“Boom, boom, boom!” Jeff shouted into the microphone. The announcer pointed at the sky. His hair seemed to have grown another 10 centimetres in the short break, a torrent of brown, extended upwards, that was fixed in its absurd style by whatever magical hair product he was using.

“…What are you doing?” Dra asked.

“I am celebrating the return to our tournament after yet another break, and furthermore, I am celebrating that we are finally going to see today’s game!” Jeff answered in a happily worked-up fashion.

“And you are doing it by acting like fireworks?” the lizardman probed further.

“Absolutely, yes!” the hyped host hailed.

“Okay then, carry on,” Dra sighed.

“Today, everyone, we finally will have that game I was wanting to have for so long, and, oh it is a game indeed!” Jeff said; “We are having a mirror match!”

It was at that moment that John snapped out of his state of admiring the feminine swing of Rave’s jawline. No idea why he had been doing that but something about looking at her just made him deeply happy. Looking at the announcer’s desk did not, especially with those news hanging in the air.

“What do I mean by mirror match? I mean a literal mirror match!” Jeff confirmed the Gamer’s fears. “Where each team fights against a copy of themselves!”

“Now, for anyone at home wondering how this works, let me show you,” Dra added, and at a flick of his fingers, the arena below started changing.

A diagonally oriented wall split the plain field into two even halves. The lift downwards would put each of the teams on their isolated side. A quick Observe, as well as John’s experience with the material, revealed the wall to be made from Baelementium, so it was rather sturdy, to say the least. It also had been standing there for a couple thousand years.

More interesting was the crystal on the wall, located at the centre of the arena.

“We are going to use this crystal. It will probably need like 50 years or several million Maybel to recharge. Personally, I think this is a supreme waste of perfectly good mana, but what do I know? I am only a person that is alive thanks to magic,” Dra mumbled that last part.

John, in the meanwhile, was getting continuously more nervous. A feeling that spread to most people on the table. “Whadderya’ll so worried about?” Rave asked.

“Well, our worry hinges on one thing,” Lydia said.

“Both teams are obligated to take part in this game with their whole line-up. Whoever beats all clones first wins!” Jeff continued the explanations. “And don’t even try to cheat by using some power-ups in the fight, the clones are equipped to respond in kind.”

“So please don’t… the mana bill…” Dra seemed very unhappy about this whole thing.

“Why do you care, you don’t have to pay it?” Jeff said. “Just get pumped for the action!”

“Hard to get pumped when I see money literally getting set on fire. It would be so much more useful spent on the Abyss Auction,” Dra sighed. “This game is worth 2 points. Just get it over with.”

“We are in some deep shit, aren’t we?” Rave asked. Even she understood what it meant if they had to fight against a copy of their whole team.

“You are absolutely, under no circumstances, never, ever, allowed to use Bloodburn during this fight,” Lydia was instructing Thana.

“Yes, I am not a fucking idiot,” the blood mage waved off. “Although I wonder if that would make that thing overcharge and explode.”

“Do – not – try,” the princess was not in the mood for jokes and whirled around to John, “You and Thana are going to just keep track of your own clones so they don’t mop the floor with the rest of us.”

Yes, that was the big problem here. The power gap between everyone else and Thana was vast, and then the one between John and the rest was also quite considerable. Not to mention that John brought another five elementals by himself. While he didn’t think that the weaker ones, that being Gnome and Salamander, were able to take out anyone on their own, an unleashed Undine could deal considerable damage.

“We should at least have one advantage,” Lydia mumbled and looked over to Nia.

“No letting yourself get copied, understood?”

“Yes,” the blank’s head went up and down in what could have been a nod or a bobble head impersonation.

Either way, they now had to go down to the arena. “Our chances to win this are low,” Momo said out loud what everyone else knew.

“Yes,” Lydia’s grey eyes were looking forward, “but we will try.”

The thing about the enemy team was that they had a way better line-up for this particular fight. Their power-levels weren’t that far apart, so they could adjust their match-ups for individual weaknesses. Maximillian could take on Mario’s clone, for example, no problem.

Meanwhile, John and Thana could really only take care of their own clones. If they had any hope of winning, it would lie with Nia. The blank would have to ‘delete’ enemies and give them a snowballing advantage to mop up everyone else.

“Let us begin!” Jeff shouted once the teams got into position. The wall separated John’s view from the enemy, and as the announcer with his ridiculous hair started the countdown, the sound from the crowd dulled. Not even the cheers would give away if someone had won yet.

