“Glad you didn’t risk breaking a nail,” I wheezed through panting breaths.

  The censer disappeared and Syvelis smiled warmly at me. “We will have such fun together, you and I.”

  I nodded, using the moment to scan the area again. That blow had actually helped clear my mind a bit more, and it didn’t seem she realized it. I needed to figure out a plan, and fast, before they started the real torture.

  I again focused on the female nymph guard. She was tall and lithe, with an angelic face and a stunning figure beneath her quicksilver, body-hugging armor. Her pure white wings shifted slightly in a gust of wind that drove the rain almost horizontal, but her delicate hands wrapped around the haft of her trident never twitched. Why had I thought she could help me?

  Oh, yeah.

  I managed to kickstart my throbbing brain enough to cast a spell. For a second, I feared I couldn’t manage the focus or reach my mana, but with agonizing slowness, my powers ignited. The effort seemed to drain most of my available willpower, but I managed to cast Minion Minion.

  “Congratulations, Lucas! You have stolen a level-71 Nymph Attendant Warrior from the control of Countess Syvelis.”

  A conduit formed between us and I screamed a command down the intangible line. At the same time, I coughed loudly, then spoke, hoping to keep the countess distracted for a vital second.

  “Hold on. I just realized why you don’t like to hit people. Even psycho alien women sucker punch like a girl.”

  Harald balled his fist for another punch, and the countess scowled, but then she sucked in a surprised breath, no doubt noticing the severed connection to her other minion. Before she could spin to look at the female nymph, I remote-triggered the Potion of Napalm on the other side of the open room. It was still just lying right where I’d set it earlier.

  With a whoosh of igniting air, the potion spewed a gush of superheated liquid fire right over the burly nymph warrior standing guard near that wall. It engulfed him in living fire, melting into flesh and vaporizing his wings. He screamed in a deep basso voice as he crashed to the stones, rolling and writhing under the searing heat.

  The explosion drew Syvelis’s attention for a split second, just long enough so when she finally turned to look at my new minion, she managed to catch a brick in the face. The very brick that had the emoji trap sticker attached, the one my minion had just chucked at her previous boss.

  It might have been an effect of my addled brain, but it seemed my new minion had welcomed my intrusion and had followed my orders with more enthusiasm than might be strictly required. Either way, the brick caught Syvelis square in the face with a wonderfully-satisfying clunk.

  The countess toppled over backward, screaming in pain from the brutal hit before she choked on the gallons of clinging mud the trap disgorged over her entire body. In half a heartbeat, her superhuman beauty transformed into muddy slime that made her look like some kind of swamp creature. She writhed in slow motion on the stones as the clinging mud slowed her movement speed by 50%.”

  Before she could hit me with another mental attack, I triggered my Hercules title Indomitable aura, giving me a plus 50% boost to Mental Resistance. I also activated my Big Head Ring of the Mind to double that boosted Mental Resistance again. And for good measure, I triggered that new Scroll of Warding Glyph I’d gotten from the adventurer’s start pack.

  My mind rose from the cloudy haze of sluggish thought she’d buried me under. The brick to the head had distracted her enough to weaken her hold, but not break it entirely. Now I could fight back.

  Focusing on my Atreides title, I made our fight an official duel. At the same time, the complex orange rune of my glyph scroll appeared on the stone beneath me and flashed with power as it countered Countess Syvelis’s mental attack entirely. It would only counter 1 spell effect, but that one was the grand prize. My thoughts raced with sudden clarity.

  “Impossible,” Syvelis gasped, spitting a mouthful of mud as her sloth-like effort to roll to her feet failed and she collapsed to the stones again under the backlash of her spell getting squashed.

  Harald raised his fist and came at me, but I heaved against the two golems holding my arms. They provided perfect anchors to kick out with the force of my entire body and drop-kick the burly nymph torturer in his glistening, overly-muscled chest.

  My boots connected so hard they actually sank a few inches into his swollen pecks with an audible sound of crunching bones before the impact blasted him back through half a dozen stone walls.

  “That’s how you hit someone, Harald!” I shouted after him.

  One of the golems could think enough to realize I was attacking and had to be stopped, so it let go of my arm to leap at my face, stone fingers elongating into sickle-like claws to rip at my eyes.

  “Thanks,” I said as I landed on the stones, snatched his arm, and heaved with every ounce of Strength.

