The Runic Artist

Kiri grinned in excitement as she walked out onto the field. When she’d stepped up, they’d asked her to wait a moment while they found an appropriate assessor. Her Economics and Tactics assessments only had a handful of students present but it seemed like almost every student took Combat. She’d loved watching her girlfriend fight. It still felt weird to call her that, but after two dates, they were apparently exclusive. It was a new experience for Kiri. Ever since she’d had her heart broken by a travelling merchant's daughter when she was sixteen, she’d avoided any serious entanglements. But this was a new start, so she was going to give it her best. Now all she needed to do was find an older woman for Nate. The thought made her smirk, which was apparently interpreted as over-confidence by her Assessor who simply shook her own head in response.

The woman she was facing held a long metal shafted spear with a teardrop shaped blade on the end. Kiri drew six small daggers from her Soul Space. She’d asked Deverell if she should hide the fact that she had such a Skill but he’d shrugged and told her that most of the students were rich enough to have a spatial storage and they’d just assume that was what she was using. Her blades fanned out around her as she used Tethered Soulblade Dancing. Four arms was no longer her limit. She could add another two with her recent improvements, but she wanted to keep them back for now. She had a pretty good idea on what it would take to get an Intermediate rating and showing off the extra arms was unnecessary. It also gave her some seriously good opportunities in the future. She just needed to get to level forty-one and take the A Hidden Soul skill she’d been offered. But that was for the future. For now, it was finally time to fight again. She loved it.

At a nod from the assessor she launched forward. For now she refrained from using her Soul Imbuement, content to harry the assessor with six daggers coming in from every angle. At first the assessor seemed quite calm but when Kiri started tossing the daggers from one tethered arm only to catch them with another the woman stepped up her defence. The whirling metal-shaft of the spear deflected every attack, and after thirty seconds, the Assessor’s speed increased as she started trying to push Kiri back. Instead of allowing the woman to dictate the fight’s path, Kiri started circling, forcing the woman to start using sweeping strikes with her spear to ward Kiri off. Another thirty seconds and the Assessor increased her speed and strength. Kiri matched her, finally using Soul Imbuement as she intentionally let the woman land a small slash on her arm in an effort to get her with an overhead dagger.

The Assessor’s spear blurred far faster than the gradual increase to deflect the dagger and Kiri smirked before she realised her mistake. She was supposed to be aiming for Intermediate. She’d gotten caught up in the joy of the contest and had started pushing her own speed and tactics to score some blood. Even the slash from the spear had bounced off of her skin. With Soul Imbuement on, she was burning through her soul energy, but for that price she also had an Endurance and Constitution of over two hundred. No doubt the Assessor could pierce that if she used her full power, but for the assessment purposes, she wasn’t at that point yet and so she failed to do more than bruise Kiri a little. A bruise which faded quickly at the cost of some more soul energy.

Kiri calmed down her attack, and while forcing the match to continue for another minute, she was eventually forced to stop by a spear to the throat as the Assessor had continually increased her speed.

“You were holding back,” the Assessor said with her surprisingly gruff voice.

Kiri chose not to respond so she didn’t accidentally incriminate herself.

When no response came the Assessor grunted, pulling her spear back to rest beside her as she announced loudly, “Intermediate!”

Kiri grinned in response even as the Assessor spoke again, more quietly this time, “Look forward to seeing you in class. You’ve got some potential.”

Kiri walked towards the edge of the combat grounds, grinning from ear to ear as she saw her best friend and girlfriend waiting for her. Life was amazing, as far as she was concerned.

*************

Nate walked out onto the grounds, checking over the runes he’d copied into his robe. His Creativity was a little over a hundred and forty now and with the growth aspect of his robe, that meant he had fourteen golden stars into which he could imbue runes. Barrier was still a must have, but besides that he’d gone with three of the main elements, taking Water, Earth and Fire, while excluding Wind. In addition, he’d added Gravity, mostly since anyone who had news from the Tournament knew he could use it. He also had Life, just in case he got injured. Finally, he’d gone with Mana, in case he needed to undo anything cast on him.

