Unfortunately for the Future Wardens… they were summarily crushed. The kids all rushed forward into the hills to deal some damage to whomever was closest to them, whereas Royal Harbingers surrounded, focus fired, and utilized height advantages to completely overwhelm them. The game lasted only five rounds. Shuuko, the healer on Royal Harbingers, actually looked pretty disappointed at the outcome. Though, considering the implied relationship she had with the children… it made sense to root for them instead of the three jerks she was playing alongside.

The boy just huffed and walked away from the table when his last turn ended and Syron signaled Future Warden’s defeat. The two men stood with him and went back to the stands as though this was all normal, so Syron didn’t think too much about it.

“And that was the second match! The winner is Team Royal Harbingers! Everyone give Team Future Wardens a warm round of applause for putting up such a good match! Great job kids!” These children were all less than seven years old… at least with Fiery Inferno Blaze they were more like ten. Syron didn’t want them to get too depressed about losing, so he tried to get the crowd to cheer them on. Apparently that sort of behavior didn’t exist in this world though, since everyone just looked around the room like they were confused.

“I said… Everyone congratulate Team Future Wardens, the really cute tiny children that just gave their all for the competition, for doing such a wonderful job.” Syron said again, this time an edge of frustration evident in his voice. There was an uncomfortable sounding ‘nice going’ and a ‘good job’, but everyone else was pretty much silent. The kids themselves were quietly crying in their seats, being consoled by their older friends. Shuuko made a move to go comfort them, but was stopped by the noble boy, and by extension the two men with him. She just stared at the children from across the room and frowned sadly.

“How cold blooded.” Syron finally said after waiting another twenty seconds or so. He sighed heavily and went to move on to the next match when a pulse of positivity went through the room.

“I thought they did a marvelous job.” Lady Forrester said, smiling grandly down at the children. At the very least, the girl that wanted to play healer stopped sobbing and smiled through her tear-streaked face.

See people? It wasn’t hard. These kids are barely older than babies.

“Thank you for your kind words, mother. I agree. Now, onto the next match.” Syron intoned with a shake of his head. The noble boy just snorted like some sort of wuxia extra that yells things like “you’re courting death!”

“Team Handsome Bachelor Society versus Team Hydrangea. Handsome Bachelor Society is going with two physical ranged and two magical melee. Hydrandgea is using four physical melee. Hrm… quite the match up here. The arena location will play a huge factor in how this match will go down, so let’s get to rolling! A six! That means Hydrangea, being the lower seeded team, gets to pick. Which do you choose? The coliseum, the forest, the mountain valley, or the cityscape?”

A man tall and thick enough to eat other smaller men for breakfast everyday stood respectfully and bowed his head first towards Patricia Forrester, and then at Syron.

“Mi’lords… we wish to have our match in the mountain valley.”

Yish… no need for the formalities.

“Mountain Valley, got it! Also, no need to refer to me as lordling or young master or anything like that. Today I’m here as Event Master Syron. If you absolutely have to use a title for me to feel comfortable, just ‘Event Master’ will do. If you are feeling squirrely, feel free to just refer to me as Syron.” Syron claimed to a gasping crowd. Syron felt their reaction was pretty exaggerated, since… who really cares what he’s called by? Why does it matter? He just formed up the map and got the units in place once again.

“Alright, everyone in their seats and ready? Yes? Great, roll for initi… whoops… priority. Roll for priority please… ah! A critical success from an archer in Handsome Bachelor Society. They are not the ones you want going first, typically. Next up is three fighters, the other archer, both spellblades, and then the last fighter. Other than the second archer, Team Hydrangea takes the last four turns. Tough break… but that’s ‘R’ ‘N’ ‘G’ people!”

Above Syron’s head the oval once again appeared, this time displaying a lithe man wearing adventurer leathers and a feathered cap. He was holding a short bow in his left hand with an arrow in his right. This archer also had a long, curved dagger sheathed to his back on his waist.

The man controlling the archer opted to have them run to the back corner of the map and prepare an arrow. The opposite back corner was then filled with the two fighters. The fighter from Hydrangea moved forward, but made sure to stop their avatar out of the archer’s line of sight. The second archer then turned tail and ran to join the other archer. This one held a long bow instead of a short bow, as well as a small straight dagger instead of the long, curved one. The perch the archers had chosen was the steeper side of the valley with few boulders to hide behind, while the fighters had chosen the corner that was less elevated but with more rocks to hide in.

The judge from Team Handsome Bachelor Society then came to Syron and handed him a piece of folded paper. Reading the note quickly, Syron nodded his head in affirmation before focusing again on the game. The two spellblades also moved up field, though they split up to opposite sides.

“Spell blades are a versatile unit that excel while on offense in both close and medium range due to their powerful two-handed swords and limited ranged magic. If you can keep them alive, they can dish out a lot of pain to opposing Avatars with their self-buffing elemental damage enchantments.” Syron started explaining while the oval above him showed two men in the usual adventurer leathers with exaggeratedly large claymores separate from the center with a nod to each other. Occasionally one blade would flicker with a ghostly blue fire while a bolt of electricity would momentarily spiral around the opposite spellblade’s body.

