Chapter 166

Annie stood around with her sister and Conor as their manager, Brett, introduced himself and started critiquing their combat styles.

Brett started with her boyfriend and gave him what she considered to be good advice, especially for someone so pigeonholed into a role because of his Talent.

It boiled down to ‘do your job really well.’

Emily got a more comprehensive instruction list that essentially meant that she needed more planning and flexibility. In a team setting, she was fine being the hard-hitting mage, but she needed to be able to stand on her own as well. Being countered by some enchantments wasn’t a viable option long-term, if she wanted to grow stronger.

To that end, Emily would also be meeting with a specialist who could help her make [Cracked Mana Bolt] a more fitting addition to her kit, as it was falling far short of its potential. He declined to expand on the details, but he had already scheduled her appointment for shortly after the tournament ended.

Annie fully agreed with everything he had said, up until the point where he dropped a stack of textbooks in front of her.

She looked at Brett with a confused look on her face. “What’s all this for?”

He, on the other hand, gave her an evil smile and replied, “For you, obviously. You’re going to study and memorize each and every one of them. And don’t forget to do the exercises. No AI.”

Annie looked devastated as she looked at each of the books. “What? No way! If I wanted to become a nerd, I wouldn’t have joined the Path in the first place! Why do I even need Kandau and Kifshitz’s Mundane Physics Fundamentals!? Or Black and White’s Anatomy? And what’s this— The Updating Manual of Mental Disorders? Some of these are bigger than my head!”

Brett just continued to smile slyly and said, “If you want something to blame, blame your new Concept. Its ability seems to come in two parts. The first part acts passively, and seems to help you intuitively understand the cleanest and most efficient method of achieving your goal. You do what's necessary, but only what's necessary, nothing more.”

Seeing Annie nod her head in understanding, Brett continued. “If the passive part of your Concept is the planner, the active part of your Concept is the agent that executes the plan. It guides your every action to complete the mission. It’s quite something to see in action. It’s almost like you become a high tier AI opponent. Though, actually integrating it into your AI comes much later.”

“That’s the part of my Concept that needs improvement. If it wasn’t for the damn thing hijacking my body and throwing me into unfavorable positions, I would have placed higher.” Annie shuddered, recalling the deeply unsettling feeling of her body being puppeted by an unfeeling and cold Concept. If it wasn’t for the massive power boost that came with it, she would just rely on the passive portion of her Concept, and never touch the active portion.

Brett smiled. “Now see, that’s where you’re dead wrong. By definition, the active portion of your Concept was executing the ‘best’ plan that the passive part of your Concept could come up with. You can’t blame the active part. It was just blindly following orders. Think back to your fights. If your body was following the ‘best’ plan to win, then why did you lose?”

Annie lowered her head and reflected on the question. In the beginning, she did very well. She cleanly and quickly defeated her opponents with nary a scratch. The problems didn’t start until she fought Torch, where the weakness of her Concept was openly exploited. At the start of the match, she actually seemed to be winning against the woman. In reality, Torch had been leading her Concept into a trap. She purposefully accepted a seemingly fatal strike in order to land a genuinely fatal counter-attack. After that, the other opponents picked up on the trick, and she began to lose more often.

With the two exceptions of Queen, who just clearly outmatched her, and Adam, where she didn’t even know how she lost, every other loss had come from an opponent stringing her Concept along into some sort of trap.

Intangibility was useful, but not so much in direct combat, where she could be led around until her mana ran low, or when she needed to attack from the front.

“It was tricked.” Annie groused with a sigh.

“Yes, but why was it tricked?” When Annie didn’t answer, Brett continued, “It was tricked because you were tricked. Your Concept acts like a pseudo-seeker Talent. Out of the millions upon millions of ways to accomplish a goal, your Concept seeks out the ‘best’ plan with both the highest chance of success and least amount of effort required. However, unlike true seeker Talents that pull key information out of the ethereal, your Concept only has the same information that you have. In the fight with Torch, she baited you with false information, leading your Concept to draw the wrong conclusion about what plan to go with. With Adam, you lacked any actionable information about how his gimmick worked, so you were dead in the water to begin with. Against Queen… Well, your Concept tried its best. I won’t fault it on that one.”

A look of enlightenment graced Annie’s face. “So the more I learn, the better it can plan. And thus, the better I can stab people...”

