Chapter IV.XXXI (4.31) - Bone Rattler

  The boardwalk rapidly flipped, over and over. Faible barely managed to keep himself from flying off while he crawled across, his hands and feet both flat against the wooden surface to maximize his contact. His shoes and socks had long since been discarded, exposing his small, hairless feet.

  Kizu held his breath as he watched Faible reach an open air section between two stretches of the boardwalk. The gnome brought himself right up to the very edge before launching himself forward.

  Faible fell.

  The tips of his fingers brushed against the other side.

  It was enough. Faible swung his weight around as the boardwalk flipped and he steadied himself. Before departing though, Faible wiped the sweat from his brow and grinned. Then, with a wave of his sweaty hand, he cast a spell and the boardwalk he’d thrown himself from appeared to extend just a little bit.

  “Sneaky,” Sene commented.

  Faible scrambled down the boardwalk towards them. Just as he hopped down from the boardwalk to solid ground, the next of their competitors reached the edge between the two dislocated boardwalk stretches. Only this student tried to grab ahold of the illusionary extension. With a cry, she fell and splooshed down into the sea below.

  “That’s going to be a delay!” Basil’s voice boomed around them. “An illusion takes out a competitor, the first to need to restart the boardwalk challenge! Just one moment and we’ll have a mage fish her out to jump her back to the start!”

  “Ah, dang,” Faible lamented as he passed the cup over to Sene. “He told them about my illusion. I don’t think it’s likely to catch anyone else now.”

  “It won’t matter,” Sene said. “We simply win now.”

  The cup filled with a brown liquid. It looked like normal, everyday, beer. Sene threw it back and took a gulp. Her eyes widened and she fell to her knees gasping, the majority of the drink still in the cup.

  “Looks like Sene is the first student to brave our final drink!” Basil said. “We decided it would be best to combine all the previous drinks and add a little something special in there as well. We call it – the Bone Rattler!”

  Aoi definitely had a hand in that name.

  Sene, with shaking hands, raised the cup back to her lips and took another gulp. This time, knowing what to expect, she shuddered but didn’t fall. It took four more painful gulps before the cup finally emptied.

  “I’m…I’m fine,” Sene gasped, waving off everyone’s concern. She avoided eye contact, nearly tumbling as she took a step forward.

  The mist around them cleared, revealing the final challenge. Three massive palm trees grew from the base of the island and grazed the skies above. Each trunk was the size of a town square. Kizu couldn’t even imagine what sort of tangle of roots must exist under this island with three trees this size coexisting here.

  Sene took a queasy step forward. Then another. With a shaky breath, she began to cast spells to create an updraft of wind.

  Kizu winced as the wind ripped in from the side and slammed her into the trunk of the nearest tree.

  “Our first competitor on the palm trees just gained an abrupt education in chaos botany!” Basil announced. “Sene appears to be learning that her spells might not react quite the same as normal when in the aura of one of these beastly plants! Grown by the gardening club last semester, these chaos plants are not a challenge to take lightly. But at the top of one of them is a perch to place your goblet. Best of luck to all of you!”

  “I-I know what chaos plants are,” Sene said indignantly. She steadied herself, a hand on the trunk as she glared over her shoulder.

  Then she turned her scowl towards the tree and began muttering to herself. This time her elemental spell didn’t launch her forward with the same amount of strength. She carefully regulated and controlled her ascent with her palms pressed against the tree to keep herself steady.

  “A snail might outpace her, but Kajima Sene is climbing the tree with her magic!” Basil said. “A remarkable feat, but at that speed I think it’s more entertaining to turn our attention back to the boardwalk.”

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  Basil’s commentary shifted over to a fight on the boardwalk between a second year student and that glass mage from earlier. Apparently the glass mage had decided to leave behind glass caltrops on the boardwalk to help knock off other contestants and that had earned her the ire of half the student body.

  “You know which tree you’ll go for?” Harvey asked as they waited for their teammates to arrive.

  Kizu considered. “Maybe that one?” He gestured at the tree on the right. “I think I should go for a different one than Sene.”

  “Yeah. Same strategy with us.”

  “Just asking out of curiosity?”

  “Nah, wanted to keep you from competing with Ulric.”

  “I’m not concerned with Ulric,” Kizu said coldly. “I can handle him.”

  “Oh, I know. Worried more about him than you,” Harvey replied with a big, sharptoothed grin. “Plus, I want to race you to the top.”

