Only ten percent of the world’s population were Bound to the System.
Only seven had a stat that read “Maximum” instead of High, now with eight, thanks to Jace.
And yet, despite of the millions and billions of other people that could've shown up, it had to be the most fearsome of the Maximums. In Honor’s case, it was Strength.
Jace was glad to be underfed for once; it meant he couldn’t shit himself.
Unfortunately, he and Gnarl and a few other sparse prisoners were the only ones smart enough to be paralyzed in fear. Most of the crowd of inmates still rushed across the bridge. Honor rolled up the sleeves of his metal armor, bending the metal with a metallic groan, revealing his toned forearms.
The stupidest of them all tried rushing at him with a crude shank. Honor’s armor shrugged it off before he grabbed the man by the neck, raising him three feet into the air. He squeezed, crushing his throat before smashing him into the ground like a ragdoll, all without a hint of exhaustion. Another prisoner tried running for the hole in the gate, thinking him distracted, but Honor spun and bashed the back of his skull, knocking him flat.
His hands oozed with a black energy, a byproduct of his Skill known to the world: Weightbinding, magic allowing him to dynamically raise the weight of any part of his body. With an extra hundred pounds behind each fist, Honor bashed and threw and clobbered his way through everyone else dumb enough to think they could power past him.
“Shit, shit, shit. Gnarl, is there another way outta here they keep secret to the guards? Like—”
“Like a boat to cross the river?” Gnarl shook his head, glaring at the carnage. “No boat. Try diving, and you split your head on rock. This is the only way in or out of the fort that isn’t suicide, but with him here…” He scoffed. “That may not be true any longer.”
The next prisoner to challenge Honor extended his arms, summoning a blast of lightning. But, Honor shouldered right through it and through him, flattening him against the gate.
“Can you use your fiery axe thing to cut through him?”
“My Skill is only usable three times, before it recharges for twenty four hours. Freeing you, killing my previous attacker, and cutting through the door took everything I had, Ex-Prisoner Jace. If I challenge that man with my axe alone, I’ll be no better than those fools dead on the ground.”
With every death, Honor gained ground against the escapees. The crowd began to hesitate; more and more paused at the foot of the bridge, screaming, some backpedaling back towards the prison, hopelessly searching for another way out.
Jace grit his teeth.
My turn.
“Everyone, stop!” he shouted, pacing forward.
Gnarl gasped. “Ex-Prisoner Jace, what are you—”
“Don’t engage him!” Jace said.
Honor had already culled the dumbest and most aggressive; the rest of the inmates froze with apprehension froze, clearing a path between Jace and Honor. His heart pounded in his chest, threatening to tear from his ribs and run back to safety if he didn’t now.
But if he was to see Ishanti again, he had no other option.
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Honor snapped the neck of the criminal in his hand before easily tossing him off the bridge. “Jace Elric. You’re the death row prisoner that started all this, are you not?”
“My friend’s the spark that started the fire. I’m more like the flint and steel,” Jace said. He jabbed a thumb at his chest, hoping the shaking wasn’t too obvious, fighting to make his voice deep and confident. “And I’m more than just a death row prisoner — I’m the new Maximum of Charisma.”
“Indeed? Well…” Honor nodded. “The tradition of our ancestors is for the new Maximum to defeat the old Maximum themselves. But, you being on Death Row, facing me here, means I have no need to hold back.” He cracked his knuckles. “I regret that Donald will not get his chance.”
Shit.
He’d have to fight him. A part of Jace hoped that would’ve been enough to make him hesitate or even back down, but Honor sounded even more riled up.
Jace reached out with his Talent, hoping to find an alternative answer, but it told him he faced a man straightforward in his complete domination. No successful logical fallacies came to mind like it did with Gnarl. He would only respond to a threat of stronger power, and his Talent brought a single thought to mind.
“[Speech 30/100]
Was his Master Speech not strong enough yet? Jace grit his teeth as HOnor took a step forward. It didn’t matter. “Stop. Stand down, Honor, or else!”
“Please. You cannot stop me — you don’t have the power!”
Honor leaped high into the air, and Jace had to crane his neck to follow with his eyes. Armor gleaming in the sunset light, Honor raised his fist, oozing black energy, increasing its weight as he fell.
His Talent couldn’t save him from getting his skull crushed in by a hundred pounds. But, Jace thought back to the encounter with Jones in the hallway, and grit his teeth, facing death head on.
Speedbinding.
Gasps rippled through the nearby inmates as he extended his palms upwards at Honor. Jace focused on his fall, honed in on his velocity as he dropped through the air. A second away from death, his forearms gleamed with magical cerulean light as he stole the speed of Honor’s fall, Binding it back at him in a different direction.
Raw nausea rushed through Jace's body — the world spun — but Honor flew backwards, crashed into the ground, and tumbled across the bridge until he stopped himself in front of the hole through the gate.
Jace glared at his opponent, fighting desperately to hold onto his confident smirk as his stomach turned. His Skill used his body as a go-between, passing the speed through him with a split second of exhilaration and vertigo.
But only he knew that. To Honor, and the rest of the prisoners stunned in awe, he just survived.
“Well,” Honor said. “It seems you can do more than talk.”
Jace nodded. “Come find out.”
Honor dashed straight at him like a rhino, clearing the distance in two lunges powerful enough to crack the concrete with every step. Jace barely reacted in time, Binding his speed to his legs, tripping him at the last moment. His hundred pound fist missed his face by an inch, but Honor fell, rolling away to his right.
An inmate tried tackling him from behind as he was down. Honor easily crushed his skull in a single upwards swing before smashing both of his hundred pound fists into the ground. The entire bridge rumbled violently, thundering under Jace’s feet as Honor threw an entire spray of debris.
Jace stole the speed from the debris, freezing the broken concrete in the air as the vertigo passed through his body. His stomach had enough; vomit burned his throat and lurched from his mouth. Honor took advantage, shouldering through the debris, rushing in low for a final uppercut.
But Jace wasn’t unconscious yet.
He let out a shout and stole the speed from Honor’s hundred pound fist, too, Binding it back at him — and all the speed he’d stolen from the debris. It slammed into him all at once. Honor shot away, rolling across the concrete and tearing through the bridge railing, barely catching himself on the ledge.
The bridge was clear.
Inmates sprinted past, whooping and cheering. As a black haze closed in on Jace’s vision, Gnarl hoisted him over his shoulder. Jace hurled once again, but the disgusting taste didn’t matter. Gnarl ran them through the hole in the first gate, with the second already being smashed open, too.
When they reached the third, the bridge shuddered before collapsing. Jace caught a glimpse of Honor amidst the falling concrete and metal and orange jumpsuits; he must’ve increased his weight to single handedly bring down the bridge on his own, taking down the middle of the crowd of escapees with him, trapping the rest on the island.
But they didn’t matter.
He was free.
The vertigo won, but as Jace fell to unconsciousness, he was only glad it wasn’t death.