“Precisely. You will study physics to better understand the world. You will study anatomy so you can be confident in your fatal blows. You will study psychology to better understand your enemies and their thought processes. Once you have a strong grasp on those, we’ll move on to the more challenging topics. Additionally, I suspect that improving your own planning skills will make using the active part much less uncomfortable and willpower intensive, as it won’t have to operate nearly as independently to accomplish your goals. By the time I’m done with you, you will be a scholar of death, capable of killing a man by flipping a coin. Now, are you ready to hit the books?”

“Yeah! Although…”, she eyed the tower of books, “Can I get lunch first? I haven’t eaten.”

Brett sighed, lowered his head and rubbed his brow. He felt like a parent trying to get their child to do their homework. “Yes, go ahead. But starting tomorrow, I expect you to complete your assignments. If you do, there’s an outside chance you can still make the Top Ten.”

When he glanced back up, she was already halfway down the hall, sprinting towards the cafeteria.

***

Kimberly met Abigail and had to admit that the woman was intimidating.

Her new manager looked like the strictest librarian in the universe, which was almost a comfort. She had spent more than her fair share of time hiding away from bullies in the labyrinths of bookshelves. The woman exuded a quiet confidence that she found almost enviable, but she was also intimidating enough to command her utmost respect.

She had already started listing out things she needed to do, and was now pointing to notes in a massive binder where she went into greater detail. Kimberly assumed that Abigail was going to ignore Emerald and Sapphire for just being Talent constructs. It was something most people were wont to do, simply because they couldn’t wrap their heads around the fact that the constructs were as real to her as any other living being in the universe. All had been going well before that thought, and as she chewed on the inside of her lip, trying to gauge how she should bring the subject up, Abigail withdrew individual binders for each of them too.

Seeing her friends treated as the real people she knew they were, Kimberly was able to relax, and start seeing the manager as someone that she could maybe trust.

When she explained the current plan to win the team tournament, Abigail flatly rejected the idea.

She simply said, “I want you to lose.”

“Why would I lose? My friends and I have worked hard to come this far, if I try hard enough and pull out some of my trump cards—we could take this thing! I can still make two new friends.”

The manager shook her head. “You could do a lot of damage with your Talent, but you need to consider the worst case scenario, Kimberly. It could do a lot of damage to you. Your gems focus on being what you need in that moment, and that’s amazingly powerful. But at the same time, watching them die is eating at you. You might not be feeling it, but I and my team of analysts can see it. We know that it sucks to lose, but losing right now with purpose is better than losing long term. The prizes for the top are great, but the difference between first and tenth place isn't that large. What, you want a cool, personalized house? We can buy you one with the rewards you lot get from delving rifts. As long as you reach the top fifty. The rewards that really matter, the personalized rewards that are custom tailored to you are the first ones allocated. Ranking higher only means more, and a better Tier of those rewards, but just placing is enough for our purposes.”

Abigail flipped through a folder she brought out of nowhere. “What you and I really want, Kimberly, is for your friends to get another shot at going into the Legacies. And if you trust me, and do what I say, we can make that happen. There are methods to allow sapient constructs to use them. But the rules for Legacies are strict, as you no doubt know from asking around. We are lucky all Pathers who are rated well by their managers by Tier 14 are allowed another trip to the Repository so none of you will miss out.”

Emerald Blade was going to respond, but Abigail shot him a flat look that made him wilt back.

Looking between all of them, Abigail said, “But you must have realized that your Talent, when creating a new friend, is entirely dependent on your own emotional state at the time. They fill a role based on your needs, but they’re also influenced by your emotions. If you want to make a healer, and more importantly, a rogue, you need to be more emotionally centered for them. Emerald Blade and Sapphire Shield being aggressive and action oriented is a good thing, since they’re both frontliners. I’d wager that you made Sapphire Shield when you were feeling defensive and alone. Same idea for Emerald Blade, I’m sure you ended up making a saber fighter when you wanted to strike back for once.”

Kimberly could only nod in response, as everything Abigail had said about Emerald Blade and Sapphire Shield was one hundred percent correct.

Abigail continued, “But a healer needs to keep their calm so they can rationally assess the team's needs. And a rogue needs to be patient, and strike at just the right time. They need you to be stable first. You don't want to have to overwrite one of their personalities if you mess up and can't work with them, do you?”

