Primal Dawn

“Apologies for the wait, we've been cycling through a lot of tamers recently to help out with challenges,” Fitt said.

It was the day of Peter's challenge. He had arrived early and had been stuck waiting for the defender to make their appearance. It was five minutes after the designated time. The room was empty, save for Peter, Fitt, and a Dryad to oversee the challenge. Evans had been unable to make it. It seemed there would be no spectators. Peter felt a little sad upon realizing this fact.

The doors open, and a man steps through. Peter squints his eyes for a moment in disbelief.

“Yo,” Jet waved to Peter and Fitt. “Sorry I'm late, some business of mine ran over. Looks like you're still around and kicking, huh?”

“You're my opponent?” Peter asked, surprised.

“That's right. Let's take to the field, I've got other things I need to be doing today.”

Peter couldn't believe the audacity of Jet. He showed up late then complained others were wasting his time. He sighed and went to his side of the field.

“Present the primals you are considering for this battle!” Fitt shouted.

Next to Peter appeared Kalista and Gaia.

Across the field, Peter saw Jet's Goblin, no, it had some unique tattoos now, and carried a wooden staff. Goblins had multiple paths of evolution, one of which was an Orc. It must have been the other evolved form, Trickster. Besides her, there were also two Frens and a Dryad.

“Since there's no rule against betting as part of a challenge, I'd like to repeat my offer from before,” Jet shouted from across the field.

“No chance, Jet,” Peter sternly yelled back. “I'm happy with where my team's at right now, and I don't intend on changing its size in either direction today.”

Jet smirked. “Suite yourself.”

Peter lowered his voice so only Kalista and Gaia could hear him. “Kalista, it's a good thing the last time you fought this guy you pointed out the weirdness around his primals. I ended up looking into it a bit later. Jet likely has a Mimic. It's a primal that copies the appearance of another nearby primal and borrows abilities from them. They start out being able to copy one move, and their evolved forms increase the limit by one each time, but they always have a penalty in effectiveness.”

“Can she steal our moves as well?” Gaia asked.

“Yes, but only the primal she is currently fighting. The justification for the rule had to do with the fact that mimics can only copy abilities from a nearby primal. In theory, in a fight against a mimic out in the open, you could not summon your primals that you don't want them to copy. In a challenge you have to present the primals you might fight with, so that option isn't really available.”

“I see. Then Peter, I would ask that if Jet uses his Mimic, that I fight it.”

Peter's brows furrowed. “Maybe. Kalista, do you have any concerns?”

Kalista turned to Gaia. “Do you think you can beat her?”

Gaia sighed. “I have some ideas. But I fear that the Mimic will copy the Trickster's Fireball, which will make winning difficult. It is still a better matchup compared to me fighting the Trickster, though.”

Kalista nodded. “Then I have no concerns.”

“Are both sides ready?” Fitt shouted. Peter noticed that he had just quickly jotted something down on a piece of paper he slipped back into his pocket.

“Yes.” “Yes.”

One of Jet's Fren's stepped onto the field. Gaia looked towards Peter, who nodded his head, and she then stepped onto the field as well.

“Begin!”

“Toxic Bloom!” Gaia shouted.

“Cile, Mimic Trickster, and use Fireball on the flower!”

The Fren's body began to unravel. The tall tan form had black strands begin to splinter off from its entire body. Soon a shorter, skinny woman with longish, black hair was standing, wearing a gothic dress. Once her full form was briefly revealed, her hair began to greatly extend and spin around her body. It was wrapping around her, looking almost like a cocoon. Soon it began to take color and definition, and the spiral of darkness now had the form of Jet's Trickster.

Gaia was closing the distance between them as her poisonous flower soared through the air and fast approaching Cile mid-transformation.

No sooner than the Mimic had taken on the appearance of a Trickster did a ball of fire appear in her hand.

“Fireball!” She tossed the flame towards the flying flower, incinerating it instantly.

“Toxic Bloom!” Gaia readied another flower and launched it, running at a slight diagonal to put some distance between her and the flower.

“Again!”

Cile launched another Fireball towards the flower, taking it out before it reached her. Gaia was getting closer.

“Toxic Bloom!”

“Fireball on the Dryad!” commanded Jet.

The flower and ball of fire both hit their marks. As the flower began to spit poison towards Cile, flames exploded upon Gaia's chest, searing her body. She howled in pain.

“Gaia!” Peter couldn't help but raise his voice.

“Heal!” Gaia began to heal herself, her scorched body slowly beginning to heal.

“Keep using Fireball on the Dryad!”

“Fireball!”

“Heal!”

The two primals continued this exchange for a few more times. Gaia continuously healing herself, while Cile relentlessly burned her. It was a losing battle from Gaia's perspective, she was taking more damage than she could heal, and at this range she had no chance to dodge. Although it was not a complete one-sided beating, as the poison was beginning to build up on Cile.

“Cile, burn the flower on you with Fireball!” With precision, Cile launched a miniature fireball towards the flower wrapped on her, burning it and the vines along with it.

“Nature's Beauty!” Gaia tossed some powder right in front of Cile.

“Cile, get in front of it before it forms!”

Cile quickly moved ahead of the now rising cloud of dust behind her. Gaia grimaced.

“Keep using Fireball to finish her off!”

“Heal!” Gaia began to heal herself once more as the onslaught of fire began again. She was badly injured all over, and her healing ability was beginning to grow weaker. In agonizing pain, her mind raced to think of anything.

One lone thought came to her.

Gaia began to press forward towards Cile, running as fast as her injured body could while she continuously healed herself. With each ball of fire she grew slower, until at one point she was stumbling towards Cile.

The next Fireball would bring her down. She was sure of it.

And if Gaia's plan worked, both of them.

Cile readied another Fireball, her target was point blank and coming straight at her. She would not miss.

“Wait, stop!” Jet suddenly shouted. Cile didn't launch the Fireball, but instead held it. “Extinguish it!”

Gaia lunged at Cile, knocking her backwards into the cloud of dust. Immediately, she breathed in some fumes, despite trying to hold her breath.

The Dryad walked INTO the ball of fire. The flames now flickering along her chest. Cile thought she was an idiot. She was about to fall into the cloud that she had previously set up behind her. Any kind of primal who fell victim to their own abilities was wholly incompetent. Perhaps her tamer was more focused on appearances rather than intelligence or skill. Jet had managed to nab a decent amount of primals from stupid tamers that way. As the Dryad entered the cloud, the flames on her body began to flicker, lighting up the Dryad's face.

All Cile could focus on was the Dryad's expression. With the Dryad seemingly wincing in pain from all the fire attacks she had endured, her smile made her look as though she had gone mad. As a lot of flickering began to happen all at once, Cile quickly came to the conclusion that such a tactic could not be born of desperation. This primal was truly insane.

It was only moments before it had happened that Peter realized what Gaia intended to do. He nearly screamed “No,” but the words got caught in his throat.

The moment Gaia entered the cloud of dust, sparks from the flames on her body kicked off a chain reaction which caused the entire cloud to explode. Sending a wave of hot air in all directions, Peter partially covered his eyes with his forearm to keep his eyes on Gaia. Out of the explosion, her body was flung backwards towards Peter's side and landed with a thud. Everywhere she was covered with burn and scorch marks. A hint of green flickered from her hand, but then collapsed.