A minute before:

  Kellen the second.

  Sense was knocked into me; ears still screamed.

  “Wake up, Boy!”

  “W-What happened?!”

  “Greystone. Get up. He has no chance against both of us.”

  The chanting of men had my attention. “Fuuuuuck.”. A mile away, I saw a trick. A regiment full of silver suits charged the hill of Vidoen troops with mana bzing, waving the fgs of Shopen and the Osberg Knights. Common regiments split from the army, heading down to the city with Bradshaw banners.

  “They are going to the slums…Why...? DAMN IT!!!” Lightning burnt the earth from my wrath. “Father—” A rough but warm hand rested on my back.

  “Go. I will take care of the boy.”

  Present:

  THE DUKE OF OSBERG

  “Let's cut the bullshit.”

  I fred my qi before it cooled on my bde.

  “Indeed. You must be in a hurry to join your father.”

  The Vioden duke fred his mana with fury his eyes cked.

  I looked in the eyes of my enemy. Almost swallowed by his presence, I could barely stay still. He was right there. I pushed outward with wind as I heard my men come to blows with his, and the many bodies of the wolf burn cn were cleared away for our battle in the crater.

  Although the pill aided me well in regeneration of my mana, the amount I had was tiny compared to the 8th circle.

  Such bad odds. Exciting.

  “Tarion Greystone. Duke of Obserg.”

  Greatsword in tail stance and legs primed from a charge, I watched the Vioden duke slowly take a stance reminiscent of kendo. Feet shuffle on the ash of his dead bastards.

  “Kellen the first. King of Vioden.”

  The Duke's rge sword jabbed at my torso, and with my bde pushing it down, I escaped with a wind-assisted front flip axe kick to the old man's head that he slipped past to my left.

  My greatsword blocked a slice at my back, and the air ptform stopped me from careening across the field. With the ptform as a foothold, a powerful left kick tore the air, chasing the duke back. No time to catch my breath as at least twelve firences were shot in my direction. My sword spun with grace as it cut all projectiles with moulinets, making a shield of steel. I mastered the air, broke sound and flew towards Kellen the first with my family's cloak blowing free. Ssh up, slice down. Metal cnged as the duke guarded. I strafed left from a thrust and riposte with my own. Disappointment as my sword’s point hit the ft of the duke’s weapon. Fsh steps dodged a devastating mana slice that pulverised the crater. Their feet shuffled as he followed my movement and sliced from his right hip. My bde cushioned the strike before I flipped over steel, surprising the old man. I flicked two mana bullets in my spin, knocking the duke’s head back.

  I see…

  I gain distance with Fshstep. Like light reflecting over many mirrors, I bounce around on ptforms of air, looking for weakness in the old man's armour. All the while, Qi focused on my greatsword’s thin edge.

  “Slow down, welp!” The duke shuffled across the ash, leaving thunder behind and lightning on his soles. My sword guarded an earth-destroying ssh from the Vioden Duke in the Orch stance. He pressed again, digging his weapon into my shoulder. His heavy, broad bde slid down my own as I countered with my right elbow of wind. As my attack dispersed off his mana armour like a breeze on a cold castle wall, the duke struck with a fming sword fsh step barely evaded. The built man blitzed with lightning, wrapping his left gauntlet around my neck. Thunder growled as enough lightning to make Thor envious zapped me.

  “ARGH!” Smelling myself getting fried, with my sword in my inventory, I struck with my right at the duke's elbow, but he escaped. The calm veteran’s left hand aimed in my direction, and his fire was inescapable.

  My sword as my guide through the storm of fire, I concentrated, making it an extension of myself. Qi oscilted. Ripples in a calm ke, my bde hummed a cool wave of power, pushing the bright, scorching fire aside. I twisted my sword, creating a tunnel within the fmes, and finally saw him on the other side. The Vioden duke’s mana thrust hit my mana armour, leaving me momentarily stunned. The fire vanished, and the frightening figure of the northern war hero leapt in the air with a broadsword held high. It dropped like an anvil on my bde and fell like a cannonball to the earth. He followed with fire jets pushing him. I rolled back, dodging explosion. I leaned back and dodged death by cut. I weaved under a certain demise. Ssh, dodge ssh, dodge, ssh and I parried his sword down and cut horizontally. He finally bleeds on the right side of his torso. A swift ssh from his right gave me the same injury. The Vioden duke’s legs lowered as he immediately attacked 90 degrees to the sky. My chin escaped the marring with a head tilt, and I returned the favour with a flurry of unpredictable flicks of my greatsword, which nicked him on his arms. From the right, I swung and went for a beheading; however, the veteran dipped for a low cut up my body. Drops of my blood flew spttered on the ground, but I controlled most of it within my body. The duke shifted and attacked my stomach with a world-twisting blow that spun me down the battlefield. Soldiers on both sides died as I flew through like a cannonball through trees. I regained my senses, sticking my greatsword in the ground to stop my momentum. A stray Vioden spear missed my neck while I ended his wielder with an air punch, crushing all the bones in the 1st circle’s torso. All attackers around me halted.

