The Dek games seemed to be fun for everyone else to watch, but something about it had agitated the voice in Kaos's head, which had just been occasionally yelling, and made it a little harder to focus during classes.
He had finally gotten the hang of the basics of magic engineering, so he wasn't particularly worried about failing the class now, but he still knew that it wasn't going to be a viable substitute for his wish's lack in combat abilities.
They had finally gotten to try and use general magic spells in General Magic class, but all this did was clue him in on just how weak general magic was. The only thing that had really helped him grow his combat abilities was Mallyjax's crossbow, but even that had its limits.
At first, he had been proud of himself for getting into Dren'Dek's group in combat class, but he lost almost every duel in class, and at this point, it was just more embarrassing than anything else. The combat class he was in now was pretty much the same as the others so far: the first half was physical training, and the second half was dueling.
The duels were a lot more about learning to use your wish in combat, than learning how to use weapons, which was more "salt on the wound" for Kaos, but he put up with it and just used the time to hone his reflexes and aiming abilities.
Kaos thought that Vasai's uncanny combat abilities would hit a wall without having a wish, but somehow he kept getting better. First, he only won about a third of his fights, then the next class, half, and after that around three quarters of his fights.
"Maybe this was Vasai's wish?" Kaos thought to himself standing back up from the mid-class break, "Maybe those inhuman movements and reflexes are the reason for his insane talent."
Still, he figured that there was only so far that Vasai's talent could get him, and eventually, just being fast and agile wouldn't be enough to keep up with the Dek students. But for now, there were very few first years that were stronger than him in the Sen class.
"You know the drill!" Came Dren'Dek's voice, "Everybody get in a ring, and duel. Once you finish the duel, the winner goes to the next ring, and the loser stays in the same one."
"Well, guess I'm staying in this ring until the end of class…" Kaos thought to himself, climbing the wall of a ring nearest to him.
"FIGHT! WIN! KILL!" came the voice in his head as another student hopped the wall of the ring.
"Yeah, yeah, I heard ya." Kaos mumbled back to the voice.
The student clenched her hand in front of her face, creating a large shield made of water. She nodded for him to begin his attack, and readied her cutlass with her other hand.
Kaos knew he was going to lose again, but began the attack anyway. First he fired once at the shield, testing its durability. The arrow lost almost all of its speed on contact with the water, but it caused the shield to splash some of its water onto the floor and slightly shrink in size. He drew his short sword and slashed at the shield a few more times, causing more splashes and shrinking the size once again.
His opponent kept trying to refill the water in the shield, but it was replenishing much slower than the amount of damage he was able to do. Then, she pushed her hand forwards, and the wall of water lurched at him, completely knocking him off balance, and blinding him momentarily.
It must have been salt water, because his eyes were stinging pretty bad. By the time he had regained his senses, he noticed that his opponent was pointing her cutlass at his neck and smirking.
"I win?" she asked hopefully.
"Obviously." he replied, still upset by the inevitable loss.
His next opponent hopped in the ring, and was none other than his teammate Gilt who was holding two small daggers instead of his usual longbow.
"What's the deal with the new weapons?" Kaos asked with a slightly frustrated tone, while attempting to twist some of the water out of a corner of his shirt.
"Dren'Dek told me they matched my wish better." He replied, looking at his small metal daggers, "Honestly, I get that the metal training weapons are dulled, but the wooden ones definitely hurt a lot less… but I guess as long as you're in the class, injuries don't mean that much, huh?"
"Yeah…" Kaos grumbled, "I joined a combat class, and all I am is a first aid kit."
"Well you can either get better at fighting or quit." Gilt shrugged, "But being a first aid kit probably pays better than you think."
Gilt was usually about as comforting as sandpaper, but these words struck a nerve for Kaos, who was doing his best not to yell insults back at his idiotic friend.
"Whatever." he replied, not really having something better to say, and fired the crossbow at Gilt's chest.
Instead of leaping into the air though, Gilt somehow used his wish to jump to the side at a lightning speed, kicking off of the wall of the ring to launch himself in a new direction. Kaos couldn't keep up with these movements, and before he knew it, one of the blunt daggers pounded him in the side, knocking him off balance.
He rolled and regained his footing. Gilt was much stronger now, and he had made his wish into something other than just a scouting ability. Kaos was envious of his wish. Not just his wish though, just his ability to grow stronger. Maybe even if he had Vasai's combat talent, he would have been content, but at his current level, he could see that his growth was completely halted, unlike every single one of his peers.
He couldn't follow Gilt's movements well enough to counter attack, and he certainly couldn't keep dodging every attack, sooner or later, he was going to get hit, and there was nothing he could do about it.
But it was Gilt who made the first mistake, failing to properly angle himself for another bounce, he crashed into the wall of the ring, and tumbled onto the ground. While Gilt's new technique was fearsome, it was just that: new. He was just learning to use it in other ways than vertical movement, and was bound to make mistakes like this one.
Kaos leisurely walked over to the groaning Gilt, a picture which somehow made him feel slightly satisfied, and placed the tip of his sword on Gilt's chest.
"I win." He said with a slightly cold smirk. He knew he didn't do anything to deserve a win, but all that mattered was that Gilt had lost.
"I feel like I did more damage to me than you did." Gilt chuckled with a groan, he paused for a moment as if expecting something and then continued, "you gonna fix me with the halo?"
Right now, Kaos really didn't want to use his wish on Gilt, or anyone else for that matter. People looked down on his fighting abilities, and then expected him to use his wish on them if they ever got hurt.
"THEY ARE USING YOU!" came the voice in his head.
Kaos had felt that was the case, and for once, agreed with the voice. His opponents would always use duels with him to push their wish's abilities to dangerous limits, and then when something went wrong, they acted like it was his job to fix them. He wasn't just being their first aid kit, they were also making him their safety net so they could learn dangerous new techniques with no consequences.
"Yeah." Kaos said, with a fake laugh, flicking his wrist, and bestowing the halo and wings on Gilt, who quickly sat back up, looking just as healthy as before.
His side still ached from where gilt had hit him with the dagger. None of this was fair, but he had healed Gilt anyway.
As Gilt jumped over the dueling ring's wall, Kaos closed his eyes, and took a long breath, trying to calm his mind.
"It's okay." He said to himself, "The next big scrimmage is tomorrow, and we'll figure something out."