They had taken all preparations to make sure that each team would fight tooth and nail with the hope that they would be the ones to claim victory. The crystal lit up, and a reverse shockwave pulled through John and his team, the sound of rattling glass filling the air. A distant, muffled “One!” reached his ears, and then several orbs of energy blasted outwards.

Like falling stars, they hit the ground, one for each participant in the fight. Lydia, Thana, John, Momo, Rave, all of them appeared one by one. Only Nia was missing, and John’s elementals, as he noted. Would they appear once they went corporeal? A question he asked himself as he had to try his best not to fall over from laughter.

For whatever reason, the clones of everyone had three remarkable differences to their originals.

One, their clothes had been jumbled up. Lydia was wearing nothing but a robe and a leather bikini, Rave was inside Lydia’s uniform, Thana was wearing a suit while John had been put into Momo’s poncho, who in turn had been outfitted with Rave’s pink, skin-tight battle suit.

Two, their hair colour was all sorts of wrong. Lydia’s braided, orderly hair was a bright green, John sported short grey and black hair, Thana’s hair had turned an utterly plain brown while Momo had changed to pitch black. Worst of all was Rave though, whose hair was now a dark blue that closely resembled her mother’s.

John could practically feel the annoyance radiating girlfriend. Their relationship had thawed somewhat, but there was still some rather strong resentment from the daughter’s side going on here.

Lastly, and this is why John was almost bursting out laughing, the clones all had moustaches. Not any moustaches either, but the extremely bushy, groomed, almost paintbrush-like things represented in 90’s comics. They weren’t even properly synced up to their individual (already wrong) hair colours, they were just all dark brown.

“How dare ya ruin my pink hair!” “Put on some clothes!” Rave and Momo immediately went into action while John used Shardbound and hurled the things at the copy of himself. They were met by the same skill of the same strength.

The encounter had just started, and John had already realized 4 things.

The clones had no item effects; if they had, their clothing wouldn’t have gotten jumbled. The clones were not able to speak. None of them had uttered even a single sound. The clones were not particularly bright. If John had wanted to block the attacks of Shardbound, he would have used a lower mana version. The attack would have depleted if it had hit something of similar size in mid-air.

The last thing was the most important one: his clone was wearing a colour inverted version of the Undine glove, meaning that there were incorporeal versions of his elementals around.

As the shockwave of Thana engaging herself caused dust to whirl up, John ran forwards. He would need to take himself out of commission as soon as he possibly could, and he knew his own weaknesses.

The only thing that kept his melee disadvantage from being absolutely crippling was Purgatory, and since the enemy did not have that, it would be John’s biggest advantage. He just would need to charge it first.

There was one incredibly effective way to do that. One that would reveal a trump card, but he would have to lie if he said he minded showing this one. Plus this game was worth 2 points.

If the elementals were already summoned, then he could throw caution to the wind. ‘Gnome, Salamander!’ he thought, and the two of them materialized and fused within the same moment.

The result was a tall woman in what John could only describe as an armoured dress. Plates of steel-like metal somehow clinging to her yellow dress, forming a bladed, knee-high skirt. It was a singular piece of clothing, shoulder- and backless, while also propping up the already sizeable chest of the mixed elemental.

Her hair was like the surface of a pool of lava, a layer of black slag swimming on top of glowing red that somehow formed the appearance of a braid. Brown eyes in a sea of hot-iron red, the elemental shily grinned, a mixture of looking forward and being kind of sorry for what she was about to do.

Smlere hit the floor with both arms raised. Having formed partially on the fly, she used her momentum and considerable strength in a hammerlike strike straight to the ground. The earth trembled as a spiderweb of cracks formed around her.

John sensed the power surging through Purgatory at the aimless destruction. As far as he was concerned, whatever cards he had to pull to take himself out were justified. Only about ten-metres remained between himself and his clone.

That was when the enemy elementals decided to attack. He ignored the colour-inverted versions of both Sylph and Salamander. Their attacks hit his Mana Protection, which he had wisely stacked high before the fight, and were neutralized effortlessly.

However, the copy of Gnome would be a bigger headache. The sheer weight of the moustached stone elemental was something he couldn’t quite get through, and he didn’t possess the agility to get around her easily.

‘There is no enemy elemental fusion,’ John noted as he checked on how to best solve this hindrance. If this truly was a clone of his, there should have been some Combination of elementals, especially now that he himself had used it. However, nothing of the sort happened. ‘Is it because it’s a Game Breaker? Can the crystal not emulate?’ he asked himself questions for later.

