Volume 4, Chapter 6 – The Tournament. The Betting Office and the Reunion of the Dvarikon Lineage
I stared at the Archmagi's mask and just wanted to hold out for five minutes — that's all. I only need to hold the defense for five minutes... But how hard that would be, I didn't know...
Suddenly, thirty Agents, Uyana, Lelik, Aviana, Arleigh, Zumwalt(!), the Air Defense Major, and Pex rushed to surround the Archmagi. The Archmage and Archmagi looked around. And beside me and everyone else stood Special Forces soldiers, hands on the quick-release levers of their cases.
"Ladies and gentlemen. Get in line," the Archmage said piercingly, and all thirty Agents grabbed their ears.
I looked at my officers and just shook my head — signaling that this was my fight.
All the officers vanished quickly — but the Special Forces had questions about the Syndicate Agents.
"Boy, are you with—"
I quickly ran past her to the Agents, whom the Special Forces were already about to pack up, and simply placed a pouch with ninety gold Euros — perfect minting, perfect purity — into the hand of one of the soldiers. And I genuinely got lucky — they let them go.
But the Archmagi walked up to me, the ground shaking under her steps.
"Lower your weapon and simply say the phrase. What are you afraid of?" she squeaked.
(Four more minutes, maybe three. I just need to resist.)
I nodded — just to be able to speak without saying her phrase.
She walked up to me while the crowd in line tried to keep up with events, to react with the right emotions — in their eyes, more had happened in one minute than in the whole world in thousands of years.
Archmages appeared. A guy in line got his teeth knocked out. Then another opened his mouth and got his teeth knocked out. Then a third tried to speak and got a foot to the face. Then a rapier — at the Archmagi's mask. Fifty people surrounding the two "fathers" got flipped. Then half of them vanished. Then an attempt to sue the rest — but out runs the same toothless guy who caused the second guy's teeth to be knocked out and the third to be knocked unconscious. He runs up to the Special Forces and gives a bribe — right in front of two Archmages and several thousand people at an international tournament in the Kingdom of Ruma.
—
The Archmagi walked up and healed my teeth.
"Hoo-oh. I can talk! Wonderful! Finally!" I beamed, and the crowd started applauding.
(THE BEST!) (Champion!!) (The toothless one got teeth, people!) (Whistle) (Applause)
"Well, now say the wisdom, my dear friend. I'd like to introduce myself first. My name is... A'yułżćń'ekh. But you can call me Amalia Ruby," she continued in her squeaky voice, looking at me through her mask, which hid her emotions.
"Why introduce yourself to someone you're pointing a sword at?" I asked, raising my sword again.
(Really) (Why though...) (Maybe something's wrong with him?)
"You look suspicious enough — and I couldn't help but introduce myself before you might die," she pointed her sword — which had a serpent's-tongue blade — at me.
"GUYS! Bets are being accepted, by the way! Odds 1.001 to 1.01. 1.01 on the Archmage. Totals also accepted — all over in one minute: odds 1.10. Incineration: 1.80. Limb removal: 2.50!" — Lelik walked between the rows with a tray and a list, collecting bets.
"Hey, mister, knock it off," the Archmage called out to Lelik.
"Guys, bets also accepted on how many seconds it takes for this Archmage to lose it and kill me — odds 0.05," — Lelik walked up to a participant in line and pulled his face closer. "— And on whether I'll hit him with a spinning kick — 1.5 if I do, 5.2 if I don't."
(No way. Two gold says you can't!) (Twenty gold!) (I bet my sword and armor!)
—
Meanwhile, Amalia and I gently touched swords — but mine simply cut hers in half.
"Ah... That wasn't love..." Amalia tossed it aside sadly and looked at the Archmage.
"Handle it," he responded — and a spinning kick from Lelik flew at his face, which he successfully parried. "— I'll deal with this one."
Snap.
And before I could even take a breath, we were inside the pyramid, next to a man lovingly restoring the mannequin.
I looked right — Apache was already bombing the Archmage.
I looked at Amalia, who'd taken a fighting stance — and I tightened my grip on the rapier, also taking a fighting stance, while behind me the battle between the Archmage and the boss-helicopter raged.
We looked at each other. In her mask's eyes, I could see the explosions reflected behind me — Lelik turning into an Apache, dropping all his rockets, then into two Black Hawks, blowing up everything around, vanishing, attacking the Archmage with a baguette and a rapier to the liver.
I stood and looked at her patterned mask with the fox nose and saw no emotion. She stood in a fighting stance and didn't move — and I didn't move. I just needed to hold out until Clarence arrived, and it'd be fine if it passed just waiting, standing across from each other, waiting for someone to make a mistake.
A red circle appeared around me, and Amalia didn't move — and I realized: she was casting in a whisper, and the mask was hiding it.
I quickly drew my pistol and aimed at her, still inside the circle of dozens of symbols, filling one after another.
"One more word — and BOOM," I explained in her language.
"Love doesn't do that to people. Why are you like this..." she answered — and fell silent again, runes appearing under her feet.