She didn’t exactly love the plan, but once Abigail explained more, she understood. She really didn’t want to have to overwrite one of her friends' personalities. She knew it was possible, but the idea was anathema to her. She’d rather set them free to live their own lives, but that was impossible, as her Talent only lasted for so long before she needed to re-energize them.

When her manager brought out three more binders to choose from for her next steps, she even started to like the idea.

When she was allowed to talk it over with her friends, and was able to pick which of the plans she wanted, Kimberly was completely on board.

A little would be lost now by not showing all of her power, but the future was bright.

She’d had no idea that top ranked Pathers were given a second chance to enter the Legacies after their spirits were healed. They just needed to prove that they were worth the expense.

Abigail even had a method and plan for getting Emerald and Sapphire their own chances at a Legacy, if the three of them could meet some of her challenges. They weren't sure that they could use them as every Talent was different, but she was willing to get them slots to try, which was all Kimberly cared about.

Short-term loss for long-term gain.

That was something Kimberly could accept.

***

Adam nodded along to what his managers recording said as they played a game of ‘spot the fake and find the original’. He never expected to win the game that the Tier 35 started, but he hadn’t expected to be continuously spanked on pure technique.

That was respectable. After his first tournament loss to Queen, he had been forced to reevaluate his own Talent and Concept.

Losing a second time to Rewind was tolerable. They both knew each other, and understood each other's secrets and weaknesses.

But Queen had just shoved a sword in his chest, ending his elaborate dance before it could begin. Unfortunately, her Concept manifestation was a hard counter to him that he hadn’t known existed… until it pushed straight through all of his defenses. His ignorance has been his downfall.

Which was why he had been desperately trying to find his manager. They were meant to help one grow and learn.

Except, he still didn’t even know his manager's name. The only thing he had found was a note that started him on a trail through the tournament world. Those hints always came with something for him to improve on that he would need to find the next clue.

So far, he had learned how to better blend in and avoid detection in various ways, which he believed had all led up to this.

His current clue was hidden inside one of the Gardeners' rest shacks, and he had no idea how to get inside without breaking his cover. His illusions only really worked on people around his Tier. Those that vastly outranked him were able to see right through his power. Monsters were easier to fool, so he was able to delve up a few Tiers, but humans were intelligent… mostly.

Chewing through a sandwich, he brushed the crumbs off his hands before walking forward.

He was just going to wing it and see what happened.

Worst case scenario, he was kicked out on his ass, and the manager would be forced to show themselves to continue the game.

Sometimes beating the game meant flipping the board.

***

The next week delivered a slog fest of fights, but most of them proved easy enough for Quill and Torch to handle without showing or burning more of their trump cards.

There were only two exceptions during the team fights. The Gems’ unexpectedly pushed them into using another of Quill’s precious [Sword Rain] arrays. Then, Diana’s team forced the duo to reveal their even more powerful, team variation of the skill.

[Blazing Spear Rain] was an upgrade on [Sword Rain], creating spears of fire that fell just as the swords did. As they were made of fire, Torch could control and empower them. She directed every strike into Diana’s team in a hellish barrage.

Even with a potent front liner and healer combination, their formidable team was unable to stop enough of the concentrated salvo to prevent their loss.

The resounding victory saw the pair clutching first place in the team rankings. No one had a sufficient counter for the overwhelming power concentrated on their team. If the attack was simply an area attack, like [Sword Rain], the other top competitors might have had some counter-play. But they couldn't stop the attack when Torch directed the barrage in a much smaller area. The usual fire defenses also failed, simply because [Blazing Spear Rain] hit at a high enough Tier to overwhelm them.

After transitioning away from the team fights and their domination of Diana’s team, opponents in both brackets started to surrender as soon as they were put in a disadvantageous position against them, instead of risking pointless wounds. A lengthy healing cooldown was the easiest way to get dropped to the bottom of the top fifty, and no one wanted to risk it.

Only one remaining fight worried Quill… his upcoming bout with Adam.

The normal-named Pather was still a giant question mark for everyone.

So far, he’d been bested only thrice. The first time, Queen stabbed what should have been an obvious illusion, but Adam was immediately yanked out of the fight.

Next, Rewind took a victory from him, but only because he failed to keep her locked down. Eventually, he just surrendered, likely because he was running too low on mana.

