“All three?” The Tier Nine spokesman snorted. “You’re Tier Eight. You couldn’t take us on one at a time, much less in a three on one.”

Serenity took a good look at his future opponents. The Tier Seven woman in the back was clearly a melee specialist; her only weapons were her sword and a dagger that she probably used for both parrying and close quarters. Serenity was confident he could hold his own against her, whether he was in melee or kept it to a ranged fight that prevented her from being effective.

The loudmouth Tier Nine was also a physical specialist, shorter than Serenity but with extremely well developed upper body musculature. Serenity suspected he normally acted as an archer and scout; he wore lighter armor and his bow was well-used. He also carried a short sword, but the real tell was in his initial reaction; he’d reached for the bow even though he stood next to Serenity.

If Serenity could close with him, Serenity would have the advantage despite the Tier difference; even if the man were stronger than Serenity, it was unlikely he was as well trained at melee combat. A ranged fight might be a different matter; in that case, Serenity would have to depend on his armor and personal durability while using magic to wear down the man.

The quiet one was a bit harder to pin down; he was an inch over Serenity’s height and looked like he needed to eat more often than he did. He wasn’t muscled the way the other two were, and the weapon he’d reached for was little more than a smooth stick. That meant he was a caster of some sort, but what sort wasn’t obvious. On the other hand, the fact that he reached for a wand instead of using a Skill was interesting; either he was new enough he’d never experienced enchantment breakage, which seemed unlikely at Tier Nine, or he used items for another reason and simply planned to replace them. There were too many options to know.

If Serenity were to fight all three of them at once, he’d need to take out two of them quickly so that they couldn’t interfere in his fight with the third. He had several options on the order, and any order ought to work as long as it was quick enough. The best order was probably to take out the mage first, hard and fast, since he was the biggest unknown and probably the most flexible; nonmages tended to be a bit more limited, though they could eventually become just as varied. After that, separate the others and charge the archer, then whittle down the Tier Seven swordswoman while playing keepaway.

Serenity grinned at the Tier Nine loudmouth. His calculations were worth the moment they took; he could do this unless they were an excellently coordinated team. “How much do you want to bet?”

“If you can beat all three of us at once, you can definitely come to a dungeon with us,” the loudmouth offered, “We’ll even let you have a fair share of the loot. But if you lose, hmm. Two runs? No, there are three of us. You have to give us all your loot for three dungeon runs.”

“Daryl, what the hells?” The mage’s words were soft but annoyed. “Even I think that’s not fair.”

Serenity shook his head; the grin was still plastered on his face. Realistically, the loot wasn’t worth that much; the attempt to rip him off for the privilege of being allowed in a dungeon was a different thing. Serenity didn’t want to scare them away, but he definitely wanted to crush Daryl’s ego now. “Yeah, I don’t think so. You’d have to give me your loot if I win to make that fair. Since you’re cheap, I’ll offer something you can afford. Whoever loses has to pay for the food at dinner tonight, when you tell me all about the dungeon and we figure out how to work together.”

He’d definitely do well enough to go to a dungeon with them. They might not want to take on the bottom floor, but anything easier than that would be fine. He wasn’t worried about needing to “earn” a spot. Instead, he wanted to make sure they fought. Calling Daryl cheap ought to work.

“You’re on,” Daryl shot back. “Out back, now. Just what you’ve got on you, cupcake.”

Yeah, he’d pissed Daryl off but good. Perfect. It was a good thing Serenity had come dressed for combat, while the illusion from his belt hid his arms and armor. He was almost certainly in better shape than the three Silver Blades; after all, they were just out of a dungeon. It was foolish, really, but at least it meant their mage was probably also a healer, since they didn’t wait to get one there. They had no way to know that Rissa could heal.

Serenity’s grin broadened to show his teeth. “Lead the way.” He dropped the illusion from his belt; it was more of a declaration that he didn’t need to be sneaky than an attempt to be nice, but Serenity didn’t really care if they misunderstood or not.

Rissa stood up immediately after Serenity did. :I’ll be watching.:

“Keep the combat IN the arena! You’ll pay for any damage you do!” Alain, the Guild employee, shouted after them as they walked out a small door Serenity hadn’t been through before.

The door led to a hallway lined with doors; Daryl led the way to the door at the far end of the corridor. It opened onto a scrubby field. It was large enough that Serenity could actually feel comfortable fighting in it, about the size of a football field. The size had to be why Alain was only worried about reminding them to keep the damage on the field.