Along with those six, he added Release, Flow, Target, Control and Drain. For the last two he had decided to go with a couple of runes he didn’t normally use for combat. Obfuscate was one, and he was hoping he could use it to hide some of his attacks. The second was Reinforcement, which he intended to use in tandem with Barrier to further empower his defence. The plan was simple. Stand still and weather the attacks against him while taking shots at his opponent to distract from the concealed attacks he intended to use.

He wasn’t sure it would work, but he was reasonably confident when it looked like they were pitting him against the same Mage that Coralie had fought. The spindly man stood calmly as the two of them stared at each other from across the sand. He was hoping that since there wasn’t water the man might be inconvenienced but that thought was put to rest when, the moment the contest started, the Mage spun up a shield of sand to whirl around him. In response Nate activated his core skills, using Empowered Runic Artistry and Imbue Intent on his Barrier and Reinforcement runes. A second later his own shield was in place. Since his opponent wasn’t attempting to attack just yet, he used his Earth and Target runes in a second runic array.

Using the runic array, he tried to take control of the sand surrounding the Mage and make it target the man himself, with Imbue Intent thrown towards reshaping the sand into hardened balls. He hadn’t really expected it to work so when the Mage was knocked to the sand by no less than ten condensed balls he knew that the Mage didn’t normally use sand. He shouldn’t have been able to overpower his Magic Control unless the Assessor didn’t have good control over the element.

The Mage stood, uninjured and with a wave of his arm water came flying over from the pond and bridges field, swirling around the Assessor without dampening the sand below him. Nate decided it probably wasn’t worth contesting the man's control of water and moved on to the next stage of his plan. Absolute defence. Creating a runic array from his Water, Flow and Drain runes, he used Imbue Intent to guide the array towards draining the flow from any water nearby. Then he waited, fully prepared for the eventual attack. He didn’t have to wait long before the Assessor started shooting the water bullets at him. None of the bullets even reached his barrier, falling apart and splashing into the sand as they approached him. He wasn’t certain, but he thought he saw signs of consternation when the Assessor saw that.

As the contest went on, the Mage continued to add more and more power behind his water bullets. Eventually they started reaching his barrier, but by then most of their force had been sapped. Nate sat inside his barrier, weathering the strikes as he monitored his Mana Reserve. Unless the Mage stepped things up dramatically, he suspected he could last another three minutes. More than enough to get an Intermediate grading, even if he barely attacked the Mage. Though that wasn’t how he was going to let it go. He’d not been idle while he waited. After his rapid increase in Intellect, he could now hold three runic arrays at the same time. It wasn’t comfortable, but it didn’t leave him with a splitting headache like it had during the Tournament. His third runic array was made up of Obfuscate, Earth and Control, with his Imbue Intent guiding it as he carved out a hole beneath the Mage. It was time for his old faithful tactic. Sand burial.

As he ticked over into the Intermediate grading territory he pulled the sand out from beneath the Assessors feet. The mage fell into the hole and Nate quickly tried to condense the sand around him. Instead he found his attempt thwarted as the swirling water shield of the Mage sped up, blasting the sand away. A snake of water drifted away from the water shield and carried the mage back out of the hole. Still, it had bought him some time and as the attacks ramped up and the water bullets turned from a steady stream into a hail, with bolts of lightning added to the mix causing his barrier to look electrified, he was finally forced to surrender. He still had almost a third of his Mana Reserve left though.

“Intermediate,” announced the Assessor, before inclining his head in a respectful nod.

Nate walked over to the edge of the field with a smile as he met back up with Kiri and Coralie, who had managed to find Null, Britt and Flash. Flash was glaring at Kiri when he thought no one was looking, but it was pretty hard to miss.

“Well done, Nate,” said Null as he joined the rest of the Guilders, with only Ameera and Karim missing. “Wouldn’t have expected anything less though.”

“Did we all manage Intermediate?” he asked.

“Flash and I are yet to go, but it looks like we will,” answered Britt. “The kids of merchants just don’t have the same combat experience as us and Null thinks a lot of the nobles are holding back.”

Nate glanced at Null with a raised eyebrow.

