Chapter 16: The Prophet's Duel - Part 1
POV: Viktor
Three days of travel had settled their group into something resembling a routine. Geralt led, his enhanced senses sweeping the forest for threats that normal humans would never detect. Renfri walked in the middle, her wound healing cleanly despite the constant movement. Viktor brought up the rear, his system interface providing a steady stream of information about their surroundings and his own gradually improving capabilities.
[CURRENT MANA: 70/100]
[MEDITATION EFFICIENCY: IMPROVED WITH PRACTICE]
[ESTIMATED FULL REGENERATION: 6 HOURS]
The knife training sessions with Renfri had become a daily ritual, helping pass the time during their afternoon rests and giving Viktor something approaching combat skills. His form was still terrible, but his Premonition Sense was growing stronger with practice, allowing him to anticipate attacks with increasing accuracy.
It was during one of these sessions that Geralt finally made his decision.
"I want to see it," the Witcher announced, settling into his usual crouch and watching Viktor attempt to parry one of Renfri's strikes. "Your chronomancy. A proper demonstration."
Viktor felt his stomach clench with nervous energy. He'd been expecting this request since their conversation about time magic, but that didn't make it any less terrifying.
"What kind of demonstration?"
"Combat. You said you could see attacks before they happened. I want to see how that works against someone who knows what they're doing."
Renfri's knife paused mid-swing, her green eyes widening with alarm.
"You'll kill him."
"If he's truly a chronomancer, he'll survive." Geralt's tone was matter-of-fact, the voice of someone conducting a scientific experiment rather than potentially committing murder. "If he's not... well, then we'll know that too."
Viktor looked between them, his mind racing through the logistics of what Geralt was proposing. He had 70 MP—not quite enough for Temporal Sense, which required 100. He had one Minor Mana Potion left, which would restore 25% of his total pool, bringing him to 95 MP. Still 5 short.
"I need a few minutes to prepare."
Geralt nodded, the gesture of someone who understood the importance of proper preparation before potentially lethal activities.
Viktor pulled out his remaining potion and drank it down, feeling the familiar burn as magical energy flooded his system. The crystalline liquid tasted like lightning and regret, but it brought his MP to the edge of what he needed.
[MANA RESTORED: 70 → 95]
[TEMPORAL SENSE REQUIRES: 100 MP]
[DEFICIT: 5 MP]
He settled into meditation, trying to regenerate those final crucial points while Geralt prepared for their duel. The Witcher moved through a series of stretches and warm-up exercises, his movements fluid and controlled despite the casual nature of their setting.
"Viktor."
Renfri's voice cut through his meditation, soft but urgent. She knelt beside him, her expression more serious than he'd seen since Blaviken.
"He's not going to hold back much. Witchers don't know how to fight at half-strength—it's not in their nature."
"I know."
"Here." She pressed something into his hand—a small clay pot that smelled of medicinal herbs. "Healing salve. It's expensive, but use it after. For whatever he does to you."
Viktor looked up at her, surprised by the concern in her voice. Over the past three days, their relationship had evolved from wary allies to something approaching friendship, but this felt like more than casual worry.
"You think he's going to hurt me."
"I think he's going to try to kill you, and I think you're going to have to be very, very good to survive it." She paused, her hand still covering his. "Don't die, prophet. I just started liking you."
The admission sent warmth flooding through Viktor's chest, a feeling entirely inappropriate for someone about to face a Witcher in combat. But Renfri's concern, her unexpected care, gave him something to fight for beyond mere survival.
Viktor forced himself back into meditation, using the emotional energy of her words to focus his mind. The familiar tingle of MP regeneration began to work, his magical reserves climbing toward the critical threshold.
[MANA REGENERATED: 95 → 100]
[TEMPORAL SENSE AVAILABLE]
[WARNING: POST-ACTIVATION EXHAUSTION EXPECTED]
Viktor opened his eyes to find Geralt standing ten feet away, his steel sword held in a casual guard position. The Witcher had removed his armor, wearing only his black undershirt and leather pants, but he still looked like death given human form.
"Ready?" Geralt asked.
"As I'll ever be."
"Good. Begin."
Geralt moved like liquid violence, his enhanced reflexes turning the simple act of attacking into something that bordered on art. The steel sword came around in a horizontal slash that would have opened Viktor's throat if he'd been standing in the same place for another half-second.
