Harald was worried. There was no lying about this fact. For as long as he could remember he'd been a half-bit adventurer scrounging out a living from the beginner dungeon and some odd-quests here and there. Finding cats and such.

Now, standing before the gigantic stone-hewn arena that dominated the bustling market district he couldn't help but feel that he was out of place. He'd always seen the gigantic triangular structure from afar, when he'd walk past it on his way to this or that, but he'd never entered, let alone registered to compete. Despite logically knowing that it was mostly peasants who actually competed in the arena, he couldn't help but feel that it was a stage more suited for Ino, with his noble background, or Lock, with his... something.

“Don't tell you're getting stage-fright.” He heard Lock's distinct echoing voice sneer from in front of him, he turned to see the black slit of his teacher's helmeted face staring back at him, through him, the serrated teeth design on the armour seemingly mocking him.

The callousness calmed him. If he could survive Lock, he could survive anything. His killing intent subconsciously built up inside of him as it always did when he was talking with his teacher. It mitigated the effects of the same skill being used on oneself. It was also a pleasant reminder that he wasn't just some random iron-rank anymore. He had a skill now.

It stung that it was something he'd been unable to achieve on his own, just like with his sword, and, he tugged at the tight leather cuirass hugging his chest, his new set of black leather armour. However Harald would rather achieve something with outside help, than be a nobody.

“No, I'm fine.” He replied to Lock's unspoken question. He received a grunt in return.

The arena wasn't very intimidating anymore. It looked sort of stupid really, triangular, why wasn't it round. He'd never seen a round arena before but he felt as if it should be round. Why was the front door, leading directly onto the fighting field open? Weren't they afraid of someone throwing a fireball out of it and into the bustling market? Yeah, the structure was pretty stupid. At least that was what he kept telling himself as he entered under its shadow, immediately feeling colder. The fact that it was made entirely out of stone gave it that quality of frost.

Lemmings patted him on the back, having shifted Kamin around a bit to make the gesture possible. He nodded in thanks to the silent giant and squared his shoulders. They were walking through a broad tunnel now. From how teacher, whose eyes he felt on him from the right, had described the structure, they would soon enter back into the light, onto a small grassy clearing.

As he exited the tunnel however, he couldn't help but gawk, because what Lock had off-handedly referred to as light, was by no means sunlight, but rather a radiance that was emerging from what seemed to be an artificial star floating atcentrepoint, and at the same altitude as the highest stand of the arena.

Wait, no, it wasn't floating, there were three strings connecting the incredibly yellow ball of light to the spires jutting out from the corners of the triangle.

He stood there frozen for a moment, before gathering himself again and chasing after his party, which was approaching a group of people gathering around a large stone circle divided into two halves with some paint. It looked oddly out of place in the natural looking field. He saw Lock talk to an older man, who was dressed quite fashionably and had an impressive moustache, pointing at him and Ino. The organizer then.

The man looked them over, nodded approvingly at Harald, frowned at Ino, and wrote something a parchment that he pulled out from somewhere.

While he'd been distractedly watching the official Lock made his way back to the party and led them elsewhere, nobody knew exactly where, but they followed.

“You've been here before?” Ino asked Lock, a question that Harald hadn't even thought of, but now that it had been stated, interested him.

“Hmmm, I came by for a few higher-ranking fights. Silly me for thinking I'd actually learn anything useful. It was just a show and even those who were serious about it obviously weren't fighting at full capacity.” Teacher answered as he led them through a door hidden in the tunnel from which they'd entered and up some stairs.

“Well, they probably didn't want to cripple each other so that they could compete beyond just one fight.” Ino said.

“Yes, as I said, highly non educational.”

Ino seemed aghast at the answer, Harald meanwhile simply snorted. Then grew worried and glanced at Kamin who was nodding along.

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Was Lock really someone who should get married to such a sweet girl, even if it wasn't immediately? He asked himself.

“Only through suffering may we reach greater heights.” Kamin whispered almost religiously and made a weird cross motion on her chest from where she was riding on Lemmings' shoulders.

Never mind.

They emerged outside once again, this time onto the stands, which were actually quite full if one considered how unskilled the participants of this tournament would likely be. The entire thing was only set to start in about two hours, they'd left very early, and there were already almost 200 people present. Sure, it didn't seem much in comparison to the seating possibility of 5000, but 200 was 190 more than he'd ever had watching a fight of his. He tried to determine who those present were by analysing their seating position and clothing.

As always however, Lock was ahead of him. “Fairly spread out, contrary to normal herd behaviour, they're here early, these are likely the families of the participants. Mostly lower-class, wearing their best clothes however, also some middle-class people. No nobles.” He said, turning his head to look at everyone spread out in the three different stands. Harald squinted his eyes to follow his gaze, it was ridiculously bright, the light of the artificial star reflecting strongly off of the white stone steps that made up the seating arrangement. The only area not experiencing this phenomena were three large black boxes, suspended in the air jutting from the three corners of the structure. Instead of reflecting light they seemed to be sucking it in. Not that anyone was inside to appreciate this fact.

