Finally, I arrived at Clare Point View, where the city’s music festival had just started. Observing the crowd, there were lines of cars and buses stretched for miles from the streets leading up to where the festival grounds were at. I couldn’t help feeling some nostalgia about this event, while shaking my head to put my focus back on the mission. With a bunch of bodyguards heeling me, screaming fangirls and fanboys rushed up to me, begging for my autograph as I made my way to the festival grounds. One guard hastily gave out a pen to me while I stopped to deal with this rowdy fan crowd. While I was signing the autograph, a familiar young blonde-haired woman caught my eye. She was wearing a turquoise tank top and a jean jacket with ripped sleeves, fitting her pale-skinned, slender body. The woman was heading to where all the other performers were  getting ready for sound check rehearsals. Once I finished dealing with all these annoying fans, I followed her to where she was going. My feet stopped in place where I saw another familiar person making my blood rise.

“It was only for a minute…’’A tanned skinned young man with brown, slightly unkempt hair, wearing a blue t-shirt and black jeans.

“Fucking Darren…” I muttered to myself, then went to hide myself behind the tent curtains avoiding everyone’s view. Darren, my fucking defective mage brother, is here and the rest of his friends. There was another tall, dark-skinned man standing next to the blond-haired woman. That’s when it hit me. So this is the NorthEasters and that blond-haired woman. She was the band leader. Now I remember her! Her name escapes me: What was her name again? Did it even matter? This same girl went from working for my ‘ex’, Roxy, to being a front woman, to this shitty lowlife band now? Damn, I can’t believe I screwed this chick before!

Knowing that I’m getting sidetracked by my mission, it’s best to leave them be for now and focus on finding The Hexes. I stepped out of my hiding spot once again as soon as The NorthEasters left. Signaling my bodyguards, I dashed as quickly as a fox to avoid all the performers whenever I could. I stopped in place when overhearing a loud voice of a young woman in another area.

There she was. Amelia, the vocalist of The Hexes, who was with her band, helping them fix up their equipment. Her candy eye smiled, allured me a little as I walked up to her boldly. The girl was clueless that I was standing behind her. Tapping my feet impatiently, Amelia spun around to face me; she didn’t seem to notice that I was there. The rest of her bandmates stared at me suspiciously. It wasn’t too long ago since I briefly met the band. A young man who seemed to look close to my age went up to me, showing a face of disgust.

“What do you want?” The leader, Nick scowled at me.

Raising my hands up, I responded to him, “Woah, I just wanted to talk to your lovely lead vocalist here. The name’s Mark Kestrel.”

“Ooh, you are that dreamy heartthrob from the old band, Midnight Force! I love your newest album you had out!” The woman, Amelia, chipped. She came up to me, ignoring the man’s hostile response. I breathed in relief, feeling more confident than ever. This was going to be way too easy for me!

I smiled at the vocalist. “Oh, I see. Mind if we have a talk together alone?”

Amelia turned to her bandmates, checking with them before we left together while I stood off in the corner out of view. Licking my mouth, we went to a private area away from the festival area. The two of us then went off to another forestry part of the park as my eyes shifted, checking to see if anyone had followed us. Pulling out my wand and waving it, a white cloud came out to cover the area. The area fogged for just a moment, only for it to disappear, then moved to put my wand into my pants pockets.  

“See? I made sure that no Outsider could see us. Now, shall we talk about business, Ms. Electra Star?” I asked.

Her face went from cheerily to stone-faced and answered, “What do you want? Mr. Kestrel? Cut the crap! I told your friend earlier that I have no interest in joining your creepy group. We’re done here. Leave us alone!”

Judging by the look on that pretty music magic mage’s red furious face, I couldn’t help to think how hot this angry chick looked!  Giving Amelia a smirk, then tried to rebuttal her rejection, “You obviously don’t know what you are missing. Joining the Rise of Light would give your band so many opportunities.”

The young music magic mage just howled in laughter after hearing at my pitch. I grinned my teeth, trying to maintain my posture while brushing my slick hair back. Amelia prepared herself to walk away until I grabbed her arm to stop her. All the music magic mage did was stare at me cooly then slapped my face. Stepping back, I patted my face frantically, rubbing the spot where that bitch hit me. Did this woman know who I am?! Who does she think she is?!

Taking a deep breath, my fury level slowed down, then carefully spoke to the music magic mage. “Say, why don’t we settle this in a duel? If I win, you and your band will join us and if I lose, I will leave you alone. How about that?”

Waving my hand to create a large blue glowing circle line appearing on the forest grounds. “If whoever gets knocked out of the blue circle line, they lose the duel, okay?”

Amelia rolled her eyes, extending her hand for a handshake and agreeing to the terms of the duel. Both of us pulled our weapons out to get ready. She took out her silver flute while I pulled out my black wand, getting ready to position ourselves. This duel will be quick before it begins. There was no way this novice mage could ever beat me. Plus, Amelia was gonna pay for almost destroying my beautiful face!