Smlere intervened right when he needed her. With a catapult-like jump she ripped the obstacle Gnome aside, fists clad in half-molten rock as she pummelled the clone. John still wasn’t out of the clear. The moment he ran by the one-sided fight, Smlere was stupendously stronger than the copy of the earth half of her, he noticed a quick movement. An attack, that he couldn’t have seen if it hadn’t been for Jack, was aiming for his back.

Under the constant barrage of the Sylph and Salamander clones, his Mana Protection was dwindling by the moment. By herself, the original tempest elemental could not really fend the duo off. He realized the white blade coming out of the mirror entity's shadow for what it was: the enemy Siena had arrived.

And she was quickly blocked by his own. ‘I will do you the favour and help without being a ‘bitch’ about it,’ he heard the shadow spirit whisper as her blades crossed her clone’s. Siena left his shadow and jumped into the one of bizarro-Gnome; these two would have a fight unseen by everyone else.

Not that that fight would last particularly long. John was now in reach of his double; the moustached Gamer erected a shield of water over his own Mana Protection. It was a matter of fact that the enemy barrier would not have been pre-charged.

The pieces, present and needed, rushed through his mind quicker than his body could hope to move. Information off the battlefield was taken in through Jack’s eyes in a mere moment. Where was the enemy Momo? Where was Nia? What was the state of Smlere? How much longer would his shield last in an unhindered barrage if he sent Gnome away?

The answers clicked in his head into a series of events that needed to unfold. Then he made a second plan, then a third one. None of the plans were set in stone, if anything there were written on rubber. Elastic, allowing him to adapt to whatever situation might arise. Although only the first one allowed for him to win within the next 30 seconds, if it was executed flawlessly.

Above him, two Rave’s exchanged kicks in mid-air, just her standard flashy close-quarters-combat without any buffs or Copernicus’ help. They came down behind him as John reached his doppelganger. ‘Sylph, go!’ he told her.

‘But, but, but, I wanna play more with myself. Uh, that sounded naughty. Also poncho-John looks fun. Audible gasp! Ponchn!’ Sylph complained and derailed herself within one moment.

Despite that, she actually flew off, following his orders. Either she had forgotten about her complaint or she just wanted to talk about something. Both were equally likely.

He had no time to waste, and to the sound of Smlere and Thanas both punching with earth-shattering might at different points in the arena, he hurled his right fist at the shield of water. The moment he came into contact with it, Undine morphed out of her item form.

First, she tried to win control over the water that formed the protective bubble. When that worked and her clone also morphed back to counteract the development, the two slimes got tangled up. Red and blue slime mixed and separated as the two of them fought with both fists and liquidity. They were trying to encapsulate the other like amoeba while also beating the other up. It was brutal and fascinating.

John had no time to dwell on that. He needed to crash down on the enemy mana reservoir. He boxed away at the Mana Protection of his double. Without a doubt his motions looked sluggish to anyone who was actually skilled in melee combat, but that didn’t change the fact that there was weight behind them.

His left hand flared up as Purgatory reached full-charge, adding extra fire damage to that one punch.

Not that further damage would have mattered in any way. As long as the enemy Momo was around, this John had too much mana to spend defensively. The moustached, empty face of his clone seemed to taunt him despite the presumed lack of emotion. The poncho-wearing double raised his hand, probably to fire a high-power attack that was meant to inflict a lot of damage to John himself.

‘I’ve got her! Yes, yes, I dooooo!’ Sylph sang and sent him an image. It was a black-haired Momo at the feet of Nia who was slowly eroding her existence with her anti-magic. He had hoped for her to be able to take the enemy mana donator out immediately, but if Nia used her powers too quickly, she would remove herself from this plane of existence. Obviously, that was not worth it.

Undine was removed, and Momo had been taken care of. It didn’t matter if she was gone immediately or over time, only that her mana was no longer in the reach of the enemy. The bizarro-John’s defensive measures were taken down. One more piece…

He had to win a bit of time. Well, win wasn’t the correct term here. He was winning, each hit at the protective barrier reinforced his advantage. The two airborne attacks he was suffering wouldn’t be enough before…

‘I have defeated m-me, uhm, Gnome!’ Smlere let him know; her voice was like a crackling campfire unsure to burn tempered by an amazon’s discipline. The last piece snapped into place.

