Chapter 61: A Battle Undecided. (Part 1)

Whatever [Skill] Ash had used on my legs had tamed their ache. It had not taken a day, as she had said. It had taken two. I would forgive her for her failure, just this once. Now, my stride came freely and without pain. Mostly.

“You know, I’m surprised this wasn’t the first class you wanted to take,” Ash said by my side. “I thought you liked fighting.”

We stood in front of a large, rectangular building. One that Ren had shown us on our tour, and one that I did remember. She had called it the Arena. It was a place where students took combat oriented classes. It was also, I had learned, where these Ranking Matches took place. Though, what they were remained somewhat of a mystery to me.

Sounds came from inside. Screams, shouts and…cheering. There was plenty of all three. We stood outside. I held the wooden device in my hand. Lines only had two combat classes per week, and I had checked. I had missed the first one. I did not want to miss the second. “Lys?” Ash prodded.

“I did like fighting. Once.” I considered how to explain it. “In the beginning, there were those who could still make a battle of it. Then there was no one.” The last true fight I could name had ended with the death of two Gods. Even my own last stand against the Hero had been no proper contest. “After a certain point, one does not fight. One merely concludes.”

It had been a very long time since there had been any point at all. A very long time since I hadn’t just destroyed every adversary so thoroughly that no new ones appeared. Yes, I supposed I had liked fighting, once. Ash nodded, though I was sure she didn’t understand.

“Well, let’s go in then,” Ash led the way. I checked on Sol through the bond. She was asleep. She had also been asleep when I had last checked, two minutes ago. A Queen is thorough.

This ‘Arena’ certainly earned its name. It was a plain building from within, lit by warm white light that came from nothing. Tiered seating climbed all four walls, enough to hold the entire Academy and a second Academy besides, and all of it was empty. Whatever battles were fought here, nobody had come to watch them today. In the center, the floor dropped into a wide rectangular hollow

My gaze lingered on the students in the central hollow. There were several slightly raised platforms. Some of them were made out of earth. Some of them looked like rings of ice. One of them appeared to be made out of green vines. A pair of students lined each of the platforms, sparring.

I paid them little mind. Most of the rings were occupied by students sparring with their hands alone. Perhaps there was some essence enhancement involved, but they were not using their marks. Two of the students, the ones in the ring of ice, were using powers.

A short boy with blonde hair raised his right hand in the air. His yellow Line pulsed, and as it did, chains coalesced around his arms. Those chains shot forward. They stabbed at a girl who leapt straight above them. She leapt so high I almost thought she had [Flight], until I noticed the air shifting and moving beneath her feet.

Simple and meager powers. More meager execution. The boy with the chains was controlling his chains directly, that much was clear. It was clear because his chains had tangled, and as such they didn’t have nearly the range they should. The boy was puppeting his chains link by link, which is why they tangled. Why he didn’t untangle them I did not know. Perhaps he didn’t know how.

The girl had some way of shooting herself through the air. Her control over it was pitiful. She would shoot forward, almost shoot out of the arena entirely, and have to hurriedly shoot back. Once, she missed a swing on the boy entirely, and ended up falling on her face. The girl’s attacks could have ended the bout two exchanges ago, had she ever once landed where she intended.

If this was combat at this Academy, then I dreaded to consider what they called a battle.

A larger contingent of students watched these battles from a small distance. It was an odd assortment of them. The ratio of humans to demonbloods had only gone one way in every other class. Here, their numbers were almost even.

I spotted Edda. She stood apart from the others, at the lip of the ice ring, and she was actually watching the bouts in front of her. The other students watched the way crowds watched all duels. For blood, for spectacle, sometimes for someone else’s humiliation. My hordes had done all three often enough. I did not get that impression from the blue haired girl. When the chain-boy’s links tangled, her gaze had already moved to the place where they would tangle, a half-breath before they did.

The Inker for this class was among them. She stood out, for even among all the Inkers I had seen, she had the most finely threaded robes. They were shining in the light. She was a slender woman, with skin so pale she might have matched my former complexion. It was an unnatural color. I almost would have thought her another Demonblood, if I hadn’t noticed her ears. She was an Elf. There was a Crest on her left forearm, one in the shape of a dark blade.

The woman eyed us as we approached. Something inside me tensed. Of all the races the demons had warred against, none had bled longer than the Elves. They had shared the widest border with my realm, and they had paid for every mile of it. Osyrus had paid for refusing to kneel. The World Tree had paid for a greater sin still. My predecessors had been no kinder to the Elves than I. My reign had merely been more thorough. Ash tensed beside me.

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

The Inker’s gaze made a show of lingering over my horns. Her lips first thinned into a single line, and then they curled into a frown. No matter how many years might pass, it seemed these Elves always stayed the same. “You are Lysanthia,” the woman said. “The one who broke the Arbiter.” One would have to be deaf to miss the mockery in it. A few of the humans snickered. The demonbloods did not.

The instructor turned her attention to Ash. “And you are Ash, the second Consecrated.” For her, the woman’s expression rearranged itself entirely. She smiled, stepped forward past the crowd, and grabbed Ash’s hand in two quick strides. “You didn’t let me introduce myself properly last time. Let me do it now, when those stuffy bastards are somewhere else. My name is Pyria Eilbella.” She shook Ash’s hands, more vigorously than human handshakes required.

“Err…right. There was quite a crowd last time. I guess I just didn’t have the chance.” Ash said. Her voice sounded oddly strained for a Hero.

Still, I could guess the shape of this woman now. Ash had said that after her measuring, the Inkers had swarmed her. This Pyria must have been one of them. “Take your hands off of her,” I said. My voice was exactly as sharp as I had intended.

The Elf looked sideways at me. We were of the same height, if not for my horns. She looked from me to Ash. “I thought Theodore warned you last time. You shouldn’t acquaint yourself with her kind. I am told you came together, but whatever circumstance forced you two together is now long past.”

My left eye twitched. I felt the Requiem stir beneath the bracer. Who did this foolish Elf think she was? I had cut down more of her kind than anyone would ever know. I could cut down one more-