Yesterday, Torch had beaten him by flooding every inch of the arena with so much fire for so long, even the stone of the arena floors started to crack under the heat. While it technically revealed that Adam was vulnerable to absolute and sustained area attacks, it was a moot point. No remaining competitor could adequately match the time, area, and intensity of attack that Torch was able to dish out.

That currently left the man in fourth, but if Quill wanted to tie his partner for first place, he still needed to beat Adam as well. He had large area attacks, but not of the type that Torch had used to defeat the masked Pather.

It was a shortcoming in his arsenal of talismans that he intended to rectify when he had time to sit down and design a few.

Their fight was his last highly anticipated one remaining in the tournament, as the top fifty had all fought with each other at this point. Though, that anticipation paled in comparison to the Torch and Queen fight that would happen right after.

Today was the day of the final matches, and Quill felt that Adam was still hiding exactly what he could do.

Quill had no proof, but that was what his gut told him, and he trusted it.

When they were lowered into the arena, Quill readied a handful of talismans, but he didn’t immediately use them.

Wide area attacks hadn’t worked on Adam, except when Torch had flooded the arena with an absurd amount of fire.

Others had tried the same thing to no effect.

When combined with Queen's single attack, he was left with more questions than answers.

Seeing Adam walk out of his box and wave, Quill tossed a [Firebolt] talisman out, which took the man in the chest to no effect.

Throwing out three [Create Water] talismans, Quill added a talisman that flash froze the attack a split second after he used [Water Manipulation], to shove all the water away from him in a wave.

When it froze, it created a massive circle of ice protecting Quill.

With his spiritual senses, he saw Adam walk up then through the ice.

He felt real, but it was obviously an illusion, as it wasn’t bothered by simple things like physical obstructions. Throwing a [Wind Blade] talisman, Quill made the illusion ripple but nothing more.

The false Adam teased, “An interesting tactic, but not one that will work. Best to use your big, bad [Sword Rain].” He then twisted to show his shoes. “I even brought my tap shoes just to dance with you. I might not be as pretty as Queen, but I’ll bet I dance better.”

The masked Pather winked at Quill as he walked up and patted him on the shoulder.

Quill felt no danger, so let the illusion touch him. But just as the hand landed, the illusionary Adam next him began to feel dangerous, so he struck out at it with his staff.

The illusion vanished like it was made from smoke.

Suddenly, Adam appeared next to the wall of ice and tapped it. He winked as he commanded, “Break!”

The entire multiple-foot-thick slab of ice shattered in an explosion of ice shards. Some were large spears that would crush the unwary, and others were small and razor sharp, cutting at any fragile flesh that was exposed.

Quill was ready, and used a [Wind Barrier] talisman that blocked most of the attacks as he waited for the ambush that he expected to strike at his back.

Except, it never arrived.

When the ice settled, Adam sat on a boulder-sized chunk of ice and asked, “What, not even a flinch?”

That was when Quill whipped his staff to his front.

Amateur rogues always attacked from the rear, as it was the hardest to react to, but Quill had spent enough time around and training with Annie to know that sometimes, letting someone expect the obvious and doing something stupid instead could be effective.

Feeling his staff slam into something solid and fleshy, Quill followed up with two [Wind Blades], but they did nothing.

The Adam sitting down on the ice rubbed his shoulder as if he had been the one struck and whined, “Well, that's just not fair.”

Quill laughed and pulled out a talisman. “It's okay. Most people have fallen for my sleight of hand in one way or another. You're just the first sucker to do it literally.”

With that, Quill sent a pulse of mana into the talisman, activating the stored spell and laughing as it resonated with the powder he had left on his staff.

A line of light appeared not two feet from Quill, and he sent a [Jolt] at the area, only to hear a yelp and cry before half a dozen new light sources appeared.

Behind the mask, Quill's eyes widened as he felt the talisman's resonance move halfway across the arena in an instant.

Adam could change places with his illusions.

That actually explained most, if not all of his odd behavior in the previous matches. There was nothing else that explained how he got through most everyone's defenses, but was defeated by Torch.

What that didn’t explain was how Queen ended the man in one hit.

Quill couldn’t ponder it more, as the resonance moved behind him and to the right, but he kept his body forward and head rotating, as if he was looking through the sea of light marks to find the original.

Quill had no reason to give away his actual advantage this early.

It would only work once, and he was determined to only reveal what he knew when he finally had Adam in a position that he couldn't escape.

He threw out a [Wind Blade] at a bar of light that paused for a second, but it passed through where the body should have been without even a ripple.

