I was crushed, but made out of stern stuff. The examiner explained in a bored monotone that my details and information had been sent to the [Bursar], and that I was to report to that department to pay. If I didn’t pay before the School left, I would need to retake exams the next time the school came by. I nodded my acknowledgement, then Vitus and I left the exam room. The examiners called in the next candidate in line, and I mentally wished them luck.

“What now?” I asked Vitus.

“Now? You either figure out how to pay for the School, or leave.” Vitus sniffed at me.

“How much is admission anyways?”

“Typically, a ruby or diamond per year.” He answered, and I mentally translated it to a ruby or diamond coin. “I have questions for you. Claiming to be a Sentinel?”

I ignored his question for the moment, quickly doing the conversion. A ruby was the same as a diamond - obscenely expensive. All the gems in my armor might be able to pay for a single year, if I roped Amber into helping me sell them, but that was a short-term solution. It was roughly 25,000 coins, which was 390 rods and change, which was roughly six and a half weeks pay as a Sentinel.

And I’d been very, very well paid as a Sentinel.

I opened my mouth to answer Vitus, but thinking about Amber and negotiating sales had me thinking about negotiations.

“I’ll answer all your questions if you tell me about the various scholarships the School has.”

“Fine.” He snapped at me. “Sentinel!? They’ll eat you alive when they find you.”

I fished out my Sentinel badge.

“Hi. Sentinel Dawn, pleased to meet you.” I showed it to him.

“That is not the Sentinel badge.” He complained.

“Well, shit, it used to be. Not my fault things have changed.”

“Explain.” He demanded.

“That wasn’t a question.” I sassed back at him. He wanted to be a royal pain in the arse? I could also play that game.

“You try my patience.”

“And I know your progenitor. Probably. One out of three chances.” I shot back.

He sighed in exasperation. Good. I could be just as annoying when I wanted to be!

“Please give me a brief overview of the events that you claim to happen that have led you here.” He… ok, he technically didn’t ask a question, but it was close enough, and I’d wound him up enough. I was all too aware that he massively out-leveled me, and could probably squash me like a bug if he really wanted to.

I gave him the short version, which still took some time.

“Entirely unbelievable.” He pronounced at the end.

I shrugged.

“Didn’t claim you’d believe me. Just that I’d answer your questions. Now. Scholarships?”

He sighed.

“The School tends to give scholarships out to those individuals which can raise or elevate the school in some way, or have particular talents that will make the School shine. Artists are popular, and you might apply for a storytelling Scholarship. I believe your tales are a little too far-fetched, and they’d deny you on that basis.”

Jackass.

“Other such scholarships include areas in which the School competes publicly. Alchemy. Smithing. Golem building and fights. Combat. Dinosaur riding. Fishing. Cooking. Wizardry contests. Sports.” Vitus listed.

One of those perked my ear.

“Combat?” I asked him.

He muttered something to himself.

“Yes, fighting. Single, pairs, teams, free-for-all, there are a dozen different methods of fighting. The School fields a team, and is on the lookout for the best to join. Not that they have any shortage of candidates.”

I beamed at him.

“Well, how do I apply?”

“By getting the woman you were with to translate for you from here on out. Good day.”

Vitus, the prick, left me in the middle of the exam building, sweeping out with his long wizardly robes.

I was left to my own devices, but managed to find my way back out, where Iona and Auri were waiting for me.

“So? How’d it go! Dish!” Iona grinned at me under the moonlight.

“I got in. No scholarship. Can’t pay for the School.” I moped. “However! I’m going to see if I can get a combat scholarship. Only way I can see myself getting it.”

“Brrpt BRPT brrrrrrpt!” Auri was full of confidence in me. Of course I’d be able to get a combat scholarship! If I couldn’t, nobody could!

“Brrpt?” She was also wondering if she could show off, and we could charge people to watch Auri show off.

Her vanity knew no limits.

Iona gave me an appraising look, possibly reading my status.

“You’ve got a shot at it.” She agreed with Auri.

