Osias didn't dare take another step, instead, he turned his head back to see Mistress Seol and assure himself that what he just heard was heard by him and him alone.

Atop the pavilion, she was intrigued, but that wouldn't have been the face she'd make at the sight of someone capable of afflicting Osias with such dread, nor the face she would make if she heard his true name.

Instead, she reacted as she would if a near finalist simply conceded without a fight.

Osias turned towards the warrior's quarters and found that Pierce was already gone., leaving him with no answers.

‘Let the world bleed and the sky turn red.’ He recalled inwardly.

Frowning deeply, Osias thought of what… no, how the man knew of his name and origin. It doesn't make sense. Mance… Mance told him it’ll be made from the past!

‘Pierce… is that even his true name?’

From the exact Ordeal level to his origins, Osias knew nothing of Pierce.

But before he could think any further, a flash of light covered the platform, and a moment later, the cries of pain were heard.

‘Looks like he's finished as well…’

Osias’s expressionless face veiled a storm brewing inside his mind, but the loud cheers that replaced the yells and shouts of Pierce’s surrender forced him to return his gaze to Surtil.

Merkel, Surtil’s opponent, was on his knees far away from the light's source, yet clutched his once armored arm and shoulder as it bled heavily underneath.

‘Not enough to kill.’ Osias quickly found.

“I yield.” Merkel stammered as relief edged the man’s tone, perhaps even thankful he didn’t face someone like Osias.

Suddenly a soft clap somehow reached Osias’s ears, and instinctively he looked atop the Autumn Wreath Pavilion where Mistress Seol began to address them all.

“With such quick battles… I’ll deem it unnecessary to rest before we resume the finale. Unless the jewel of the military wishes otherwise?” She said, riling the audience away from their disappointment.

From across the other platform, Osias eyed down the radiant Surtil who looked up to address Mistress Seol.

“No need, Mistress of Rolling Silk. This… Merkel wasn’t enough to satisfy my spirits.” Surtil said. His voice was confident, certain, and almost lofty.

“Very well.” Mistress Seol said.

In the next moment, Osias raised an eyebrow as he felt the stone platform below his feet shake and rumble. Then, he raised his chin and found across the courtyard that Surtil’s platform was also shaking.

‘Ah, they’re joining these two at the center.’

Although Mistress Seol moved the finale ahead without asking him, Osias didn’t mind the sudden change, rather he welcomed it.

Willing his body to remain upright, Osias awaited his battle with Surtil.

The Golden Duskveil General’s son... Surtil, standing tall across from him, wore the same disdain that his father once did. His gleaming white armor, trimmed in gold, radiated a sickening purity that seemed out of place on the battlefield, and the similar sword in his hand—that gilded monstrosity, was an ornament of execution, not battle. The young competitor’s cold sneer was visible even from the other end of the platform, his posture too relaxed for what was to come.

However, Surtil’s appearance made it seem like Osias could avenge Geral and the others in a way.

Osias scanned the crowd once more, searching for the familiar radiant figure of Surtil’s father, the man who had executed his comrades with cold precision. But the Duskveil General was absent. Osias's lips curled into a bitter smirk.

‘So it falls to the son.’

"Is your father not present here?" Osias called out, his voice clear but thick with venom.

Surtil’s response came quickly, his words sharpened and emboldened by pride:

“He’s been tasked with the honorable task of eradicating your country, prisoner rat.” Scowling at the sight of Osias’s body before continuing, “I’ve been told that all those under the Red Feather were an uncouth lot, barbaric as they attacked our lands.”

“You’ve been told the truth.” Osias agreed, his mind flashing to the raid on the abandoned city.

“...Honesty that betrays appearances too it seems. I’ve also been told that my father was the one who passed both sentence and blade after the pitiful siege against Qurssai.” Surtil continued, eyeing how the two raised platforms have joined entirely now.

“Will you try and finish what your father could not?” Osias asked. Narrowing his eyes, Osias brought a wary hand to his saber and lowered himself in anticipation. The bitter cheers and sweeping wind touched his back as he awaited the chime once more.

Osias steadied himself, his muscles tensing under the weight of his anticipation. As the platforms met with a grinding shudder, they locked into place, forming a single, vast stage in front of the pavilion where the high families and other onlookers gathered.

“Your best tricks, use them. I won’t hold back.” Surtil said, disregarding Osias’s probing.

Surtil shifted, taking up a stance that seemed foreign to Osias — something odd as Surtil’s hand gripped the hilt with grace in front of him, but two fingers on his free hand brushed the back of the blade.

The golden sword gleamed in the pale daylight, catching Osias’s eye. Its etchings, too elaborate and grand, distracted from the blade's purpose.

“My sword spans the nine skies, the light touches all,” Surtil said below his breath, something Osias could only hear if he focused.

