Fire Vs Water

The two third circle mages stood seriously at opposite sides, keeping a watchful on the other, but neither made a move. They both wanted to reserve their mana for the all-out confrontation and as the fight had quickly escalated to third circle spells that were too mana intensive, they both took a break to come up with a new strategy.

Ariane, was even more careful as Kara had still not revealed her trump card, Ice magic. Freya had shared the information that she had mysteriously obtained, with the whole team. So Ariane also hid her trump card, waiting for the right moment. While the magic, she had learned from the Church of Orion, was only support magic, she also possessed a secret weapon that she had yet to use.

Kara on the other hand was reluctant to use Ice magic because she wanted to save it for the siege of the town. The walls were the human's greatest asset in this battle, and only her top tier Ice spells were strong enough to create an opening. She was also relying on the secrecy of the Ice magic, unaware that her opponents already knew about it.

The next confrontation began with another second circle spell cast by the human mage, "Fracturing Stomp!"

The gem on Ariane's staff glowed a pale brown as the mage stomped its tail end into the ground and the very ground cracked, starting from her staff, the fissure began to spread towards her opponent. Kara tried to get out of its way, but the deep crack followed after her.

She quickly tried to think of a spell to block the propagating crack, but none came to mind. In the end, all she could was dodge, but the speed of the spreading crack was too fast for her and her left foot got stuck in the crevice. As the Orc mage tried to free her foot, Ariane managed to cast another third circle spell that took a long time to cast.

"Crimson Fire Tiger!" Her spell reached completion before Kara could free herself. Red and Yellow flame erupted from the red hued gem of her staff and formed into a two-meter tall and four meter long, yellow tiger with red stripes.

Although the spell seemed similar to the blue orc guardian, it was far simpler, as the tiger would only attack its target and could not follow any other commands. The fiery tiger rushed at its target with a roar as Kara redoubled her efforts to extricate her leg from the crack in the ground.

By the time she succeeded, the flame tiger was just three meters away. Kara quickly went through her repertoire and only found a single spell that could save her life. She poured her complete focus in casting the spell and succeeded just a second before the tiger crashed into her as the turquoise gem on her staff glowed brightly.

"Ice Dome Barrier!" In the single second before collision, large amount of water vapor condensed to form a dome around her and instantly froze to form an ice dome around the Orc mage.

The roaring beast rammed into the ice barrier and began to slash it with his claws and even tried to bite through it with it massive jaw, but the barrier stood strong, only giving off a mild white mist. The Tiger's attacks grew fiercer as it tried to get through the dome and managed to create a crack in the shield.

Unfortunately, the Ice barrier managed to outlast the tiger's attacks, as the fiery beast exhausted its mana just before the barrier collapsed. While the barrier was only a top tier second circle spell and the fire tiger was a third circle spell, it won due to its elemental advantage of the fire element, but just barely.

Ariane was weaving another spell when the barrier collapsed and the orc mage came out of its protection with her hands raised and shouted, "I surrender!" while she still had a lot of mana, the human had forced her to reveal her trump card and she didn't want to reveal any more so she stopped.

The human mage stopped her spells with a mild smile and spoke, "I guess that concludes the fighting for today." The proud tone in her voice was evident as she continued, "But seeing as I won the duel, I believe I deserve a spoil of war. How about that staff of yours?"

"What! NO!" Kara couldn't help but shout at the audacity of this human mage. "You didn't win but I surrendered, there's a difference. So don't get comfortable because I'll make sure to repay you."

"I still believe I am entitled to something from you as a spoil." Ariane insisted with her signature innocent smile.

Kara could do nothing but groan at the shameless human, "Fine. Here, take this, but don't get attached to it, as I will be taking it back soon."

The orc pulled a small coin shaped cylindrical green gem from her pocket and tossed it to Ariane, "It's a soul stone containing the soul of a wind attribute magic beast, so don't lose it."

With her words said, the mage quickly went back to her location before the shameless human female could demand something else, and with that the battle score was 3-2. Ariane had saved them from the brink of collapse and as she reached her colleagues, she received a round of applause from them.

Freya was also clapping with a proud smile at the victory of her companion, even if it was an incomplete one. She had carefully observed the fight between the two mages and finally understood the reason Artium was insisting she learn to fight enemies up close.

The two duelists had been powerful third circle mages, and yet a fatal flaw was evident in their fighting style. Without another person there to protect them from melee attacks, any melee fighter that could avoid their spells would be a menace at close range and unless they could cast spells almost instantaneously, which was quite impossible, the mage would be nothing more than a sitting duck for that melee fighter.

As the duels came to end, Jeera ordered his men to release the human prisoners, which they reluctantly did. He also gave them a few words to deliver before taking his small army and retreating back a few kilometers and set up camp for the night.

Yet the sun was still at its apex and with almost half a day remaining, Morris had more than enough time to prepare his soldiers with an effective strategy.

The freed captives ran with all their remaining might towards the human settlement, and Morris sent a small squad of soldiers to retrieve them and immediately sent them to the infirmary.

The four remaining duelists also returned to the top of the wall to report back to their captain, who congratulated them with a warm smile.

"Well done, all of you." The red haired giant patted their shoulders, "You have brought us enough time to come up with a better strategy and even managed to get useful info about the enemy strength."

"But don't become complacent just because we won today, the enemy is still strong, and our quest will not be completed until we have wiped out the orcs completely." The captain commanded with serious eyes, giving a death stare to Alex, who had refused to kill his opponent.

"You are dismissed for now. Get some rest." He ordered as the remaining mercenary left for his group immediately. "You three meet me in the command tent in five hours. Hopefully Maria will have returned by then."