“Now I need to figure out where the heck I sign up for this sort of thing.”

“They didn’t tell you?”

I gave Iona the quick rundown on Vitus.

“Oooh, that dick. I’d love to get my hands on him and…” Iona made a wringing motion with her hands. I totally agreed with her.

“Brrpt. Brrrpt?”

Auri suggested Fire.

“That’s a good idea.”

“BRRRPT!” Auri picked a direction and started flying off, convinced she’d find Vitus in the direction she was going.

I retrieved her.

“What now?” Iona asked.

“Wander around until we find the combat place?”

“Like the one behind you?”

Oh right. There’d been a dueling ground we’d watched on our way over.

Some quick navigation later - how everyone was so energetic in the middle of the night I’d never know - and Iona was translating for me with a dullahan, who had purple paint on her armor.

“I’d like to get a combat scholarship. How can I make that happen?” I asked her.

“Age?” She barked at me. Iona’s translation barely softened the tone.

“The System says I’m 22.” I was shooting for the lowest possible number that I could intellectually defend.

“Under 30. Good. You need to be the best. Not only the best, but you need to be utterly dominant. Even then, we’ll only take you if we think you’ll fit. Do you want to compete in singles, duos, team, or free-for-all?”

“Singles and free-for-all?” I ventured.

“Pick one.”

I frowned.

“Free-for-all.” Singles had the unfortunate mage problem of eventually running out of mana, and usually had all sorts of rules attached to it. A free-for-all sounded like my type of jam, a place where I could put all my training to use.

The dullahan gave me another look.

“Purple-robe healer wants to compete in the free-for-all. Now I’ve seen it all.” She shook her head.

“Can I compete in the duels to see what it’s like?” I asked her.

“Sure. Only the big tournament counts, although we’ll be watching everything.”

That sounded like even the duels counted. Iona and I did some wandering around, before finding the right place.

An elf was overseeing the entire dueling grounds in a weapons room. Three dozen different types of armor covered one wall, while weapons of all shapes and sizes covered the other three. A few people were working in various corners, fixing up gear, fitting people in armor, and generally helping keep the place running.

“I am Mormerilhawn, the Black Rose. You wish to compete for fame and glory in my grounds. Very well. I will ensure that minimal harm comes to you. Here are the rules. Every person I permit to participate is shielded by one of my skills. I tailor the skill to what would be a powerful blow against you. When the skill activates, it will do so with blinding light. That is the signal to stop. If you persist in fighting after the signal, you will be evicted. If I am feeling generous, you will still have all your limbs. Please keep in mind that my defenses will not work against suffocating attacks. If you use one, you will be evicted. If I am feeling generous, you will still have all your limbs. If you somehow cause grievous harm to another duelist, you will be evicted. You will not have all your limbs. Am I clear?”

I swallowed nervously.

“Partially. I’m bound to do no harm. How does that work?”

His eyebrows raised.

“Well. An Oathbound healer, fighting in my arena. Now, that is a first. Most interesting. How do you fight?”

I was about to show off most of my tricks, and while I didn’t need to get into the School, I thought it’d dramatically improve my life.

“Radiance magic is my primary means of attack. Failing that, I’m trained in spear and short sword, although I have mediocre stats and few skills backing them up.”

“Sorcery or wizardry?”

“I… don’t know the difference.”

“Sorcery uses the skills you are granted, while wizardry uses runes and the like to bend the world to your will.”

“Sorcery then.” The person with all the talismans must’ve been a wizard.

“Radiance sorcery, at the level you are at, will not cause harm to your fellow duelist, and I would be surprised if your physical prowess could cause any issues. Good. You will be fine. How durable are you?”

I grinned.

“Basically impossible to kill. Except for headshots. I don’t know about those.”

Mormerilhawn shouted something over his shoulder, and Iona didn’t translate. A few minutes later, a black-robed healer showed up. Looked like a scaly person, with a long tail, and a snout, and -

Ok.

More like a lizard person.

“What’s he?” I asked Iona, confident that nobody could overhear us.

