[Center][h1][color=aba000]Sekhandur Khain[/color] vs [color=f26522]Ty Varen[/color][/h1][/center]

Sekhandur did not wait for any official acknowledgement for the matches to begin, and attacked Ty as soon as he felt ready to. His grimoire unfurled, an ancient scroll filled with the utterances of long-dead kings, and he repeatedly whipped his staff in Ty’s direction in a graceful, circular motion. As he did so, small cyclones the height of a man tore their way up from the ground, vicious funnels filled with scouring golden sand. It didn’t matter that Sekhandur was not currently standing in the desert in which he ruled; its natural forces obeyed him all the same. The dust devils homed in on Ty in the way that natural phenomena most certainly did not, roaring with cutting wind and blinding sand. Keeping his opponent on the backfoot would be difficult, and Sekhandur had to attempt to get him there as soon as possible. He stayed ready, carefully watching for how Ty would react to this. 

Straight to business. Ty was starting to like this guy already. His heart was racing and if he had fur it would certainly be standing on end. He watched as Sekhandur spun his staff and his ears were filled with the violent hissing of a million grains of sand. He’d seen elemental magic users before, but sand was one he wasn’t familiar with. Moist soil and rocky creeks were what he had back home. He’d walked on a beach once and noted how it was harder to run on sand, but other than that, all he could tell was that these cyclones surging towards him were not fully solid. And that was enough to go on for him. 

Ty brought his left forearm up as if shielding his eyes against the assaulting winds, then pulled on his mana. His tome was tucked away, pressed against his chest. It pulsated with energy, matching his ever-quickening heartbeat. He visualized the toughness of a shell, imagined the feeling of its rough contours, and a tortoise shell spread out over his forearm, acting like his shield.

Ty grinned, then dashed forward to meet the cyclones head on. What was the point of running around trying to avoid them? He’d just be wasting energy before he had to deal with them anyway. His feet pounded against the ground, then, just as he was about to collide with them, he channeled his bull charge. He felt the rough grains biting into his skin as he plunged through them. He was aware of every cut and scrape the sand made, a side-effect of the sixth sense, but one that he could plow through with some raw guts. His swift maneuver brought him through the cyclone as quickly as possible, his shell protecting his eyes, nose, and mouth. He sustained some cuts on his arms, legs, and body, but they were shallow. This small amount of pain wouldn’t stop him. 

Ty bounded towards Sekhandur, pulling his shell away from his face and revealing a wide grin. His right arm warped and contorted into a tiger’s claw. With an animalistic yell, he swung. What he used was no martial art, but the honed instinct of an apex predator. It was a swift, clean vertical strike aimed at his opponent’s chest. If Sekhandur wanted to play a distance game, it was clear Ty had no intention of letting him. 

The turtle shell covering Ty’s face, as well as riotous noise of the dust devils, made Ty completely oblivious to Sekhandur’s next move. As he saw that Ty intended to charge head-first through the devils, he began to side-step the oncoming charge, and waved his staff so as to direct the tornados of sand. He did not have much time, and concentrated on working quickly. The dust devils that had gone to either side of the one that Ty had plowed through swung back around behind him, and at Sekhandur’s command they dissolved into tendrils of sand that latched around his ankles from behind, and swiftly hardened into durable clay, rooting into the ground. Sekhandur had planned for this to bring the bull-charge to a swift halt, sending Ty crashing face-first into the ground. The desert prince intended to end this quickly, and made ready for the remaining swirling stand to converge on Ty with increased fury as soon as he was immobilized. 

Ty felt the sand hardening around his ankles. Immediately, he sensed his center of balance shifting. He crashed to the ground, but not on his face. He swung his tiger claw downwards and caught himself before he ate the dirt. But, now he had some very serious problems to worry about. He was grounded and those tornadoes were coming in fast. He didn’t have time to smash free from the clay, and if they were on hard ground he’d likely be in trouble. Lucky, they were in a courtyard with soft soil for growing delicate flowers. Ty released his adaptations and took a deep breath as the cyclones converged on him.

Ty focused on growing a new tortoise shell over his head. It was stuffy and temporarily blinded him, but it protected his face from the grating sands while he worked. He plunged his hands into the soil and scooped out the dirt surrounding the clay roots. He didn’t need all of it, just a good chunk to loosen it up. Then, one good tug with his legs yanked the rest of him free. He bounded out of the cyclone, clay on his ankles, a tortoise shell falling off of his head, and his arms and legs covered in cuts, blood flecking off of them as he ran. But now, instead of attacking Sekhandur directly, he made a grab for his staff. 

