D.E.M.O.N.S: Getting Summoned Weekly isn't so Bad

--- Willow ---

Willow sat down on the edge, it had become her signature move so she might as well make use of it again. Plus, it was looking like it was going to pay off! She could flip down and around to get a nice bit of speed up while grabbing the first ring. That was surely something. She'd recovered a good deal of mana, with five good blasts in her. All without passing out! Her stomach was a bit sore still, but that was just a bit of pain, and perhaps torn muscles… minor internal bruising. It would be fine. Unlike the last two competitors. 

Gareth… well… he'd gone above and beyond for his team and Willow could appreciate that. It… just didn't seem worth it though, not really. He probably wasn't going to get anything better than third place. She couldn't see herself or Mauve getting a time as bad as either of the first two and Cyan… had used up a good deal of mana. Probably. 

Then there was Nabras. That smile at the end really didn't reach his eyes. He didn't seem… unhappy with his performance, so it had to be something else. *All this training at reading facial expressions and intentions but I've really got no idea what the heck Nabras was thinking about. Then again, it's not like we were actively engaging in conversation, or that I know the guy well. Still… seems this jump has a way of getting to people. Well NOT ME. I'm going to do AWESOME and heck, maybe even take home the win. I'll just have to do it well.

So I've got five bursts I can use. Where am I best using them? Obviously I use one to get that extra three near the start, same as Gareth. I… do I use a burst to get the final two in that set of three on the 'second layer' of things? Might be worth just going for the ones in the South-West… but there's two lots of those, one on top, one below, and nobody has actually TRIED for them yet. Can you eve get them in one burst? 

If not… that might not be worth it. Then again… two bursts over there instead of the one burst to get the two rings before it. I still wouldn't get the North-West ones. That's probably out of my reach. But well… hmm… I just feel like there should be a better way of doing it. I'm still going to be skipping AT LEAST four rings. Probably more. Hard to say how many are in the two lower sets. My eyes aren't good enough to see. Then again… there are an awful lot of sets of two and three in this course. So it's probably one or the other, so four rings, or six.*

Willow let her dangling legs smack into the underside of the platform a few times, just to pass the time, see if she could come up with anything better. *I've got a bit of room to work with. I… might technically have six shots at this… but I'd really rather not risk it after that big speech time gave. So let's just stick to five. Play it back once more. 

Go down, get one, two, three, four, blast across to get, five, six seven. Maybe blast across to get the next set that I think is a set of three. So that would be… one or two blasts for that. Then a big break over to the North-East corner. Which… can I make it over there without blasts? Probably not? So that's at least three of my five gone. Maybe four. Then I'd need to use it once more to claim the full set of six, going down to either nothing, or one more blast. Probably best just to go for the North West ones for that set? If I miss the final ring set in the middle… the… well it's a bit of a risk. I guess I'll just have to see which set looks like it has more rings?*

Willow flicked her wrists out a few times. *Ok. Let's do this. And focus on speed where I can.* With a cheeky salute to Thyme, Willow fell forward and down, quickly flattening herself to get as much speed as possible all the way to down the first ring. Then she starfished out, just for a moment to slow herself and turn, then off she was zipping towards the middle. One blast, and afterwards she'd collected six rings. 

Willow looked over at that distant set, now clearly a set of three. Fuck it let's GO! Willow shot herself over there, wincing at the impact on her arm, because she, like a dummy, had used the same one twice in a row and it was really smarting. Didn't matter though, she was claiming three more rings in just a moment. 

Another blast carried her back up towards the next set of rings. It was… serene on the way there. After the slightly rapid-fire start, it actually took her quite a while to get over there. She used the chance to study the rings, and saw that both of the 'missed' sets of rings below her contained three rings. *Eh, we'll see how it goes.* 

Eleven and twelve, two more rings down. Willow had seen the others glide down to the set of three, Willow? Willow ZOOMED. She sped down through the first two, then nearly missed the two after that, but managed to correct her course well enough… before blasting up to get the final two for her set of six. One blast left to go… 

And Willow unleashed it at an angle, drastically upping her speed as she went towards what was possibly the last three rings she was going to get. With the boost it wasn't hard to claim them… it was hard to turn. It took a bit of finagling but she managed it… not in time for one more ring. So instead, Willow sped downwards, hopefully, to victory. 

"Good job Willow!" said Thyme. "You've got the fastest time yet, both in pure time, and after penalties. Though I won't be spoiling that just yet. For your total time it's seven minutes and five seconds, which puts you solidly in the lead!" 

*Nice.*

--- Mauve ---

Mauve rolled her neck as she looked over the edge. Like the others before her, she saw it for the mess that it was. Unlike the others that came before her, she wasn't so worried about the past performance of the other competitors. Mauve was in the zone, and she was going to win. Mauve had enough for six blasts. Six uses of those damned gloves. One more than Willow, and that was going to buy her the win. Mauve was certain of it. 

Mauve cracked her knuckles as she looked over the edge once again. *Just gotta do what Willow did… but also pick up the final ring. No way it was more than one ring, she's managed a time that's too good for it to be more than that.*

Mauve clapped her hands together, and then she jumped. It was easy to slip down and complete the first section, just as Willow had… but then came a slight mistake. Mauve was one for speed. She'd loved the speed. Treasured the speed. Embraced the speed. Perhaps, too much speed as it turned out. 

Mauve was coming up on the Eleventh and Twelfth rings, and realising, with no shortage of horror. That she was going to come up short. *No! Dammit NO! I'm too close to use a blast, but if I don't I'm going to lose the rings. Curse me. I can give myself a bit of height with them, offset the fact I'm too close… but that will slow me down massively. Shit. I can probably make the second ring… barely. But that means I'm going to tie with Willow. Damn. I don't have time to decide. Pick one me!*

Mauve cursed, but did nothing. She sped through, missing one of the rings and then completing the pattern the same as Willow did. She could only hope she was faster. When it came time for the last ring, Mauve blasted towards it, and prayed. Prayed that she was faster then Willow. That she would be the winner, overall. 

Mauve blinked as her feet hit the ground. "Congratulations Mauve! A bit of a different route from Willow, but a great time non-the-less, your final time is… wait for it… keep waiting…" 

"JUST GIVE ME MY TIME!" shouted Mauve. 

"That doesn't seem like waiting," answered Thyme. Mauve glared back at him, "Fine, your final time is six minutes, and fifty-nine seconds," 

*Hahahaha YES! That means I managed to beat Willow!*

Unlike Mauve who was celebrating her win, Willow was instead, trying to remember the scores for the previous rounds so that she could work out who exactly was in front after that. Thyme was looking between them with an obnoxious grin, so it was obviously close. 

Cyan grimaced at this and asked "Hey Thyme, can I forfeit this final round?" 

"Oh? Why is that?" asked Thyme. 

Cyan shrugged, "There's only points for first and second, and I don't think I have the mana to get enough rings so…" 

Thyme shrugged, "Sure, if that's how you see things I'm fine with it," 

"Thanks," confirmed Cyan with a nod.