It was now day 2 of Melanie's training at the Hall of the Novice. Her mentor watched her from across the arena grounds, his face expressing a mixture of doubt and curiosity as if trying to read her body language. Melanie was displaying a lot of confidence in herself which left her mentor uncertain what to expect from her.
"It seems ye recovered after yesterdays' trainin', I wonder 'ow much of it ye remember an' if that smug look on yer face is just a bluff!" he yelled over to her.
Melanie stood her ground poised ready for action. The mentor waved a hand over and her training partner from the day before entered the arena.
"ok, let's see what you got!" the warrior said as he positioned himself ready for an attack.
Unphased Melanie awaited for her opponent to make his move. She knew his moves and how to avoid taking a beating, so now it was a waiting game for him to attack to decide what her next move would be. She knew if she started casting now it would give him time to rush to her and knock her off her feet, so she had to time it right to catch him in the act of readying an assault himself. And there it was, right on cue. The warrior lowered his weapon and began to concentrate. Melanie could sense a buildup of aether around him. She knew immediately what this was. Once the surrounding aether reaches its maximum charge the warrior would raise his weapon swinging it around him and slam it to the ground, causing a shockwave in front of him that would knock her over and cause severe injuries. Whilst it would take him but a few seconds for the aether to fully charge it would give her ample time to just run from his line of sight and begin her own assault. He would be far too focused concentrating on his abilities and blinded by the surrounding aether to realise what was happening before it was too late.
Melanie made her move and raced to his side and quickly tapped a fire aspect, launching a fireball into his direction. The warrior still focused on his own attack didn't realise what was happening until his weapon slammed down to the floor. "Huh?" he gasped whilst looking around only for his gaze to be met with a large fireball followed by another. The warrior began to swing his weapon around, however from her training Melanie knew how to dodge his attacks and gingerly dodged his assaults.
"Not bad!" the warrior said under his helmet. "But now I mean business, prepare yourself!" The warrior began to relentlessly swing his weapon around. Melanie was struck several times unable to dodge all of his assaults. Thankfully the pain from being struck was nowhere near as bad as compared to receiving a heafty blow from an aetherically charged attack and Melanie had started to notice that the grazes from normal hits were superficial thanks to her iron skin from her previous training, however this still impacted the speed in which she was able to cast a spell. Each hit interrupted her focus, needing her to concentrate for longer to build up enough energy to launch a fireball at him. She needed another window where he would try to focus on another aetherically charged move before she could launch another barrage of fire aspected aether at him. It didn't take long for him to do just that and immediately she ran from his view and began her chants.
"That's good 'nough!" the mentor called out as he watched the warrior fall to his knees defeated after being struck by multiple fire and ice attacks. "Egads, ye learn fast! Yesterday ye were crawlin' around like a milksop an' now ye be fightin' like a real warrior! Let's see what else ye got up yer sleeve."
The warrior sheethed his weapon and hobbled away from the arena to receive attention from some nearby scholars. He gave Melanie a quick pat on the shoulder as he departed from the arena to be replaced by another warrior, this time they were accompanied by a scholar.
"Th' rules are th' same, however this time ye got a healer t' watch out for. Put too much attention on yer apponent an' ye shall pay fer not payin' attention to his healer consort. Let's begin!"
Melanie poised herself as before. Her attacks would be the same as before, but now she had to also keep her eye on the healer. She knew she needed to take out the healer first. It was a common move to make in all MMOs - take out the healers and the mages, then focus your attacks on everyone else leaving the tank for last due to their excessive amounts of defence and health. Melanie watched intentively for the warrior to begin his move. The scholar was also poised ready to begin healing him as soon as he took damage. "Oh how little you underestimate me" Melanie thought to herself trying not to grin too much to give away her plan of attack. The warrior lowered his weapon and the air began to crackle around him. It was now time for Melanie's move! Melanie raced to his side and to the scholar's surprise she faced the scholar and sent fireballs in her direction. The scholar was knocked to the ground almost instantly in surprise having taken severe hits due to their lighter attire which offered very little in defense. The warrior having now finished his assault and realising his healer was in danger began to charge towards Melanie. Melanie had forgotten about him and was focussing her next assault on the scholar before she healed herself and was promptly knocked off her feet.
"Ack!" Melanie yelled out as she felt his axe blade strike across her back. The mentor was about to call off the fight when Melanie pushed herself slowly back onto her feet and dusted off the dirt from her clothes. "That was stupid of me" she thought to herself feeling a little cross at having not paid proper attention. "ok, let's remember for next time. The scholar still needs to go down first, but I also gotta watch for that warrior too so he doesn't interrupt my casts." Melanie poised ready once again and the battle resumed. This time there was going to be no mistakes. Melanie planned her next move. Once the warrior would start charging his ability she would dodge out of the way and begin assaulting the scholar. This time however she would back away once she launched a couple of fireballs and ensure both the warrior and the scholar were both in her line of sight, and she would continue to move backwards to draw the warrior towards her and away from the scholar so he would be too far to receive any healing from her.
