THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS VIOLENCE THAT MAY NOT BE SUITABLE FOR SOME READERS.
Damon woke up with the faint flow of his Eterna beneath his skin. He moved to the wardrobe, pulling on the streamlined combat cloth. A deep black, shot through with faint electrical-blue lines along the seams.
He wore black bracers on his forearms; they hummed with energy, the lines glowing as if they followed the shape of his veins. His gaze settled on his left wrist.
Natsuki's bracelet glowed softly, the only colour not crafted by Woewyn's light. It didn't clash with his black wear; it completed it. A small, constant anchor in the chaos.
If anyone saw him, they saw a disciplined prince ready for war. But he knew the truth: he was just a boy, dressed to move like the power he hoped to control.
Daichi, now shrunk to a large, manageable wolf size, lounged at Damon's feet inside the transport vehicle. Cythera sat opposite him, while Bravira occupied the seat beside the pilot, her posture military-stiff.
"The Trineum Festival is Woewyn's oldest tradition," Cythera began, her voice calm. "Three kingdoms, three heirs, and one endgame mission. Many students on Woewyn have fought their way to be one of the 20 in their districts so yeah, its important."
"But before the endgame," Bravira cut in, her voice low and uncompromising, "the 20 from Woewyn battle one another. The winner earns the right to represent us at the final stage of this whole thing, against the selected ones of the other kingdoms."
Damon leaned forward. "And you expect me to participate after three days of training?"
"From what you showed us yesterday, speaking in terms of your light manipulation." Cythera said, a hint of admiration in her tone, "You are operating at the highest of the Aegis stage. That makes your participation mandatory, like it or not."
Daichi nudged Damon's hand with his wet nose, a silent offering of support.
Bravira turned, fixing Damon with a gaze that held all the cold seriousness of a battlefield general. "You will not fail us, Prince. If you do, your training will not be simple instructions, but my... torture." She grinned.
Damon swallowed. It wasn't an empty threat. He was genuinely scared.
The transport glided silently to a halt.
Damon stepped out and stared up. The arena was vast, an enormous tech dome settled within the natural Woewyn stone, its metal floor polished to a mirror shine. It was like an advanced version of a gladiators colosseum of Old Earth.
But built for gods, not men. People were gathered in the circled rows, yet they looked small in number compared to Woewyn's sheer massiveness.
"Woewyn's so big," Damon murmured. "But the people here look small compared to it's size."
"Other people are watching from the projection screens we call 'Sky Sheets'" Cythera explained.
As he walked toward the entry gates, Damon saw her. High up in the main tier, sitting in a Royal seat. His mother. Two guards stood beside her. Her posture was regal, but her eyes were only for him. Nyra was beside her, waving her arm with an exaggerated, cheerful motion that made Damon smirk.
He walked through the gate and into a room filled with other contestants. Silence dropped as they all turned to him. Damon met their stares neutrally; they eventually turned back to their prep.
A staff member entered. "This year is going to be different. The first match will not be a team match in the usual sense. It's a two-versus-two match."
Damon turned to Cythera. "Will you be participating, at all?"
"I'm a tutor for a reason, Damon. My ability far surpasses yours."
Near the corner, a girl in ginger hair and green eyes tensed visibly at the announcement. "Not a team match... I'll be the first to get knocked out and disgrace my family's name. I must get a good teammate." Her negatively flustered self talk drew a few stares.
The arena lights flared to life in a violent pulse of violet-blue, and a hush swept over the crowd. A shadow rose from the centre platform. Then—BOOM.
A pillar of flame shot upward, exploding into sparkling dust. And out of the smoke swaggered Zaro Kindell, his voluminous afro moved in the sparkling particles, his coat flaring behind him. A screen showed his name in a dramatic representation.
He tapped his crystal amplifier once. Thump. The entire metal parts of the stadium vibrated. Zaro grinned, wide and chaotic.
"WOOOOOEWYNNNNN—! ARE YOUR HEARTS AWAKE?! ARE YOUR SOULS SCREAMING?! LEMME HEAR YOU!"
The crowd erupted. Zaro put his hand dramatically on his chest.
"Mhm. That's what I like. Pure chaos. Tastes like home. Now LISTEN UP, you bright little sprouts of the future—because this year… ohhh this year… we're BREAKING TRADITION! This year… we start with BLOOD-PUMPIN', SKILL-CRACKLIN', HEART-STOPPIN' TWO ON TWO! First of all, you little twerps sitting there and the ones watching. All you had to do was train and participate. Imagine only having twenty brave hearts. TWENTY!!!"
He let out a long breath.
"Now, welcome the disciplined anchor of the Earth Element, her attacks hitting like tectonic shifts— Selin Arvale!"
Selin, looking lean yet strong and trained, walked to the center, her face neutral and focused.
"And her partner, the searing heat of the battlefield, look at the fire dancing on that bicep bangle—it's Verik Solborn!" Verik entered with a confident stride.
"Challenging them—the prodigal son of the High Winds, that handsome, cocky grin belongs only to my brother from another monster, Jarol Fenwick!"
Jarol waved broadly.
