Curt wasn’t one to boast, but he had gone through his fair share of duels back up in the Dusts. And since he was still alive, he figured he was pretty good at them. He was used to the outcome of duels being determined in the first few seconds. He didn’t think he’d have another duel that depended so heavily on a quick draw down in Sanora though. But here he was. It was almost nostalgic.

The moment Syara’s hand came down, Curt was already moving.

Time seemed to move in slow-motion as Curt’s hands closed on the handles of his revolvers. Not taking his eyes off Quentin, he began to draw. He could feel the metal of the revolvers brush over the leather of the holsters. He watched as Quentin’s mouth moved, forming the words to a spell.

His right hand was always a little faster on the draw. His right hand began to pull the trigger as the barrel aligned with its target. His left hand lagged behind by a fraction of a second.

He was going to make it. Quentin was still casting his spell. Judging by his expression, Quentin had no idea what the guns did. Curt looked forward to seeing the man’s look of surprise when the bullets burnt his fingers.

What Curt didn’t anticipate, was his own look of surprise.

His vision went white. It was like getting swallowed up by the clouds again, except this time it was accompanied by an ear-splitting blast. His hands went hot, then cold. He could hear gasps and shouts and curses from all around him. The white disappeared, replaced by spots of black in his vision.

Curt blinked, trying to get rid of the dark spots from the blinding explosion. He tried to make sense of what had happened. He could hear Quentin’s cast complete. His vision was still spotty, but he could make out something bright coming toward him.

Dimly, he remembered his training. He tried to raise a gun to block the attack, but his hand was empty. Where did his gun go? The bright ball of energy was growing bigger. This was definitely not the way he wanted to go. Not against a lame guy like Quentin. The only silver lining he could see was that at least if he died, the win would go to Point Blank.

The ball of magic stopped right in front of Curt. Curt squinted at it, not sure if he was hallucinating. He stared, dazedly at the crackling magic hovering in his view.

“Second round goes to Ancient World,” Syara said.

The magic evaporated as Quentin twirled his staff and put it away. Curt could barely comprehend what was happening. Someone — or maybe two — was hauling him out of the ring. Distantly, he could hear voices talking over him. One sounded like Bauph. The other might’ve been Tera. He felt his body get pushed onto a nearby bench.

Someone had placed their hand on his back. It felt warm. He could feel his vision and mind starting to clear.

“What—” Curt opened his mouth to speak. His mind was still replaying what had happened. The flash of light. The deafening blast. His hands burning, then nothing. “—happened?”

“You lost.” That was Tera. She didn’t sound upset though, just blunt.

“I figured as much,” Curt mumbled. Still, it stung. “But how?”

“Your guns exploded.” This time it was Bauph.

Curt groaned. Of all the times for Otto’s secondhand revolvers to backfire. It felt too soon. He barely used them. Unless, all that training counted as usage time. Those fucking pebbles. Curt leaned back in the bench. The ringing in his ears was starting to fade. He glanced down at his hands. They looked fine to him; skin still intact, no burns like he expected.

“You were pretty badly burnt,” Bauph commented as he saw Curt inspecting his fingers. “Thank the False Life Circle for healing you back up.” So that’s what it was.

Tera turned her head to face the ring again. “No one could really see what happened, but you’ve gotta give Quentin some credit. Even though he was also surprised, he kept on going with his incantation. It wasn’t even for some lame mana shield either — he was casting that magic orb to throw at you. Seems like he expected the match to be determined in the first few seconds.”

Curt followed her gaze and saw Quentin approaching from the ring. He wore an expression that made one think he was stepping through shit on his way over, but maybe that was his default expression. Curt saw no malice or disdain in his eyes.

“You were faster,” Quentin said.

Curt just shrugged. “Doesn’t matter; I still lost. Thanks for stopping that blast from hitting me though.”

“Indeed, I am still the victor of this duel.” Curt felt like retracting his thanks. But then Quentin continued, “But if this weren’t a duel, I have a feeling I would’ve lost. I underestimated you.”

With that, Quentin turned on his heels and left. Curt blinked at Quentin’s retreating figure — did he come over just to say that?

“I honestly thought you were going to be incinerated when Quentin finished casting,” Tera remarked. “Not many mages have the control to stop their own spells like that.”

“That’s why they’re A-rank,” Bauph said.

Syara’s voice pierced through the buzz of the audience, who were trying to piece together what that flash was all about.

