Chapter 2 – Battle Royale

Andor hadn't expected anything quite like what was being described to him. Karlan had told him there would be another test, but hadn't told him it would be quite like this. "Do not worry," said a red robed man standing beside a door. "When you passed the last test, you officially became a Red Wizard. The maze is just a test that we put new members through before the ceremony."

"I see."

The man cocked his head to the side, as though he were hearing something. Andor immediately recognized a received message, though he had no idea what the man was being told. He didn't really care. The man opened the door and said simply "Begin."

With a sigh, Andor stepped through the door. He found himself in a corridor, perhaps fifteen feet across. Twenty foot walls opened up into nothingness above. He couldn't hear anything, couldn't see anything but the walls, the corridor in front of him, and the openness above. From what he understood, he was somewhere on the outer edge of a giant half-circle maze, trapped with the other fifteen wizards who'd passed their tests recently. Somewhere in the center of the maze was a prize. The first wizard to get to it "won."

Shaking his head, Andor started forward. He wasn't particularly happy about this. There was a real chance he might come across someone more powerful than he was and be killed. The thought of death was not a happy one, and he was fairly certain that anyone he came across would try to kill him.

He kept his left hand on the left wall. He'd heard somewhere that if you followed one wall, you would eventually make it through a maze. It wasn't certain that this would work in this particular wizard's maze, but it was a start.

It was nearly an hour before he found another living being. Intermittent explosions made him quite sure there were others around, and that they were definitely hostile, but he didn't see one until he caught the sounds of footsteps from in front of him. There was an intersection there, and it sounded like the steps were coming from the path to his right. Andor slunk back against the right wall and silently cast shield on himself. He could hope the other person wouldn't see him, but it would be stupid not to be prepared just in case.

A short, pudgy man jogged around the corner and turned right, heading off with his back to Andor. Andor breathed a sigh of relief. It disappointed him that he'd wasted the spell, but it was better to waste a spell than to be caught unprepared. After the other man's footsteps had faded away, Andor conjured some mage armor, just in case. Then, listening a bit more attentively, he went forward and took a left.

Mere minutes later he rounded another left and saw a tall, pale man coming toward him. The man looked like he'd already been in a fight or two, but immediately skid to a halt and began casting. Andor wasn't concerned by the magic missile being cast at him. He thanked his luck that he'd cast shield now. It hadn't been wasted after all. Instead of worrying about the spell, he put his hands up and called out "We don't have to fight. Why don't we work together?"

Three magic missiles streaked at him, but he didn't even flinch. The intersected with the invisible shield hovering around him and were gone. The other mage's eyes widened. He then promptly turned tail and ran off in the direction he'd come from. Andor couldn't turn around without possibly condemning himself to walking around in circles until he was killed by a random evoker. Therefore, he trudged forward, following the pale man and hoping he stayed far enough behind. His shield wouldn't last much longer, he knew.

A few minutes later, he came across the pale mage crouched over a dead body and loading a crossbow that he hadn't had before. Andor tried to hide against a wall, but the other mage saw him and fired. The bolt streaked toward him, but missed. "I don't want to fight," Andor tried again.

The mage stood and began casting another spell. Fireball. There was nothing Andor feared more than evocation, the school of magic he had never quite been able to grasp, and he seemed to be a magnet for it. He countered with dispel magic and hit the fireball as it was forming. When the mage saw his spell puff out in his hand, he gave Andor another strange look.

"I can't turn around," Andor explained. "Truce?"

The other mage thought for a second. "Only until we get to the next intersection. After that, we go our separate ways."

"Agreed."

Andor strode forward, toward the other mage, who was looking down at the body at his feet. Together, they moved on.

"Why haven't you attacked me?" the mage asked as they were walking. He was still warily eyeing Andor.

"I'm not much for attacking. As my mentor says, 'The best offense is a good defense.'"

The man thought for a second. "I thought it was the other way around."

Andor smiled. "Most people do."

They continued on for another ten minutes or so before coming to a corner. When they went around the turn, there a hundred feet or so in front of them, was a large pedestal, on which rested a gray box. They'd found the center already. Andor was glad he was nearly out of this place.

The two mages turned to look at each other. Before the pale man had a chance to act, Andor began casting. Within seconds, the floor beneath the man was covered in grease which surrounded him, ending right beside Andor's feet. Without a second thought, he began running forward toward the prize.

