Dimensional Descent

Arion looked toward the old Lord Guard, but the latter had already begun to speak again.

“Faelon. Passed the Preliminary Round of the Gathering of Kingdoms on his second bout. Forward.”

The Preliminary Round had given everyone three chances to win a single battle. So long as they won one, they could make it to the next round. To say that one had passed on their second bout meant that they had lost one before making it to the next.

The fact that both seemed to have the same record painted the picture that the Ma’at Bubble was at least not forming an unfair pairing and it should be a fair battle.

“You two will be sparring. The winner will be based on a tag system and your weapons, should you need them, will be provided, as they will be blunt. A tag will be based on my count and every battle will last one minute total.

“Now, what weapons, if any, do you need?”

The Half-Spiritual spoke first. “I’ll take a saber.”

The old Lord Guard looked toward Arion. “I… will take a spear.”

“Good.”

Soon, the two had their blunt weapons and faced off against one another.

“Begin.”

The two shot forward.

A minute sounded like a short time, but in reality, for Seventh Dimensional existences of their caliber, it was enough to exchange several hundred moves and even decide a winner if one was superior enough.

A clash of spear and saber resounded. The weapons had a clear heft to them, and every time they collapsed into one another, their bodies would bow and bend as the wind clapped like thunder.

In a rush, the two unleashed a barrage of assaults, forgetting almost instantly about the time they were allotted.

Arion seemed like a clear battle junky, his gaze even becoming somewhat blurred as he lost himself.

“Time!” Alderian spoke out.

Arion didn’t seem to hear him and lashed out, his blunt spear tip skewering into Faelon’s gut.

The Half-Spiritual felt all the air in his lungs leave his body, his torso bending into a U-shape as he was sent flying backward.

He landed heavily on a foot and a knee, glaring upward at Arion that even seemed like he might continue.

“Enough!” Alderian’s voice boomed, knocking Arion out of his weird state.

Arion blinked and slowly lowered his spear, looking around in confusion as though he had forgotten where he was for a moment.

Luckily, his spear didn’t have any blood on it as the blunt tip hadn’t penetrated skin. But…

Arion’s thoughts flooded back to him and his face paled.

He hurriedly bowed in Faelon’s direction, not in subservience, but in apology.

“I’m sorry, I lost myself. Please forgive me.”

Faelon snorted with unhappiness, but eventually grunted out an acceptance.

Alderian frowned beneath his leather helm, but since Faelon had let it slide and there were no lethal blows dealt, he chose to let it slide. Though, he had mostly chosen to do so because his Lordship had said to go easy on them. If these were military training grounds, he would have already sent Arion to be whipped.

They didn’t need loose canons in the military, that was how you ended up with dead brothers.

“The exchange of tags was in a total of 163 to 148. Faelon wins by a narrow margin.”

Arion lowered his head and retreated as Alderian called forward the next pair.

“… Really?” Leonel spoke in a low, cold voice. The only person who heard him was Aina, and she looked toward him with an odd glint in her eyes as well.

As the battles went on, from time to time there would be a few who stepped out of line like Arion did, but it wasn’t very frequent. Sometimes it would occur just once every five, sometimes only once in a hundred, and the situations were always different, while the end result was just the same.

By the time 300 bouts had been fought, the Half-Spirituals had won almost 200 of them, and of those 300, there were 11 humans that had stepped out of line.

Every battle was close without fail, usually within 50 tags, and even that upper bound only occurred when the duo was strong enough to exchange at least 500 blows in the minute of time.

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However, Leonel had already understood what was happening after the very first one.He just sat back and watched in silence, not saying a single word while his expression was unreadable.

Had he paid attention to the Gathering of Kingdoms, he would have realized what was happening before the first strikes were even exchanged, and that was because he was fairly certain that the records of the Half-Spirituals, at the very least, were nothing more than a farce.

It wasn’t even difficult to make it up either. It was even possible that these Half-Spirituals never participated in the Gathering of Kingdoms to begin with just to ensure there were no slip ups.

They were very good, honestly. They were even wrapped in hidden runes and Force Arts that could limit their power so that it wouldn’t be obvious. But there was no doubt in Leonel’s mind that every Half-Spiritual that stepped forward was actually far more powerful than their opponent.

Who could possibly memorize trillions of faces, let alone which rounds they performed in? Everyone here had to take the word of the Spirituals for it. Even Lyra just assumed that she was being told the truth.

And what was the purpose? To make humans look like barbarians who couldn’t even follow simple rules.

“Savahn. Accumulated a total of 47 victories, failed to reach the Penultimate Round. Forward please.”

A hint of irritation was in the old Lord Guards words by this point, and his cadence was far more biting.

“Caladon. Accumulated 44 total victories, failed to reach Penultimate Round. Forward please.

“You both have one minute. The next time someone steps outside of that, don’t blame me for being impolite, you Lordship.”

The Emberheart Lord chuckled and waved a hand.

“They’re just kids being kids.”

“Begin!” Alderian shouted.