“Guess I’m up.” Tera sauntered over to the ring, not looking the least bit pressured that the entire fate of Point Blank rested on her victory. Though, she might also not care about the guild. After all, it was Curt’s fault that she was forced into joining.

Bauph helped support Curt to walk back to the ring’s sidelines, where he could watch. He still felt a bit dizzy from the guns backfiring on him, but he wanted to see how Tera fought. She definitely didn’t give it her all in that little skirmish back in Sahnju. Hell, Curt doubted she put more effort in that than she did when she took a walk.

Otto’s eyes flicked to Curt as they approached. His cigarette was burning through, but Otto didn’t seem to notice.

“I’ll talk to Kirina ‘bout gettin’ you a new pair of revolvers,” Otto said. “Can’t believe those revolvers backfired so soon. I barely fired a shot outta either when I had ‘em. You’ve been busy, huh?”

“Let’s just hope Tera wins this for us,” Curt just replied. He wasn’t sure if he wanted another pair of guns from Kirina.

“Announce your fighters,” Syara declared.

“Tera Yong, from Point Blank.”

“Laszlow Denton, from Ancient World.”

The man standing in front of Tera looked like he was sculpted from solid rock. He threw off his shirt, revealing a toned musculature. Physical appearances might matter less in a world that had magic, but Curt couldn’t help but be impressed. The Laszlow guy looked like he was made for speed and power. Similarly to Tera, he didn’t seemed to be armed.

“Tera? Isn’t that the name of Sahnju’s current strongest?”

“She’s in Point Blank? Who are they?”

“She’s up against Laszlow though. He was once Sahnju’s strongest too, you know.”

The arrival of the two new fighters made Curt’s fight quickly forgotten as the crowd threw speculations and bets around. Hearing that Laszlow was also once Sahnju’s strongest disciple made Curt feel a bit uneasy. If he hadn’t lost, Point Blank wouldn’t have been in this much peril. He didn’t doubt Tera was strong, but would she actually fight seriously for a guild she didn’t care about?

Otto was chewing on his cigarette, eyes focused on the ring. Seemed like Otto was also worried about that too.

“Heh, to think I’d fight another Sahnju disciple,” Laszlow said, cracking his knuckles. “I’m surprised you ended up in a guild like that. Don’t disappoint me.”

Tera didn’t bother to respond.

Syara raised her arm once more. Both fighters took their stances. The crowd became hushed as they watched with anticipation. She brought her arm down.

“Round three, begin!”

Tera disappeared. And Laszlow fell face first into ground. Curt wasn’t sure if even bullets could move that fast. He didn’t even see her blur.

There was a stunned silence as everyone seemed to try and process what had happened. Syara managed to regain composure as she announced, “Third round goes to Point Blank! Point Blank wins, 2-0.”

It was like her voice had broken a spell over the audience as everyone began to talk at once.

“No way! Ancient World lost to some no-name guild?”

“What was their guild’s name again?”

“No wonder all the guilds were trying to recruit her.”

“Hey, did you hear what this duel was about?”

Otto let out a long sigh of relief, letting what remained of his cigarette fall to the ground. Ancient World’s members were dragging the unconscious Laszlow out of the ring, and Talmander was walking up to them now, holding a rolled up parchment in one of his hands. Tera was also outside the ring again, taking off her gloves, looking like she didn’t even break a sweat.

“I believe this now belongs to you.” Talmander extended the hand holding the piece of paper to Otto. Otto took it and glanced at it briefly before nodding. “As arranged, Ancient World will not be participating in the Grand Guild Tournament.”

“You don’t seem that torn up about it,” Otto commented.

Talmander smiled. “Ancient World wasn’t as ambitious as Point Blank it seems. If you don’t mind throwing a bone to us losers of the duel, could your guild promise us something?”

Both of Otto’s brows rose. Then Otto put on what he probably thought was a dignified expression, and he replied, “Depends on what it is.”

“Now that we’re out of the tournament, we’d like to place our hopes onto you. If Point Blank wins the tournament, all we want to know is what the ‘ticket to Star City’ really is. After all, Ancient World’s primary goal is to record all knowledge the world has to offer.”

Curt couldn’t believe the A-rank guild was asking a favor from their D-rank one. With the assumption that Point Blank even stood a chance at winning the tournament. Talmander turned to Curt.

“I know Quentin can be quite rude, but I hope you forgive his behavior,” Talmander said to Curt’s surprise. “Despite his tone, he is one of the most honest man I can think of.”