“A dragonling.” Iona’s words sent a cold splash of water over me.

“Everything ok?” She asked, like she hasn’t casually dropped the D-word. Lots of people were saying it.

Maybe… it was ok?

I shook my head.

“I’m fine.”

“This is Ixcoh. He will be on hand for when you are inevitably less durable than you believe.” Mormerilhawn’s tone was a bit hard to tell through the translation, but boy did he sound condescending. Not nearly as nice as Awarthril and the rest had been, although… thinking about it, they’d been a little condescending in their own way.

“How does this work?” I asked.

“Remove any clothing you’d like to keep intact, spread your arms, activate your defensive skills, and we will begin.” He said. “Please do not use external shields, armor reinforcement, redirections, and the like. This assessment is simply to determine what will be considered a hit hard enough for your opponent to obtain victory. Your shields and armor will prevent those types of blows from happening in the first place.”

Got it. [Mantle of the Stars] wasn’t getting tested here.

I had exactly zero spare clothes, so I completely stripped, feeling Iona’s appreciative look. I then moved into a T-pose as Mormerilhawn suggested.

“I unfortunately require you to assent to being assaulted by me to properly test the limits of your durability.” Iona mimicked a tone of frustration and boredom, like Mormerilhawn was bucking against the rules that required him to do something as mundane as ask my permission.

I thought about it for a bit. I was pretty firmly against allowing myself to get mutilated. Both on a personal level, and on an [Oath] level.

However… with how I’d grown, getting sliced or losing an arm was just losing a chunk of mana. With only the greatest stretch of imaginations was I coming to ‘harm’, and I couldn’t bring myself to believe it. No injury. No pain. Just a brief expenditure of mana.

I just wasn’t getting harmed.

Which has a subtle, but important, distinction from getting hurt.

“Do your worst. But not the head!”

He took out a knife, and started to lightly tap my forearm, so gently that I didn’t feel a thing. Slowly, he tapped harder and harder, until he broke skin.

“Not particularly durable.” His tone was undisguised contempt.

“Really?” I pointedly looked at my arm. “I’m not sure I agree.”

Iona hesitated before translating my smack talk. Mormerilhawn looked at my arm.

“Mana-based regeneration. Not without precedent. How much can you handle at once?”

“My entire body from the neck down.” I proudly boasted.

Mormerilhawn’s knife flashed, and I felt my bicep shimmer for lack of a better word.

“Of course, you need to use a larger blade than that to cut something off.” I shamelessly boasted. Iona shared an identical grin with me.

Mormerilhawn grabbed a thick sword, and applied it to my arm. As the elf finished his cut, fully separating my arm, my healing kicked in and immediately made a new one, regrowing from the stump of my arm with such speed and force that it sent my old arm, which had just started to fall, spinning across the room. It baptized the room and the rest of the inhabitants with a spray of my blood, no longer pressurized by my heart but forced out by the spinning force anyways.

We all stared after it.

“Brrrpt.”

“I’m not cleaning that up.” I said, and Iona faithfully translated… probably also doubling up that she wasn’t cleaning that up either.

Mormerilhawn looked delighted, which was an unusual reaction to having bloody limbs flying around the room.

“Excellent! Your shield is set. Do note that the portion protecting your head will trigger a loss at a significantly weaker hit than the rest of you. Enchanted weapons, armor, talismans, prepared spells and the like are all permitted. However, gemstones are only permitted in a limited capacity for Gemstone duelists.”

I briefly debated asking why, but my severed arm was still pooling blood on the floor. It didn’t make much of a difference for me.

“Understood.” I started to get dressed again.

Iona, Auri, and I left in short order, and a new victim - errr - potential duelist came through the door, Mormerilhawn starting his speech again.

Iona laughed as we left.

“What’s so funny?” I asked her.

“Your arm!” She gave another deep belly laugh. “Mormerilhawn implied that it was from someone who’d broken the rules!”

I remembered what he kept saying about “maybe you’ll have all your limbs”, and laughed with Iona.