With the precious few seconds that immobilizing Ty had bought him, Sekhandur worked on the next stage of the attack. With his staff he kept the dust devils focused on Ty, like drill made of sand, but he looked back to his grimoire to make ready for when his opponent made it back up onto his feet. Sekhandur chanted words in ancient Kemeti, feeling for etheric presences. At first it seemed fruitless, but then, there it was, small but direly angry, balling up into itself in a singularity of hatred.

Ty broke loose just then, and Sekhandur readied himself to jump back from yet another savage charge. However, he veered to Sekhandur’s right, where his staff was held aloft, and Sekhandur adjusted his plans. As soon as Ty latched onto his staff, Sekhandur gave it up without a fight. The small smile on Sekhandur’s lips may have been Ty’s last indication of the mistake he had made. Sekhandur’s grimoire was the source of his power, not his staff. Now that the other boy’s hands were full, he had no way to defend himself. Sekhandur thrust his hand toward Ty’s face, and from his palm erupted a stream of boiling-hot sand directly toward the other boy’s face and eyes.

Ty gripped the staff. Sekhandur smirked. Ty smirked right back. Wolves would often attack stags head on, to make them think the danger was up front. But, while the front wolf would deal with the antlers, the one from behind would go for the kill. All predators knew about misdirection. It was in their blood, and it was in Ty’s blood. Sometimes, all it took was for him to do something unexpected, leave an opening and see what happened. Here, he got Sekhandur to stand and fight. Hunters were always taught to aim for the core. A head could move too quickly and you would miss your mark. Ty was no good at verbalizing strategy on a piece of paper, but his instincts kept him sharp on the field. 

Since Sekhandur was no longer holding his staff, Ty spun and ducked beneath his palm. The searing-hot sand would definitely have put him out of commission, but it sailed high, over his head. Low to the ground, he pivoted on one foot, performing a sweep kick with the other. But, his intention was not to knock Sekhandur off his feet. As soon as their legs connected, he would activate his constrictor limb, coiling his leg around his enemy’s and applying enough pressure to threaten the integrity of his bones. And, since he had that nifty staff, he’d whack him right in the ribs as well, using his circular momentum. 

Ty’s quick movement’s took Sekhandur unawares; he was not prepared for the speed of the other boy’s reflexes. The takedown was swift and effective, leaving Sekhandur on the ground, his leg painfully coiled, and he could feel a bruise forming on his ribs. He kept a death-grip on his grimoire and continued to channel its power as he writhed on the ground in pain.

“[color=aba000]Clever.[/color]” He forced out through his teeth. “[color=aba000]Too clever. This will be worse for you.[/color]”

With that, his eyes glowed with power that did not belong to this world, and he beckoned to the presence of pain and hatred he had felt earlier. Class Camelia had been using these grounds to train for every one of the past ten misbegotten years. Avalice was not a nurturing place for the weak, Sekhandur had learned, and it did not surprise him to find that there had been [i]accidents[/i] in this very courtyard. Accidents that left behind some incredibly bitter and vengeful spirits.

Invisible forces tore at Ty by Sekhandur’s command, murderous ghosts that hated Avalice Academy and all of the living students in it. They ripped and screamed and shrieked at him, unleashing their pent-up rage at their own failure, and their bitter jealousy of those that still lived. Trying to fight them was like trying to fight the very air around you, like a wind that could hate and could kill. //

[color=ed1c24]”This is a place of learning, you ingrate!”[/color] Ty had no idea where the voice was coming from. [color=ed1c24]”All that yelling, yelling, yelling! How is anyone supposed to rest!?”[/color] The voice was like claws ripping right at Ty’s brain. 

[color=f26522]”What the hell!?”[/color] Ty gasped. This wasn’t just mental tearing. He could feel that anger manifesting into something physical, but not. Something that could absolutely tear at Ty’s flesh. [color=f26522]”G-GHOSTS!!”[/color] There was nothing that Ty feared in this world. The other world, though, that was something he couldn’t even comprehend. Unfortunately for Sekhandur, since Ty couldn’t attack the incorporeal creature tearing at him, he’d have to attack the very corporeal being that was summoning them. He raised the staff. His constrictor limb tightened. [color=f26522]”Make it go away! Make it go away!”[/color] he said in a panicked tone, punctuating each plead with a whack to Senkhandur’s head with his own staff. 

