Jessica watched as the fight started. She stood on top of a small dais at the bottom of the blue glowing cloud hovering above the arena. The only other person there was the white, red, and purple-robed mage who had put up that impressive wall of force to block Caldwell’s platoon’s rifle fire. She sat cross-legged, ignoring the dual below and Jessica as sternly as possible.

Should I be meditating too? She asked herself, but then there was a burst of rifle fire from below and her attention was forced back towards the duel.

Max was running like a madman through the jungle, lifting his rifle to take potshots at the equally fast approaching spearman. The difference was, the spearman didn’t look winded at all. He almost looked like he was taking a leisurely stroll, where Max looked like he was going full tilt. That doesn’t speak well about the potential level difference between them, she thought as she watched.

Just before they came together and clashed, Max disappeared into the jungle. Jessica couldn’t follow his movements, but it had seemed to her he had just vanished. Swallowed whole by the vegetation and thick jungle foliage.

The spearman ran forward, past where Max would have met him. As he crossed the last place Jessica had seen Max through the tree canopy, an explosion erupted. That was a grenade!

The explosion involved little light, but the pressure and shrapnel shredded the leaves and underbrush like a lawnmower. When it was finished, the spearman stood practically on top of where the grenade had gone off, leaned down, and plucked a tiny piece of metal from out of the flesh of his right leg. The wound healed almost instantly, but Jessica could tell the man was perturbed.

“Traps are unbecoming of warriors, low born or high born. Show yourself and face me, child of —” the man’s challenge was cut short as a burst of rifle fire impacted into the back of his head. Then shrugged it off, rubbed the spot slightly as if a child had punched him, and turned to face Max.

Come on Max, run! She urged him in her mind. But then she saw what most people wouldn’t have noticed. A half smile, most people would have thought Max was being arrogant, or trying to cover his fear. She knew it meant he had something up his sleeve.

Max pulled the trigger again, and more rounds impacted square in the spearman’s chest. The armor turned the bullets aside with a red spark for each round. One round ricocheted up into the spearman’s eyes, but one moment his head was in the bullet's path, the next he was standing a few inches to the side as if the world had shifted and he had stayed perfectly still. Then, Max dove to the ground and the second grenade he had thrown as the man had been dealing with the rifle rounds exploded.

The shrapnel entered the spearman’s legs, ripping and tearing holes the size of quarters or larger in his flesh. He screamed in agony, and then rage as he leaned down and began pulling shards out of his body.

That was when Max struck.