  His black, stone eyes somehow looked surprised as I yanked him into the air and over my head to smash down onto his twin still gripping my other hand. The two crashed together so hard, they exploded into shards of broken stone.

  Dawnfire and Scalebiter dropped into my hands as I touched a foot to my armor and willed it into my inventory, then spun back toward Countess Syvelis. My armor appeared on my body a heartbeat later and I grinned. Time to repay a little torture favor.

  Except, in that second, the world shimmered, and the ruined mansion transformed into a dungeon crawling with giant, deadly insects. Huge, hairy black spiders scampered across a metal grid ceiling directly overhead, venom dripping from oversized fangs as they prepared to drop on me. Scorpions the size of grizzly bears raced in from both sides, and a great, horned beetle with electricity snapping between its 5 horns charged me from in front.

  For a second, I froze in surprise, but then the truth became clear as the real world superimposed itself over the terrifying dungeon scene.

  Illusion.

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  Congratulations, Lucas! Mimic has captured Waking Nightmare. Time remaining to re-cast the spell: 15 seconds.

  The countess was truly gifted, but Wolf Sight allowed me to pierce illusion and invisibility. If she could have leveraged the full force of her tier-3 powers, or even accessed tier-1 force, she probably could have locked me in an illusory world I might never have escaped. Limited to tier-0, she lacked the raw power to overwhelm my sight.

  Countess Syvelis surged to her feet nearby, the clinging mud somehow dispelled. Her inhumanly gorgeous face seethed with rage and her eyes glowed with purple fire. Another mind attack speared at my brain like an invisible dagger, but my newly-boosted resistances deflected it.

  Congratulations, Lucas! Mimic has captured Mind Piercer. Time remaining to re-cast the spell: 15 seconds.

  That one came too fast. Didn’t even give me the chance to re-cast Waking Nightmare back at her.

  “Not going to work this time,” I growled and our eyes met through the illusion of giant insects leaping upon me.

  Her affronted rage flickered with the beginnings of cold fear. At the same time, I triggered my latest Mimicked spell, Mind Piercer.

  Syvelis stiffened, her surprise as obvious as the fact that the spell had failed to affect her. “How dare you?”

  “Kind of like this.” Using Twilight Blades, I yanked shadows together into a 3-foot sword and slammed it through her belly.

  She screamed and staggered back, her fear ratcheting up to panic. Without her minions to hold me down and her mind powers to control me, she lacked the physical might to fight me.

  I lunged, leading with Dawnfire, and plunged the energy blade through her fancy, golden blouse, right between her breasts and into her heart. She screamed so loud it hurt, her entire body convulsing from pain as her clothing and skin and innards were consumed by immolating fire.

  I yanked Dawnfire out and slashed with Scalebiter, aiming for her throat. No long duel with this countess. This one would end now.

  An invisible force punched me in the entire body, hurling me backward through most of the rest of the mansion. I managed to twist back to my feet, but couldn’t stop sliding back, smashing through one wall after another.

  Congratulations, Lucas! Mimic has captured Psychic Avalanche. Time remaining to re-cast spell: 15 seconds.

  Wow, Jane would love that one. I didn’t bother casting it back at Syvelis. She seemed immune to her own spells, so I’d get to carve out her heart the old-fashioned way. The flames around Syvelis winked out and a cool, blue light surrounded her. Screams turned into a shriek of absolute fury.

  “I will slowly roast each of your organs while you still live!”

  “Try it,” I growled and cast Shadow Walk.

  The entire tableau came alive in my sight as concealing shadows boiled up around me and the innumerable shadows covering the entire area lit up, giving me glimpses of the spaces around them. I stepped through one directly behind Syvelis, already slashing at her throat again.

  The blade touched her skin, biting just deep enough to draw blood before another psychic ramjet slammed into my side, catapulting me away again. This time I tumbled end over end as I shattered most of the rest of the mansion and a couple large buildings nearby. She hadn’t held back with that one, and every inch of me felt battered and bruised.

  I lost my blades in the wild tumble, but as soon as I stopped, I summoned Dawnfire, and my Slippery Fingers bracelet yanked Echo back to my other hand. I rose into the air using Water Flight, ready to finish off the annoying countess. I expected to see her preparing another spell.

  Nope. She was running like death itself was hot on her heels.

