1.24 Tooth and Fist
A wolfpack bounded towards a stationary trio of humans, sand flying behind the two dozen predators.
Almost as one, the humans moved. One raised a crossbow to their chest and released, the bolt sinking into the chest of the closest wolf. After confirming the shot, they reloaded, using a built-in windlass to reload in seconds.
Another of the trio drew back their bow and let off a powerful shot, it pierced through one wolf and plunged into another, stopping both in their tracks.
The wolves advanced, unbothered by the deaths in their pack.
The last of the humans forced a stave into the ground and closed their eyes. Another pair of missiles shot from the other two, each taking out another wolf. The wolves were now less than a hundred feet away.
After a few moments, the staff wielder opened their eyes and shouted "Got it, get behind me!"
The two shifted behind the staff-user, their weapons ready with another projectile.
Without warning, the ground beneath the wolves exploded, sand shot up, twisting against ankles and fur. The wolves yelped in surprise as the sand rose quickly, engulfing a dozen of the wolves, with a burst of mana, the sand hardened into limestone, trapping the simple beast in a suffocating prison.
The seven remaining wolves yipped before continuing their assault. Two more shots sprang forth, striking true as two more wolves fell to the ground.
The humans dropped their ranged weapons. The crossbow user drew a long quarterstaff from a leather bag at its hip, sweeping it in a large arc, pushing back two of the beasts. The other staff user swept its staff, pushing back another set of two wolves.
The final wolf pounced, fangs aiming for the thighs of the crossbow user, who was too distracted to notice.
Just as tooth met sweet flesh, a steel mace crashed down upon the wolf's skull, causing it to shatter, large chunks of clay and metal fell to the floor.
"Thanks Nora! Owe you one!", Alar called out, still defending against his two wolves.
"No problem!" Nora danced forwards, a mace in each hand, forearms bulging against the long sleeves.
Vicktor swung a bit too wide on his off-side, momentum carrying his pack off his shoulders, the strap sliding down to his bicep. The hundred pounds of ore was manageable most of the time from Master Xan's training weights, but he hadn't practiced fighting with this.
'This is too fucking heavy, I need that dimensional storage.'
As he struggled to get the strap back on his shoulder, a wolf took advantage of his lopsided posture and snapped at his leg.
Nora was there again, the short mace braining the wolf, causing it to be thrown into the path of Vicktor's final wolf.
With a snarl, Nora dashed forwards, bringing her maces together, obliterating the wolf leaving it to slump to the sand.
The last two wolves were easy. Both Vicktor and Alar were able to brain the wolves with large vertical strikes from their staves.
The bout was over.
The three apprentices surveyed the damage to the arena. Vicktor had thirteen kills, although technically the arena constructs couldn't actually suffocate as they required no air to function. Nora had seven kills and Alar had four.
"That went well!", said Vicktor, happy with his performance.
"It could have been better," said a slightly irked Alar, "I almost got hurt and I barely got any kills."
Nora put a normal sized forearm around the avian. "Both of you need more practice with the staff, but it is always going to be hard for you given the restrictions."
"Yeah, Alar. You couldn't fly and you couldn't use your turrets, the fact that you were able to mostly keep up given those limitations is great. Plus you are a crack shot with that crossbow! That windlass is really cool!" Vicktor said with genuine interest.
Alar smiled sheepishly, "Yeah, it'll get better soon, I'm working on making some improvements. Something to make the crossbow shoot faster and some potential ideas for different tips."
Nora chided him, "Well we all know how you are about tips, you'll do great!"
Vicktor chuckled before saying, "Water break, then golems?"
"Sure!"
"Sure!"
Two lumbering golems stood motionless, nearly 200 feet away from the apprentices. These had no weapons, they each stood eight feet tall and had the bulk of the northern white bears. Instead of fur was hard sculpted clay, whomever designed these obviously had a thing for large men. Every muscle has striations and veins, they looked almost lifeless except for the gray brown of their skin. They were almost identical except for a slight variation in clay color.
The healers signaled and the trio responded in an affirmative, whenever the controllers were ready.
At once, the golems lurched forwards with easy long strides, closing the gap quickly.
Vicktor released the cord alongside his back, allowing a black dust to tumble onto the yellow sand. With a will of intent, the magnetite flowed towards the two large humanoids, the black magnetite a black wave over the sand, a thin black line of the ore led to Vicktor's staff, resting gently in the sand.
His hand moved from the cord to a part of his bag, where a metal plate was sowing into the bag, letting him connect with the crude mana vault he'd been storing all his excess mana into.
Nora ran in an arc, perpendicular to the oncoming constructs, releasing huge bolts from her massive warbow as she ran. The constructs were far too slow to dodge, so they used their arms to try to protect their imagined internal organs.
