Lucius and Lenore wandered around the castle grounds trying to locate the sparring arena. Neither knew of its location and were just basically walking around blind, relying on their luck.
Eventually, they found a large area encompassed by a crystal blue transparent dome. The scale of the area was giant, the surrounding area was clear of objects and miscellaneous items. While a magical shield will negate all damage caused by stray spells, the shockwaves will still bypass the shield still causing damage even if it is more of an inconvenience. Although, It had only taken the pair around thirty minutes to locate the arena.
Most of the Heaven's Hand were gathered around the arena including the other members of the Heaven's Three. Ellis though was nowhere to be seen, as expected. Lucius thought she most likely forgot what time she said to meet or would show up at the very last minute. Walking over to Felix and Corbin, as they had called over for him.
"So Corbin, who are you betting on?" asked Felix, smiling at the larger man.
"Sorry Lucius but I've got to go with Ellis. She fights like a rabid dog." answered Corbin, stepping back slightly and shivering at his words. Apparently, he had fought her before and lost spectacularly, almost losing his life just before Lucius was stationed with the Heaven's Hand. He wished to see the two fight again but he doubted that would happen because of the common man's reaction to even speaking about it. Poor man.
"I'm guessing it'll be a tie." said Felix, simply stating his opinion. While the Heaven's Three were equal on paper, they do have a hierarchy between themselves. Felix and Lucius are at the top and are actually equals in their combat power while Corbin falls slightly short but this doesn't mean he can't give them a run for their money. Battles between the three usually last hours showing how closely matched the trio is.
"Thank you two for your confidence in me." Lucius spat sarcastically, getting impatient by the little girl's tardiness as it was approaching the time of their fight. Lenore was silently observing the trio, playing with her light pink hair and not saying a word. This mystified Lucius as she was often bubbly and loud. He thought she was perhaps shy, he didn't say anything to her and respected her wish of silence.
Finally, the little devil made her way towards the arena. Her cheeks still puffed out but for a different reason than before as she still had some grub on her cheek. She strutted towards the three of us full of confidence at her hip was two shortswords. Lucius had seen her preferred weapon before but had never had the honor of seeing them in action. Their hilts were of a light blue shade and had emerald green gems embedded into them. If he could remember right her blades made no noise when slashing which is a testament to her strength or some trick of hers which wouldn't surprise Lucius. What Lucius didn't expect was the thin chains that dangled off the end of the shortsword; he had heard tales of her new way of fighting from the soldiers who were transferred out of her unit. She would wrap the chains around her arms so she couldn't be disarmed anymore which didn't seem very different to Lucius but he thought he was perhaps missing or forgetting something.
"Muhaha. Shall we start, my prince." asked Ellis, apparently already sure of her victory. Unfortunately for her Lucius had no plan of making it that easy.
The two took opposite ends of the pitch around a twelve metres away from each other. Corbin was the designated refugee much to his displeasure at being so close to an unrestrained Ellis.
I assumed a guard position and bought my trusty spellbook in front of me, waiting for Corbin to lower his hand and signal the start of the match. After an excruciating couple of seconds he lowered his hand. Ellis grasping her double short swords with the chains secured tight enough not to falter under pressure. She burst forth at an alarming speed, shattering the earth under her feet into mere memories of its former state.
Panicking slightly, Lucius summons a long spear made of ice and a short spear made from his other primary element, moonstone. Lucius noticed he wouldn't be able to counter her blades without sustaining a lethal blow. She had closed the distance in a matter of seconds. Lucius did his best to keep a cool head and conjured one of his many spells, Lunar Acceleration giving him the speed equal to Ellis'. Ellis performed a cross slash at Lucius' neck, he brought the two spears up to block and silently cast a spell to summon icicles aimed at the girl's feet. Sensing the danger, she shot back and destroyed the icicles with her signature element, wind. Multiple wind waves shot out from the gems in her swords, annihilating the icicles. Her guard was lowered for a second and Lucius took the opportunity launching a full frontal attack with the help of lunar acceleration. Allowing him to land a few shallow cuts as Ellis was blocking his attacks at the same pace. From the outside of the mana shield, all that could be heard was clagging of metal coming from her swords and even less could be seen. Most likely appearing as a blur to normal humans who had yet to enhance their eyes with some sort of spell. Lucius' attacks were so ferocious that his weapons were starting to chip under the extreme pressure but he could easily repair them as they were of magical nature.
Ellis was on the backfoot for a short period of time but was starting to push back Lucius. Sensing he was in danger, he jumped back and dismissed his spears. Bringing his spellbook back into the front, he took advantage of Ellis' slight stumbling after his unexpected retreat.
He cast one of his most destructive spells which hadn't seen action in a while because of its extreme potential for friendly fire.
"May the celestial spirits heed my call, grant thee power and summon the spell of my desire, Moonpiercer!" shouted Lucius, gathering all of his strength. A massive spear made of moonstone materialized in front of the prince, granting the majority of his mana into it. It began to oscillate and then launched at an astounding speed straight for Ellis who raised her swords in defense. Lucius floated to the ground, manipulating the stray stone using them as stepping stools.
Lucius knew better than to be sure of his victory and summon his spears once again, ready to counter. A gut wrenching scream came from the direction of Ellis, the moonstone shattered to pieces and revealing a bloody Ellis. Blood ran down from the temple of her head but she wasn't seriously injured. Lucius wasn't aiming to kill her after all. The battlefield went silent and Ellis burst forth once again with even more vigor and speed than before. Lunar acceleration was no match for the girl, she closed the distance and her right shortsword touched the skin on Lucius' neck. At the same time, Lucius managed to weave her sloppy defense as she put anything in attacking. Trying to speed blitz the prince. His shorter moonstone spear tapped the girl's neck as her blade touched his. Her eyes went wide, she disengaged and started to laugh. Her smile grew bigger which she had been wearing since the start of the battle. Lucius dropped to one knee, utterly exhausted after Moonpiercer and putting all his remaining mana in lunar acceleration to reach that stalemate.
Ellis was laughing mischievously, hands on her hips apparently finding her and my dire state funny. He used his spears to prop himself up and walked over to the audience, who were clapping.