While waiting for the start of my battle in the under-tribune premises, I couldn't see how other duels were unfolding in the sand. And this time, I was curious about who would win. Because right before me, Paravi Malik was fighting in the arena, and I crossed my fingers, hoping that this beauty, who was so adored by the local audience, would be knocked out of the tournament at this stage.
The attendant nearby probably thought that his charge was meditating, standing with his eyes closed and leaning on the tournament spear. But I was simply listening to the roar of the crowd in the stands, which could be heard even in these rooms. And the longer I listened, the harder it was for me not to smile. Judging by the buzz of disappointment, things weren't going well for Paravi. And the longer the duel lasted, the quieter the stands became, which was also a good sign for me. I really didn't want to face this girl in battle. And I would prefer that someone else, not me, gained the laurels for victory over her, as well as all the spectators' anger and irritation for this victory.
Alas, it seems that the questers have cursed me and turned my luck into the negative zone. Nothing in this Cycle has been given to me just like that, although in the past, there were pleasant surprises. Once, "the past me," literally out of nowhere, passing a dungeon that locals had been clearing as soon as it was available for two millennia, managed to find a Mithril-class artifact. And since "the past me" was on Steel at that time, that artifact pendant helped "me" advance through the ranks more quickly. I sold it for a good amount of money, and the proceeds were enough for the best equipment of the metal coil. But in this Cycle, it seems, such luck is not meant for me. Because, to my deepest regret, Paravi Malik did win her fight. And the stands were furious about it for almost ten minutes. And no matter how much the organizers rushed to fit all the fights into today, they let the crowd catch their breath before announcing the next pair of fighters.
And that next pair included me.
"Me-e-e-e-e-e-e-et! Ra-a-a-a-a-aven! From Seattle!" the lead steward announced me. "And his opponent, Ta-a-ak-r-r-r! Bu-u-u-uda-a-a-ar!!"
Despite the fact that Takr was a local and served in the protection of trade routes, it seemed to me that the stands, for some reason, preferred me more than him. I'll have to ask Aun about this anomaly. If the boy keeps his ears open, he might clarify such a sharp change in people's mood. But these thoughts quickly flew out of my head as soon as the coordinator gave the signal to start the battle.
Knowing that I would be fighting today, of course, I had prepared several plans for this fight, depending on which opponent I would be pitted against. When guessing was no longer necessary and I learned the name of my opponent, I slightly adjusted these plans. But after watching Ronin's fight, with the earthling's theatrically emphasized approach to the battle, I got the idea to adopt this practice myself. So now I've thrown out all the previously prepared plans, developing a new one on the fly. Usually, such an approach with a sharp change is far from the best choice in a fight, but I was sure of my victory in any case, so I was hardly taking any risks.
My main task was not just to advance to the next stage. I could do that with my eyes closed. By local standards, Takr Budar might have been a good fighter. He followed one of the so-called Wild Styles, where you fight, driven by instincts and natural fury. Something like the famous berserkers on Earth. And since the trade route guard was physically developed and obviously paid attention to training, he was indeed a tough opponent for many in Bronze. Moreover, adherents of the Wild Styles were not common because being one required a certain type of character from their follower, and because of this relative rarity, many simply didn't know how to fight such an enemy properly. I knew. Moreover, the "combat satori" that I had learned to enter was a direct counter-argument to any of the Wild Styles. Because emotions, even the most destructive and furious, always lose to Inspiration. So I really could close my eyes, enter a trance, and end this duel in seconds.
I could, but I was not going to do that.
Because one of my main tasks for this battle was to restore the high betting coefficient on me. And, alas, this was so difficult that none of the approaches I had conceived gave much hope for success. Only the show arranged by Ronin sparked what could be the right idea in me. And it is this idea that I intend to implement.
My initial plan was to play out a typical scene from an Earth action movie, where at the beginning and almost the entire fight, the main villain drags the main hero across the sand with his face, but in the end, the main hero "gathers strength" and ends the duel in his favor. This plan had only one flaw, but it was fundamental. I'm not an actor, and the local audience, most likely, would quickly see through my drama. But what I saw in Ronin's duel, and remembering my conversation with Ye Lan and her behavior at our meeting - these two seemingly unrelated events spawned a new plan in my head.
I stepped out onto the arena's sand almost the same way I did when I first appeared in the qualifying round. A sense of calm, bordering on indifference, was visible on my face and permeated each of my movements. Against the backdrop of my opponent, this looked particularly striking.
Unlike me, Takr Budar, as soon as he emerged from the under-stand rooms, began to wind himself up. He puffed out his chest, shook his axe, even roared, addressing the stands. But with all these external displays of aggression, he didn't move forward. And when I calmly and measuredly headed his way, shifting my spear into a combat position, this brawler pretending to be a furious berserker even retreated.
