Into the fields of Summer - 90. The Millennium King

I heard everyone burst into applause and cheer when I was declared the winner.

I released my four opponents from my water blobs and they all took a few seconds to catch their breaths.

I approached them and helped them all to their feet as they all seemed to be very tired.

“That was a good match” I said to no one in particular.

“Wow. That was amazing, Prince Christopher” the water elf said to me as he took my hand.

“They don’t call you the Platinum Prince for nothing” the fire mage remarked as she dusted herself.

“Prince Christopher, thank you for giving us the chance to spar with you” the air elf said. “It was truly a pleasure”

“Oh. Don’t mention it, I learned a lot” I flashed a smile back at her. I think she blushed at that, but I’d hate to disappoint her since I don’t play for her team. Hehe. Oops.

My four opponents left the stage and looking around I saw that our battle had left it in tatters. Cracks, craters, boulders, mud, and sand everywhere. It’s a good thing that the shield held up, sparing the audience from being affected by the fight.

I wiped my forehead, I was sweating a bit, come to think of it, I wasn’t breathless like my opponents though. Huh. Curious.

The applause from my friends and family had stopped and only the clapping of a single person was left hanging in the air. I looked opposite my family and saw King Ethnar in a fitted gray uniform.

“Well done, young one” his voice was loud and clearly filled with pride.

“Thanks, great grand father” I lightly bowed at him.

King Ethnar did something I wasn’t expecting and jumped on to the stage.

“Now time for the main battle” he said to me with a grin.

“Huh?”

“Warm up’s over son... show your great grandfather what you’ve got. Don’t hold back” he winked at me.
He then directed his gaze at Sarad and Zenfar at the audience. “Zenfar... Sarad, cast healing and reinvigoration spells on the young prince”

“But I feel fi-“ However my great grandfather cut me off.

“Better to have you reenergized... it wouldn’t be right to fight you while you’re slightly drained and I’m not”

Zenfar and Sarad then stood and approached the stage, with their skills they didn’t need to be close to me to cast a spell on me. In seconds I could feel the energy I've spent return to me, though it wasn’t that much. I feel I would have fully recovered in an hour or two.

“Thank you” I said to Zenfar and Sarad.

“Best of luck, young prince” Zenfar said. Was he warning me?

“Please activate the second and third layers of the shields” King Ethnar said to nobody in particular.

Second and third layers? We had those? And right as if on cue, I felt a click in the stage around me and felt the slight buzzing of the shields grow thicker.

King Ethnar was now just a few feet from me. He looked around the stage and said “such a shame to start a fight in such a beaten stage... although I’m sure we’ll do much greater damage to it a few minutes from now” he mused.

King Ethnar then put a single knee on the stage and his right hand on the ground as well. And the amount of energy I felt kind of scared me, cause almost instantly the cracks and craters and any damage we’d done on the stage all but disappeared. The mud, boulders, stones, and sand all melted back into the structure just like that. It was as if the session I had earlier never occurred.

“I specialize in earth magic... just in case no one has told you yet” he said.

“Ohh... I see... amazing” I absentmindedly said, as I looked at the newly fixed stage around me. Wow.

The older king then took his place almost 30 feet from me. He stood tall and confident of himself. Gosh he was intimidating.

“Ready when you are” he said as he took his stance.

“I am” I replied.

And just like that the horn blew and we were off.

I was about to conjure water and fire balls but King Ethnar was just so fast and it was almost he teleported right in front of me. “None of that” he said as he launched powerful punches and kicks at me.

Good thing I was immediately able to conjure my body shielding, I was able to block most of King Ethnar’s attacks, but even with my shielding I could feel every punch and kick coming from him was laced with magic. He was strong incredibly strong. I couldn’t think of fighting back as I was purely focused on defense.

“You’re distracted, young one” he said as he threw a kick at me that I failed to block. I flew several feet into the air, good thing I was able to spin and land on my feet.

I immediately conjured a wall of ice in front of me but the king just punched right through it. Good thing I managed to dodge that one as I jumped away from him and hurled fire balls at him all of which were deflected by his own shielding around himself.

Fuck he’s strong.

King Ethnar gave me a smug smile and said “not bad... you are indeed very capable, young prince... but a little bit unrefined for my liking, you have to concentrate more”

“Huh?”

“Precisely my point” as I heard his voice come from behind me and then it happened so fast, I felt a kick hit my back.

“When? How?” I said turning around.

I started to blink more as now I was seeing 12 King Ethnar’s surrounding me.

“Illusion spell?” I asked myself.

“Not quite” he smiled back at me.

All images of King Ethnar launched themselves at me, I defended myself from their attacks but something felt off. But I couldn’t wrap my head around it.

I was getting tired of this so I called on more of my energy and in one strike I hit three clones of the king, all three clones broke into stones.

Stone mannequins hidden behind an illusion spell? That’s it. But when did he conjure them. He infused the stone mannequins with magic just like I did with my water humanoids earlier that’s how they’re all able to attack me and move according to his will.