It took some time to properly sign up for the free-for-all, then I was in the arena, getting some practice fights in. Getting a feel for my competition. Sure, I could go in totally blind - and have everyone else blind as to what I could do - but knowledge was power.

Deception was key in warfare, and I had my Deception Ring on, setting me to a respectable level 200. Not so weak as to make people suspect I was up to something - I wouldn’t trust a level 40 in the arena, I’d assume there was mischief afoot - but not so strong that people stood up and took notice of me, and tracked what I did for the free-for-all.

I also had a second issue. I’d let some of the people running the arena know that I was aiming for a combat scholarship, and I couldn’t attend the school without it. I needed to show dominance.

More than that.

I needed to prove that I’d be an undisputable asset to the School. I wasn’t thinking that I couldn’t lose - nobody reasonable would expect that - but I believed I needed to show off.

In other words.

I needed style points.

The arena was obviously temporary, a large dirt circle divided up into a dozen or so hexagons for multiple duels to occur at once, transparent shields dividing each segment up. Iona had wandered away, Auri was cheering me from the stands, and I was ready.

I looked doubtfully at my first opponent. A nerdy-looking scrawny kid from the School, he might be 18, and I doubted that he could run a mile, even if his vitality was good. There was a bookish, distant air to him, and while I knew the System didn’t care about physical baseline for mages and casting skills, there was no reason for a good battlemage to not look after their body.

[Identify] gave me [Mage - 256]. Impressive for his apparent age, or at least it was extremely impressive for his age in Remus; I had no idea how it stacked up here.

I’d armed myself with just my tunic and my knife, leaving the “this person is dangerous!” armor with gemstones behind - along with the prayer from my parents. The last memento I had of them. I wasn’t going to risk that, not on something this minor. If I got into the School but lost my prayer, I’d never forgive myself. It wouldn’t be worth it.

The light between us turned green, and I waited to see what my opponent would do.

He closed his eyes and started chanting.

He CLOSED HIS EYES. IN A FIGHT.

Gods help me, it was amateur hour here. What was I doing here?

Establishing dominance. If this was the quality I was dealing with, this would be easy mode.

I mentally admonished myself not to get cocky, my eyebrows continuing to go up as my opponent kept chanting with his eyes closed. At one point he stumbled, and I couldn’t do it anymore. I couldn’t wait to see what he would do, counter that, then beat him.

I slowly walked up to him, keeping my speed down to what a poor physical stat [Healer] should have, and “stabbed” him in the chest with my knife.

His shield flared with color, the light in our arena turned red, and I didn’t need Iona to translate to tell that I’d been declared the winner.

I rolled my neck.

Right.

Next one.

The dueling light turned green again, and the level 200ish [Ranger] across from me started flinging knives at me. One after another, she quickly and efficiently threw them at me, each one aiming for a vital spot.

A solid tactic, letting me know that not everyone here was a rank amateur, and my first opponent had simply been… somewhat special.

However, I was more than twice her level. In spite of obvious skills enhancing her moves, the knives didn’t look like they were moving all that quickly to me. I dodged and weaved through them, avoiding the vast majority of her attacks. Her patterns were good, and I wasn’t able to fully dodge all of them. I grabbed some of the knives out of the air, returning them to sender, and every now and then one of the knives required an action besides ‘dodge’ or ‘catch’.

So I simply flared my [Mantle of the Stars] in a tiny circle right above my skin. To people who were low-leveled or inexperienced, it would look like they hit me, but didn’t do anything. To people with high levels and more experience, it would look like I had an automatic shield skill.

The experts would be able to tell exactly what I was doing, and would know just how difficult it was to pull off, and they were the people I needed to impress.

We traded knives until I got a lucky shot in, and was declared the winner of the duel.

Hey.

I wasn’t exactly an expert at throwing knives! Never donate your weapon to your opponent and all that.

I did a few more duels, getting a feel for how people fought these days. A small measure of the quality of my opponents, and what I could get away with.

It was still good exercise, and I felt suitably warmed up for the free-for-all that was going to start soon.