All the Skills by Honour Rae

Author:Honour Rae [Rae, Honour]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-12-20T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirty-One

"In the red corner," said the announcer. "Shawna Shadow Sorceress."

The crowd cheered, and Shawna turned and waved. As she did, Arthur noticed she held a stick in her hand about a foot long with a painted red end on it. This must be the marker Horatio talked about.

"And in the blue corner, we have the Master of Multiplication!"

The man on the other end was a little harder to see due to distance. However, as the crowd cheered he took off his top hat and bowed to them all.

"Tonight we battle under normal Uncommon dueling rules: The first one to mark the opponent’s skin wins. Now… fight!"

With the last word, the announcer dropped his hand and quickly backed to the far wall, presumedly to stay out of the way.

Shawna Sorceress reached for her left forearm. There was a dark, rectangular mark on her skin. Arthur couldn’t see the fine details, but Shawna seemed to pull out a card from her skin.

She held it out in front of her. "Shadow Veil!"

Instantly, a cloud of shadow engulfed her half of the arena. It was inky black and impossible to see through. For a moment, it seemed the cloud would roll up to engulf the audience, but at an angry buzzing sound, the cloud sank back again to puddle on the grounds.

"What did I tell you," Horatio sighed. "If there’s any fight in there, we won’t be able to see it."

The Master of Multiplication hadn’t been resting on his laurels. With the hand not clutching his own marker, he reached under his long, flowing jacket and held up his own card.

"Baker’s Dozen!"

Instantly, a crowd of exact copies of him sprang from where he’d been standing and charged headlong toward the darkened half of the arena. Arthur could not tell which was the original, which was likely the point.

Before the first of the copies reached the shadow cloud, Shawna’s voice called out.

"Dark Tentacles of Power!"

The shadowy clouds boiled and coalesced into long whip-like arms that slashed at the oncoming copies. All that struck passed through, proving that the copies were insubstantial illusions.

The dark tentacles couldn’t reach all the copies. Several plunged through and disappeared into the dark cloud.

Arthur half stood, desperate not to miss a thing. "What’s going on? I can’t—" He stopped himself before he blurted out that he couldn’t see anything.

Horatio laughed. "Told you."

He didn’t have to worry. A moment later the dark clouds thinned and boiled away in patches, revealing copies of the Master Multiplier holding up identical cards that beamed bright light.

It seemed to break Shawna Sorceress’s illusion spell entirely, and as the clouds shrank back, she was revealed looking caught off guard.

Shawna reached for the black mark on her arm, pulling out one card after another and looking a little panicked.

"She’s either arrogant, or she’s planning something," Horatio said.

Three of the Master of Multiplication spotted her at the same time and ran at her. Only one held a stick tipped with blue at the end — his marker. That likely meant he was the real version.

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