Behind him, he heard the other mage hit the ground as he slipped on the grease. Keeping watch over his shoulder, Andor moved more slowly than he'd have liked to toward the pedestal. He continued to hear the other man fall down again and again behind him. Finally, as he was looking forward, thinking he would make it, he suddenly incredibly exhausted. Slowed almost to a crawl by muscles that didn't want to work, he looked back in time to see the man standing, lowering the finger he'd been pointing at Andor. The pale man then abruptly fell over again.

Andor was more careful now, keeping a more vigilant watch as he crept closer and closer to the pedestal. His vigilance allowed him to notice the man casting a spell this time. He was going to try to charm him. Mentally berating himself for not memorizing that spell earlier that morning, he turned and began a dispel magic. He lashed out with it, but missed.

"Hey buddy," the pale wizard called, "come help me out of this grease."

That was a good idea, Andor realized. His friend was obviously having trouble with the grease coating the ground around him. This was made even more obvious when the man fell over again, slipping for perhaps the third or fourth time. Slowly, Andor began trudging toward him.

Eventually, he made it over there and offered a hand to the once again standing mage. The man took his hand and tried to use him for leverage to get out of the grease, but instead, due to Andor's exhausted state, pulled them both down into the muck. As Andor lifted his head to try and figure out how they were going to get out of it, the grease around them disappeared.

The pale man stood up and offered Andor a hand to help him up as well. "Watch my back," he said, then walked toward the pedestal.

Andor simply nodded, glanced behind them, and began backing toward the pedestal himself. He did his best to watch both what was going on with the man and the box and what might be coming up behind them. The pale man couldn't seem to get into the box. Andor tried to help by casting open on it, but it didn't seem to change anything.

When Andor reached the other man, they began examing the box to try and find a way into it. All of a sudden both of them were covered in a web. The pedestal and the box disappeared. From somewhere down the corridor in front of them they heard "Ha ha ha!" and the sound of running footsteps.

The pale man growled and began to struggle out of the web. Seeing this, Andor began to attempt to break his way out as well. He just didn't have the strength to free himself, though.

"Stay here until you get your strength back," the other man said. "I'm going to go after whoever that was."

"Good idea."

As the pale wizard ran off, Andor sat back. He was rather tired. It would be nice to have rest.

A few minutes later, his strength did return. Hoping he could catch up to his friend, he began pulling free of the web. He jogged off after the pale mage, feeling rather refreshed. Six or seven hundred feet down the corridor there was an intersection. Near the middle of the intersection was the pale mage, apparently unconscious.

Andor walked up to the downed man slowly. He'd been charmed, he realized now. He seemed to have a weakness for that particular spell. Half out of disgust for himself, he kicked the man, then bent to take anything of value from him. There were a few weapons, such as the crossbow from earlier, which radiated a faint magical aura, but Andor had no interest in weapons. The man did possess three arcane scrolls though, and Andor had no problems relieving him of those.

He continued on. The left seemed to be full of blast marks where left by fireballs and scorch marks left by lightning bolts. Roughly a half an hour after he left behind the unconscious body of the pale wizard, he slipped around a corner to see two mages squaring each other up. The one across from him noticed him, but the other had his back to him.

"15 gold if you help me defeat him," said the one who was now glancing at Andor.

As the mage in the middle was muttering inaudibly in what sounded like a confused tone, Andor nodded his head and raised his hands to show that he wasn't armed. The money meant nothing to him, but if he could build trust with one of them, perhaps he wouldn't have to fight both.

The tall mage that Andor had allied himself with began casting a fireball. The blast sent the other mage into the wall, but he got up and started his own spell. Just from the words and what he could see of the hand gestures, Andor knew it was Melf's acid arrow. Luckily, Andor had that spell memorized. He'd just realized he didn't have any more dispels in his mind.

Without hesitation, he countered the mage's spell. When the acid arrow fizzled in his hands, he seemed even more confused than he had been earlier. The tall mage hit the other with a magic missile and the mage dropped to the ground.

Andor stepped warily forward, hoping the other man wasn't about to throw another fireball. The man simply smiled at him though, and motioned him over. A little less cautious, Andor joined him near the guy they'd just taken down. "Nice work," the man said, "I'm Andris."

