Chapter 54: Frontline Combat 101, pt. 2 (Patreon)

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1J6l94vo_EgGnCmVbspWC85iXae2ssEfoed50-cg8Pas/edit?usp=sharing

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“You need to be able to fight,” Instructor Barry said to the remaining forty or so students in his class. “And so that’s what we’ll be doing for the rest of today. Getting a baseline for your combat abilities. Now, I understand that some of you may be thinking that you’re in no condition to fight, tired as you are. That if we wanted accurate measurements of your capabilities, we should wait until you’re all fully rested and in peak condition. And what I say to that, is: troll-dung.

“I couldn’t care less about how well you can fight at peak condition. What matters is how well you can fight when you’re tired, without sleep, and injured. We won’t be getting into all three of those today, but I promise you that they are all things you will eventually be training. Now, before we begin, there’s someone you need to meet.” He clapped his hands, and a well-dressed man with hooves peeking out the ends of his pant legs – a satyr – strode from the shadowed tunnel onto the arena sands.

Cayden wondered how long he had been standing there, waiting for his cue. Was it simply to make a dramatic entrance?

“This here is Cassius, and is on employ by the academy, and he will be both your best friend and worst enemy when it comes to sparring. His special skills are part of what makes training at the academy so valuable. Cassius, if you would?”

Without a word, the satyr reached out and placed a hand on Instructor Barry’s shoulder. A moment later, he removed his hand and nodded at the burly instructor.

“Cassius’ skill allows us to fight with minimal restrictions. For anything but an instantly lethal blow…” In a smooth motion almost too quick to follow, Instructor Barry drew the sword that had been hanging by his side since the beginning of the lesson and sliced through his own arm, the meaty chunk of flesh dropping to the sands with a sickening thunk. As the students screamed in shock, but before the blood had a chance to soak more than a few inches of sand around the dismembered arm, there was a flash of blue light and Instructor Barry waved at the students, once more hale and whole. “Cassius will be able to return you to your exact health from the moment of his initial skill cast. This will allow us to have more legitimate duels, unencumbered by restrictions. Of course, this will not always be the way you will fight. Cassius’ time and mana are extremely valuable, as I’m sure you can imagine, and there are benefits to learning how to limit yourself and face real danger. But for now, fight freely, with your only restriction being to avoid instantly fatal attacks. This means no headshots.” Instructor Barry’s glare sharpened as Cayden got another notification about [Intimidate]. “If any of you end up attempting a headshot on another student in a duel, I will personally ensure you are expelled and punished. I don’t care about any personal feuds you may have outside of this academy – these duels are not the place to resolve them.”

He clapped his hands again, his head wobbling from the motion. “And with that, I think our first duelists have had enough time to recover from their warm-up. Amber and Petre, come to the front.”

Two students, one of them a cyclops and the other an ogre, pulled themselves up from where they were resting on the sand. They were both hesitant, looking at Instructor Barry and Cassius with looks of apprehension, but obviously trying to hide it as they puffed out their chests and glared at each other in challenge. They were both dressed in the clothes of nobles, and Cayden assumed there must have been some history between them from the looks on their faces as they stared each other down.

Ignoring their glares, Cassius rested a hand on each of their shoulders for a second before releasing them and nodding at Instructor Barry.

“Get in that ring, there. First to leave the ring, fall unconscious, or be pulled out from Cassius’ skill loses.” Instructor Barry paused. “Or I suppose someone could surrender. That would also obviously count as a loss.”

The look on his face made clear what he thought about that option.

The two students walked over to the rack next to the ring which housed dozens of different weapons, and Cayden realized for the first time that they weren’t practice weapons. He was so used to the courtyard at the guildhall where all the provided weapons were practice weapons that he had unconsciously assumed the rack here would be more of the same. The instructor had explained that the duels would be ‘real’, but seeing the bared blades glinting in the afternoon sun brought that realization home in a way that words never could.

Things were about to get bloody.

“There is no chain-sickle here,” the cyclops called, tossing her brown hair over her shoulder. The ogre had already grabbed a sword and shield and was waiting on one side of the ring.

“Is that what you usually use?” Instructor Barry called, and the cyclops nodded. “Well then you should’ve brought it with you.” He turned to the rest of the class. “Let that be a lesson to the rest of you! You’re at the Delver’s Academy now, and you’re training to be adventurers. You should never be caught without a weapon.”

The class murmured as students looked back and forth at each other. A few glares were directed at the five students who wore weapons at their hips, each of whom looked smugly back at those staring at them.

Cayden glanced down at his claws, for the first time appreciative of the text of his skill – he truly never could be completely unarmed. He might need to get into the habit of carrying his spear, though, as he was sure there would come exercises where it would be useful. Multiple spears were resting on the rack next to the sparring ring, all of which looked high quality, but given the option he’d much prefer to use the weapon he was used to. Using a replacement spear wasn’t nearly as much of a hindrance as using a substitute for a different weapon which relied more on perfect balance, like a sword, but in combat Cayden would take every minor advantage he could get.

Jeremy was unfortunately one of the ones without his weapon, and Cayden noticed him staring at the rack of swords as if trying to judge the available weapons from a distance.

“Didn’t get a warning about this, huh?” Cayden asked from the corner of his mouth.

“...it seems I’m less prepared than I originally thought,” Jeremy mumbled back, his eyes still locked on the weapon rack.

The cyclops wasn’t happy with the instructor’s response, but she didn’t argue and reluctantly grabbed a flail from the rack before stepping into the ring.

The two nobles stared at each other, hefting their weapons in silence as the rest of the class shifted to get better viewing positions. Then after a few moments without anything happening, they glanced at Instructor Barry.