"And partnering him, the fluid terror of the sea, wearing the noble battle fit with devastating grace—give it up for Ciela Wistmere!" Ciela entered, composed and royal.
Zaro finished his hype speech and turned serious. "Remember this rule! Fight to let your hearts out, yes—but no killing. Break bone, break hearts, break will. But break that rule, and you will be executed where you stand... BEGIN!"
Jarol started with a smile toward Ciela, his voice carrying, "Don't let my team down, Ciela. I cannot tolerate disgrace."
He immediately created gusts of wind, fast and powerful, whipping the air toward Selin and Verik. Selin reacted instantly, slamming her foot down. Earth shot up, pulling a jagged boulder from the metal floor for cover.
Verik dashed. He ran on and over the boulder, fire igniting on his fists and feet. "Watch my back and I'll watch yours!" he yelled.
"Deal," Selin replied.
Verik targeted Ciela, but she flowed, using a low-level Water Eterna link to the floor to move like a controlled, shifting liquid. He shot balls of fire that exploded on impact, but there was no effect.
She dodged them with perfect swiftness. However, the heat of fire crushing the ground beneath her evaporated her waters.
Selin created and launched earth spheres with sharp spikes at Jarol, who used a gusting wind tornado to push himself up and send a dense wind attack back at her.
Selin's skin shimmered, reinforced by Earth Eterna. She was inside an 'earth suit.'
Jarol who was still in the air, arrogant as always, quipped, "My my. You're going to be trouble. Nevertheless."
Jarol created 3 three-bladed propellers in shape of wind, sharp as razor wire. Then launched them at Selin. They sounded like a slap and whistle in the atmosphere at the same time.
Selin dodged, ran, creating large earth shields to block the propellers. Her defence never broke, but the force of Jarol's attack sent her flying.
Two of those propellers violently dashed at her as they spun in the air. They were turned horizontally. Selin only jumped and spun between them and landed in a crouch.
The third caught her by surprise but she crossed her arms in an 'X' form. But she gritted her teeth and reinforced her suit. The suit wasn't bulkier but obviously stronger.
Damon watched. "They're good."
Cythera spoke in agreement, "Selin is a low Aegis mage, but her defence is nearly unbreakable."
"That explains why she's currently on defence," Damon noted.
"Jarol is at the middle level of the Aegis stage. Verik is in the Blaze stage but on the higher end, and so is Ciela," Cythera clarified.
Ciela used her water mobility to lift herself into the air, raining water with ice tipped attacks down on Verik. She created a flexible water sword and shoved the water she'd used to lift herself into small, fast-spinning discs aimed at Verik.
He punched them away, fire striking water, but one slipped past and hit his gut. He grunted, only for the air around him to shift.
Water gathered.
Circular discs formed in a wide orbit around him, each one a solid plane of spinning water. They hovered several meters away, arranged above, beside, and behind him, shaping a loose sphere with huge gaps between each disc. Every disc rotated so fast the air vibrated, the surface tightening like a compressed vortex.
Three points on each disc sharpened, positioned points that would be on a triangle. Water shot forward in straight, narrowing streams, the pressure rising until the lines became cutting beams.
Verik's eyes widened. Those could cut diamonds. She isn't aiming for my head because she can't kill me. She's holding back. Even now?
He exhaled. "Well then."
Fire rose from the ground.
A dome of flame rose around him, swallowing the discs and evaporating them. A second dome expanded outward, larger, enclosing Ciela. Two spheres of fire, one inside the other, separated only by a thin layer of shimmering heat.
Ciela looked up. Verik lifted his hand.
The outer dome collapsed inward, a controlled implosion of flame.
The arena held its breath, and Zaro Kindell tightened his grip on the mic.
"THAT'S A DOUBLE‑DOME SPECIAL, BABY. FIRE INSIDE FIRE, WHO DOES THAT?!"
While Jarol was distracted, Selin made her move. She focused her Eterna into her feet, not just for defence, but for projection. With a guttural roar, she sent a compressed wave of stone through the ground, forcing a towering, sharp Earth Blade to erupt right where Jarol was airborne.
The blade surprised him. Jarol, arrogant and focused on offense, had ignored the potential for earth to move quickly. He reacted a half-second too late, the blade clipping his side and his leg. Sending him spinning with a cry of pain.
"THERE IT IS!" Zaro screamed. "The tank isn't just a shield, folks! Selin Arvale just surprised the King of the Winds. Anyway, that's what happens when you skip leg day!"
Selin didn't hesitate. She used the earth beneath her to push herself upward, landing a punch directly on Jarol, sending him crashing down with a loud thud that kicked up a cloud of dust.
Verik dropped his dome. A spear of ice punched through his midsection, the double‑ended blue blades jutting out of him. He coughed blood into his palm and turned. Ciela stood behind him, encased in a divine‑looking suit of ice.
How…? I was inside the dome. I couldn't see anything outside… shit.
She didn't give him a moment to breathe.
Verik took a whip across the back from Ciela's lance. He endured the pain, used fire from his foot to momentarily stop himself, dashed forward, and kicked Ciela directly into the arena wall. The kick landed, knocking the air from her lungs. They waited for the five-second count.