“The last to move is the second fighter from Hydrangea. They are also moving up the center along with the other fighter, though they are in different hiding spots. Because of Handsome Bachelor Society’s decision to hole up in the corners, Hydrangea is left having to attack somewhat fortified positions. If they are unable to take out some units quickly, the height and cover disparity will cause them quite a bit of trouble.” Syron started commentating while having cartoonish examples of stick figure fighters charge up a hill and becoming pincushions to the waiting stick figure archers. The stick warriors had ‘x’s over their eyes while the archers jumped and high fived each other. The illusion even went as far as making it look like it was drawn in crayons by a five-year old.

“Next turn… everyone roll for priority again… and first is the spellblade nearest to the opposing fighters. They have opted to use one of their spells to… oh, this seems clever. They are using acid mist, a weak persisting spell that deals low damage over time in a vicinity. Choose your target area and roll for concentration. While it is true you are in battle, you’ve yet to actually be engaged by an enemy, so there is no need to subtract from your concentration total based on being in combat. You rolled… plenty. Alright, the acid cloud will descend on the fighter’s rock formation in the corner next turn. I’ll have you roll for damage at that time.”

The oval showed the spellblade run his hand along the flat of the blade of his claymore, giving it a green aura. They then used both hands to point the blade into the sky above the nearby rock formation. A sickly green looking mist falling from the sky and towards the fighters below.

“Fighter is next. They can either choose to sit out the damage from the acid mist, or they can run out of their cover. We won’t know how many turns the mist will last until it hits, but it can go from one to four total rounds based on the spellcaster’s stat values. Ah, the fighter has decided to wait out the spell. If the mist turns out to be only run one turn, the spellblade will have wasted a valuable spell use for minimal damage. Next up is both archers. They have opted to nock arrows and utilize their ‘Firing Lines’ ability. They don’t attack now, but if another avatar passes their protected squares, the archers are given a free attack that turn. If no one passes their location, however, they effectively wasted a turn. The judge here has brought me their chosen targeted lanes.” Syron continued to commentate to help the audience understand what was going on. Perhaps because entertainment is limited, it seemed like more people were really getting into the show as well as the competition.

“The other spellblade is going. They are also dropping acid mist, but this time it is on the archers. Based on my guestimates pertaining to the fighters, it would take around nine turns of sitting in the acid mist at average damage values to go critical. Given that the spellblades only have one other spell each, including their unique abilities, it could either wreck the opposition or turn out to be a complete waste. They roll for concentration… and it is a success. The mist will descend next turn.”

Out in the audience, Korfus was trying to comprehend once again what he was seeing. When he had seen the illusions at first, he was pleasantly amused at how much effort the Forrester boy had clearly put in to making it look nice. As the first match ended, he was even impressed that the boy was able to so clearly show the state of the fights as well as the little scripted motions the avatars went through while fighting. Now that they were on their way into the third match, Korfus was having trouble understanding just exactly where Syron Forrester was getting his magic power. Illusions typically became much more difficult as more people were introduced to them, given that it would require an illusionist to individually target each person’s mind. Since Syron didn’t seem to be having any issues with this, Korfus could easily deduce that he was not tricking everyone’s mind in to thinking they were seeing things, he was tricking the world into thinking these things could be seen. After all, how else could a twelve-year old boy have enough power and control to trick over a hundred people? The answer is… he almost certainly doesn’t.

Or does he? Korfus started to seriously ponder. These types of huge visual illusions are not easy to maintain or alter while being viewed. While originally assuming that perhaps the Forresters were illegally hiding another, much older and better practiced illusionist, the weaving and eddying of magic flowing out of Syron were obvious to anyone trained highly enough to notice it. Korfus, whom had been at this stage in his control of magic for going on thirty years, could not ignore the irrefutable evidence.

He’s a natural. After all, how else could a boy that had never left his estate possibly be able to imagine so completely and accurately the death pits in Khalra’sa? From reading a book? Impossible for all the but the most genius of imaginations. For an illusionist, there is no greater power than that of their imagination. There were obvious differences from his ‘coliseum arena’ and the death pits, to be sure… but those differences were negligible. For the peasants in the audience that would also never travel abroad, especially to the war-torn expanses of the Outer Reaches, this is the only time they would ever get to ‘see’ such an historical location. And the mountains? There is no chance he had been taken to see mountains, given that they are on the opposite side of the Eastern Forest.

To think he is wasting such a potent ability on a trifling game. With the proper training, he could perhaps become a Forrester worth keeping around. Not as an heir of course, as the people would never trust someone with his aptitudes to protect their lives… but as a Royal tool? Certainly, We could find a use for him. The level of detailing on those ‘avatars’ of his… they look like real people.

Little did Korfus know, Syron had never read about any place called Khalra’sa. Even if he had, he wouldn’t have been able to construct a believable representation of it with just a description. He did, however, watch an astounding number of movies throughout his previous life.