It was a solid plan, and it worked all too well once the warrior began his assault. Without hesitation Melanie ran from his view and assaulted the scholar with a number of fireballs. Hearing the explosion from behind her as the warrior slammed his weapon down she immediately stopped her assault and began to back away. The warrior started to charge towards her swinging his weapon furiously. The scholar realised what was happening all too late. Quickly she began to cast healing spells on herself, but her healing magic was unable to counter the next barrage of fireballs as the warrior positioned himself for another aetherically charged assault leaving the poor scholar open to further attacks from Melanie. The scholar collapsed defeated and the mentor waved his hand in the air to signal a cease to the battle.
"Bravo Brovla!" he cried out estatically. "Ye took a hit an' ye didn't give up, an' ye took down yer opponent! That's th' spirit!"
Melanie lowered her staff and bent forward panting. Another scholar ran to her aid and began to heal her wound on her back. Melanie felt so proud of herself for finally overcoming her challenges. It was like the man back at Swiftperch said, don't let failure be an affirmation that you can't do something. But wow the amount of effort needed to keep on her toes was intense!
"Ye definitely improved lass" the mentor continued. "I think ye are ready fer th' next test. Ye think that last fight was a challenge? Ye aint seen nothin' yet!"
The arena cleared way as another 3 trainers entered the floor. This time it was a warrior, another scholar, and what looked to be a thaumaturge.
"Three against one?" Melanie questioned nervously.
"What, is three too many fer ye?" the mentor mocked. "In real combat lass, people aint gonna come rushin' at ye one at a time. Ye gotta be prepared fer 'em comin' at ye all at once."
Melanie looked back at when she was ambushed by those 3 thugs the other day. The fact she was able to fend them off all by herself without any training was pure luck. Come to think of it despite their large builds they were pretty much amateurs themselves and probably got away with being intimidating enough that they bullied their victims into giving them what they wanted rather than actually getting into a fight. Killing them was probably an overkill, but at the time she felt she had no other choice and acted purely in defense, especially when it sounded like they were going to...
"Enough talkin', let's see what ye got!" the mentor bellowed and made the signal for attack. Melanie quickly freed herself from her thoughts and got into position. "I'm guessing this is going to be the same as before. The healer needs to go down quickly to avoid them healing the warrior, but that thaumaturge...their nukes can hurt a lot if I don't deal with them promptly, and the longer I leave them standing the more stuff they can inflict on me that I'll be half dead without them even needing to cast a single nuke. Which means they need to go down first." Melanie turned to face the thaumaturge and straight away began to chant a fire spell in their direction. The thaumaturge realising they were being attacked first began to chant their own spell. Before they could finish a fireball socked them in the face interrupting their cast momentarily. Melanie was momentarily distracted with her successful assault when she remembered the warrior. Any second now he was going to unleash his heavy attacks on her, and it looked like that was exactly what was about to happen. But something else was also taking place, something Melanie wasn't prepared for. The air around her was starting to heat up. What was happening, did her magic go arwy and was causing the air to ignite? Melanie looked around in a panic unsure what to do.
"What ye standin' around there for? Get outta there!" the mentor yelled out to her. Melanie glanced over to him bringing her back to her senses and she began to run. Not a moment too soon either, the ground she had been standing on was beginning to turn molten and suddenly errupted into a plume of fire and molten rock that crashed back to the ground. Melanie was knocked off her feet by the impact and rolled away staring in horror at the sight before her. The mentor quickly waved his hand to call off the battle and slowly walked over to Melanie. "Why didn't ye run when ye sensed th' danger lass?" he said to her in a slightly disappointed tone. Melanie looked up at him confused as she slowly picked herself up from the ground. "Surely ye felt th' air heatin' up around ye and knew what was about to happen?" Melanie tilted her head even more confused as she started to think about what just happened. The air did indeed change, and she could feel the ground below her heating up before it errupted. For a moment she thought it was a real incident where something like a small volcanic plume was about to burst from the ground, but now as she looked over to where the fire took place the plume had already died down and the ground had cooled leaving but a small patch of burned dirt in its place. "Of course, it was a spell from the other thaumaturge!" Melanie felt so dumb and breathed a small sigh of relief.
"I'm sorry" she said bashfully. "I forgot that a thaumaturge could cast more than fireballs and thought it was a real incident."
"Th' real incident would've been ya bein' cooked like a roast dodo!" the mentor said exhasperatedly.
"I'm sorry mentor, I'll try harder" Melanie said lowering her head in embarassment. The mentor nodded acknowlegedly and signalled for the battle to resume.
"These trials seem to be less about fairness and more about just trying to catch me out with the unexpected" Melanie thought to herself. "That mentor is enjoying watching me fail way too much. I need to up my game, stop expecting the usual and be wary of my challengers using dirty tricks to try to make me stumble. This is no longer just training, this is the real deal!"
