Sir Gareth continued his attack.
His blade moved with a speed that should have been impossible a relentless barrage of cuts and thrusts, each one aimed at Mordred's vital points, each one carrying the full force of his hatred.
Mordred evaded. Blocked. Survived.
Then Gareth paused.
He came close to Mordred closer than he had been in any of their exchanges. His body pressed against the younger man's, their blades locked together, their faces inches apart.
His hand released his sword.
His arm wrapped around Mordred's leg gripping it, lifting it, pulling it off the ground. Using only one arm the arm that should have been weakened by exhaustion, by injury, by the limits of human endurance he raised Mordred into the air.
And threw him.
CRASH!
Mordred's body slammed against a boulder near the edge of the battlefield. The impact cracked the stone, sent fissures spiderwebbing across its surface, shook the ground beneath them.
His hand broke.
Gareth's hand the one that had thrown a full-grown man against a rock snapped at the wrist. The bone fractured, the joint dislocated, the flesh swelled with internal bleeding.
He did not feel the pain.
His mind consumed by hate, overwritten by the need to kill simply... ignored it. He released his broken hand and reached for his sword with the other.
He went ahead for another attack.
Mordred pushed himself off the boulder.
His body ached. His left side burned the eleventh rib, cracked by the impact, splintered against the stone. He touched the spot, feeling the abnormal shift of bone beneath his skin.
"Oh my." His voice was calm, almost annoyed. "That was really hard."
He straightened, rolling his shoulders.
"Let's take that sword away from you first." His eyes fixed on Gareth's weapon on the blade that had come so close to killing him, that had drawn his blood, that had marked him with sword cuts across his armor. "I'm exhausted from my previous battle. If I push it like this..."
He took a breath.
"...I'll let my guard down."
He moved.
His body darted forward not at full speed, not with the explosive power he had shown earlier, but with precision. He bent low, his blade extended horizontally, his eyes fixed on Gareth's hands.
Gareth raised his sword to block.
Mordred's blade sliced through the air not at the weapon, but at the fingers wrapped around it.
SHLIK!
Three fingers.
The index, middle, and ring fingers of Gareth's right hand severed cleanly, cut at the second knuckle. They fell to the sand, still twitching, still grasping at a sword they could no longer hold.
Gareth's eyes widened.
The sword dropped from his grip.
But he did not scream.
He did not react.
His broken hand the one he had used to throw Mordred reached for the blade. His severed fingers the ones still attached tried to grip.
Mordred rolled backward.
He created distance, pushed himself up, and stabbed his sword into the ground. The blade stood upright, waiting, ready.
Then they locked hands.
Gareth's remaining fingers wrapped around Mordred's wrists. Mordred's hands gripped Gareth's forearms. They pressed against each other forehead to forehead, chest to chest, will to will.
Like bulls that had locked horns.
Gareth pushed.
His body driven by hate, by rage, by the single-minded need to kill forced Mordred backward. His feet dug into the sand. His muscles strained.
Mordred's feet slid.
"Hey." His voice was strained, but still calm. "That's really not a nice idea."
He pushed back.
"If there's one thing I pride myself in..." His arms bulged with muscle, thick and dense beyond what should have been possible. "...it's strength."
He stopped his backward slide.
"I am far, far stronger than your average human could possibly comprehend." His voice hardened. "Strength is my forte."
He pressed forward.
And truth be told, Mordred spoke no lie.
In terms of raw physical strength, he was truly at the top. King Arthur even before he found Excalibur, even before he became the legend was known to be one of the strongest men alive. Stronger than knights who had spent half their lives in training. Stronger than anyone who had ever sat on the throne of Britain.
According to the men who could see the thread of fate the Seekers, the prophets, the seers who had predicted his birth and his destiny even if Arthur had never found Excalibur, he would still have been king.
All paths led to the inevitable.
It was simply... inevitable.
Mordred had inherited that strength.
On a greater level.
He was able to learn any form of combat without the slightest experience. To defeat opponents and find pathways and weaknesses in combat forms just by seeing them. His body was a vessel for violence born to it, raised in it, perfected by it.
He pressed down on Gareth.
"Do you know," he said, his voice low, "that there are places in the human body that, once they are damaged... there is nothing else that can be done?"
Gareth's eyes burned but he did not respond. Could not respond. All his will was focused on pushing, on killing, on overwhelming the man before him.
"Places that, if damage is given to them..." Mordred's voice was almost gentle. "...that obsessive will to kill me wouldn't even be able to push you on. Wouldn't be able to keep you going."
He smiled.
"One of those places..."
He shifted his weight.
"...is your toe."
To someone else, this would have been stupidity. To tell your enemy your next move to reveal your strategy, to explain your tactics, to give away the advantage you had worked so hard to create.
But this was not stupid.
Because the enemy Gareth, the knight who had become a killing machine, the man who had erased every instinct except the need to kill lacked the ability to understand anything at that moment.
His mind was gone.
Only hate remained.
Mordred loosened his grip.
Just slightly. Just enough.
He let Gareth push him back let the older man believe he was winning, let him pour his strength into the press, let him commit everything to this single moment.
Then he moved.
His left foot stomped down.
CRUNCH!
His heel crashed onto Gareth's right foot onto the toes, onto the metal of his boot, onto the bone beneath.
The metal buckled.
The boot compressed folded inward, crushed by the force of the stomp. The bones inside the phalanges, the metatarsals, the delicate architecture of the human foot shattered.
Not just broken.
Destroyed.
Gareth's leg buckled. His body lurched. The press the strength that had been pushing Mordred backward collapsed.
He fell.
His knees hit the sand. His hands one severed, one broken reached out to catch himself, but there was nothing to grip. Nothing to hold.
Mordred's hands moved.
They wrapped around Gareth's throat.
His fingers pressed finding the carotid, finding the windpipe, finding the life that still pulsed beneath the skin. He squeezed.
Gareth's eyes bulged.
His mouth opened. His teeth bared. His tongue bit down hard drawing blood, spraying crimson across his lips, across his chin, across Mordred's hands.
He yelled.
Not in pain.
In hatred.
Severe, absolute, unending hatred. The sound tore from his throat raw, primal, animal a sound that had no words, no meaning, no purpose except to express the fury that consumed him.
He wanted to kill the man in front of him.
But he lacked the ability to do so.
Mordred looked down at him.
His hands were still around Gareth's throat. His fingers were still pressing. His face was calm, almost peaceful.
"Remember what I told you," he said quietly. "About parts of the body that, if damaged, will lead to your defeat?"
He tightened his grip.
"I just paralyzed you."
Gareth's legs kicked weakly. His arms flailed. His body broken, bleeding, dying struggled against the inevitable.
"So it doesn't matter what's running through your head now." Mordred's voice was soft. "You will die."
Gareth bit his tongue again.
Blood poured from his mouth mixing with the saliva, with the spit, with the last remnants of his life. He yelled the same wordless, hatred-filled cry and kept yelling, kept fighting, kept refusing to accept what was happening.
But he could not move.
His toes were crushed.
His hand was severed.
His throat was crushed.
He could only bite and scream and hate.
Mordred's hands tightened.
Gareth's voice faded.
And the grey sky watched.