I knew that Samuel was an intermediate water mage like me, so I wanted to test out my ice magic control, which I had the least confidence in against someone who had experience with it. I am hoping to learn a thing or two from how he uses his ice to improve myself.
Samuel smirked at my suggestion. "Okay, I'll make sure to go easy on you. I don't want to hurt our precious lady."
He was obviously feeling cocky, but it didn't matter much to me. My whole point of coming out here was to show off to everyone in the manor and make sure no one would look down on me for being weak.
I have been training tirelessly every morning with Nick, an advanced mage, so I was confident I had the strength to face an intermediate mage at a similar level to me.
I would be a lot less confident if I was facing Arthur, since even though he was also an intermediate water mage, he had many years of experience under his belt. However, Samuel was the same age as me, so he could have only been a County mage for a couple of years.
"No need for the courtesy, I want us to fight all out. That's the only way I can know my true strength."
Samuel clentched his jaw and grunted, "there is no way I would loss to a woman."
I had to roll my eyes at the clear sexism. He could probably beat me in a test of physical strength, but pure physical strength had almost no bearing on who would win a magical duel. "Only one way to find out."
The rest of the County mages moved over to where my Mother and Rob were standing on the side. Samuel and I took our stances several feet away from each other.
Arthur came up to explain the rules, "since you are both agreeing to this and your Mother and Brother also want to see you two spar, there is nothing I can do about it. However you both need to be careful not to injury each other too heavily. I will step in the moment I think it is getting too dangerous.
Also, remember that in this match you can only use your ice magic. Luckily, ice magic is not as dangerous as something like fire magic, so there hopefully not be any permanent damage done to either of you. The first to get their opponent to surrender or knock them out will be the winner."
I nodded my head in understanding. "Okay, that sounds good to me. My husband has brought along a number of stamina potions, so we can use those to heal us if someone gets seriously injuried."
Arthur's worried face loosened slightly, "that's good to know."
However Samuel scoffed, "does your husband even care about you enough to use precious stamina potions on you?"
Athur glared at his son, "Samuel! Enough with the disrespect! Our lady is now a Duchess!"
Samuel shrugged his shoulders, "Father, I am only asking an honest question. I don't want us sparing as if we will have stamina potions when we really won't have any."
Samuel obviously thought he could be disrespectful to me because I had no real power with my husband being the orginial Duke, who planned to use me as a pitiful powerless figurehead.
I was starting to feel ticked off by his tone, but I didn't annoy me too deeply because I knew the truth. I actually started to daydream about how cute Nick's worried face would be if he got news I was injuried and rushed back from my Father's steel shop.
However, I much rather he hear about how I was strong and confident instead of seeing me weak and defeated. I want to be his competent equal more than I want to be helpless and saved by him.
With adrenaline coarsing through my veins, I smiled confidently, "no need to fear, if my husband got word that I was injuried here today, he would teleport here as fast as he could to hand deliver the stamina potions, but I don't plan to worry him like that by losing."
Neither Samuel or Arthur believed my claims this time and it started to make Samuel impatient, "whatever, just start the match already Father."
Arthur shook his head. "Ok, 3, 2, 1, begin!"
As I stared down Samuel to see what his first move would be, I could hear my Mother in the background cheering. "Go Becky! You can do it!"
Her cheers gave me a surge of energy, so I decided to make the first move. I quickly created ice at my feet, so I could start skating towards Samuel. I zigged and zagged, so he couldn't get an easy shot at me from distance.
He didn't start skating as well, so I assumed he liked to stay stationary and use his ice from a distance. Instead of shooting ice shoots directly at me because of my fast speed, he started creating ice walls in front of where I was skating in hopes of getting me to slam into a wall at my high speeds and hurting myself from the crash.
Luckily, after practicing my skating skills during most of my daily training, I was able to dodge these ice walls without too much difficulty. While avoiding the ice walls, I tried to get closer to Samuel to start throwing ice spears from a closer distance.
However, once I was about to throw my first ice spear, Samuel suddenly shot ice from his feet to propel himself forward and landed directly in front of me with an ice sword in his hands.
The crowd of County mages clamored in awe, "there is his patented ice sword!"
Seeing him propel towards me, I had just enough time to make a crude ice sword myself to block his strike, but I couldn't put any momentum into it so his sword swing knocked me off my feet.
I was shot backward and my body was about to slam into the ground, so I added a layer of ice to the floor so that my body could slide instead of scrapping the ground. After sliding 20 feet, I quickly got up on my feet and started skating again in one motion. I had to recover quickly or the ice shards that Samuel shot out after sending me flying would have hit me and ended the match.