps his hand, a wave of fire streaming out.

I roll under and keep up the pace.

This man is in some ways better than his counterpart. He understands the way his powers let him move and is using it to its fullest, and his fire being both ranged weapon and melee attack is making it difficult to find gaps to take advantage of.

There is one though.

He’s taken every opportunity I’ve given him to attack, even when he probably shouldn’t have.

I can use that.

I just hope Sophie can handle the other three on her own though, as I’m almost out of mana.

When I come out of the roll, he’s standing there, one hand glowing bright with heat. Knowing how he’ll act, I leave myself as open as I can before I get in range, and quickly punch him in the face.

Just as I expected, he takes the chance to get in another hit, not even noticing my coming fist. His hand lands open palmed against my shoulder, and at the same time that I slam into his face, he lets loose.

I scream in pain as fire roars over half my torso, burning deep into my left arm and shoulder. Agony blazes through me as I feel the crunch of my metal covered fist hitting his face. The mage is thrown back, and the pain is finally enough to overwhelm me.

I lose my grip on my mana the same second it runs out.

My enhancement ends, my gauntlets dissipate.

And darkness overtakes me to the sound of Sophie screaming my name, and the faint shriek of a whistle.

**********************

“Right. Let’s go over what went wrong, shall we?”

I open my eyes, to find myself sitting in a soft velvet chair. Across from me is Armsmaster, sitting in a slightly larger, but equally soft chair, and between us is a low table with tea and cookies. Food doesn’t do anything for me when I’m projecting, but it’s nice for comfort.

I look around us. Instead of the usual entrance hall, we’re sitting in an endless starscape, impenetrable blackness broken up by tiny lights.

I look back at Armsmaster, who’s giving me a small, patient smile. “I thought it might help to calm down. That was pretty brutal.”

I give a silent nod, and take a cookie.

“Well. To start, that was a total clusterfuck. To begin with, you didn’t even need to fight them, both you and Sophie are more than fast enough to evade and outrun all but the fire mage, and once he was separated from the rest you could have taken him handily.”

I wince. That never even occurred to me.

“It’s a common problem for young mages, Valerie. All too often kids like you get in fights that were wholly unnecessary just because they believed they would when. And all too often, they get killed for it.”

She takes a sip from her own tea.

“Your second mistake was in letting Sophie decide who to target. The girl’s got a good head on her shoulders, but she’s no tactician. She’s used to having a weapon on hand, so she thought as if she had one. Even then, the better choice was to swap targets. Sophie’s fighting style is almost tailor made for handling singular, tough opponents, and she could have gotten the mooks out of the way fairly quickly. The fourth guy on that end was even less of a concern.”

On the other side of things, with full mana and stamina, and uninjured, the fire mage wouldn’t have been able to hurt you anywhere near as easily. Your gauntlets have proven able to deflect his attacks well enough, and one good hit took him down. With him taken care of, the other three would have been easy, and then you could have assisted Sophie on the other end if she still needed it.”

She pauses to let that sink in. I think a part of me recognised the flaws in Sophie’s plan at the start, but I fell into the trap of thinking that just because she could beat me, meant she’d handle them better than me. Different people are suited better to different situations, after all. I’m going to have to pay more attention to that from now on.

“Finally, once you blocked the fire mage’s attack on Sophie, you should have used the time his surprise gave you to take care of the guys attacking her. Even just one less opponent could have meant a win for her, which means she could have then helped you with the fire mage. Do you understand all this?”

I nod mutely.

Having everything I did wrong laid out in front of me stings, and I can’t help but wonder what her intent here is.

She must have read it in my face, as she next says, “I’m saying all this because as far as we can tell, you have survived those mistakes, which means you have the opportunity to learn from them. From now on, you and I will start drilling combat scenarios similar to this one, as well as whatever else I can come up with, but you would do well to speak to your mother after she calms down. She’s a poor magic teacher, but an excellent tactician.”

After Mom calms down? What does that mean?

I think my face is unusually expressive after the fight, as Armsmaster reads that too.

“How do you think she’ll react when she discovers that her only daughter was nearly killed in a robbery gone wrong? It will not go down well if you don’t wake up soon.”

Oh.

Damn.

Satisfied I understand the gravity of that situation, Armsmaster leans back.

“And now we come to what you did right.”

I look up at her, incredulous.

“I’d be a very poor teacher indeed if I didn’t recognise your achievements. Let’s see, you did very well to both read Sawyer’s moves and take advantage of them when facing him, and apart from when you were distracted by his minions, the coward was right. You handled him like a toddler. It was viscerally satisfying to watch.”

I blush and mumble my thanks, still not fully together after everything.

“And though you erred afterwards, you were quick to recognise the danger Sophie was in and how best to take off the immediate pressure. Then, whilst low on mana, nearing exhaustion, and in pain you weren’t accustomed to, you recognised and exploited a glaring flaw in the fire mage’s approach. All in all, for your first life or death fight, I couldn’t ask for a better outcome.”

That shocks me out of my half stupor.

“What?”

She raises an eyebrow. “Sawyer was without a doubt aiming to take your life, Valerie.”

“No, I me- okay, that’s worth noting and definitely something worth talking about, but I meant what do you mean you couldn’t ask for a better outcome? I almost died! I might still die!”

Then the full implication of that hits me.

“Oh my god I might actually die from this.”

Armsmaster gets up and pulls me into a hug. “You’re going to be fine, Valerie. That whistle you heard as you went down? That’s almost certainly from a city guard captain. You were fairly close to the market, it’s no surprise it caught attention. That’s what I meant about this being the best possible outcome. You had your first fight with real stakes, you did things wrong, you did things right, and most importantly, you survived. Now you can recover and learn from this, and improve.”

I just stand there and let her hold me until I wake up again.