Alar ran to the opposite side of Nora, wings rising to their full height before delivering a powerful stroke down, forcing the avian into the sky. A second beat of his wings carried him further into the sky.
–Thunk–
A turret fell to the arena, landing with a splash of sand, the turret orientated itself towards the nearest golem, the gray one. Each pellet struck the center of its chest.
The gray golem spread an outreached hand to absorb the shots, each shot blew away chunks of the golem's hand. After a third shot of the turret, a crossbow bolt protruded from this golem's skull, the quarrel embedding right next to its sculpted ear.
"Nice shots, both of you!" Vicktor yelled, concentrating on building the inscription in front of him. The distance made it surprisingly difficult to see the far edge, only twenty feet or so was enough to almost obscure the more complicated glyphs.
The gray golem diverted towards the turret, while the brown one continued towards Vicktor, giant feet casting a shadow on the black dust until–
Blue light illuminated the underside of the golem, the knee down was stuck in the air a few inches off the ground. The rest of their bulk tumbled around the stationary limb. The blue light flickering as the force needed to retain the leg changed in intensity.
The drain on Vicktor's mana was immediate, the inscription leeched far more than Vicktor had anticipated, the crude mana vault he had set up with the bauxite was nearly half empty in a matter of moments.
The gray golem reached Alar's turret and picked it up with its undamaged arm. Shot after shot pierced deeper into its armored chest. It kicked the sand and shoved the turret into the new depression and began walking back towards Vicktor.
Arrows and bolts slammed into the brown golems sides, piercing deep.
Vicktor's bauxite mana vault was drained completely. He was doing his best to draw in ambient mana through him and his staff, but it was only a trickle compared to the torrent that flowed out of him. His ruakh would be dry in less than a minute. He needed to do something as the gray golem closed on his location.
His eyes fell over the pile of sand where the turret was buried, he could feel the turret grinding against the soil, trying to maintain a lock on the golem. He spared some excess mana, creating a sloped grading so the turret could still fire uphill, there was barely enough room.
Alar's voice boomed, "One second!", with his ring enhanced voice far louder than should be possible. The man swooped lower, dropping the other turret fifty feet from Vicktor on the other side of their arena section.
Nora set her bow down, detaching her quiver, drawing two short maces.
The second turret began to unload its barrage on the brown golem, it tried to defend itself with an arm, but the golem was still struggling trying to get free.
"Twenty-five percent left!" Vicktor yelled, struggling to maintain his meditation and focus, pulling every shred of mana that he could, he had only a few moments until he was drained completely.
Nora's powerful strides dug into the sand, she pushed against it, sprinting even faster than the golems. With a final burst of energy, she jumped nearly ten feet into the air, maces raised high.
Vicktor spared a glance at the flying hybrid catkin, her arms, shoulders, and abdomen swollen with mana-enhanced muscle. Nora brought the maces down onto the helm of the construct.
–THWAM–
The head exploded, clay cascading down to the grey-brown shoulders. The movement ceased instantly, locked in place, the clay seeming to harden in place as the rapidly changing blue light turned only a solid cyan. Nora fell to her sand, spinning to land on her feet. Vicktor released the power to the inscription, clay body falling in a heap to the sand.
Nora started for the remaining opponent.
The final golem made it to the turret, it's palm and the hand down to the mid wrist had been blown apart. It kicked at the turret clay foot extending fast towards the turret.
With a will of intent, Vicktor made a pillar of sand, protecting the little turret. With another thought, he hardened it. The kick struck the pillar, sending the ton of sand toppling over. Vicktor broke the pillar with his mana, aiming the sand to let the turret rotate back onto its footings. The turret continued its assault.
The golem was near to complete destruction, only a stub of the golem's arms remained. More than a dozen embedded in various points throughout its body.
Nora arrived in a dash, both powerful arms aiming at the knee joints. With a wet crunch, they failed unison, causing the construct to topple onto the sand.
The golem attempted a half-armed sweep, but Nora jumped, tail wild striking the golem from above shattering its collarbone and head. The construct's flailing arm went still.
Vicktor ran over to Nora, pulling the magnetite back into a pouch. Alar swooped down next to the pair, almost tackling them.
"We did it!", Alar cried, wrapping his wings and arms around the other apprentices. They reciprocated his hug. Nora's still enhanced arms grabbed tightly around both of their waists.
The celebratory hug lasted a few more moments before Vicktor spoke, "Wanna go celebrate our victory? Bear's Paw for drinks?"
"We had a better idea", Alar grinned.
"Oh?", Vicktor asked.
Nora began, "So in the warehouse district there's this adult bookstore..."