Harald wished that they could sit within those boxes, in the shadow, instead of on the steps, it was starting to become unbearably hot, especially with his new and tight-fitting armour. He pulled off his helmet, and sighed, grateful that there was a breeze present. He saw Lock do the same out of the corner of his eye, revealing his stern visage to the world. Assaulting it with the judgement of it not being good enough.

He looked away and down into the arena. There were about ten fighters mingling about the one official, and several others laying down on the grassy field, or leaning on the stone platform. Twenty overall, some were also in the stands however. Probably. The thing that bothered him the most though was the fact of how tiny they seemed due to the distance. They were seated on the lowest step and he already couldn't distinguish the fighter's facial expressions.

“Will the audience even be able to see the fights?” He asked doubtfully into the round.

“There will be a pyramid shaped barrier set up around the arena. It will also serve to magnify the goings on.” Lock answered his question, turned to him, and then apparently noticed something over his shoulder that caught his attention. Not in a good way.

“Of course he's here.” Harald heard him mutter before a voice from almost directly behind him announced its presence.

“Lock! Cousin! What are you doing here?” It said jovially. Harald turned around to see who had spoken and saw an oddly muscular man about his age, 18-19, dressed like a stereotypical warrior, sharing facial features with Lock, having however short-cropped hair and blue eyes, approaching his teacher. Arms stretched out for a hug. To his surprise Lock reluctantly recuperated, likely to have it over with.

“I'm sitting down mostly, although I'm also breathing as always. Hearing your annoying voice is sadly also on my agenda now, apparently.” Lock said scathingly, but his cousin simply laughed it off.

“Such a jokester!” He exclaimed and clapped the aforementioned jokester on the shoulder. The facial expression this elicited almost gave Harald a PTSD flashback. “No but really, you're here to participate aren't you?” The cousin then asked conspiratorially while glancing around, meeting the eyes of Harald, Ino, Kamin and Lemmings. “These your friends?” He asked, seemingly a bit taken aback at something.

“I'm not here to participate, I didn't qualify.” Lock grumbled out. His cousin, who'd been putting on an interested expression up to that point seemingly lost all interest, turned around and left. It was ridiculously fast change of expression and intent.

His parting words were. “Well, not really unexpected, we always knew putting in as many resources into you as Grandfather did would be a waste. Senile old fool. To fail at registering as an iron-rank however... Whatever, I'll leave you to watch your betters fight for now.”

Harald watched him leave, noting the ridiculously large sword on the man's back.

“I see that you have more than just one mentally retarded cousin.” Ino suddenly said in a dead-pan, causing Lock to crack a smile, making him, for once, seem his young age of 16. He carefully brushed some hair out of his face with his gauntlets.

“He's not nearly as stupid as you probably think he is. He is perpetually blinded by pride however, something to keep in mind if you face him.” He remarked.

Harald meanwhile was still boggling over the fact that anybody would assume that Lock of all people would fail the exam. Looking at his teacher he made sure that he hadn't been swapped out for somebody else while he hadn't been looking, but no. It was still the same person, steel greaves, chain mail, red gambeson, gauntlets, knives, sword, and alchemy pouch all combining into making him look like a knight. A certain atmosphere of impending doom hung in the air. The feeling one got when one's pyromaniac friend was playing with explosive fireballs in a thick forest that hadn't seen rain in a month.

“What did he want?” He asked, perhaps stupidly.

“Scope out the competition.” Ino quickly answered. “He immediately left once he came to the assumption that Lock failed the exam however, probably thinking that his associates weren't worth the time.” He turned to Lock. “Is there anything you can tell us about him, while we're already talking about reconnaissance?” He asked.

“He trains for explosive strength mostly, from what I know. Kind of like a body-builder. He certainly still looks the part, honestly, he should be ridiculously easy to beat. Just dodge around a bit and he'll get exhausted within five minutes, after that you just need to punch him a few times and he'll surrender.” Lock explained with a shrug.

“Isn't the entire tournament a horrible format for him then? I mean, it's basically just a bunch of fights after the other?” Ino asked dubiously, while Harald was wondering what a bodybuilder was.

Lock looked at Ino as if he was an idiot. “Of course it’s a horrible format for him, he's probably just too prideful to let that concern him. To be fair, he most likely knows deep down that he has no chance, but wants to try anyway. It's a good combat experience either wayt.” He said.

Harald was about to ask a question, but that was the moment the well-dressed man from down below decided that it was time to truly start processing the contestants. Holding a hand to his throat his voice boomed out as if it was screaming from right behind him. “Will the participants please make their way into the arena, and all non-participants leave for the stands. We shall now begin checking for magical and alchemical effects and determining your level!”

Closing his mouth Harald stood up along with Ino and made his way down.

“Break a leg.” He heard Lock say from behind them, and his last thought before he started descending the stairs was that he hoped his teacher wasn't being literal.