Taking out some ear plugs and putting them in my ears, Amelia cried, “Hey, that’s cheating!”

I replied, “Do you really think that I am going to let you get the advantage of this duel? We didn’t make any rules about ‘not playing dirty’, did we, darling?”

Making the first move, I run away from Amelia, waving my wand to create copies of myself in different places throughout the area. Watching Amelia, she played her flute as I saw her slowly creating small little balls around her. Strange, I thought most music magic mages were mostly close range attackers?  

Directing my copies to lounge at the young woman while staying in my hiding spot. Amelia threw one bomb at one copy, it devolved up into blue smoke! Watching her from afar, the music magic mage repeatedly throwing another small ball at another one of my copies. I tried to hold in my laugher while continuing to stay in the shadows of the trees.

Then I called out to Amelia, “The more copies you destroy, the more my spell will quickly deplete your aura little by little. I suggest you give up right now. I already got this duel in the bag!”

Soon, there was silence. All I did was just wait for any movement on her side. Crossing my arms, I was relieved that I didn’t have to pull out my more dangerous spells. Using my poison magic isn’t necessary for this duel!  Sitting on a tree branch, the tree shook violently, I grabbed the branch, holding it tight to keep myself from falling.   

“What the hell?” Thinking to myself, my eyes kept looking for Amelia! She was nowhere to be seen from below. Taking a deep breath, keeping my cool, I observed my surroundings around the area and directed my copies to scout for Amelia. “Hey, I will find you stupid little b–” Suddenly, a wind hit me, knocking me off the branch and being thrown into the air! In quick motion, I chanted a quick spell to keep myself from becoming a pancake. While floating in the air, my attention returned to look for that damn music magic mage.

“You can’t hide forever! You…” I shouted until another wind kept pushing me further over to where the boundary line was. Wait, no! This can’t be happening!

A big flash of light flashed around the forest area, hearing the screams of my copies being destroyed. My hands were shaking, still in disbelief that I still couldn’t find that witch. An icy chill made me shiver down my spine, sensing that Amelia could be nearby.

Pulling my wand up, I choked, “Show yourself, witch!”

A pink bodied figure with a flute positioned close to her mouth showed up in front of me with a smirk on her face. Before I could react, the figure played her flute, which created another powerful wind that pushed me out of circle bound lines! As I fell, a pink bubble appeared around me to keep me from falling down harshly. It slowly floated me then popped once being close to the ground. There I saw Amelia appearing in her normal form, who landed herself down next to me. My mouth gasped, still in disbelief at losing to this duel. The brunette music magic mage fixed up herself, brushing down her hair and patting down light gray skirt.

“You… You… You little wench! You cheated!” I yelled angrily, taking out my earplugs and throwing them to the ground.

Amelia held out some pink stickers and giggled. “These little tracking stickers come in handy sometimes! I knew by throwing them around, they wouldn’t stick on fake people. So your illusion ‘copies’ are useless. It’s a little trick that I learned when I was in school, when fighting mages of your magic type! I had a little fun!” She then glared at me mischievously and said, “What’s wrong, darling? I thought you like fighting dirty, huh?

Marching up to the music magic mage, I got up to her face and sneered, “This isn’t over, witch. Roxanna and I will not give up.”

“Get out of my face. I’m not joining your cult! Stay away from my band or me!” The music magic mage screamed.

My hands grabbed her face, forcing her to get up close to mine. I used my other hand to hold her waist down to keep her from escaping. Despite this duel taking up most of our aura, I gained the upper hand. Amelia started kicking and yelling for me to let go..

Before I could do anything, a small rock hit me in the neck, then another one got my leg. I let go of the music mage, turning to see a tall black man and petite black woman standing at the corner entrance of the forest. The man was wearing a plaid black and gray shirt and black jeans while the woman had on a red tank top matching short skirt. Both of their eyes glowing as there were tree branches and rocks floating around them.

“Hey Bozo, hands off of Mel!” the woman warned me coldly.

“And who is in the fuck are you?” I shouted back. Suddenly, there was a lavender aura glowing around me, then a powerful force pulled from the ground and threw me off of Amelia!

Luckily, the landing wasn’t hard enough to knock me out when I landed back on the dirt face down. The force held me down with my mouth getting filled with pieces of grass and mud. Being in this position was so humiliating!

“Gabriel? Nicola?” Hearing Amelia’s voice called to her two rescuers.

“Mel, come on, let’s get out of here.” The man, who I assumed was Gabriel, told her in a calm tone.

Feeling the vibration of the group’s footsteps stomping away, the force weakened off slowly. I got up then observe my surroundings. Slamming my fist to the ground, I cursed to myself, “Dammit….”