Osias exhaled, feeling the wind whip against his face. The sun dimmed behind a cloud, casting long shadows over the arena. The distant roar of the crowd and the howl of the wind became background noise as Osias's world narrowed to the man before him.

Slowly… everything around Osias became increasingly dampened and disregarded. A blur in both sight and sound as he focused his entire being onto Surtil as such strength demanded it. Mistress Seol, Pierce, the prisoners, the Black Warden, returning… it all didn’t matter if he died by Surtil’s hand.

His hand twitched on the saber’s hilt, ready for the clash—

A soft jingle of a bell sounded and in the very next moment, a ruthless grunt prologued a shimmering golden light that covered all Osias could see.

Expecting an immediate attack like all of Surtil’s matches from before, Osias turned to his side and guarded what he could with his saber. He sealed his eyes shut, and in the absence of light, he felt a searing cut against his right arm that guarded much of his midsection.

Opening and inspecting himself, he found that despite the distance, it was as though Surtil slashed him with that golden blade.

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It was deep and concerning, yet Osias was sure that he’d be healed after the finale as usual.

…His toes and feet arched and he lunged forward towards Surtil. Each step pounded heavily against the stone.

“Hmph. Like an armored dog.”

Suddenly another flash of light was directed at Osias, but knowing the same ploy, Osias relied all he could upon the sense and reflexes he honed whilst fighting many enemies at once.

‘A flash of light that blinds, and then a second, but thinner light with weight that cuts from the edge of his sword.’

This time his thigh was cut. The Innate Ability itself was potent, much more than even many First Ordeal Abilities. But this couldn’t be it if Surtil felt so dangerous.

“My father gave you a chance, yet you’ve spurned his decision… such ingratitude.” Surtil suddenly said, finally taking up a proper stance as he brandished the golden sword to meet the rapidly approaching Osias.

Osias didn't respond — there was no point. The memory of Surtil’s father, the Golden Duskveil General, weighed heavy on him. The sight of that man executing his bannermen, one by one, still lingered in his mind. Osias had survived that day by chance, but this time, chance would not decide his fate.

Osias surged forward, blood dripping from the fresh wound on his thigh, his body straining but still surging with the strength that made him so formidable. His breath came out in deep, controlled bursts as his focus narrowed further into his essence control.

The second flash of light had left a burning cut across his thigh, but Osias was undeterred. He pushed harder, knowing that the key to beating Surtil was surviving long enough to exploit the openings between those blinding flashes.

Each step reverberated through the stone platform, his wrapped feet and legs thudding heavily as he closed the gap between them. Surtil was waiting, his golden blade gleaming in the pale sunlight. His stance was perfect, almost too perfect, like a pose struck in a painting.

Suddenly, Surtil’s blade shimmered with light again, and Osias braced for the inevitable flash. His instincts screamed for him to shut his eyes, to avoid the blinding assault. But this time, he did something different.

He kept his eyes open.

The blinding light erupted once more, but Osias forced his body to react on instinct alone. His vision burned white-hot, and for a moment, the world dissolved into pure brilliance. But his saber, heavy and familiar, was in his hands, and his muscles moved as if they knew what was coming.

A sharp slice of light tore through the air, aimed at his shoulder. With a grunt, Osias threw his body to the side, feeling the searing heat graze past his arm but missing the vital flesh it sought. Pain flared up, but he gritted his teeth and continued forward.

Surtil's eyes widened, just for a fraction of a second, as Osias closed the distance with terrifying speed,

The golden light had faltered.

For the first time in the fight, Surtil looked truly focused, a flicker of uncertainty crossing his features — something that even Osias could see with his damaged sight. His polished stance tensed as Osias brought his saber crashing down with raw, unrefined power.

The clang of metal echoed through the courtyard, and the spectators watched with bated breath as the two warriors finally clashed head-on.

Osias pressed hard, forcing his weight down against Surtil's gilded sword. His arms trembled from the effort, muscles straining as the heat of the duel roared between them. The blinding flashes, the golden slashes, none of it mattered now. It was strength against strength.

Surtil snarled, pushing back with surprising might, but Osias didn’t let up.

“I cut down the prison rat you are!” Surtil hissed, pushing Osias back as another flash of light erupted from the golden blade.

‘No blinding?’ Osias wondered, evading the cutting slash of weighty light.

“You’re an animal.”

He heard Surtil's mocking voice over the din of battle, but it barely registered as he relentlessly re-engaged once again.

Osias fought with a feral, almost animalistic intensity that sent chills through any who witnessed it. His movements were savage, yet terrifyingly efficient, as though each brutal strike was calculated for maximum destruction.

At times, he dropped to all fours, lunging forward like a beast, his powerful muscles augmented by the violent surge of essence coursing through his veins.

The back of his blade would scrape against the stone platform with an eerie, grating sound, as it dragged across the ground before another devastatingly heavy attack was thrown onto Surtil.

