Tournament (4)

Upon landing on the observation platform Apollonia rushed to my side and congratulated me on my quick and decisive victory.

"It does not matter the outcome of these bouts but the magical prowess we show within them that matters, remember that during your own fight." I said while looking down at her

She quickly nodded giving my a determined look she remarked " I wont let you down brother!"

With two of the seven fights of the first segment of the tournament completed and no more volunteers to continue the elder pointed at a random youngling that had not gone yet and ordered them and their opponent to head down to the arena floor.

The battle between the two dragons produced nothing of note, so much so that I was almost certain that these two would fail the trial. Their mastery of runes was at best mediocre and they only ever used what spells they created in a very elementary way.

Their fight ended in a win for the green dragon named Ulsur but only just barely and as soon as the elder announced his victory he too collapsed to the arena floor.

Once the two dragons had been moved out of the arena to join the other wounded, Apollonia was called to step forward. When she heard her name called she briefly went rigid then looked at me, I gave her a reassuring nod then she returned it and leapt down to the arena floor.

POV Apollonia

With a nod from brother I felt like I had the courage to face anything so I jumped from the platform and landed at my side of the massive arena, the sand floor blew about as I landed.

As I steeled myself for the battle to come, my opponent the purple dragoness had also made her way to the opposite side of the arena floor. We locked eyes and at that moment I knew that this would be a difficult fight. Yulia had positioned herself close to the arena floor almost crouched like she was ready to pounce the moment that the round started. Her deep purple scales glinted in the sunlight and her green eyes gave a glow of determination.

'I need to fight my hardest to make brother proud!'

One last time I glanced up at my brother and grandmother before looking back at Yulia and readied myself for battle.

Soon enough once we had settled into our positions the elders voice boomed across the arena "Begin!"

Immediately I charged forward and Yulia did the same, it seemed that we both wanted to close the distance. As I ran I summoned my first spell, I activated it as fast as I could, launching five blades of wind aimed for various places on Yulia's body.

She quickly summoned a wall of earth to stop the blades in their tracks, While I prepared my next attack she emerged from behind the wall with a complete spell already made, and launched a spear of earth at my torso.

Catching me off guard I quickly summoned flames to wrap around my body as a last line of defense. Then went to dodge out of the way, but as I stepped to the side my instincts told me that there was danger so I redirected and leapt backwards. Just as I sprang back a spear of earth came rocketing out of the ground were I had planned to dodge.

I charged past the trap activating a spell of my own and prepared two others as well using my body to obscure them. The first was a torrent of flame meant to obscure her vision as it lacked any amount of deadly power against a dragon that commanded water. Then when her vision was completely blocked I launched the other two, one launched more wind blades from above while the other shot more that a dozen ice spikes through the flame.

As the flame spell was about to end Yulia charged through the fire with a thin covering of water over her whole body. Just in time I was able to pick up the mana distortions around her to see that she was about to fire a spell.

I quickly dodged towards her and to the right narrowly avoiding jagged rocks that trust up from the ground where I had been standing.

Looking at her now I could see that at least one of my attacks had landed because she had a slight limp and her right shoulder was slightly bloodied.

Now only about twenty feet stood between the two of us, as she had already been wounded I opted to go into close combat and increased the heat of the of the flames dancing across my body and then formed blades of wind to circle myself like a small tornado.

I then charged forward as Yulia launched another spell, I managed to dodge out of the way just in time to avoid and serious damage but still was grazed by the sharp edges of the earth spikes.

As I grew closer I continued to increase the heat that my flames let off, Yulia with a shield of water still protecting her continued to attack as I bobbed and weaved towards her. All the while continuing to pour my mana into the raging inferno that now covered my whole body.

Soon enough I got close enough to attack so I lashed out with my summoned wind blades and flames, causing Yulia's water shield to boil off instantly as it was to thin.

Several blows managed to hit her so as her last stand she summoned countless spears of earth from the ground all around me. As I leapt into the air to avoid danger, one spear pierced my right hind leg causing me to wince in pain.

Wanting to finish the battle I unleashed all of my gathered mana, causing waves of flame to envelop Yulia. Hearing her cries of pain did nothing to make me stop my onslaught, as the elder said the fight is not over until he says so.

After releasing so much mana I could feel myself starting to get low enough where I should stop using so much. Halting my onslaught I walked to where Yulia had been standing before I unleashed my flames.

The ground was scorched and I could visibly see waves of heat radiating off of the arena floor, just in the center of the carnage was a dome just large enough for my opponent to fit inside. It too was letting off waves of heat, I walked up to the earthen dome and pushed on it.

as soon as my claw touched the outer shell it crumbled apart revealing Yulia's charred remains. It seemed that her water mana was not strong enough to withstand my flame.