Winner Takes All

Hum—

The moment figures appeared on either side of him, Dago began murmuring a spell. With a casual gesture, he summoned a dense swarm of Frost Spears that radiated intense cold and pointed at the young wizard from the Water Palace on his right.

The young wizard's face changed. He instinctively retreated.

They were standing far too close, almost as if a transparent wall were all that separated them. The distance between them looked to be less than ten meters.

As Dago cast an Activated Ice Crystal Technique at the young Water Palace wizard on his right, crystalline armor like a curtain of snow and ice quietly appeared around him. It was meant to guard against the Black Marsh wizard on his left.

The wizard was indeed casting at him, only a fraction slower than Dago.

At the same time, countless spells erupted from the hands of the wizards standing in the different passages of the corridor.

Yet every spell missed.

Dago watched dozens of his Frost Spears pass through the transparent wall beside him, then vanish without a sound.

His mental connection to them was severed outright.

His spell never reached the young Water Palace wizard on his right, nor did the Black Marsh wizard's spell appear before him.

Looks like we can't attack each other?

Dago's eyes flickered. Then with eight spots available, is this a race?!

Boom!

A visible wave of white air exploded through the mirrored corridor. Dago vanished from where he stood, becoming a blurred black shadow that shot toward the far end.

If this truly was a race, a view from above would have shown more than a hundred densely packed lanes arranged in a circle, all pointing toward the same finish line at its center.

In Dago's lane, a black streak overtook the