Quill was about to say something while the still sitting Adam asked, “Shame. I thought it would be a more interesting fight.”

Then, all of the light-up images turned into various versions of himself that Adam had used in the tournament. They ranged from every size to skin color and hair color as they all rushed at Quill.

Sidestepping the first of the attacking illusions, Quill waited for the real Adam to make his move and wasn’t disappointed. From his left side, he felt the illusion be replaced with the resonating mark, and use a [Firebolt] talisman at the illusion when there was less than a hair's breadth between them.

Adam looked surprised as he peered down to the hole in his chest, then back to Quill.

His mouth moved, but then an illusion covered the wound, and Quill heard Adam command. “Reality is an Illusion.”

He felt his own Concept resonate with the man's command as the wound vanished, as the illusion became real.

Visually Adam hopped two steps back before cursing. “I really didn’t want to expose that, but if I beat you, I can catapult to the third place spot. Damn, I have to ask though, how’d you do it?” In reality the man had teleported across to the other side of the ring. The false copy paused, as he looked to the light on his arm, and it vanished with another burst of power from his Concept.

Quill winced. Each time Adam used his Concept to invert illusion and reality, it felt like someone ran their nails down a chalkboard to his own Concept.

It didn’t hurt, but it was profoundly uncomfortable.

Adam looked to him and said, “I slit your neck.”

An illusion of the wound was created on Quill, and he felt the Concept try to sink into his flesh and invert truth with fiction, but he flexed his own willpower and threw the attempt off.

What surprised him was how strong Adam's willpower was. The man felt like he had been trained with his Concept. It was strong and precise in its application, like a honed blade.

If Quill hadn't spent so much time fighting with Luna when training his own Concept, Adam might have been able to convince his body that it had just been fatally wounded.

Not letting the man try for a second time, Quill rushed him, but a trip line appeared in front of him and became real just as he was about to pass its location, sending him tumbling to the ground.

Quill went with it and threw out two [Wind Blade] talismans where he felt an attack was coming from.

As he sprung to his feet, he saw a half dozen throwing daggers get scattered to the side.

They clattered to the ground, signifying that they were quite real and deadly before fading away.

Quill threw back his cloak to catch a real half hand as it tried to pull at the clasp. Another hand pulled at the talismans that make up the cloak, but that was a mistake.

Cloaks were notoriously easy for an enemy to grip, and Quill had been prepared. “You fell for my trap card!”

Adam’s hand exploded as the talisman on the edge of the cloak activated at his touch.

No one had been able or willing to touch his obvious trap for good reason. Even with his ability to turn injuries fake, Quill knew Adam had just lost that hand.

He appeared on the other side of the arena as all the illusions vanished, missing half of his arm below the elbow, proving his conjecture correct.

Adam opened his mouth to speak what Quill was sure was going to be an illusion and an inversion of his injury, but Quill threw his own Concept at Adam and did his best to interrupt the attempt.

The distance worked against him, but Quill had willpower to spare and in the end enforcing the status quo was always easier than change. He prevented the inversion long enough to use two attack talismans. The [Firebolt] took Adam in the pelvis, and the [Wind Blade] cut off his other arm.

Even with the crippling injuries, he still tried to invert truth into an illusion, but Quill was now closer, and the power failed to take hold of reality with Quill actively fighting it.

Before Quill could finish closing the distance, the referee pulled Adam from the fight, signaling Quill the victor and first place winner of the tournament.

The only question was if Torch would be tying him for first, or if they would be taking separate placements.

Her final fight was against Queen, who they knew had prepared counters to all of her shown abilities.

When he was able to sit down, the two women were already lowered into the arena. The solo tournament gave team members the option of automatically drawing instead of fighting against each other, which he and Torch had opted for before their match on day two. So if Queen beat Torch here, Queen would have just a single loss, and would become sole possessor of second place. Meanwhile, Torch would drop to third with a loss and a draw, instead of tying for first with Quill’s one and only draw.

Even as they took their positions, Quill listened to Light explain everything to the watching citizens and crowds of people at home.

The Royals were even on their own platform, just waiting for the tournament to officially end with the two women's final fight.

On their platform, there were small pillars of marble that each held a plain ring corresponding with the top fifty rankings. Next to that, the points ranking pillar showed the top fifty in each category. Those winners were all already seated in their order, with only a few missing people who had made it into the top fifty. He nor Torch knew anyone in those rankings, though. Those teams were mostly those who disregarded the solo and team events for whatever reason.

