I had hoped to be ignored. It would have been nice if that happened until one of them had eliminated the other, but the man who controlled fire realized that he was outclassed. He was barely managing to hold his own against the woman with the trident. There was no way to know what spirit root the woman had, but what was obvious was that she had dual affinities. And that she had trained them well enough to gain access to a third.

Magnetism was one of the most difficult affinities to master or defend against. The metal from your armor and weapons was just as likely to be turned back and used against you as deliver a hit on your opponent. The man had to know this. He had to know his loss was inevitable unless he did something outside the norm.

So, it came as no surprise that he would take advantage of my presence. He needed to do something, take some action to even the odds. His movements telegraphed his solution. I watched as he began slowly moving, working around the surrounding wall so that he could close in on my location. I refused to allow him to get within range and created more platforms that would allow me to maintain my distance.

Unfortunately, that meant I was temporarily in the line of sight of the female cultivator. [Stealth] didn't allow an individual to become invisible. It worked with the environment and my surroundings to make it, so I was less noticeable, blending into the background. It was more a mechanic of camouflage than invisibility. The true power of [Stealth] was related to the ability to control Qi signature.

Once I was in view, the torches that lit the room reflecting off my armor, the young woman easily noticed me. But she didn't seem concerned, as long as I wasn't attacking her, she was content to leave me be until after she had finished off the fire attuned cultivator, at least I assumed that was her intent until the first of her trident's tine came screaming towards me.

He had other ideas though and worked to force her and my hand by deflecting her attacks; the tridents redirected and sent flying my way. She could have stopped those deflections, she had proven to have complete control over the metal that was made in their creation, but she didn't. Instead, she supported his efforts, the deflected tines homing in on me. I understood what he was attempting to do; he hoped to force me to engage and take the pressure off.

I obliged, but not in the manner he hoped. I powered up a lightning arrow and fired [Water Pierce]. The [Water Pierce] when I released it, was targeted at the ground between the two combatants. As it detonated, a ground current was formed. I had no real control for the path that current would take, but I watched in satisfaction as tendrils of lightning formed. There was enough water lying in pools left from earlier combat to serve as a conductor, and his bad luck found him standing in one of them. As the arcs of lightning reached where he was fighting, he was blasted off of his feet.

So far, the two of them had been trading ranged blows, I was equally adept at that type of combat. I understood that he had expected to manipulate events, hoping that I would bear the brunt of the young woman's focus. And his plan might have worked, she was using her ability to control the flight path of her trident to attack. But that did not mean she would be the focus of my attacks.

I'm not sure why he assumed I would ignore him to concentrate on her when he was the one that orchestrated events. Or why he felt it was safe to make the outcome of his duel contingent on my actions. Or why he felt it was smart to anger a second cultivator, one that was powerful enough to ignore gravity by standing on air. But his miscalculation was about to be proven idiotic.

I dove from the platform of air that I had been standing on without cycling or engaging a martial technique. I had decided there was no point in equipping my Tessen; the woman had enough control over the magnetic field that the metal spines of the weapon would only allow her to turn the Tessen against me. I would have to battle using my bow and created arrows.

That didn't mean I was limited to [Water Pierce] techniques.

For whatever reason, the woman battling with him considered my presence secondary, and for now, I was willing to ignore hers. I knew the man had expected me to help him; she was obviously the more dangerous threat, but I didn't like being used. I had had enough of being discounted and looked down upon in Flowing Waters. If I was going to be part of a brand-new Sect, I wanted to have a fresh start. I thought making it clear to any potential Sect brethren about how I felt concerning duplicity and the nature of manipulation should start now.

It may not make a difference, but I hoped I would be respected and taken seriously at the very least.

As I landed from my dive, I began the opening motion for [White Crane Opens Wing], the only difference was that in the part of the movement where I would normally snap open the Tessen I used the momentum from my dive and somersault and focused that energy into my bow. The string was already pulled back, an arrow nocked, so it was simply a matter of letting go.

I had created a modified ice arrow. It had become second nature for me at this point, switching between arrow types of ammunition. My ability to layer the elements I was calling upon one within the other had also progressed to the point that it was simply a matter of thought to craft the dual-natured arrow I had fired.

Fire and ice were natural enemies, I had factored that enmity into my plans. I expected him to be able to counter the ice arrow, but the arrow itself was layered. The ice only an outer coating to hide the true danger. He reacted as I'd expected, meeting ice with fire, but what he didn't expect was for the ice coating to offer no resistance, melting quickly to reveal the solidified air shaft that had been nestled within.

Compressed air was powerful enough to scour flesh from bone if it could be directed and sustained long enough. His ability to control heat had melted the ice, but it hadn't affected trajectory, he hadn't thought it necessary. I had aimed towards the side of his head, making no real attempt to hit him.

That wasn't my intent.

Air had certain properties, some of those properties responded to heat. The high temperature that he had released acted on the air molecules that I had compressed, forcing them to vibrate faster. I wanted those molecules to vibrate faster, but because I wasn't certain he could raise the temperature of the air fast enough to make a difference, I had to plan by assuming he couldn't.

Gaining an affinity for an element was more than just learning to use or mold it. Part of gaining control was learning to understand the natural laws that that element labored under. For air, that meant I had to understand how it moved, what happened when I stimulated or repressed the element, and how other phenomena impacted the changes I made.

In this case, my control of the air wasn't meant to do direct damage, my focus was on how air would affect sound and frequency. The last part of [White Crane Opens Wing] required the Tessen to snap open, the serrated edge that was threaded across the outer edge of fabric slicing as it made contact. I applied that same opening maneuver on the air construct that had comprised the arrow, using Qi to force the air shaft to expand. My aim, to create an attack using sound.

The attack was as effective as I'd hoped, the air from the arrow exploding when I forced the compressed air molecules to expand. The explosion was enough to damage the side of his head, the sound to rupture his eardrum. The damage wasn't significant, not enough to eliminate him, but his blood did begin flowing from the side of his head and out of his ear.

He had jumped back when he saw his fire had had little effect on the arrow, but too late to mitigate the damage. His mistake had been to assume that I would react as he planned. He was so confident of the superiority of his scheme that he hadn't planned for things to go wrong. His certainty in his ability to deflect or defeat any retaliatory physical attack on my part had left him open to the more immutable nature of air when that nature was directed and enhanced with Qi.

The damage from his burst eardrum wasn't considered debilitating, but it was effective. The damage had affected the inner ear and resulted in a severe case of vertigo. His sense of balance was destroyed making it impossible for him to react as the young woman pressed the advantage that I had made for her.

This time when she cast the trident, each tine of the weapon landed, doing enough potential damage that whoever was judging the event removed him from the labyrinth just as the attack had landed and would have killed him.

He had made a tactical error by forcing my hand, I just hoped I hadn't made one too by removing him from the tournament. I thought I could hold my own against the woman, but that might be hubris on my part.

Turning to confront her, I acknowledged reality. It was now down to just the two. We would decide the outcome of this first bout, but both of us were dual aligned, so I wasn't certain who would have the advantage. I hope I hadn't miscalculated, but we were about to find out who would win this round.

Water and Air versus Metal and Earth.