“Unlike us, they’re competing with each other for far more than just good grades and some University resources. To them, knowledge is power, which means concealing knowledge is also power. There are a few that I am pretty sure took dives to get a Basic grade and not reveal too many of their spells or skills,” Null explained.

“Sounds smart,” Nate replied.

“Sounds boring,” Kiri retorted with a smirk. “What’s the point in being a badass if you don’t get to be a badass?”

She draped her arm over the shorter Ice Mage casually which caused Flash to grimace and Coralie to smile a little.

“Did we get any Advanced grades?” asked Britt, looking around the group.

Coralie raised a hand, as did Null after a moment, followed by Nate.

No one else made a move so Britt pushed on, “For what subjects? I just want to know who to bother if I have any questions.”

“Skill Development,” replied Null.

“Concepts and Embodiment,” said Coralie.

“Enchanting, Skill Development and maybe Art,” added Nate.

The last comment got Britt and Null’s attention.

“You’re taking Art?” they asked in unison.

“He’s an artist before anything else,” added Kiri with a smile.

“What she said,” added Nate, enjoying the reactions of the group. Flash didn’t seem to care and Coralie must’ve already known as she didn’t bat an eye. Null however looked perplexed, like he couldn’t correlate the Runecaster who beat him with an Artist. Britt on the other hand looked excited.

“Can you show us one of your artworks?!” she blurted out.

At that moment his unigem buzzed. Pulling it out he saw he’d gotten his grade for Art. Advanced, like he’d expected. There was also a message that he could come collect his painting.

“The piece I submitted for the Art exam just got graded. I’m in the Advanced grade for the subject but I need to go pick up the painting I did for it. Maybe I will show it later. If not, I have a couple of other pieces. We’re all rooming near each other right?”

“That’s right. Guess we’ll see you back at the dormitory!” replied Britt with a huge smile on her face.

Nate turned to go after giving everyone a wave but sensed Kiri as she untangled herself from Coralie and joined him for the walk.

“Where’s Frick at anyway?” she asked as they strolled through the frankly beautiful University grounds towards the Art facility.

Nate extended his senses through the Familiar Contract to see how far away the little goblin was. At least three hundred metres was his guess.

“He’s doing a little scouting for me. Trying to figure out a good way to solve a problem I ran into,” he replied.

Kiri nodded agreeably, getting the hint that this wasn’t the place to talk about it.

“Do they let us out much?” he asked, nodding towards the gates of the University as they crossed near the fountain.

“Dev said we can basically do whatever we want but to not waste the opportunity. Why? Thinking of making some visits to the Den?” she asked, waggling her eyebrows at him again. “Luc was talking about how much they liked you there. Bet they even have a few older ladies to suit your niche tastes.”

Nate laughed and gave her a gentle shove with his barrier which only made Kiri laugh harder.

“Nah, just thinking about if we want to use some of the Dungeon tokens I got from the Guild. Need to figure out when we can skip a few classes for a couple of days and make sure we continue to develop. I think our levels are going to matter as much as our Skill development to get into the higher grades,” he explained.

“You’re probably right. You sure you’re okay with me using some of the Dungeon tokens? You are the one who earned them,” Kiri asked.

“I’m sure,” he replied as they entered the room for his art examination.

The painting was right where he left it and he showed it to Kiri, dramatically flaring his arms out to indicate the artwork. Kiri stared at it for all of one second before getting excited and throwing her arms around him in a friendly hug.

“I love it! I love it so much! It’s perfect!” she gushed before she stopped and stared at him. “There is no way we can show the rest of the Guildies though.”

He looked at her in confusion as she glanced back at the painting.

“That’s clearly my fight with Flash. He’s already angry enough as is. If he sees this, he’ll probably try to murder me,” Kiri explained jokingly.

Nate nodded his agreement before replying quietly, “And what makes him think you won’t come back?”

It took Kiri a moment to realise what he had said before she burst out laughing as he reminded her of basically what she had said to Flash after she’d beaten him in the Tournament.

“You’re right,” Kiri said as she got herself under control before looking at him deadpan. “Fuck him. I’m immortal.”

Nate couldn’t keep it in and burst out laughing as they continued to joke all the way back to the dormitory. It was finally time to see what he was working with in terms of a room.