The crafters rankings had also already been decided, and they sat off in their own area.

There were more groups of finalists amongst the numerous separate categories, but they only had public rewards for the top twenty-five, instead of the top fifty.

A flash of flame brought his attention to the arena where Queen and Torch met in a furious display of melee prowess.

Torch was forced to dodge Queen’s second manifestation of her weapon, but had the strength advantage in their exchanges. Her spear was mostly used to block, but when she had an opportunity, she struck like a viper and drew blood each time.

They were never serious wounds, but they were always landing where Queen's armor was weakest. As the swordswoman was unbothered by the heat of the flames, Torch was mainly relying on her internal [Blood Manipulation] and Blood Alchemy to give her the strength boost to out-muscle the other woman.

In one exchange, Torch grabbed Queen's blade with a gauntleted hand, and held it just long enough to jab her with her spear. It skittered off Queen's armor, but it left a scratch deep in the metal. As it became apparent that Torch wasn't going to be able to beat Queen in a battle of weapon arts, she pulled back and summoned a blob of molten metal, but it was instantly blasted away from her control with a burst of energy from Queen's armor.

Torch took to the air, followed immediately by Queen, but Quill nodded, seeing that she was finally using her own false Legacy trump card.

Queen was just that hard of an opponent, and he understood why she was being pushed to this degree.

Torch was limited in crossover skills from Liz, but they both had and used the bloodline that her mother had given her.

In the air, Torch theatrically screamed as a blast of fire came out of her cloak and armor. That same fire rebounded off the barrier separating the arena from the crowd, and then reformed behind Torch in a pair of wings.

Wings of raging flames.

The air around them rippled from the insane temperature, and he knew that even Torch would be feeling the heat.

How exactly Queen ignored flame attacks, they weren’t entirely sure, but no enchantment was perfect. They all had upper limits.

As the wings condensed around Torch, she rushed at Queen, who, for the first time, started to retreat and fight defensively.

Even from where they were, they could see Queen’s armor start to soften and melt under the crazy heat that Torch’s armor was producing.

It was supplied by an enchantment based on Matt's endless sub-aspected mana, which caused her attacks to linger longer than what would be allowed by her mana pool. They pretended the effect was gained from a Legacy for the observers. An easy and convenient lie that no one could, or even would, question.

Light was nearly out of his seat as he shouted, “With Queen's armor melting, will she be able to so easily shrug off such intense heat? Every time she tries to open some distance between herself and Torch, the fire wielder ignores her own defenses to press the attack even further!”

As he said, Queen's armor started to glow and warp, and they were all treated to the answer of why Queen seemed so impervious to the fire.

Instead of the standard skintight clothes to pad the metal armor, Queen wore a nearly translucent, full-body suit that appeared to be made of water with runes floating inside it.

Light provided the explanation. “Who would have expected Queen to be hiding a Tier 12 water skin suit?! Those are made from condensed water essence, and are highly valued for their protective properties. Incredibly rare before Tier 15, too. That said, her problem now is that her armor is only good for blocking magical attacks, not physical ones.”

As if he jinxed it, Queen pivoted too slow and took a deep gash across her thigh that sliced right through the water suit. Blood started to flow freely into the water, and Quill knew that Liz must be cursing up a storm in her own blistering armor. If she could use her true skills, the fight would end right there.

They had expected the heavy armor itself to be enchanted, so once it melted, they figured that Queen would be crippled by burns from the molten metal. Instead of that being the case, the rare and unusual water suit perfectly shielded her from any of the heat. His partner was back to square one in a melee fight against a true monster.

Dodging back from a counter strike, Torch hurled her spear at Queen and tried to rush in for the grapple behind it, only to be nearly bisected by the second blade Queen had created.

After two more attempts, Torch finally knocked the second sword away, closed the distance, and wrapped Queen up in a wrestling hold, keeping control of one of her legs and arms. She held on just long enough for her spear to fly up and puncture Queen through the side.

Queen kept up the struggle, but it was useless, as Torch forced the spear to skewer clean through her chest to the other side.

The referee quickly ended the fight, causing the crowd to collectively lose their minds.

The cheering thundered so loud that Quill felt rumbling in his chest.