He was afraid of me. More accurately, he was wary. And I saw how this, albeit slight, fear enraged Takr himself. It irritated him. But this opponent was one of those who could turn their fear to their advantage. Fear does not paralyze such people, but on the contrary, it gives them extra strength and makes them more cautious and dangerous.
If I wanted to win easily, I should have dashed forward and taken advantage of the fact that the enemy was in a contradictory state. Attack him before he can turn his fear to his advantage. But instead, like in the preliminaries, I reached the center of the arena and stopped. Only, unlike then, I didn't sit down in the sand but thrust the spear into the ground and slowly turned to follow my opponent as he cut circles around the perimeter of the arena. And with each such circle, Takr wound himself up more and more. His eyes filled with blood, and the growl breaking through his clenched teeth increasingly resembled that of a beast.
But such indulgence in his inner beast did not mean that my opponent suddenly forgot how to handle weapons and was about to rush at me, stupidly swinging his axe left and right. No, there are special techniques that allow you to maintain control over yourself, and Takr Budar mastered these techniques perfectly. His attack was swift, sharp, unexpected. He darted forward like a tiger. Quickly, aggressively, so that the sand, which flew from under his feet due to the sudden start, had not yet settled, and he had already covered more than half the distance separating us. At that moment, he really did resemble a tiger. A conscious tiger.
I could have met this attack with at least three dodges, two blocks, and four counterattacks. But instead, I chose a different option. Remembering how Ronin moved and what he emphasized during his fight performance, I acted similarly. Only if the fencing master highlighted the Dragon school - I chose the Crane style as the basis, which was more suitable for my external aesthetics.
Takr's swift attack, which was intended to knock me off my feet and inflict critical damage, fell into the void.
It fell because, before the axe's blade struck, tracing a line of death across my chest, I leaped high and, using the spear stuck in the ground, literally flew two meters above the sand. I performed a half somersault and, with a strike of my feet to his back, sent the enemy who had missed his attack rolling across the arena towards the nearest stand. All this time, my spear remained stuck in the ground. And after the enemy plowed the sand with his nose, I didn't rush to finish him off but froze in the classic Waiting Crane stance. The stance from which begins the kata of Battle Beasts familiar to many in the stands.
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The crowd reacted variously to this first exchange of blows. Ambivalent. But my opponent became even more enraged. He quickly jumped to his feet and turned to me, his nostrils flared, and his eyes were completely filled with red. This was no longer a tiger in human guise but a furious bull.
His new attack was not as swift as the first one but much more sweeping and truly full of fury. I felt in every inch of my skin that if I fell under his blade, he wouldn't stop his blow. He would kill without the slightest doubt or regret. Realizing his mistake from the first time, in his second attack, he acted more broadly rather than focusing on a pinpoint strike. This had its logic. The Crane Style is famed for its sharp, full-stride transitions and instantaneous shifts from very high stances to those literally sprawling on the ground. Hence why he chose this approach, namely, to advance not as swiftly as the first time but much more broadly, cutting off with swings of his far-from-small axe all my other paths of maneuver, except for retreat.
Earthly fencing knows well how to respond to such an attack for a spearman. After all, with wide swings, the opponent reveals the palms of his hands holding the axe's shaft. And, unlike a sword, rapier, or foil, these palms are not covered by a guard or other protection. With swift lunges, calculating the amplitude of his swings, I could leave Takr's fingers in the sand, lying separate from his hands, and thus end the fight. But I didn't need such an early end to the duel.
Instead of this simple solution, I allowed Budar to get closer and even attempt a strike. My spear sharply jerked upward, let the axe's swing pass by, and then once again quickly stabbed into the ground. And I, for the second time now, using it as a support, soared above the sand. My right foot deflects the butt of the enemy weapon to the side, and my left heel, with all the strength and speed available at Bronze, under the Auras of Enhancement and Acceleration, hits Takr in the center of his chest. When I step back onto the ground, my opponent is still flying backward, and only a moment after I adopt the Waiting Crane stance, he falls on his back onto the sand of the arena five meters from me.
A normal human would never get up after that, even if they were a super-athlete. But this is Ain, and my opponent stands at the Bronze rank of Core development. Therefore, after a couple of breaths, Takr got to his feet, swayed, but didn't even drop his axe from his hands. Even in this case, I spared him, not adding Discharge to my blow. Not to mention that a moment before the blow, I could have used the magic of Illusion to apply the Sign of Des, the rune of Destruction, to my heel.
Most spectators had already figured out what I was doing. As many of them have been in the stands since morning, they saw Ronin's fight and began to suspect that I, in essence, was repeating it, if not in form, then in spirit. And the reaction of the stands to this was again ambiguous. Some liked it, while others, on the contrary, started to whistle.
Takr also came to the clear conclusion that he was being played with. This drove my opponent into even more of a frenzy. And now, in such a state, he was at his most dangerous. Yet I seem blind to this, continuing to await his attack in the same position and stance as I did the first and second times.