  Tip’s arrival cut off the rest of their small talk. The fifth year student handed Harvey the cup.

  “Bottoms up.” Harvey downed it in several gulps.

  Kizu watched with some fascination as Harvey’s tattoos glowed, activating to keep him from collapsing.

  “Tasty?” Tip asked, clearly amused by Harvey’s scrunched up face.

  “Bleh.” Harvey stuck out his tongue and scratched at it. “Good luck with that, Kizu. See you at the top.”

  And with those parting words, Harvey stumbled off in the direction of the tree Kizu had gestured at in their conversation. He slammed a glowing fist into the chaos tree, creating an indent in the trunk. Then another. He punched his way up the tree. Apparently it was external magic that was affected by the chaos aura. Harvey’s enhancement spells still functioned without any obvious issues.

  Unfortunately, the chaos palm tree was magical enough to heal the damage dealt to it. As soon as Harvey removed his appendage from it, the trunk popped back into place and healed.

  “You have an idea how to get up?” Faible asked. “Are you going to jump to the top?”

  “Can’t risk jumping with the chaos aura. Might end up inside the tree or worse. But judging by how Harvey is moving, your last drink being mixed into the final concoction will help me stay stuck to the wood of the tree trunk. I should be able to climb it fine without much magical help.”

  “No potions of your own to help out?”

  “Not with the up-coming drink. There’s no telling how dangerous swallowing two different concoctions in rapid succession might be. Unless I know the potion ingredients and their potential side effects, I try to put at least ten minutes between drinks. And, besides that, I’m already feeling queasy enough from the last two of Basil’s drinks. If I puke after drinking a potion to transform me into a bird, that’ll be disastrous.”

  “You’re serious about just doing this without spells? You know you’ll be drunk.”

  Kizu felt a smile touch the edges of his lips. He let himself relax as more students arrived on site. He put his fingers together and practiced stretching little spatial spells between his digits.

  He watched as his brother struggled to cross the boardwalk, barely hanging on as other students attempted to knock him off, aiming with prejudice. It seemed nobody had forgotten his icebergs in the water area. Finn struggled to stay on the boardwalk. He’d spent too much of his blood on his first stretch and now was at a severe disadvantage.

  “You think he’ll be fine?” Faible asked after a student summoned a woodpecker to assault Finn’s hands.

  “He’ll make it.” Kizu’s brother was nothing if not surly and stubborn. The boy was filled with resentment and boiling anger. While far from a healthy mindset, it should be able to get him through the challenge.

  Finn caught a summoned woodpecker, froze it, and smashed it against the boardwalk. It took time, nearly half the competitors had already arrived at the beach by the time Finn landed on the sand beside Kizu. But he did make it.

  Without a word, Finn thrust the cup into Kizu’s hand and the goopy black liquid materialized inside.

  Kizu took a deep breath and brought the alcohol to his lips. Then he activated his plan.

  He created a gate inside his mouth. It was a flawed spell that could only hold for a few seconds and only transport something a few meters away but he’d spent the last ten minutes practicing this spell in preparation. He knew it was possible based on theory. It was the same as when he’d cast an elemental wind spell inside his body to pump his lungs with air when Warlord Inari had suffocated him. It should be easy to control, he simply needed to make certain he didn’t accidentally sever his tongue.

  Spells inside the body were notoriously difficult to detect. Nobody would know.

  He downed the disgusting liquid.

  It dropped into the sea behind some rocks.

  Mindful of his tongue, Kizu closed the gate and brought his head back. He faked taking big gulps. And some drops of the liquid did still spill into the back of his throat, making his gag incredibly authentic as he gasped for air afterwards.

  Then he gave Finn and Faible a queasy smile, doing his best to imitate all the other drunk students stumbling around the base of the tree, before heading off in the direction Harvey had departed in. His mind, not clear, he still had two other toxic drinks in his system, but significantly more sober than his peers.

  He passed Harumi who’d been part of a team of first years who’d performed better than anyone expected. Now though, Harumi was struggling to even stand up. The boy was caught in a loop where he tripped on the tree’s roots, fell, and swayed back on his feet only to trip again.

  The wood’s bark felt coarse and solid. It filled him with a sense of nostalgia. He wished Mort was here with him. But the familiar was napping in Taroe’s house. Maybe they could return here together sometime and race up the trees.

  He gripped the bark and heaved himself up. Hand by hand, he ascended.

  Prismatic Spiral a follow.

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