Ciela only stirred at the count of two, rising bloodied. How is he still moving like that? She thought.
"I'm not anywhere near done!" she declared out loud.
She raised her hands. This time, the water Eterna took time to gather. It was heavy, floral-scented, and shimmering. It took several seconds to fill the area. The air pressure dropped noticeably as she compressed the vapor.
Verik and Selin staggered into defensive stances.
Zaro yelled: "Oh hell naw! Someone turn the fog machine off! I can't see JACK!"
Verik, seeing Ciela's slow, deliberate compression of the fog around them, knew they were finished if he waited. He let out a primal scream and focused all his remaining energy. The fire on his fists and feet expanded, not as an attack, but as a pure, desperate defence against the air. He was turning the atmosphere into a furnace.
Sweat poured down Verik's face, turning instantly to steam. He was trying to evaporate a royal's worth of water Eterna with sheer will. He took one step, then another, teeth gritted, every vein pulsing. He was burning himself alive. And so were his wounds.
The mist around him began to writhe, collapsing into nothingness. The water in Ciela's floating orbs evaporated before they could be triggered. The floral fog was gone.
The arena floor was clear. But Verik staggered, his legs giving out beneath him. He collapsed onto the metal floor, barely conscious, clothes scorched and body exhausted from the sheer energy dump.
Selin was left standing alone.
"Two on one now!" Zaro roared, the hype gone, replaced by a tense edge. "Verik is down! Can Selin hold the line?!"
Then, from the dust cloud where Jarol had fallen, a wind exploded. It was a chaotic, beautiful vortex that sucked the remaining moisture from the air and solidified Jarol's focus.
He rose, his clothes shredded but his eyes blazing. Wind Eterna pulsed around him, clearing the air completely. He glanced at the collapsed Verik and sneered.
"Took him long enough," Jarol quipped, adjusting his bicep bangle. "Well, Selin. The distraction is over. We will finish this with some real power."
Ciela rejoined him, her own wounds ignored, the royal water battle suit now shimmering with concentrated water. They were going to combine their elements.
Jaro raised a hand, creating a dense, fast-spinning vortex of wind. Ciela compressed a massive wave of water and fed it into Jarol's vortex. The result was terrifying: a high-pressure, bladed "Hurricane of Liquid Shards", they both yelled. It was designed to choke and drown Selin alive.
Selin knew I can't defend against this sustained force. She took a chance, using the earth around her feet to launch herself high into the air, screaming for her downed partner.
"VERIK! NOW!"
She didn't need a verbal reply. Trust was enough. Selin used the last of her unspent offensive Eterna to form two massive, reinforced Earth Pillars beneath Verik, launching him skyward.
Verik's eyes snapped open. He was wounded and staggering, but his will was pure. He didn't just light his feet; he let the fire engulf his entire body. Ignite completely.
He roared, falling like a roaring comet, a screaming blur of red-hot Eterna descending upon the Wind-Water combined attack.
Zaro lost his composure, screaming with pure hype: "OH HE'S IGNITING HIS WHOLE BODY—THIS BOY IS A COMET!"
The Meteor Punch slammed into the Hurricane of Liquid Shards. The collision was a blinding explosion of steam and sound. Ciela screamed as the heat negated her water shield, and Jarol screamed as the force pushed his wind shield to the breaking point.
When the dust settled, Verik lay half-buried in the arena floor, his body smoking, but Jaro and Ciela were still standing, battered and bloody but ready. The Meteor Punch had failed to end it.
Selin landed hard beside Verik, forcing him upright. He was staggering, bloodied, but his hand found hers. They were in sync. "Now," Selin gasped, her voice raw. "The final strike."
She raised her right arm, and with painful effort, creating earth Eterna, coating her entire forearm and fist in a giant, jagged, condensed Earth Hammer.
Verik heard her cry, ignoring the screams of his body, placed his flaming left hand directly on the back of the hammer. He didn't just heat it; he channeled his residual fire, superheating the stone from within until it glowed with a terrifying, white-hot orange aura.
They ran forward as one. "DUAL BREAKER!" An attack aimed at Jarol and Ciela. Jarol, still confident, raised a triple-layered wind shield. Ciela formed a thicker ice-armour.
The Dual Breaker hit.
The Earth Hammer shattered Jarol's wind shield instantly. The internal superheat turned Ciela's ice armour into a blinding explosion of steam. The combined force was too much. Both Jaro and Ciela were slammed into the boundary wall, unconscious before they hit the ground.
Silence.
Then—
Zaro Kindell grabbed the mic, his voice hoarse with respect. "WOEWYN... WE HAVE A WINNER!"
The crowd erupted like they've been woken up from a trance with energy guns.
"Against the odds, the elemental teamwork of Selin Arvale and the blazing will of Verik Solborn prevail!"
Damon watched Selin pull the collapsed, smoking Verik to the side, both victorious and broken.
He whispered to Cythera, "They won't be able to stand again for a week."
Cythera nodded, her face impressed. "See what I mean by creating and/or bending their attribute? That is the cost of victory, Damon. Now you see the quality of what you must beat."
Damon thought, If this is Aegis... then what the hell is Sovereign?