  She wasn’t wrong. I leaned forward to give chase, but my new minion tackled me back to the ground, her arms and legs wrapped around me, trying to pin me down.

  I hadn’t even felt Syvelis take control back or noticed the message. I jabbed fingers into the nymph woman’s eyes, making her scream and recoil long enough for me to lop off her head with Dawnfire.

  Congratulations, Lucas! You have defeated level-71 Nymph Attendant Warrior.

  I waved away the notification, triggering Loot and Soul Feed out of habit as I accelerated as fast as Water Flight would allow, arrowing through the downpour after the fast-receding countess. She’d already gained half a kilometer lead over me, with the gap only increasing as she tore through the air, fast and low. Whatever flight ability she’d activated, it was one that I wanted. That lady could move.

  Not fast enough, though. I cast Tether Slide, with the tether point locked onto her fast-retreating back. The golden chain shot out nearly to its limit, but caught her and linked us, then yanked me forward like a horizontal meteor. Rain cascaded off my mana shield, so dense it blurred my vision for a second.

  Then Tether Slide snapped and I slowed. By the time I could see more clearly, Countess Syvelis was just gone.

  How had she broken Tether Slide? No one had ever managed that before. Had she triggered an escape teleport token like the Briggs had used to escape me so often?

  “Walla Walla, Fargo, Wellington!” I swore, then scowled up into the rainy night sky. Sometimes I just waned to swear my own way, dammit.

  Losing Syvelis more than sucked. Not only had I missed a chance to take out a central player in Marisara’s court, but my game pretending to be Tydrion in their chats was up. She’d warn everyone.

  Even worse, she had the Phoenix Censer. How was I going to get that last relic back? Eva interrupted my thoughts.

  Congratulations, Lucas! Countess Syvelis has fled the duel arena. All of her titles, dominion, and property will be forfeit unless she agrees to a rematch within the next 48 hours. As the temporary victor, you receive a platinum Gilderoy Lockhart loot box.

  I would have laughed at the loot box name if I wasn’t so annoyed. Syvelis had turned out a lot like the annoying Harry Potter professor.

  “She can run and get a rematch, just like that?” I exclaimed as the loot box appeared, hovering in the air next to me.

  “It is standard protocol, especially since she did not formally accept the duel in the first place,” Cyrus said.

  “Damascus,” I swore. She was gone and she’d tell Queen Marisara about our little encounter, so my game would be up. I willed the loot box open. It flashed with light and left behind a scroll and a familiar coin-shaped token with an old-fashioned clothes iron stamped on the front.

  Champion’s Glory refresh token. You stand victorious, so you should look and smell the part. Restore health and all weapons and gear currently equipped or in your inventory to pristine condition, removing all damage and cleansing back to their original states.

  Note: This item is fleeting. It must be used within 60 seconds, or will expire.

  That was a welcome prize. The description was slightly different from the one I got after defeating Noctarus, but it looked like it accomplished the same thing. I activated it and savored the intense pulse of cleansing energy. My battered armor suddenly gleamed like I’d just polished it, and my lingering aches vanished.

  Scroll of Victory. Uncommon. You stand victorious on the field of mental battle. Plus 50 to Mental Resistance. Plus 2 to Wolf Sight.

  That consolation prize was also welcome. I read it, and although the feeling of new mental strength, coupled with my recent cleansing felt wonderful, it wasn’t enough to make up for my annoyance at letting Syvelis escape.

  So I flew on anyway, just in case she was trying to hide from me like the sneaky devil she was. Maybe we could have our rematch in the next minute instead of waiting for 2 days. To help scan through the heavy, concealing curtains of rain, I cast Eyes of the Hunter, my new long-sight spell that let me see through rain and water.

  My vision expanded a hundredfold as the entire night lit up like midday. I whistled softly in appreciation as I scanned a good half kilometer in every direction.

  I also focused on my new artifact, Zyros Fang, willing its Hunter’s Ascendancy ability to track my prey at any distance to activate, with Syvelis as my target. A second later, I felt a faint pull to the north. It was distant. The wily countess really was gone.

  With a sight, I activated Spellseer’s Gaze to help Wolf Sight spot any active spellscasting, illusions, or anything that might give me a target to vent some frustrated anger on.

  I didn’t spot Syvelis, of course.

  I did see Count Vhaernos shooting toward me like a fiery rocket, though.