  “Its him... The Tyrant of Osberg...”

  I breathed in.

  Jimmy

  I y over a rude Shopen captain; blood bubbles from his sliced throat. He asks for help. I can give it. But there are more pressing matters. “KEEP THE LINE, MEN. SHIELD MEN, PUSH FORWARD. GUNNARY SAVE MANA. DON'T USE THE DUCHESS'S GIFT YET!!! PINCER ATTACK! PROTECT. OUR. DUKE!!!”

  “YES!! LIEUTENANT!!”

  Mana coated my spear, taking life after life in the chaos. All I could think of was cursing the bastard of a duke for giving me too much work. Lord Masse blocked an arrow for my head, and I thanked him with a nod. I looked down to his waist, where a dagger, wetter with blood than his sword, hung.

  “Tsk. Boys.”

  TARION

  This is enough mana. Wind swirled, twisting into arrows of gale. I focused and ignited. Ten nces of fme made men tremble and leak. With a wave of a hand, a dozen men turned to ash.

  Lifesight.

  The Duke of Vioden and I struck low at the same time. Our power rippled through the earth beneath us, breaking the ground like great waves of the sea; soldiers ran away as we thrashed our weapons against each other. Our sparks made fires around us. A ssh downward rippled reality, pushing us back with hard breathing.

  “You think you learnt something about me, haven’t you? Is this how you won so far? Geniuses get on my nerves.”

  I fsh-stepped while he ran forward with lightning. My bde fell upon the guarding duke, and he fell for the feint. “I am gd,” I said, attacking 25 degrees to the right. The shift made them for a weird block, and a left palm of condensed wind ignited and broke a rib. A wincing duke retreated with shuffling feet, and fire nces tracked. Holding his side, nces die off by his sword. The duke cuts a tether near, then another.

  “Tsk. Like his shitty son.”

  I jab and jab, shooting as much mana thrust; however, the Duke endured all with a mana shield. I shot a bullet of mana, tunnelling through the duke's shield. The dark ft of Kellen’s bde blocked the head knock attack, but the Duke knelt on his left knee, screwing his old face in pain. A second bullet made it through, hitting low on his body.

  “Sly…Bastard.”

  Good. Bring it out…Fshstepping close, my greatsword sliced to the heavens with all my strength. With one hand on the dulled edge, the duke held my bde back with gritted teeth.

  105 to strength.

  Kellen the First’s arms fil in the air, barely able to keep hold of his golden weapon. A rock-splitting knee to the face rolled down the field. Two tethers grabbed on, and like a paddle ball, the duke returned to feel my fist of gold. The duke guarded again, and my left fist rang his sb of iron like an untuned bell. Impressed, I uppercut his body. He impressed me again by twisting his sword to guard. The feinting right grabbed onto the sword, and a left hook rocked the duke's world. A dagger fshed into my left, and I went for a reverse-gripped stab.

  Lightning cooked me from every inch of my body. The dagger dropped as I did. I spasmed in absolute pain as foam evaporated from my mouth.

  I did. It was jagged and rough. Qi waves bounced within my body, matching frequencies. The pain remained; the spasm was no more.

  “ENOUGH!!!” I roared, summoning a whirlwind; a tornado cloaked my bde as I attacked the fleeing duke. The first of Kellen fought back with his own bzing tornado. I twisted my sword, extinguishing the mixing elements.

  Sense 55, Agility 50

  I danced between fshes of lightning with qinggong. My sword hummed with soft white qi, redirecting yellow electricity to the earth. Injuries slowed him down, and I reached him in quick time.

  “How does it feel, Kellen?”

