Gale covered himself in an earth shield just in time to protect himself from the orb of fire that exploded against him.
However, Moira wasn't as lucky. She couldn't react on time as an Advanced Magician, so she was blasted by the collision of Richmond's fire magic and Gale's earth magic. She was mortally wounded with third-degree burns all over her body and chunks of her flesh were torn by the shockwaves.
She was lying unconscious in a small pool of blood a few meters away from Gale, making him feel stressed to rush and help her.
A man's figure stepped out of the shadows with a disappointed face. He didn't expect another True Mage to be able to block his ambush completely since it was extremely difficult to block an ambush from a darkness mage of the same stage.
Luckily for Gale, his connection was far stronger than normal mages thanks to his young age, and he had an affinity with darkness mana which allowed him to feel Richmond's magic sooner than others.
"Moira! Move!"
He tried running to Moira to feed her with healing potions but wind blades were homing on him, blocking his way and forcing him to retreat.
He took a deep breath and cast two large cages made of earth; he was inside one and Moira was inside the other. He needed time to calm down and assess the situation, and the cages served as shields from the enemies.
He understood he couldn't take care of Moira while he was still fighting, so he had to kill his enemies as fast as possible and treat her later.
Fire, wind, and water spells bombard the cage shielding him, slowly forming cracks around it. He saw through the cracks of the cage that he was surrounded by three mages. The darkness mage used his sub-element to attack while the other two seemed to be using their main ones.
"Who are you? Why are you attacking us?"
"You picked the wrong side, now it's time to pay for your choices."
Richmond gave him a short answer and kept attacking the cage that defended Gale.
"I chose no sides, I planned to leave for the capital in a few days from now."
Richmond was surprised for a moment, but he quickly realized it might be just a lie. And anyway, it was too late to stop now.
Since he made his decision, he wouldn't keep debating with Gale on whether it was correct to kill him. The cage suddenly fell apart, leaving behind debris and dust that hid Gale's figure inside it. The attackers could only see a figure standing and they quickly shot their spells at it.
Two air blades hit the figure; one cut off its neck and the other removed one of its legs.
"That's it?"
They were surprised, wasn't it too easy? Why did they even bother ganging up with three against one?
"Wait, no! It was just a distraction! I feel darkness magic!"
Richmond suspected the situation and tried to feel the mana around him more carefully and found out Gale's plan, but it was too late.
*BOOM*
"AHHH!"
Richmond felt a sense of déjà vu; a figure of a man stepped out of the shadows and shot an orb of fire, "Orb of Sparks" was the name of the skill. Gale aimed at the unprepared wind mage because his defense was the second lowest other than the darkness mage, but it wouldn't be easy to ambush a darkness mage.
The orb exploded half a meter away from the wind mage and sparks flew at him at high speed, making every spot a spark touched ignite, lighting the mage's body on fire. It didn't end there; due to Gale's spreading affinity, the fire spread to the whole body almost instantly.
You guessed it; the new affinity he gained from Sol, decaying, quickly made the flesh burn and rot. The Mage tried using his earth magic to cover himself with earth but it was too late. He was mortally wounded, and a simple stone bullet spell left a hole in his head.
Gale used his chance splendidly and took down one enemy swiftly, reducing the enemy number to two only.
"You're a threefold mage with a double main element!"
Richmond's declaration sounded like an accusation as if Gale was supposed to tell them in advance he had another affinity they didn't know of. Threefold mages were rare, and double main element threefold mages were even rarer; it meant that they had two affinities in the level of a main element.
Richmond thought Gale's earth and fire were both main elements after seeing his last spell while darkness was his sub-element.
Gale didn't plan to explain to Richmond about his elements, he simply repositioned himself during this time and prepared to deal with the other two mages.
"There are still two of us Richmond, we don't need to worry. His trick won't work twice."
The water mage quickly waved a red flag that normally doesn't end well. Gale decided to take down the weak link in the chain; the darkness mage. After Richmond's initial ambush, his power was reduced significantly since his darkness spells were good mainly for concealing.
Gale cast a stone pillar under the water mage's legs in an attempt to distract him and dashed toward Richmond. However, the water mage used a sphere of water which simply pushed him away from the pillar in a smooth movement as soon as the pillar touched the sphere.
He bombarded Gale with ropes made of water, causing him to slow down in his dash toward Richmond. Richmond didn't stay idle; he took advantage of Gale's slowed speed and summoned fire snakes that tried to constrict around him and burn him.
Gale was ready for them and cast with his stone pillar also a shield spell simultaneously, deflecting the fire snakes. However, water seeped through the cracks between the shields and started binding him.
Gale decided to overpower it with brute force and canceled his earth spells. He used his fire mana to cast as much fire as he could at once, evaporating all the water around him. His connection with mana was extremely powerful, so at the cost of additional mana, he could use fire to overpower water.