Bang — I shot her in the leg with an MOU round, and she clearly hadn't expected the metal to reach her body.
I lunged, trying to pierce her mask and reveal her face — she grabbed the blade with both hands, stopping it but getting burns that seared the magical structure from her hands.
"I know one place where such metal exists... Where did your Love get it from?" she marveled, starting to piece together the puzzle.
"Don't—"
"I understand..." she knelt on one knee, head bowed. "But I ask you to leave my love with me and not change the wisdom. I love Az!"
uy, and I love the wisdom of Love, and changing it would be painful and hard for me. So please, let's each stay with our own wisdom... But only your love can decide what is truth and what isn't. I'm not trying to impose anything on you. I just... Believe... In my Archon..."
"What? I wasn't going to. I thought you wanted to do something bad to me," I lowered the rapier.
"What? Oh, Archon Azuy, fill this... Archon with love," she continued kneeling. "We came to learn about the ascension of a new Archon. But it doesn't affect the world order badly. Only an Archon can fail to love their brother. Between people and mages, that's impossible... This means one thing. If you don't love one Archon, you don't love his whole family and the brother Archons."
I sat down on my knees next to her.
"But that's not true. A regular mage knocked out my teeth, a mage woman almost killed me. How do you explain that, if it's not 'not-love'?" I genuinely didn't understand.
"My Archon follows one of the wisdoms that says — when a person becomes strong, people shift from fear to respect and devotion... Azuy wrote about it as a glass overflowing. And when a person is just born, their trials are the path from death on their knees to rising from them," Amalia explained calmly in her squeaky voice, studying my face like a cat trying to give an object dimension. "Maybe a person and an Archon start the same way..."
"I don't understand..."
"Hah... But your wisdom is different. This is Azuy's wisdom — yours might be different. Why did a mage woman almost kill you, and a mage girl knock out your teeth?" Amalia asked sincerely, taking my hand in her warm palms.
I thought... (Why did Asa almost kill me? Just because of a refusal? This world has conventions after all — killing ten envoys is a huge punishment. So why did she react to me that way? Maybe she noticed the Archon in me back when I hadn't understood or accepted it — and she had a rejection, because I couldn't accept the fact of the Archon then. I didn't know about it. And because of that, it came out distorted — and made her afraid and attack?)
"I think because I was young and didn't know the concept of an Archon — and the mage woman got a wave of aura and got scared, experiencing rejection, and decided to attack on primal instinct 'fight or flight,'" I offered my thought.
Amalia nodded.
"Your wisdom is quite deep. I haven't heard such wisdom in Azuy."
(And why does Uyana beat me so easily? Maybe simply because she became close to me, and her fear just overflowed from the glass? And only devotion and her character remained?)
"And the mage girl, I think, beat me because we became close and her fear overflowed from the glass," I decided to share this with Amalia too.
"Possibly... You see, you are family, and you use Azuy's wisdom to supplement your own," Amalia picked up, giggling.
(So that means...)
"Am I understanding this right — it's... Tooth-shattering... Love?" I asked, uncertain, cautiously.
And Amalia kept holding my hands, warming them.
"Only you can decide what it is. Love isn't a label — it's what makes people want to be near each other..." she said quietly.
"Archon Seraphim!" Clarence burst into the pyramid, a parachute trailing behind him.
"Archon?" the Archmage abruptly stopped casting incineration magic, holding Lelik by the throat — and Lelik instantly vanished, breaking free of the grip, and with a rapier hilt attached to his boot, knocked out the Archmage with a spinning kick.
"Duuude! I knocked him out!" Lelik rejoiced genuinely, poking the Archmage's side with his boot toe.
"Clarence..." Amalia removed her mask and looked at him in shock.
"A'yułżćń'ekh..." he looked at her with even greater shock.
I didn't even understand how he pronounced that — but while I was trying to process it, Lelik dragged the Archmage outside and showed photos of how he'd knocked him out, collecting mountains of gold and stripping participants naked.
Amalia stood up and took off her shoes, beginning to levitate above the ground, approaching Clarence — and he sighed and looked at her with a smile.
"I thought the Dvarikon lineage had vanished..." he looked at Amalia with sadness.
"It vanished as a place on the map... But I remained — and all of Rekhilon, the city-state, formed from this lineage... Most residents no longer remember the founders, but the main thing is — they're our descendants..." Amalia said quietly, holding Clarence's hands.
I got to my feet and looked at the Man — who was frantically defending his mannequin from me and Lelik, having seen what Lelik was doing — and then looked at the Archmages in shock, then back at me.
"I-I-I... That's it... Archon... Ah..."
"My wisdom — forget what you just saw," I smiled, wanting to avoid attention and not make him think a new god stood before him.
He thought for a moment, then looked at me with slight displeasure.
"You! You Democr... How many Democrats are there here?"
"Enough..." I answered quietly, glancing at the intact mannequin.
"Don't look at it!" he shielded the mannequin with his body. "All Democrats get S and don't touch my mannequinI smiled and headed toward the exit, watching Amalia and Clarence go.