John deactivated Mana Protection just as the doubles of himself, Salamander and Sylph were unleashing a barrage of attacks. The fire did next to nothing thanks to the World Ender set bonus, the air cut into his suit, and a blue shard pierced his lower abdomen. It immediately disappeared into arcane crackles.

What would have left a gruesome open wound, only slightly cauterized by the arcane burn, on anyone else was fixed in a mere moment thanks to Gamer’s Body.

He put Purgatory directly on the shield and pulled the trigger on the stored spell. A dark glow emanated from under his palm as the shadow-infused Mana Blade tried to penetrate the defensive shell. Arcane power collided, the mana of his double quickly sank, and then it was gone.

Just as the Mana Protection had been taken care off, the blue hue disappearing and leaving only simple air between him and his double, the second was over. The Mana Blade, whose time had been cut short by the elemental property infused into it, could no longer be used to eliminate the enemy John. That, however, was not needed either. Smlere, having no further opposition to stop her, was closing in.

All John needed to do was jump to the side, and the volcano elemental tackled into his clone with the might of a bulldozer. In her grip, the physically weak, unbuffed John was carried off, his weak punches hurting himself more with the heat of the lava spirit than they were a threat to Smlere.

A red firefly caught up to her and buffed the impressive Stats even further. Smlere headed for the Baelementium wall. The false John was rammed right into the immovable object with unstoppable force. His rib cage caved under the impact.

Still, with his Endurance he could take more than that. It would have been better if he hadn’t. A series of blows to his head that allowed for no counter-attacks to be taken were followed by him getting tossed into the air with just one hand.

“Terribly sorry,” Smlere apologized, “but I need to kill you!” The elemental rammed her fists together, and when she pulled them apart, a rock materialized between them. It was quaking, less stone than a condensed earthquake, and Smlere threw it after the copy of her summoner.

Once it came into contact with him, it erupted, scattering more ashes and rock than should have been possible for an object of that size. John’s plan had worked perfectly, even if he had likely been off in the timing department.

‘The elimination took longer than expected, and the gaps weren’t seamless,’ he told himself. ‘The buff on Smlere also wasn’t applied in the timeframe I wanted.’

‘My fireflies aren’t some instantly used buff, they actually need to reach the target!’ Momo aggressively reminded him.

‘I know, just correcting my calculation,’ John replied. ‘I estimate that took us about 94 seconds since the start of the fight,’ the support informed him. That meant that the execution of his plan had been roughly 34 seconds longer than he had wanted. He would need to be more gracious with his time allocations in the future.

With his own clone gone, they had removed more than half of the other fighters from the equation. It was only a matter of cleaning everyone else up now. Lydia was locked in a battle of will against herself, metal quivering in the air, unable to move as the two were wrestling for control. That one was the easiest to solve.

One usage of Shardbound, four merging into one, and the purple energy material plunging into the pretender’s side tipped the balance of that duel in a mere moment. With Sylph’s help and Undine’s healing, Rave quickly got the better of her own clone as well.

It was so easy to mop up those weaker than himself now that he wasn’t preoccupied. For the last obstacle…

Thana and her clone were creating craters wherever they engaged. Darting over the battlefield, one of them lost in crazed laughter, the other a silent parody, they met over and over. “Thana, pin her down!” John shouted, sure that the blood mage would hear her.

Nobody in the group would be able to intervene in this fight, it was too far above their level. Damaging an immobile enemy though? More than possible.

It took Thana a couple of tries, punches taken and dished out, until her suited clone made a slight mistake. Just a slightly wrong angle, and Thana managed to grab her brunette imposter by the arm and used an improvised throw to hammer her into the ground.

John hurried over. What they were about to do was inelegant, and nobody liked treating a copy of Thana that way. Wave after wave of, for her, weak attacks rained down on the clone.

“I really hate doing this,” John let Thana know as several shards impaled her clone’s body.

“That’s nice to fucking know, now get it over with!” Thana screamed back, holding her struggling clone down with all her might. The problem was that this copy had the exact same Stats as Thana, including her absolutely absurd Endurance.

It would take a while to kill her. Nia was their best shot, but she couldn’t eliminate all of that magic so quickly. Every time the blank used her powers, the clone dropped a few levels. Afterwards, Nia needed to readjust herself on this plane to not run the risk of fading away.

It would have been a wonder if they won this game. The reality of Thana’s regenerative power was simply this: it took too long to take her out. Her greatest power became their greatest weakness.

Eventually, they succeeded, but as predicted, Maximillian’s team had won themselves minutes before.

Lydia: 5, Max: 7