Author's Nightmare: Chapter 122 (Patreon)

Beam POV: Day 98

Current Wealth: 211 gold 39 silver 22 copper

Solitaire had been hunkered up in the house for a while when, the day before the tournament, he’d headed out. No warning, no reason given, he just fucked off. Scurrying away down the streets, and returning so sneakily and suddenly that we’d barely even had a chance to realise he was gone and start panicking. 

I wasn’t that shaken, he just tended to do stuff like that. It was his coping mechanism- one of many- for when something got to him. Granted, it was a bit disturbing to think he might be feeling nervous. Both for what it implied of my chances in the tourney…And because he currently had access to ridiculous volumes of explosive material.

He’d come back, though, and he’d come back grinning. That was how I’d gotten my new weapon, all verified and cleared with the organisers before its use of course. And viciously effective. Why was it always the most unstable, disturbing moods that saw him at his most productive? Perhaps some things were better left unanswered. 

Aja the Pithound was up first, when we arrived at the stadium, and thank fuck he wasn’t fighting me. Or Argar, which would’ve been worse actually. Because I could actually take him. We all watched him demolish the poor bastard thrown out before him, a fairly remarkable warrior in his own right who’d have beaten all but a few of us as we were. He might have even taken down Solitaire. 

Definitely didn’t take down Aja thought, and the fight was over near-instantly. The Challenger was up next, against the only other man in the quarter-finals that I can’t recall the name of to this day. I’ll let you guess for yourself which of them won. After that came a horrible realisation, followed by confirmation of my growing suspicion. 

My name was called, and Argar’s came after it. We were to fight each other. 

I glanced over at the giant, and found him grinning. It was such a typical response on his part that all I could do was laugh. 

At the very least, I knew I was guaranteed a place in the next round. Argar was frankly quite lucky to have gotten as far as he did, even with Solitaire’s armour and his growing physical strength. 

We both came into the arena at once, weapons out and eyes hard. Argar’s were a sight more amused than mine, I had to say, but he seemed to be taking everything seriously all the same. That was concerning. Give me a relaxed, cocky asshole to surprise and beat any day over whatever I was facing now. 

It wasn’t that Argar might have won, just that he’d still have been able to make a fight of it. He’d improved almost as much as me over the last few days, hitting the early learning curve for his standard training and, apparently, possessing some ridiculous innate talent that saw him improving from it several times faster than usual. We were a lot closer than I’d have liked. 

And that was all the considering I was given time for, because he went for me after that. 

He swung, I parried, and fell for his feint hook, line and sinker. Argar’s axe was coming back around faster than I would’ve thought possible and I just barely dipped beneath it. His boot was next, but he’d tried that trick before and I dodged it easily. I gave him a little smack across his head, just a reminder of who he was dealing with. His reeling stumble only lasted a moment before he was back again. 

Fighting Argar was like fighting a seizing man, all unpredictable flailing and raw physicality. But there was something new to him that hadn’t been there a week ago. Degrees of technique, scraps of order mixed in with the chaos. It made him more dangerous, not less, and forced me to keep my guard up as I dodged.

But I just had to keep my guard up. Argar was faster, not fast. Strong, not unmatchable. The gap between us had shrunk after all and it would shrink ever more. His strength had already slowed in its growth, mine was showing no signs of stopping.

The axe hurtled from his hand, and my sword came down to gently rest on the crook where pauldron met helmet. Argar froze, stared, then sighed.

“Bugger it, you win.”

I withdrew my weapon with a smile. 

Back in the stands, I actually found it hard to even watch the damned fighting that followed. I was too eager to see what benefits I’d gained to my experience. 

That didn’t last long, of course, when I realised that it was the last match of the day. And there were only two fighters left. 