Viktor activated Temporal Sense.
[TEMPORAL SENSE ACTIVATED]
[DURATION: 120 SECONDS]
[MANA: 100 → 0]
[PRECOGNITIVE WINDOW: 1-60 SECONDS]
Time became negotiable. Reality became fluid. And suddenly Viktor could see every move Geralt would make for the next two minutes, laid out before him like a tactical manual written in possibilities and pain.
Overhead strike following horizontal slash, arriving in 3.2 seconds.
Duck left, blade passes over head.
Recovery thrust targeting center mass, 4.7 seconds.
Sidestep right, sword extends into empty air.
Pirouette attack spinning blade in horizontal arc, 6.1 seconds.
Drop to ground, roll backward.
Viktor moved like he'd been choreographed for this exact dance, his body flowing through the sequence of evasions with a grace that was entirely artificial. Geralt's sword whistled through the air where Viktor had been moments before, the Witcher's amber eyes widening as his target proved consistently elsewhere.
"Impossible," Renfri breathed, watching from the edge of their impromptu arena.
But Viktor barely heard her. His entire world had narrowed to the stream of information flowing through his enhanced perception, the precise timing required to stay alive against someone who'd been engineered to kill.
Feint left, true attack right, 8.4 seconds.
Geralt expecting standard dodge pattern.
Jump backward instead, break his rhythm.
Follow-up thrust targeting new position, 9.9 seconds.
Twist left, let blade pass right shoulder.
Geralt's technique was flawless, his attacks flowing into each other with the kind of seamless precision that came from decades of practice. But precision was useless against an opponent who knew exactly where every strike would land before the attacker had finished deciding to make it.
Viktor ducked under a swing that would have decapitated him, rolled away from a thrust that would have skewered him, and came up just in time to avoid a pommel strike that would have caved in his skull. Each evasion was perfect, timed to the microsecond, and he could see the exact moment when Geralt realized he was fighting something beyond normal human capability.
Complex combination sequence beginning, 11.7 seconds.
Five-strike pattern designed to trap opponent.
Requires perfect execution to survive.
Timer check: 90 seconds remaining.
Viktor's enhanced perception mapped out the approaching sequence—a masterwork of Witcher swordplay that would corner him and force him into a position where evasion was impossible. But knowing it was coming meant he could break the pattern before it trapped him.
He dove sideways, rolling across the forest floor as Geralt's blade carved the air where he'd been standing. The Witcher's sequence collapsed as his target moved outside the expected parameters, forcing him to improvise rather than execute.
"You're faster than I expected," Viktor called out between dodges, his voice surprisingly steady despite the mortal terror coursing through his veins.
"You're more elusive than I expected," Geralt replied, his breathing still perfectly controlled despite the increasing pace of their duel.
Overhead chop with full Witcher strength, 15.3 seconds.
Stone-breaking power.
Dodge timing critical—blade will shatter ground.
Use debris as cover for next sequence.
Viktor waited until the last possible moment before throwing himself sideways, feeling the wind from Geralt's strike ruffle his hair. The sword hit the forest floor with enough force to crack stone, sending chips of rock flying in all directions.
Timer check: 60 seconds remaining.
Warning: Precision decreasing as skill duration wanes.
Recommend conservative tactics.
But conservative tactics weren't an option when facing a Witcher who was starting to understand his opponent's capabilities. Geralt's attacks were becoming more unpredictable, incorporating feints and misdirection designed to test the limits of Viktor's precognitive abilities.
Multiple possible attack vectors detected.
System struggling to calculate optimal response.
45 seconds remaining.
Accuracy declining.
Viktor could feel it happening—the gradual degradation of his supernatural advantage as Temporal Sense approached its time limit. His foresight was becoming less precise, his reaction time slowing by crucial microseconds.
But he was still ahead of the curve, still dancing through attacks that should have killed him a dozen times over. And in Geralt's amber eyes, he could see something that might have been respect beginning to replace the cold calculation of a predator sizing up prey.
Timer check: 30 seconds remaining.
Final sequence incoming.
Witcher adapting to predictive patterns.
Survival probability: Unknown.
Viktor dodged a spinning strike and landed in a perfect crouch, his system's countdown timer glowing at the edge of his vision like a clock counting down to doomsday.
Ninety seconds down. Thirty to go.
And Geralt was just getting started.
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