Fate Flow

Fate Flow — a combat discipline specialized for battles between wizards.

Magical intervention in fate creates disturbances in fate's current, like eddies in a stream. By sensing these eddies, a practitioner can perceive an opponent's next move as if glimpsing the near future, and respond accordingly — that is the essence of Fate Flow.

To its practitioners, time seems to slow, and pale blue lines appear, tracing what is to come. Where a launched flame will burst; how the opponent will move. As if everything were laid bare, they read the play ahead and act on it. In effect, a practitioner can always win the exchange after seeing the opponent's hand — an overwhelming advantage that is exceedingly difficult to overturn. A battle between masters becomes a contest of reads so refined it is likened to a checkmate problem in shogi.

This art, however, is not learned overnight. Reading the landing point of a pebble tossed overhead — only by repeating such humble training, day after day after day, does one finally touch its first glimmers. Yet for wizards who choose the path of fighting monsters, mastery of Fate Flow is an absolute requirement.