"Pleased to meet you, Andris. I'm Andor, the Secure. I always thought that title was a bit of a joke, though."

"Why is that?"

"I'm actually rather insecure."

Andris smiled again. "I see. Well, Andor, I don't really want to fight you. Care to join up and look for this prize together?"

"That sounds like an excellent idea."

"You're armed, right?"

Andor's left eyebrow rose slightly. "Armed? No, I'm afraid not."

Andris simply reached into one of his sleeves and offered Andor a dagger. "Just in case."

Andor didn't really want it, but he took it anyway, so as not to jeopardize this uneasy friendship. Together, the two mages continued on. It wasn't but ten minutes later that they turned a corner and in front of them was a larger room. There was another pedestal in the middle of the room. Floating above it was a ring.

"We found it," Andris exclaimed.

"Don't be so sure. I've already run into one illusory prize."

Andris glanced at him. "This would be a very difficult illusion to pull off. I should know. I'm something of an illusionist myself."

"Then what happens now?"

"Well I don't really want to fight you for it. Why don't we flip a coin?"

Andor looked over at him skeptically. He'd just claimed to be an illusionist and was now asking to leave it to chance. Still, it would be better than fighting the other mage. Especially as Andor was low on useful spells.

"Alright," he said finally, "but I'm casting dispel on the coin afterwards. No offence, but you did just claim to be an illusionist."

"I perfectly understand." Andris took a coin out of his pouch and rubbed it between his hands. He began to do an elaborate ritual, passing the coin from hand to hand in strange hand gestures. Andor was quite intrigued by this. The man must flip coins a lot if he has such a ritual for doing it.

"Call it," Andris said right before tossing the coin in the air.

"Heads," Andor immediately said.

The coin came down into Andris's upturned palm showing tales. It suddenly occurred to Andor that it had quite possibly come down heads. It was likely the hand gestures were the somatic components of an illusion spell. "Care to cast dispel?"

Andor had no way of telling whether his bluff had actually worked. "Not really. I don't care that much about this prize anyway." Andris just shrugged and walked forward, taking the ring from the pedestal.

As soon as he slipped the ring on, they were approached by two Red Wizards. "Congratulations," one of them said, "you two are the winners."

They were teleported to a room high above the maze. The floor was clear so that the entire maze was visible below them. There were six other Red Wizards and fourteen other wizards, a few of which Andor recognized. The pale wizard was there, as was the mage who had passed him by without seeing him earlier.

One of the mages who had teleported them up there walked up to Andor and put a hand on his shoulder. "I'm very proud of you Andor. You've gained much respect for the Abjurers. The Illusionists will try to claim that Andris actually won because he fooled you with an illusion on the coin and got the ring, but the fact that you made it to the end and survived says something about what we can do."

"It didn't fool me. I just didn't have the means to call him on it. And I didn't care much for a prize anyway. I'm just wanted to get out alive."

"You couldn't have died, actually. There's an enchantment on the whole maze that makes sure no one ever dies, but is knocked unconscious instead."

That explained a lot, Andor realized. If the wizards died in there, there would rarely be more than one living graduate from each session.

"She took out four people before going down!" someone across the room argued rather loudly. Andor looked over to see that it was a red-faced Red Wizard. "That must count for something!"

The man beside Andor sighed. "The evoker is getting out of hand again. One of the evokers went looking for opponents to destroy, apparently with the rationality that if she took everyone else out, the prize would be hers by default."

"Only an evoker could think that way," Andor said solemnly, shaking his head in disgust.

"My sentiments exactly," the man said. "I'd better go try and calm him down. Great job down there. Oh, and congratulations on passing the tests. You'll get your robes at the ceremony tonight." With that, he strode off toward the other Red Wizards, followed closely by the other who had brought them up and had just been talking with Andris.

He'd done it, he realized. He was a Red Wizard. And from the looks some of the others were giving him, a fairly well respected Red Wizard, at least among this group.

Andor wandered over to one side of the large room, away from the others. He couldn't help but think of how happy his parents would be. And his great-uncle Alumviris, who'd been like a second father to him most of his life. His brothers would only continue to laugh at him for being an abjurer, blissfully unaware that they'd made him into one. One day, Andor would prove to all three of his brothers that he was just as capable and just as powerful as they are. Some day.