Curt wasn’t sure how to take Talmander’s apology in Quentin’s stead. It wasn’t like Curt even held any hard feelings towards him anymore. Shaking his head, Curt replied, “He spared my life in that fight, so we’re even anyways.”

“Is that so? Well, contact our guild anytime if you’d like to do an exchange of information. I’m sure there’s plenty Point Blank knows that we do not yet. Until then, I hope your guild fares well.”

With that, Talmander bowed, and headed back to his guild members. A few of them glared at Point Blank, some of them even had tears in their eyes. Despite Talmander’s words, it seemed that some of them were really hoping to win. As Ancient World left, the crowd began to disperse as well. A few from the audience tried to ask Otto questions, but he quickly waved them away. Curt thought Otto would bathe in the attention, but the man seemed preoccupied with his thoughts.

“I’ll go turn this in,” Otto said, shaking the paper in his hand. “Go get Mahku and Jesse and have them pick rooms out in the base. I’ll be back later tomorrow. Get some rest in the meantime — you guys earned it.”

Otto headed off without another word. He didn’t seem as happy as Curt thought Otto would be that they just won a duel against an A-rank guild.

“That was incredible,” Xujen was saying to Tera. “You truly are the strongest disciple of Sahnju.”

“I’m not part of the dojo anymore,” Tera said. “Anyways, that guy was underestimating me. He purposely dropped his guard to bait me. Clearly he didn’t think I was the real deal. So he deserved his loss.”

“What did you do anyways?” Curt asked. “It looked like you just… melted away and reappeared behind him. Except crazy fast.”

“You basically saw the gist of it then,” Tera said. “My magic affinity it to shadow. Doing something like hiding myself in a shadow isn’t that difficult.”

“But the speed at which you did it is something most people will never achieve,” Xujen said.

“Yeah, shadow is one of the hardest elements to master,” Bauph chimed in.

“So, what exactly are these elemental affinities anyways?” Curt didn’t like feeling this lost in a conversation.

“Just like how some people might be better at one thing than others, people are often better in certain types of magic than others,” Bauph explained. “Often people are good in one type, with maybe a secondary or even tertiary proficiency in others. In my case, I was found to be good at light magic. That’s why I was even part of the Holy Order.”

“Shadow for me, as I mentioned,” Tera said.

“Ice for me,” Xujen said.

“Do I even have one? With my broken mana center and all.”

“Mahku would know that, why don’t we go and ask him?” Tera began to head for the city exit. “I want to get my question answered finally too.”

----

When the group arrived at the campsite, they found practically everything was already packed. Mahku and Jesse almost looked like they were waiting for them. In fact, Mahku didn’t even ask them the results of the duel.

He simply stated, “I’m sure Tera wants to hear the answer, but first, let us get settled into your guild’s base.”

Jesse’s eyes flicked towards Curt, and then flicked away. He should probably apologize for snapping at the younger man a couple nights ago. Curt was agitated then.

At the city entrance, the guards saw Mahku and merely nodded, letting him in. When they finally arrived at the modest home, Mahku and Jesse both took the unoccupied one. It was starting to feel a bit crowded now. Once they set their things down, everyone gathered in the kitchen — the largest room in the abode.

“You wanted to know of my exile?” Mahku prompted, sitting in one of two chairs.

“I’ll let Curt ask his questions first. I’m guessing it’s a long story,” Tera replied.

Mahku smiled. “It could be. Well then, Curt, what do you want to ask of me?”

“I just learned people have elemental affinities,” Curt began. “So, I guess I wanted to know what mine was? If I even have one.”

“It was difficult to tell,” Mahku answered truthfully. “But if you are able to produce flames from the guns, it is likely fire.”

“What’s your’s then?” Curt asked out of curiosity.

“Lightning, primarily. I also know a bit of enchantment magic as well,” Mahku answered.

“Last one.” This question had been bugging Curt for a while. “Why did you want to join Ancient World?”

“The answer to that is tied in to the story of my exile. Before I tell you all what happened, I want to warn you that I am breaking severe laws of secrecy. I will also be disclosing some well-guarded secrets. Do not let what I say in this room to leave it.”

Mahku’s expression was grave, almost angry. There was no trace of the peaceful, tea-drinking wanderer that Curt had met. Everyone just nodded, despite the man being blind. Curt was beginning think Mahku had some third eye or something to see with, because the older man began to tell his story.

“It all began when I finally was chosen to become a dojo master.”