As Torch walked out of the stage, she raised her spear and roared. Skills started to be launched into the sky at the movement, and Quill smiled to see his flower talismans in the crowd amongst the other non-physical attacks.

Stepping up next to his partner, Quill wanted to say something, but Light spoke faster. “Unbelievable! For the first time since Shadow and I did it ourselves, we have a single team sweeping first place in both the solo and team tournaments. Everyone, give the champions a round of applause! Undefeated! Unbeatable! Unstoppable! Legends in the making, and you were all here to witness the story start! Quill and Torch! A mage and melee fighter once again proving that the iconic pairing is stronger than anything else!”

Shadow popped up next to them, stepping right out of Quill's shadow, and slapped her hands on their shoulders. Before they could react, she drew them into the darkness and then onto the stage with the Royals.

Before she slipped back through the ground, she whispered, “Congratulations kiddos. Enjoy the long, boring ceremony.”

Tur'stal gestured for them to take their seats at the front of the stage where the chairs were rearranged. Now, the normal top seats for solo and team had been merged, and slightly raised. He took the time to catch Torches hand and give it a squeeze to show how happy he was for her defeating Queen as the crowd cheered.

After letting the crowd burn off most of its energy cheering for a long few minutes, the Royal began her speech.

“People of the Empire. Today is a momentous day. Not just for our victorious competitors, but for all of us. Over the last year, the Tier 10s who arrived in my little garden have grown and improved. I could not be more proud of you all. And yes, I do mean that. All of you have worked hard, and should take pride in that. Without blood, sweat, tears, and sacrifices, none of you would be where you are today. Even if you aren't on this stage, you know what your next goals are. Take what you earned here and learn. Grow and strive to surpass those who sit behind me.”

Tur'stal looked to those behind her and gestured to the crafters. “First though, I want to recognize the crafters. I always love this section, even if it's not the most popular in the wider Empire. This is where I found my own trail in life, and it led me all the way to where I am today. Seeing you all take raw ingredients and making special things out of them always gets me emotional. First, the crafters of metal. My smiths, please come and receive your awards. In the twenty fifth spot, Vic of House Damone, who created an expanding shield that can be made completely transparent from either direction. Let us give her a round of applause!”

With that, she started to introduce each and every one of the top crafters and described what they had created in their competitions.

Quill took note of a few of them, but he had already marked most of the ones that he believed he could work with early in the tournament. At this point, he was able to just relax and enjoy the show. He did however record the name of one Ripley Jones, who had created an intriguing stained glass blade. Based on that item, he suspected that the man had access to several odd mana types; he wanted them for both his talismans and aperology research.

The rewards were fittingly generous to the top crafters, starting with a two month apprenticeship under a Tier 25 crafter in their field and expertise, then moving on to include more and more rare skills. Custom tools and exotic materials to make items with were also included as the rankings of the recipients increased. The other categories kept the winners’ rewards a secret, but for the crafters, Tur’stal blatantly advertised how much their wares would soon improve.

After finishing with all the crafters and moving on to the delve point rankings, Queen quietly arrived on stage to take her seat. Thankfully, she didn’t look upset. At least, her body language appeared calm.

Her congratulatory AI message to Torch was also friendly. The demand for a rematch when they met back up at Tier 11 that immediately followed eased any concerns that the dual losses had tainted the budding friendship that they had been toiling over.

When the solo and team tournaments were introduced, Tur'stal stopped after third place in both.

Then, once every other tournament winner had been announced, she introduced Queen. “And now we have Queen! Ranking second place with an absolutely stunning performance, the swordswoman who cut her way to silver in both the solo and team battles. This is a rare happening, but one that we all love to see. To her go the rewards for the team battles.” Tur'stal dropped a shining ring into her waiting hand.

“And the solo fights.” A second ring tumbled down.

Queen had actually lost against Diana’s team in the team battles, but they had in turn fallen to three other teams, which still made them rank below her. In every other fight, she had managed to come out ahead, even if only slightly. A one-versus-many was never a good situation, especially in the top fifty, but the lone swordswoman had scraped through time and time again. Only one team had developed an effective strategy to keep her fully contained, and none of the others had replicated the feat.

As she had with everyone in the top ten, the Royal added a third ring. “And the traditional bonus for all the medal winners, a portable house that is fully customizable and built around the specializations we believe best suited to your future.”

“Everyone, please give Queen a huge round of applause for her magnificent showing.”

