The outcome of the first match was set from the start. After only a few minutes of fighting in the fog, Dana managed to hit the Moor Cat with a barrage of magic missiles, breaking its barrier and ending the match.
Dana ended her spells, and the cat transformed back to human form to pout.
“Mages are too dangerous in a fair fight.” She complained.
Another beast, some sort of chimera with a mostly feline body, but tentacles on the sides and six legs, stepped up to challenge Dana.
They started off easy enough, with probing attacks. Then the beast seemed to split into three, and a surge of understanding flowed through Karl’s mind. That skill was a solid illusion, but it was the same as the essence of the Bodyguards. Now he understood how they were supposed to be formed. But on the battlefield, Dana was having trouble. The clones seemed to shimmer in and out of existence, vanishing only to reappear, and under the effects of the skill, she couldn’t tell which was the real one.
Even using wide area blade attacks wasn’t having luck, and the beast had landed multiple hits on her shield already.
But Dana wasn’t always missing. It only looked like it to her, thanks to the beast’s illusion. So when Dana sent a flurry of attacks out at where she predicted the beast to be, then jumped to avoid its retribution, she was as surprised as everyone else when the match was called.
The illusions vanished, and the cat was revealed in a different spot than anyone had been seeing it, other than Karl, who could still see it with thermal imaging. Though, that might not be right. A few of the other beasts were looking smug, including one young dragon. Not many beasts saw heat, but those who did were much harder to fool with illusions.
If the cat was at Karl’s level, it might have known how to hide fully, but this one was still young and mastering its skills.
“Monster Man, how would you deal with that?” The Wolf asked.
Karl smiled. “I can see her through the illusion.”
The cat motioned for Karl to come prove it. She wasn’t ready to accept that he could evade her skill.
Dana left the sparring ring, and Karl stepped in to take her place. He didn’t take out a weapon, only nodded at his opponent. There was a split second of lag in her short range teleport when she attacked, and it telegraphed her movements perfectly.
The cat activated the illusion again without waiting for the clerics to bring up the barriers, and Karl smiled as it crept along the ground, looking to ambush him from the side as the three illusionary images approached and Karl remained perfectly still, as the cat hadn’t moved out of his peripheral vision.
The illusions prepared to attack as the cat pounced, and Karl lifted a leg to spin himself horizontally to the ground, over the line of the strike. He caught the cat on the way by, then wrapped her back legs with his own and put an arm around her neck and forelegs to pet her head while she couldn’t escape.
It took a second for her to release the illusion, she was so shocked at the turn of events.
The problem was that if she transformed to find out how he did it, he would still have her, and that would be even more embarrassing. Karl let her up after a second, and she shook the dust out of her fur before transforming to shout at him.
“How did you do that? It shouldn’t be possible. You can’t see a displacer beast through her illusion.” She demanded.
“When you teleport, your butt wiggles, and it gives away both your timing and your target. That’s how I knew to move. Also, for some of us with enhanced vision, we can still see you. Your illusion doesn’t hide your heat signature.”
One of the other beasts transformed into a human girl with long fox ears. “She still wiggles her butt when she attacks? She totally did that as a kid. Like a blink cat preparing to attack. It was adorable.” She giggled.
“Shut up, I do not wiggle my butt. The Monster Man is messing with me.” The displacer beast complained.
“If we can’t beat him with illusions, maybe we can beat him with speed?” One of the others suggested.
“Or strength. He is higher rank, but he’s still human.” Another suggested.
Karl motioned them forward. “Why don’t we test both theories? I should be able to keep track of two targets at once.
Actually, I have a better idea, you can test against my summons. That way I can give pointers.”
The two beasts transformed. One into an Owlbear, and one into a massive scorpion nearly the size of Rae.
Karl focused on the [Bodyguard] skill and called forth the summons.
They weren’t quite what he expected. Remi got blue Naga Warriors with black patterns similar to her own. Karl got a pair of Lamias with white scales, vibrant red hair and leather armour. They also only had two arms, not four as the Naga Warriors did. They were also smaller, not muscular warriors with thick chests, but slender females with an assassin’s grace.
Of course, there was no such thing as a male Lamia, but some of them were large and muscular.
They were Commanders, which was startling to Karl. Remi’s was Royal Rank, but for some reason his was a Rank weaker. He was sure he did the skill correctly, but the bodyguards weren’t at the same standard.
But when the match started, Karl realized that they were an entirely different beast than the warriors. On their own, they activated a Royal Rank [Flaming Body] and attacked with [Rend], though they did cut the power of the attack.
[You screwed it up.] Remi complained.
[I have no idea how. I was certain that it was right, but it summoned Lamia instead of Naga.] Karl replied as he watched them fight the students.
[Maybe because he’s human and it’s a Naga skill? He got halfway in between.] Hawk suggested.
[You’re just smug because they can use fire.] Remi informed him.
[Very much so, yes.]
The Lamia swayed on their lower body, enabling them to attack from rapidly changing angles. That mobility was offsetting both the damage of the stronger opponent and the faster one.
“Get closer. You’re giving them too much room to evade. If you’re nearly chest to chest, they can’t sway far enough before your strikes land.” Karl offered.
He could sense them rolling their eyes at him. If it were that easy, they would have already done it. The Lamia had swords covered in fire, and almost all beasts were instinctively afraid of fire. It made them want to shy away, not get closer.
But after some consideration, the trainees both came to the same conclusion. The body of a Lamia was more vulnerable than the chest. That was how they landed their first strikes. Just behind the ground contact point, where most of the bodyguard’s weight was balanced.
Of course, they didn’t make it out unscathed. But they did manage to land a strike, which was better than anyone before them.
The teacher stepped into the ring as they were about to retreat. “Try again. You’ve almost understood the concept.”