Most of the field was torn up, burned, or otherwise damaged; it was clearly a practice area and might well be used for demonstrations or even real fights on occasion. There was no evidence of any of the truly large-scale spells, like earthen walls, but the damage was severe enough that it was likely that they simply made anyone who made that sort of change put it back when they were done. The footing wasn’t great, but that would help Serenity more than it hurt him; he was planning to use his Air Glide boots the entire time.

Serenity was ready for an attack the moment he stepped onto the field, but the three Silver Blades kept walking until they were well away from the edge of the field. They were clustered together, so Serenity made sure to hang back about twenty feet. He wanted to separate them, or at least separate Naomi from the mage and the bowman.

“Is everyone ready?” Naomi drew her sword as she asked the question.

It was good to know that they were using something approaching dueling rules, even if no one had actually established which set was in play. Serenity nodded and freed his Crystal Hilt from its sheath; he wanted to see how it held up against shields. He’d pull his ax if he needed to, but he hoped it wouldn’t be necessary. He didn’t trigger the Solid Form enchantment; against this group, a true manablade would probably be more useful.

The mage and the archer said they were ready, then Naomi shouted “Then go!” and started running towards Serenity.

Serenity triggered his Boots of Air Glide, rose into the air, and slid rapidly off to his right. An arrow and a flaming bolt from the mage’s wand hit the ground just past where he’d stood before he moved. The boots let Serenity glide faster than Naomi ran as long as he supplied them with enough mana. That was easy to do; they were fairly well-made and designed with mana efficiency in mind. Serenity wasn’t nearly as limited on mana as the people they were designed for, either.

The mage and the archer were separated by about five feet. That was a fairly reasonable distance; it gave them room to move while allowing Naomi to more easily stop things from getting too close to them. Serenity had hoped they’d be a bit farther apart, but this should still be fine.

Serenity slid farther to the right; he needed to avoid being intercepted by Naomi and she was still closer to her partners than Serenity was.

“Just dodging won’t let you win!” Daryl called out as his arrow narrowly missed Serenity.

The next firebolt from the mage splashed on Serenity’s leg as he charged forward. It burnt through his jeans, but Serenity barely felt it with his armor-self. It simply wasn’t hot enough to actually hurt. That was a little surprising; the mage was a Tier higher than Serenity; he’d expected to take at least some damage from him, even if he was attacking one of Serenity’s better Resistances.

That meant he could take risks. Normally, the mage would be the primary target, but this meant he could afford to take Daryl out first.

Serenity grinned even wider and changed direction, charging through the air at Daryl. He lit his sword with Plasma-affinity mana; if the mage wanted to play with Fire, Serenity would show his team what Fire really was.

The archer managed to get off two shots before Serenity got to him, both of which hit Serenity and even penetrated his armor-self. One was in Serenity’s shoulder; the other was in his chest, more or less over the heart in a human. Daryl seemed to be playing for keeps.

That was normal in a high-Tier fight; it was why high-Tier people who were smart always arranged to have a healer on site before a real fight. Serenity wasn’t worried about healing; he’d be fine.

Serenity bowled into Daryl and knocked him on his butt. Daryl dropped his bow and went for his knife, but he’d delayed just a bit too long to get that second arrow off. Serenity’s manablade crashed into Daryl’s shield and punched through it. The portion of the manablade that made it through the shield was less than half the width of the normal blade, but that was still enough when it was plasma. Serenity burned a deep line in the bicep of the archer’s right arm.

It wasn’t where Serenity had wanted to hit; taking out a tendon was generally better than flash-cooking a section of muscle. Fortunately, it was still enough that Daryl’s arm didn’t respond correctly when he tried to stab Serenity; his arm wavered and he weakly punched Serenity’s side instead of stabbing his belly.

The suction on Serenity’s mana was higher than he’d expected to bring the manablade back up to full power for another slash, but it was worth it; the second hit burned through a tendon in his left elbow. It wasn’t enough to fully take him out of the fight, not if the mage was also a healer, but it was enough that he was no longer going to be very effective without some good, fast healing.

Another firebolt connected cleanly with Serenity’s side as he hit Daryl. The mage was doing his best; Serenity expected he’d soon realize that fire wasn’t doing much good.

Serenity saw Naomi rushing towards him again; he’d stayed focused on the archer for as long as he could. Serenity slid out of the way just as she arrived, narrowly avoiding a sword strike that came close to hitting Daryl. Either she wasn’t careful of her teammates or she was very careful and they trusted her; it would take more time to tell which it was.

Serenity circled the group, once more playing keepaway with Naomi. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the mage tuck the wand he was using away and pull out another one; Serenity expected it to be another element, but knew he needed to be prepared for something trickier. The last thing he needed was to be pinned down right now.