Tur'stal allowed the crowd all the time they wanted to cheer their hearts and lungs out. Nearly ten minutes went by before the Royal finally quieted them.

Queen seemed nonchalant about the whole thing, but waved back. Once the din subsided, she nodded to Tur'stal before returning to her seat. Most contestants had taken the time to say a few words. Queen simply turned around and sat back down.

Tur'stal then gestured for Torch and Quill to stand next to her, on either side.

Before she even said anything, the Pathers started to roar and cheer. Tur'stal laughed and calmly spoke over the roar without seeming to even raise her voice.

“Today, we have two people who went undefeated in both the solo and team tournament. Technically, they drew to each other, but I don’t think anyone is counting that. Tied for gold, there is nothing we can do but double the first place rewards, and move everyone else up. Exactly what they get will be between the two of them, but know that prizes are numerous and valuable. The Empire has so many new treasures to share this year.”

Tur'stal looked to Torch and smiled. “The inspiration for one of the largest fan clubs we’ve seen in recent centuries, paired with one of the most contentious contestants we’ve ever had.”

Torch waved, but Quill took half a step forward, sensing that now was an appropriate time to speak. He said, “Thank you! Thank you! I know how you all love, adore, and lust after me, but I must beg that you to not hate on poor Torch so much. She’s a delicate and sensitive flower that doesn't handle the heat very well.” Hearing the booing, Quill let his mask smile. “But as Adam would say, every magician needs a good closing act. So here’s my big finale!”

A hush ran through the crowd.

“Over the last eleven months of the tournament, I have released ten new runes, all for free. I’ve heard people speculating that I’ve been too busy with the finals to do another drop for this month. But no! In my boundless genius and benevolence, I have formulated something very special for you all.”

Two talismans appeared in his hands, accompanied by the words, “These two little beauties are a mated pair. A new spherical homeostasis temperature rune that notably does not need to be set in a predefined area, alongside a matching alarm spell. The two runes pair seamlessly together, and can work in almost any environment. If you have them active, and someone or something trips the alarm rune, you will be alerted by the sudden and rapid change in temperature. My collaborators and I have pared them down to Tier 7, and have scaled them up to Tier 14.”

Most of the fighters radiated disappointment and disinterest in the homeostasis temperature rune, but the crafters were nearly falling or jumping out of their seats at the news.

Homeostasis runes normally needed to be contained to a formation built around limiting the area of effect, if only to keep the temperature stable, but not his rune. After expending over a three billion mana, Matt and his AI had managed to make it work in any space, and without needing to be permanently anchored.

The crafters universally understood what a revolutionary idea this was, and were beyond excited.

Everyone else, not too much.

Matt had been over the moon as well, but Erwin and Luna had partially burst his bubble. This precise rune was definitely new, but they knew of at least two guilds who probably had something similar hidden away for only their own members.

Still, Matt was pleased to use the Quill identity one last time to tweak their noses, before it vanished until their journey to Minkalla. After this, Imperial agents would be taking over most of the high profile masked identities to lead spies and assassins on wild goose chances through the Empire, while the real Pathers focused on delving.

Once they sat back down with a single, shared, but larger portable house, Frederic stood up and made his declaration. In celebration of his coronation and in thanks to the wonderful host, he would be awarding everyone who placed in the top fifty of the Big Three a rare or cracked skill out of his personal vaults. Additionally, he and his staff would be providing everyone in the top one thousand free consultations on how to uniquely enhance any cracked skills they already had, or later gained while on the Path. The offer even extended any previous tournament’s top thousand placers who were still on the Path.

That once more thrilled the top contenders, who had long since grown weary of the long talks.

Quill had to admit, the man worked fast to establish ties with the Pathers, and he was sure it would work. At least a little. In fact, he really did hope that a lot of people took advantage of the consultations. After Frederic sent him a ‘starter guide’ on how [Cracked Phantom Armor] could be modified, Luna had clued Matt into the fact that the new Royal’s expertise in skill modification served as a persistent if small advantage for his faction. On average, the nobles he worked with had more skills that worked harder, more efficiently, more precisely, and sometimes even uniquely. With normal skills, the advantages were mild yet notable. But with cracked skills, the differences ranged from stark to game breaking.

Eventually, the cheering celebration and joviality died down and there was nothing else for them on the planet.

And then, just like that, the Tier 10 tournament ended.