Arthur walked out into the arena, testing swings cutting the air as he limbered himself up. He didn’t seem the slightest bit perturbed, despite everything, and somehow his confidence gave me a boost to my own. I was still sore where he’d thrashed me in training bouts, despite my own improvements. Perhaps, just maybe, if anyone could do it…

The King of Blades entered to a volcanic detonation of cheering, which fully reversed my growing confidence and left my mouth dry as sandpaper. 

It was almost hard to believe the height difference. Arthur was very tall, for this world, at least my height, but there was still close to a foot separating the top of his helmet from the King’s. One was close to seven feet tall, height bolstered by the centimetres of steel encasing him, and the other was well over. 

But height didn’t mean much, the King had overcome a bigger gap already. What mattered was how they fought, how they moved, how they struck. And that was what I watched out for as the two enemies closed in as one. 

Over the course of the tourney, I really had improved. I actually caught the King’s movement, this time. Barely. 

It was a heavy swing, and Arthur caught it at the edge of his blade. He slid backwards, actually slid backwards. Two hundred pounds of man, and probably five hundred more of armour too thick and heavy for a normal human to wear. I saw scrapes left in the stone under his heels where they dragged, and it was clear by the exertion of his body just how far behind the King’s strength he fell. 

Arthur didn’t hesitate long to reply, stepping in and throwing quick, short jabs at his enemy. He was moving, still, despite the block. Strength enough that he could stave off injury if not effort in the process. The King met his attacks, turning them away, backing off and controlling the space between them expertly. Even so, I could see there was no advantage for him in technique. Arthur took that category by a hair, and I was more advanced than that from him. Which meant the King wasn’t perfect. He could be surpassed. He could be beaten.

But it was hard to imagine Arthur managing that, because the King soon moved past his testing jabs and came on again, foregoing the careful feeling-out of an enemy, simply spurring the fight on into explosive violence at the peak of their strengths. And his peak was far higher than Arthur’s. 

Arthur was stumbling back, then dodging one way and the other as great guillotine-swings hurtled for him. One missed so widely as to hit the ground, smashing a skull-sized chunk of stone to pieces and sending flecks of it to rain down upon the crowd. My ally did his best, and fought no worse than he ever had against us. Better, really. But there was just a limit to what could be managed against an enemy like this. He was slower, and the gap in power was bigger by that than far. Blows started to connect. Grazing, scraping blows at first, but they deepened and accelerated in their ruination of his armour. 

Tool steel, modern steel. Good steel. But for all its effectiveness, and all Ardin’s genius at working it, it wouldn’t have stopped an anti-material round, and it didn’t stop the ten pounds of mystery metal now slamming into it hard enough to cut a SWAT helmet completely in half. 

Red flashed in the air, a fleck of blood drawn where one blow had gone deeper in the rest, and I knew from that moment on there’d be no winning this. Arthur continued retreating, stepping back even as he fended off the endless army of attacks raining down on him. The ground at his feet became littered with scraps of mangled metal, and sparks were spat into the air so thickly it was like watching a cascade of burning matches. 

Then I saw it. Arthur’s back was about to hit the wall, his retreat about to end. The King was moments from accomplishing the very same snare Solitaire had been subjected to by Arthur himself, and there was no greater chance of it failing than there’d been last time. It was over. 

But Arthur surprised me, then. And he surprised the King too. One single, unexpected swing sent his sword’s tip screeching along the helmet of his enemy, leaving a discoloured rent where tool steel hit magic steel, and knocking the King’s head to one side. 

Then the King of Blades’ own sword came down, making a quick end of the business. 

We all watched as Arthur was carried from the arena- gently, of course, he was a fairly popular minor noble after all- and the crowd reached a new level of murmuring. I turned to see Shango’s face was tight, hands balled into fists which were tighter still. He was on the verge of shitting himself.

But I smiled. Because I’d seen for myself that the King could be hit, now. Could be parried, dodged, tricked. And if all of that were possible, then he could be damned well beaten. 

“What are my experience rewards looking like, Shango?” I asked.