“Is this all your father taught you?” Osias growled, teeth bared. He shoved harder, his saber grinding against the golden blade.

“You’re going to die from a champion of whores!” Osias mocked, wishing to crack and irk the military jewel’s mind.

Surtil’s face twisted in frustration, his earlier calm slipping away. He raised his sword, ready to unleash another burst of light, but Osias was already moving. He dropped his shoulder and lunged forward, his saber swinging low in a brutal, sweeping arc.

Surtil barely managed to parry, but the force of the strike sent him stumbling back, his perfect stance formed from a particularly grounded and balanced battle style was broken.

And now Osias knew for certain — Surtil wasn’t invincible.

But in the next moment, Osias felt the hairs on his skin rise in response to the very air cackling oddly.

"Enough impudence, you will not prance before me!" Surtil's voice had dropped into a cold fury, his body trembling with the power he was summoning. Supporting himself on his blade, he spat in a menacing whisper, "I’ll shake the stars in the vast skies. My blade bolts the air and rouses to the thunder."

Osias suddenly saw blood spill from Surtil’s gleeful mouth once he was finished reciting whatever it was.

In the next moment, Osias felt the hairs on his skin rise as the very air crackled and shimmered around him. Tens of thin lines of pure light, sharp and searing, began to materialize in every direction, crisscrossing the battlefield in brilliant streaks. They filled the air like the webs of some deity, firing and lancing outward without warning.

Osias’s instincts flared in warning as the lines of light erupted violently, ricocheting off surfaces and slicing through the space around him. Surtil’s wrath filled the air with sharp streaks of light cutting through the sky as though the world itself was being torn apart.

He dodged and evaded what he could in the small spaces between the constant webbing of thin light tendrils, and compromised what he couldn’t have to places he could withstand being damaged.

In a few seconds, this storm of light quelled and the vast platform was devasted. The pall of stone dust began to fall and the scene revealed to those of the crowd who couldn’t sense the two final competitors shocked them.

In the aftermath of Surtil’s storm of light, an unrecognizable battlefield was revealed. Upturned stones littered the vast platform, streaked with glowing scars left by the deadly barrage. The ground was split in places, cracked open like fragile pottery, while a haze of dust fell in slow, drifting sheets, obscuring the spectators’ view.

For a moment, there was silence.

Such… power wasn’t supposed to belong to someone who has yet to suceed in their First Ordeal.

But then, from the settling dust, two figures emerged, both eerily still, leaning heavily on their swords like pillars of exhaustion.

Surtil’s once-pristine white and gold armor was marred with blood and dust, his face drenched in sweat. His body trembled under the weight of his own power, the toll of his Innate Ability now evident in the staggering rise and fall of his chest.

Across from him, Osias stood, hunched over, blood dripping from deep gashes across his arms and legs. He looked like a feral beast cornered, fighting in his death throes. His wounds should have slowed him, should have brought him to his knees — yet his flinty eyes were undeterred. He gripped his saber like it was an extension of his own body, using the flat of the blade to steady himself, the faint rasp of its edge grating against the torn stone underfoot.

Osias’s body was a patchwork of injuries, each one a testament to Surtil’s deadly power, but none were enough to stop him. His eyes, wild and focused, glinted in the fading light as he pushed off the ground. His body screamed in protest, but he forced himself forward, closing the distance between them.

There was no honor or grace—just raw, primal violence honed for one purpose: to kill.

…Surtil saw him coming and raised his sword weakly, trying to muster the energy for another strike, but it was too late. Osias lunged, his saber sweeping upward in a savage arc. It wasn’t elegant. It wasn’t graceful. It was the strike of a dying animal, one that refused to go quietly into the night.

“Yield! Champion of the House of Silk, you’ve won!”

“Surtil, yield!”

“Hey… he won’t kill him, right?”

“Father, do we engage? That is our second cousin!”

“Fool! Do you see those guards? No, even the Mistress of Rolling Silk too… even the grand matron of their house could be angered. We can’t save Surtil.”

…Then the saber’s edge met Surtil’s side with a sickening crunch, tearing through his armor and sinking deep into flesh. Surtil gasped, his body jerking violently as the force of the blow drove him backward. His sword clattered to the ground, the golden light dimming as his strength finally gave out.

Osias, panting heavily, stood over him, his saber still lodged in Surtil’s side. Blood dripped from his wounds, pooling beneath his feet as he struggled to stay upright. He watched as Surtil’s eyes, wide with shock and pain, slowly glazed over, the golden light fading from them just as it had from his sword.

The crowd was silent, their bickering and prattle stopped as they could only watch. Even those who shared ties with the military and the Golden Duskveil General couldn’t help his son.

…The only sound that remained was the labored breathing of Osias, standing amidst the wreckage, saber in hand.

‘In another life, the one who died today could’ve been the general himself instead of his son… I hope you all will be satisfied with this.’