Lord of Charm

"Without further ado, fight!"

Drake was already feeling nervous about the fight; he used most of his time traveling in the kingdom as a tourist rather than stabilizing his magic and learning how to use it properly ever since he strengthened his body.

Gale on the other side was just as nervous; originating from the empire meant he got better magic education and had better basic mana control.

Gale decided to do the first move. He started double-casting powerful pillars, but in contrast to his duel with Zach, he condensed the mana to the maximum.

Drake felt the movement in mana and already knew this spell from the fight against Zach. He used a wind spell that boosted his speed and dodged the pillars that kept popping from the ground.

Gale was fine with this stalemate; continuous spells like boosts took much more mana in the long run, and Drake would run out of steam first.

Of course, Drake felt differently about the situation. When he felt more comfortable with dodging the pillars, he removed one of the speed boosts and used his now-free casting slot for air blades. The blades moved in the air in unpredictable routes and intertwined with one another to confuse Gale and make it harder for him to defend.

Gale canceled one of his pillars casting spells, reducing the burden on Drake, and had to cast shields to protect himself. His affinity with the earth mana was, give or take, equal to Drake's affinity with the wind mana. It showed how talented Drake was; this earth affinity was Nancy's main affinity, yet wind was just Drake's sub-element.

Thanks to his mana-compressing training under Shana, each shield took on two air blades before breaking down, which meant they were still in a stalemate in Gale's favor; Drake's speed boost took more mana than Gale's pillars, and he cast two blades for every shield of Gale, which meant he still spent more mana than Gale.

Drake didn't practice dual casting with different elements yet, so he had to switch to fire completely. He used his wind magic to back off to the other end of the arena for a short break from the fight and switched to fire mana.

"Drake was forced back and switched to fire mana! Will we see his signature move?"

And Drake didn't disappoint. He summoned the spell for which he was famous in the empire, firebirds. Each animal had its own benefits; Lena's snakes slithered, which made them difficult to block. Gale's wisps were numerous, which gave a different type of advantage. The birds' advantage was that they were fast.

Birds started flying swiftly toward Gale who had to use a large wall to block them. This time he was the one maintaining a continuous spell, so it was his 'responsibility' to break the stalemate. Additionally, Drake's fire magic was considerably stronger than his earth magic and his wall held only because he compressed his mana better than Drake.

"How are you ranked among your peers in the empire? Are you one of the strongest?"

Gale wanted to know about the wider world outside the kingdom. This man advanced to the mage phase only two years older than Lena was when she advanced to the mage phase, and he wanted to know if it was considered normal.

"I'm the fourth youngest mage at the moment. Among all mages under 50, my age of advancing is ranked 17th. The first rank advanced a month after his 24th birthday.

Drake didn't mind the stalemate, so he provided Gale with a full answer. Gale was relieved to find out Lena would be considered exceptional in the empire as well, otherwise, it'd be too late for her even if they got good guidance after the tournament.

Gale decided to break the stalemate and used fire mana to cast a speed boost on himself. He kicked the ground and ran forward, sliding under the firebirds. Thanks to the sudden change of pace, the birds couldn't change their route on time and missed him.

"It's fire magic! And it's more powerful than his earth magic! Gale was cornered and forced to reveal his fire magic!"

Steve's shouts pumped up the blood in the spectators' veins as they all roared with enthusiasm over the new magic revealed.

Gale continued by summoning his own signature move, the wisps of fire. Dozens of wisps emerged from the air around him and half of them met with the birds incoming. Since the wisps' target was to protect Gale, they didn't need to chase after the birds, which neutralized the birds' main advantage – speed.

The birds ran into the wisps and couldn't pass through; although Sol's affinity was slightly weaker than Drake's, the difference wasn't big and Gale's compressing was far superior. Each bird was met with 2 wisps and got destroyed.

"What am I seeing?! The firebirds met their counter and got destroyed by Gale's spell!"

The other half of the wisps swarmed Drake who did his best to dodge them with his speed buff and burn them down by casting a firestorm that embraced them all. However, by the time he managed to destroy them, a few fireballs appeared next to him and exploded, causing sparks to fly all over the place.

Drake was in a crisis, his casting speed was stretched to the maximum and he was barely holding on. A few sparks weren't blocked in time and found his legs and stomach, leaving behind painful burns. The pain made it difficult for him to concentrate, slowing down his casting speed which led to even more injuries.

"Drake is falling behind, can he make a comeback? Oh! He fell to the ground!"

A blast sent Drake off his feet and without thinking he used at once a powerful firestorm by using a single cast instead of casting two spells. Although the mana consumption of such a large spell was enormous, he wanted to buy himself enough time to stand up and catch his breath, yet he suddenly felt the mana moves under his stomach.

There was no delay like Drake expected, because Gale already mastered casting spells of two different mana types simultaneously. A pillar of stone came out of the ground and hit his stomach, making him fly in the air out of his firestorm with blood and saliva dripping out of his mouth from the impact.

He was still in the air, paralyzed by the pain when a barrage of stones started hitting him and breaking his bones. He landed on the ground without moving, and a wall made of stone was raised in front of him to protect him from any further injuries.