I had to do something and fast. I pooled more energy around me and sent out a huge blast of energy from my body... incapacitating the remaining stone mannequins. I then spotted King Ethnar safe behind a shield of his own several feet away.

“You can’t always make your way out of a fight with blunt force alone Chris”

“What do you mean?”

“You have to do better than that. Think. And think hard”

Hmm. I pulled water from the air with my right hand and conjured a serpent-like water dragon. Then with my left hand i conjured a fire dragon. Both dragons were at least 40 feet long, and I laced them with my magic. Both dragons were now at least gold level on their own right.

The dragons were now circling the stage and King Ethnar seemed happy with what he saw. “Not bad, but you can do better than that” he smugly said.

The King put both his hands in the air directed towards my dragons... he was casting a spell.

I couldn’t let him finish with his spell so I launched a large fire ball at him, only to be deflected by a shield.

Then coils of white light wrapped themselves around my dragons, straining them, I pumped more energy into my dragons for them to be able to break free but King Ethnar saw that I was preoccupied with such a task and then launched stones at me, and by stones I mean streams of stones!

I conjured a shield around me and my focus wavered a bit. I lost control of my dragons and the coils Kong Ethnar had wrapped around them consumed my creations. My dragons vanished into thin air.

Fuck.

I then realized I was mainly focusing on elemental magic despite having spell casting abilities of my own.

Most gold and all platinum spell casters don’t need spells anymore, and I clearly did not need one, all I needed was a clear picture of the spell, have the equivalent incantation in mind, put myself in that meditative state and will the energy and magic to bend to my will.

With a flick of my right hand, I conjured a cage of energy around King Ethnar.

“Hmm... not bad” he smiled back at me, but with a spell of his own my great grandfather broke free.

He then conjured a similar cage around me which I easily broke free from as well. I cast a powerful illusion spell and ended up creating 12 mirror copies of myself.

“Nice try...but you haven’t hidden your energy signature. I know where the real you is” and with that I was hit by powerful energy ball.

King Ethnar then steeled himself and willed the ground underneath him to rise. It was as if he was standing on a growing pillar of stone. He stopped when he towered around 40 feet above the stage and then I saw him start working on a spell.

Shit is that a Magnus Spell? I’ve seen those on the scrolls at the tower. Powerful mages can cast multiple spells at once... but usually the limit is 3 or 4. But a Magnus Spell was an advanced...no...it’s a rare and formidable form of spell casting...it is a combination of spells done simultaneously, each designed to strengthen each other’s effects.

King Ethnar had his right hand directed towards me, while his left hand was moving in angular motions around the bright ball of light forming on his right hand.

If I could read it right he was casting 14 spells as once. A mixture of power, energy, enhancement, manipulation, and reinforcement spells on top of one another.

I could feel the ground tremble and the air around the stage grow warmer by the second.

I had to stop him. I launched a fire dragon against him but it was being held back by an energy shield around the King. Well at least my dragon did not disintegrate in contact.

The King was now merely a few seconds away from completing his spell. Fuck, ‘think Chris’, I thought to myself.

With barely a second left, I put a lot of my energy into a beam of energy towards the stone pillar holding the king.

The pillar started to crumble when the king launched his spell at me, that was enough for me to dodge his very powerful spell. It caused a huge explosion in the stage, creating a 30 feet wide and 5 feet deep crater on its wake.

I didn’t escape unscathed though. I was flung several feet into the air and landed on my back. God that hurt. I coughed hard as I tried to catch my breath.

King Ethnar also laid on top of a pile of rumble from what was his stone tower, though he seemed to be recovering faster than me.

I got back to my feet and then conjured my fire ball minefield again. King Ethnar was surrounded.

“Hmm...” he smiled.

And with a flick of his hand the ground beneath me gave way and now I was trapped three feet into the ground.

I tried to use an energy blast to free myself but this earth trap is stronger than the one the previous earth elf did to me.

King Ethnar was now preparing another Magnus Spell. Fuck. Clouds of dust swirled around him as the power gathered on his right hand.

Fuck. Fuck.

Then I could feel the chains inside me give way. I felt my heart skip a beat and then felt a surge of power in me. I broke free from my solid stone encasement and was now glowing silver.

I found myself floating several feet into the air. King Ethnar looked amazed with what he saw but continued with his Magnus Spell.

I don’t know how but I raised my right hand towards the King and started flicking my left hand around it. While King Ethnar’s left hand were doing angular strokes, mine were circular. I started chanting in a language I did not know and I continued to feel the chains loosen inside me.

I was casting a Magnus Spell of my own, but this one was of ancient elvish spells.

King Ethnar completed his spell first and a bright beam of white light flew towards me, if I read it right, this Magnus Spell was again composed of 14 spells on top of one another.

I then launched my own Magnus Spell and both beams of white energy hit each other, enveloping the stage in bright white light.

The ground underneath started to crack and give way from the immense amount of energy released, large pieces of stone flew across the stage, and the first and second layers of the shielding gave way, I looked towards the audience and King ZoHal, Zenfar, and Sarad had already conjured a large shield around them and the other observers.