  I attacked his body. Thrusting him fifty meters back. Umbra steps allowed me to whisper in his left ear. “How does it feel to be on the receiving end?” The duke cut the air where I was and left him a mark on his back. He felt my presence again but failed as I cut his shoulder. The geezer swore with sweat finally dripping from nervous brows. Impatiently, he sliced wherever he sensed me. A cut to his thigh peeved him enough to fre his mana wide.

  “There you fucking are!” Like the battle-worn veteran he was, he calmly shuffled his feet, and he shot himself like a railgun into a lightning-tipped thrust.

  Mana repulsed from my bde, knocking it down off his weak grip. My arm whipped my bde in a clean motion, cutting through skin, rib, and lung. I watched the stunned, weaponless ‘king’ look from his prized sword with wide, startled eyes. My tethers threw the sword deep into the battlefield, where I still heard my men valiantly fight on. A mana hazed on the duke's outreaching right hand.

  Senses, 50. Intelligence, 55.

  Qi focused on my family's greatsword.

  And right turned in the air, raining blood. I sliced and sliced and sliced. Wiggling like a babe, a pool of blood surrounded the limbless noble. “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!! GREEEEEEEEYYYYYYYSTOOOOOOOOONEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!”

  I shot nces on the discarded body parts, smelling the cooking meat in the wind. “What else should I cut off?”I looked down low.

  “NOOOOO, PLEASE, LANDS ABOVE, NOO!!!”

  “Woah, hahaha, I am not perverted.”

  “Please! Your father and I-!”

  I stabbed his bowels.

  His screams paused the entire battlefield. Metal ceased its cshing. The yells of desperate me were silenced by the howl of suffering. I twisted.

  “PLEAS-ARRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAH!!” Gutting him like a fish, I look at him, deep in his blues with a smile that would frighten the descendants of this battle. I dragged my father's greatsword across the stomach and examined the human. How he widened his mouth, the veins pumping life into his red head. The duke's eye bulged in anger, willing his nonexistent arm to strangle me to death.

  “I WAS THERE AT YOUR BIRTH!!! BEST I HAD STRANGLED YOU BY YOUR UMBILICAL CORD.”

  “Haha! Too little, too te, Godfather.” I twist.

  “I SHOULD HAVE—” The struggling duke coughed red. “I SHOULD HAVE TAKEN YOU, WHORE MOTHER, TO BED WHEN I HAD THE CHANCE. ERASED YOU FROM EXISTENCE!!!” I paused.

  “You? And my mother? Please, I need a good night's sleep after this.”

  Come on… so close…

  I pulled my greatsword out, whipping it of its gunk and blood.

  “This was fun… Wish I could continue. I truly do. But I have a city to capture, you see.” I raised my father’s sword up. “Can’t waste time.”

  A thud. Just below my heart, a sharp tendril of mist stabbed deep.

  FINALLY!!!!

  My sword whacked away a second tendril coming for my head, and I retreated with light steps.

  From the half-dead body, mist swirled.

  Wind projected my voice to all corners of the battlefield.“YOU SEE, MEN OF FREIDLAND?” I point with my sword. “THIS IS WHAT WE FIGHT. THIS IS THE TRUE NATURE OF YOU LEADERS!”

  Tendrils lifted the body as slowly regenerating hacked tissue.

  “A CULT MANIPULATES YOU, USES YOUR STRUGGLES AGAINST YOU FOR THEIR OWN SELFISH ENDS.”Feet form and nd on grass. The cursed being examined itself with a small smile. Red, youthful hair waves in the night; fire shone on supple, unweathered grey skin. The cursed mouthed a single phrase.

  “Worth it.”

  I shouted to the crowd. “IF YOU CAN’T BELIEVE MY WORD, BELIEVE YOUR EYES. FEAST YOUR EYES ON A DEMON WORSHIPPER!!!”

  The duke's long ears wiggle at the mention of his benefactors, and long canines protrude from a grin with squinted eyes of obsidian sclera. Red irises shone like mine.

  “Capture my city, you said.” He looked at my injuries. “Overconfident.”

  My greatsword disappeared, and a sack of holy water fshed into my hand. I chugged it all, feeling my body meld itself.

  “True confidence comes from being prepared.”

  Thank you, Vanessa.

  I caught a wrist, and earth and soil blew away like sand. A centimetre from my cheek, the smelling mana bubbled on his right wrist.

  “You are not the only one with surprises.”