Sekhandur grunted in pain as Ty thwacked him about the head, and lifted his free arm in an attempt to ward off the blows as well as he could. Neither of them could keep this up for long. He encased his arm in a shell of clay from the surrounding sand scattered around, buying himself time to think, but the pain from his leg was starting to overwhelm him. Sekhandur then realized that when direct confrontation wasn’t working, a different approach was necessary.

“[color=aba000]If you beat me unconscious,[/color]” Sekhandur grunted out between blows, “[color=aba000]I cannot call them off of you.[/color]” Then, a look of pure malice overtook Sekhandur’s princely features, his eyes once again glowing with spectral light. “[color=aba000]His eyes![/color]” He called to the attacking ghosts. “[color=aba000]Take his eyes![/color]” 

Ty stopped his assault with staff at Sekhandur’s warning. In any other circumstance, he’d likely have maintained his gung-ho attitude, but ghosts? No, he couldn’t be haunted forever! [color=f26522]”Mister Spirit! I’m sorry for yelling!”[/color] Ty yelled. But then Sekhandur uttered his command. Ty’s blood ran cold. He’d been holding back with pressure on his constrictor limb to prevent permanent damage to his classmate, but if this was how it was going to be… He gave one sudden jerk of pressure, enough to shatter the bones surrounding Sekhandur’s knee, and then released the hold. 

He swung at the ghosts with the staff, but his hands were trembling, his grip weak. The pole went flying out of his hands. His heart rapped inside his chest with an unfamiliar rhythm. A cold sweat ran down his body and his normally nimble legs wouldn’t move. He tried to run, but he tripped over his own feet and tumbled to the ground. Ty’s whole body was trembling and at that moment, all of his training and practice failed him. For the first time in his life, Ty felt fear. 

[color=f26522]”Please, make them stop! Make them go away!”[/color] Ty cried out. He curled up on the ground, scared and helpless as the creatures he couldn’t possibly understand clawed away at him. For all intents and purposes, the fight was over. 

Sekhandur sighed in deep relief, his face still tight with pain but the venom in his gaze gone. He wasn’t sure that bluff was going to work. If he [i]had[/i] been beaten unconscious, it would be a match loss for him, and it was more likely that the ghosts would have dispersed on their own or otherwise been dealt with by their professor. Sekhandur felt… rattled, to say the least. Even though he had won, he didn’t like how close that had come. It did not bother him that he had to use deception to win, merely how near he had come to being defeated.

Now to deal with the ghosts. His eyes once more burned with ghostfire, but rather than command the spirits, he inhaled deeply, his jaw even seemingly extending wider than would be normally possible. The sounds of spectral screams seemed to be sucked into his waiting mouth, and once his maw snapped shut, were silenced. Sekhandur swallowed the ghosts, turning their spiritual essence to pure mana, and ending their post-mortem existence of rage and suffering. The first thing he did was rest his hands on his broken knee, and his eyes and palms glowed with glimmering golden light. Pops and cracks sounded from his injured leg as the bones snapped back into their rightful places, and Sekhandur stood back up onto his feet, though slightly unsteady.

Sekhandur bent down over Ty’s prone form, retrieving his staff, and aimed it down at him, as though he intended to finish him off. However, his eyes again glowed with golden light, and the brilliance shone out of the end of the staff. Ty’s wounds from the sand and ghosts closed, leaving behind only faint traces of marks, easily lost among many others. 

“[color=aba000]Well fought,[/color]” said Sekhandur, in a tired yet regal tone, “[color=aba000]But fate was not your ally today.[/color]” With that, he turned back to join their professor and the other students that were observing the matches that still had yet to finish.

The screaming subsided. The phantasmal claws stopped raking his skin. It was over. Ty just stared at the ground still trembling. The pain wasn’t the worst of it. The wounds were only a bit more painful than tumbling through some brambles. Even as the spirits departed, the cold grip of terror still clung to his body. He hadn’t even realized that he turned off his sixth sense, so he didn’t notice Sekhandur approach. Then, in an act of camaraderie, he used his magic to undo the damage from the fight. What was left was entirely superficial. Ty sat up with a daze expression, but his hands still shook. He looked at them curiously. How long would it be before his body would go back to normal? 

[color=f26522]”Yeah… guess you’re right,”[/color] he said in a soft, distant voice. He replayed the scene in his head. Sloppy. Everything he did once the ghosts were summoned was sloppy. It was inefficient, irrational, and not what he had practiced. He took a deep breath and brushed his hair back. The trembling slowly started to subside. Who would have thought that the fearless boy would lose to fear.