“What are y’all waiting for, a written invitation? Get going!”

And with those unceremonious words, the first fight began.

The ogre was the first to move, dashing toward his opponent on the opposite side of the ring. But before he made it three steps, he stumbled and barely caught himself before falling on his face. The cyclops wasn’t close enough to take advantage of his misstep, shuffling closer as he regained his bearings and resumed his charge.

“Gravity-altering skill?” Cayden murmured, noting how both of the combatants’ feet dug into the sand with each step, moving slower than they had a second earlier.

“Looks like it,” Jeremy responded. “She used it too early though.”

Cayden nodded. If she had waited until the ogre was closer, she could’ve taken advantage of the opportunity her skill activation created. Although perhaps the skill took too much concentration or had other limitations that would have prevented her from doing so.

The cyclops swung the end of her flail in a circle as the ogre approached, looking confident despite her unfamiliar weapon. It had a longer range than the ogre’s sword, and before he was close enough to attack she swung out, the head of the flail twisting in a counterintuitive pattern as she sought to wrap it around her opponent’s shield, clearly being manipulated by a skill.

The ogre, however, wasn’t caught by surprise, tracking the trajectory and meeting the head with the edge of his shield. At the moment of contact, there was an explosion, and the head of the flail was rocketed back with just as much force as it had on approach.

The cyclops barely managed to retain her grip on her weapon, but her guard was left completely open for the ogre’s counterattack. He swung at her side, sporting a vicious grin as she let out a cry of pain as the sword dug in, blood spurting from the cut in her side. The wound wasn’t as deep as Cayden had expected, though, and she leaped back in a surprisingly long jump as the ogre stumbled once again.

“Lessened gravity?” Jeremy asked, and Cayden nodded.

The cyclops landed lightly on the opposite side of the ring, her hand going to her side and coming away bloody. She looked at Instructor Barry, who looked back impassively, and then refocused on her opponent with a determined expression, her bloody hand regripping the haft of her weapon.

The ogre approached again, though slower this time. With his opponent wounded, there was no need to rush to end the fight, and he seemed wary of another gravity mix-up. But despite the wound in her side, the cyclops showed no signs of flagging. She swung her flail around in confusing patterns and was much more careful to avoid any hits that connected directly to the ogre’s shield. Anytime the ogre got close, she would back out of his sword’s range with a sudden shift in gravity to prevent him from chasing.

For two more minutes, it continued like this. The cyclops had a natural advantage with the ruleset – cyclops’ were notorious for their hardiness, with the exception of the glaring weakness that was currently protected by the ‘no headshots’ rule. But it became clear that the cyclops was less proficient in her borrowed weapon than the ogre was with his. All it took was a single mistake for him to capitalize.

The flail’s head clipped the edge of the shield and was once more blasted backward, the handle slipping from her bloody grasp.

“I surr–” the cyclops started, but the ogre didn’t give her a chance to finish, stabbing her through the chest.

And then, in a flash of blue light, they disappeared and reappeared outside of the ring next to Cassius fully healed, though the cyclops immediately hunched over and groaned.

“Good fight!” Instructor Barry called. He was holding a clipboard and pen, evidently taking notes on the combat. “Now bow to show there’re no hard feelings, and we can continue.”

The ogre and the cyclops stared at each other, the ogre with a smirk and superior look on his face, and the cyclops with a scowl, still slightly hunched from residual pain. Neither bowed.

“...do I need to repeat myself?” Instructor Barry asked in an entirely different tone, and Cayden’s skill once more pinged him about [Intimidate].

Cayden sighed. [Mind is a Temple] was an amazing skill, but it was only the first day of classes and he already was annoyed by the spamming messages. He wondered if there was a way to ‘mute’ certain notifications; [Intimidate] wasn’t the ‘mind-altering’ skill he was particularly worried about.

Begrudgingly, the cyclops and ogre inclined their heads to each other, a ‘bow’ in only the most technical sense. Evidently, it was enough for Instructor Barry, as he merely returned his focus to his clipboard.

“Jules and Melvin, you’re up!”

The next three battles passed in a flash of skills, weapons, and blood.

Cayden had been wondering about the purpose of doing the duels one at a time. Surely they could make things more efficient by setting up multiple fights at the same time? But as he observed each of the duels, he found he was learning much more than he had expected.

Watching these duels was an entirely different experience from watching the trials. Not only was he close enough to see the nuances of the fight and even feel the effects of some of the more powerful skills, but fights between adventurers with real weapons and skills were entirely different from delving a dungeon or sparring in the courtyard of the guild. Cayden wasn’t sure how fighting other adventurers with classes and skills was beneficial training towards their roles as adventurers, but it was certainly a new experience.

Some of the adventurers called to fight were obviously limited in their own experience, as well.

Two of the fights ended after first blood was drawn, not because the injuries were debilitating, but because the ones receiving the injuries were not prepared for the pain and the sight of their own blood, freezing long enough for their opponents to end the duel. One of the opponents seemed just as surprised, both combatants staring at the red that dripped from the elf’s leg onto the sand for several seconds without reacting. He recovered quicker than his wounded opponent, though, and finished the fight to the cheers and yells of some of his friends on the sidelines.

The observers got much more interested after the first fight as they recovered from their fatigue from the earlier run. Cayden could hear bets being made between other students, but he stayed next to Jeremy, the two of them commenting on the fights in a low voice.

After the fourth fight concluded with a flaming mace crushing through an orc’s knee (Cayden wasn’t sure what the benefits were of the skill that ignited the mace), the moment he’d been waiting for arrived.

“Cayden and Ignar, you’re up!”

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