The beams of energy were equally matched and resulted in a powerful explosion that knocked me off the air. King Ethnar tumbled several feet away as well as he lost his balance from the explosion.

I was barely finished dusting myself off when I see King Ethnar launch a dragon made of sand and stone towards me.

I pulled more from my energy and with an intense beam of energy, heat turned his dragon into glass which broke into pieces.

The look on King Ethnar’s face was immaculate. He did not expect that from me.

I then dug deep into myself and found an ocean of energy all waiting to be siphoned off. The chains inside me continued to loosen their grip and I was able to draw more power.

Streaks of white and gold light covered my skin. I felt warm and insanely powerful.

I started to float on the air again. Dust swirling around my feet.

I was now starting a Magnus Spell again of my own, I was ambitious enough to combine 22 spells on top of each other. Power, reinforcement, enhancement, energy, heat spells on top of one another. My left hand’s movement was fluid around my right hand that was now holding a bright orb of intense energy. This Magnus Spell compressed thousands of words worth of incantation into a few strokes and flicks of my fingers. Rings of white light surrounded the central energy orb on my right hand.

King Ethnar for a second or two had a look of not just amazement but fear as he saw me cast a very powerful Magnus Spell of my own. If memory serves me right, based on what I’ve read in the tower, this Magnus Spell I was completing was an ancient one, thousands of years old and had been lost to history.

I was merely a few seconds away from completing my spell when I felt the chains inside me tighten again.
I then felt my Magnus Spell prematurely launching itself, missing King Ethnar entirely, hitting the shielding around the stage instead which instantly broke, good thing my spell was directed away from the onlookers as I doubt the shields cast by the rest would have provided enough protection from what I’ve conjured. The end result of my failed spell was a 50 feet wide, 7 feet deep crater.

I fell on my knees completely drained of energy. The chains inside
me not allowing me to pull anymore energy. I felt tired and exhausted, the chains now refusing to give way.

I then felt myself consumed by a rock encasement and saw King Ethnar standing in front of me.
He was smiling. “Not bad, but this time I win” he said.

I smiled back at him and nodded in agreement. “This time”

—-

Sarad and Zenfar cast recovery and healing spells on both King Ethnar and myself.

Hmm...without their help it would have taken me at least a full day to recover my energy. The healing spells managed to reduce that to several hours, both Zenfar and Sarad weren’t powerful enough for a spell for my full recovery.

“Wow...you both gave us quite the fright” Patri said as he hugged me.

“Indeed...I thought you guys were seriously going to kill each other” Uncle Rehanmir added.

“Hmm... it would take more than a Magnus Spell to kill Chris” King Ethnar chuckled.

“I’ve never seen someone conjure a Magnus Spell in the flesh” Jetan piped in from several feet away.

“I’ve only done in a few times myself before...it’s a difficult spell” Patri answered. “The most I’ve done was a combination of 9 spells”

“Wow...I’ve only done 7 spells in combination during the few times I’ve succeeded” Zenfar said.

“King Ethnar crammed in 14 spells in that Magnus Spell of his” I commented.

The senior elves then gave me an odd look, King Ethnar had this look of total astonishment on his face.

“You can count how many I was casting?”

“Yeah...each angular movement was equal to either 1 or 2 spells... the repetition of movements was a little bit confusing but then I saw the pattern and realized you had 14 spells”

“Amazing...you’re simply full of surprises” King Ethnar replied as he came closer to me and gave me a hug. “I’m proud of you Chris... you gave this old elf a fight he’ll never forget”

“Thanks grandfather...”

“Who knew I’d have my most intense fight in a sparring session” King Ethnar chuckled. “That Magnus Spell of mine was similar to the one I used to eradicate a squadron of low level demons in the 14th century...and you just matched it with a Magnus Spell of your own”

Uncle Selvenus and Uncle Rehanmir then called for all of us to have dinner together, my earth crew, elf family, and Zenfar, Sarad, Jetan were eating together, I could already see a boisterous dinner ahead.

Victor and I walked back together to the residential palace. He had his left arm around my back as we slowly walked.

“Goodness Chris... don’t ever allow me to be on your Great Grandfather’s bad side. He sure as hell scares me”

“And what of me? You aren’t scared of me” I flatly said with a serious face.

Victor froze. “Uhm...”

I whispered into my boyfriend’s left ear.
“I’m kidding... though I’m sure you’ll be in my good graces if you give me a good pounding tonight” I said with a sly smile.

“Goodness...you’re insatiable”

“You bet I am” I winked back at him.

Reza and Konrad approached me while we were walking in the corridor.

“Chris...that was spectacular” Reza said to me.

“Thanks”

“I’ve never seen such show of force from the elves before” Konrad added.

“Let’s consider ourselves lucky to have witnessed it” Reza replied to his husband. “Such display of power, simply amazing”

“I think you guys should both say that to my great grandfather as well”

“We already have” Reza said. “Though to see you evenly match King Ethnar, was certainly a sight to behold”

“Hmm...I suppose”