Steam is literally rising from my enemy, hovering above his shoulders. His eyes are ablaze. His breathing resembles the roar of a lion. The blade of his axe takes on a bright red hue of heated metal. Fire magic, enhancing the weapon. He didn't use this move in his last fight, and I think that now he has decided to put his main trump card "on the table."
Takr Budar begins to move towards me. His movement is powerful, unstoppable, measured, like lava flowing down the slopes of a volcano during an eruption. The Fire Mane style - and for a Bronze, this is cool. Few can boast that they managed to master even the initial exercises of this school with such little Core development. Among the spectators, there were also connoisseurs who appreciated the level demonstrated by Takr. Yet I pretended not to understand the change in him. And, like the previous two times, I met my opponent in the same way.
But this time, my combo of kicks does not reach the target, and I have to twist in the air like a cat so as not to fall on my back. The reason for this was that my spear was chopped in half just as I transferred my weight to it to begin the jump. The heated blade of the enemy's axe sweeps over my head, literally within an inch. And that's a bit over the top as it could have damaged my new hairstyle. A hairstyle that I like so much. Without changing style, spreading my hands wide to the sides, I close the distance in a low stance. The lower part of the shaft is all that remains of my spear in my left hand. The other part, with the tip, lies in the sand at the center of the arena.
I expected Takr Budar, having gained such a substantial advantage, to continue his attack immediately. But I slightly underestimated how much I had managed to hurt the feelings of the caravan route guard in these minutes of battle. Instead of attacking, he halted, bent down, picked up the tip of my spear, showed it to the spectators, and then threw it out of the arena. He then turned to me full front and, drawing with his foot that the center of the Arena was now his, roared with a roar that King Kong would envy.
What a sneaky bastard! He had accepted my game and now turned it against me! Having taken the center, he doesn't rush to attack, with his whole demeanor showing that he's now the king here, and it's me who has to prove otherwise. Prove it while being practically unarmed.
My face maintains a calm expression. My movements remain measured, as before, and my breath is steady. But it's precisely this that shows the spectators that I'm at a dead end, that I'm losing. Because it's in the East that they understand how important it is to keep face, even when everything is going against you. If I had shown fear or started to panic, there would have been those who thought that everything happening was nothing more than a game on my part. But the fact that I "tried" to look like nothing important had happened after losing my weapon and giving up the center - this is what made the stands believe that I was losing.
Perhaps Ye Lan is right, and I do have some decent acting skills. Because not only the spectators in the distant stands believed in this performance but also my opponent. And in vain. Because I saw his feint, I knew he was not really aiming at me but at my weapon. In fact, for the past two rounds, I had been provoking him to do exactly this. And he fell for it. Disarmed me. Took the center.
Everything was as he wanted.
And as I needed.
I had to show the spectators that I could be defeated, that I had weaknesses, and I succeeded perfectly. For the next nearly ten minutes, the fight followed the same script: I tried to attack with the broken handle in my hands. Precisely "tried" because all these attempts were unsuccessful. So unsuccessful that even the dullest spectator must have realized by now that I had no plan on how to rectify the situation, and I was pushing forward only to save face. And the fact that I retreated back each time after such attacks with an impassive look and steady breath only confirmed my utter helplessness in the eyes of others.
I even began to tire. Slightly. I thought that Takr would get tired of taunting me much sooner, and he would go forward. But he was literally reveling in how he was overpowering me in front of thousands of people, effortlessly deflecting each of my attacks. I had long ago identified at least four of his weak spots and could have defeated him at any moment, even if I had thrown the handle out of my hands. But if I had done so, I would have shown my true level, and earning at least something via betting on myself would have become impossible. So, I continued my onslaught, just attacking slower each time, letting my shoulders drop lower and lower.
Five more minutes passed, and Takr finally grew tired of this performance. He met my next attack with a firm block and launched a counterattack. The swings of his ax forced me to spin, rotate, and whirl. The sand beneath my feet was literally flying in all directions. I had to retreat so swiftly. And any spectator could see that if I didn't change my chosen Style, Takr would corner me soon. But to change style after I had so pompously started this fight would mean what? Right. Losing face. And I stayed in the Crane school, which only provoked an even more bloodthirsty smile on Takr's face.
He wanted more than just to win. He wanted to smear me into the dirt. Trample me. Humiliate me. And that's where I caught him, pretending to stumble from exhaustion. He should have immediately delivered a finishing blow, but he hesitated, even casting a victorious glance at the stands. That was his downfall, as he received a kick under the knee and the stub of my spear directly in the groin. And, as in the last time, I put all the strength of Bronze and the supporting Auras into this blow, even adding a bit of Discharge, about a third of the power available to me.
This time, unlike when he caught my similarly enhanced heel kick in the chest, Takr Budar didn't get up from the sand. He continued to lie on the arena, curled up and pressing his hands to his groin, ignoring the ax lying on the ground, even when the referee announced the winner.
I left the sand, slightly staggering, under thunderous and, as it seemed to me, pretty sincere applause from the stands.
I hope such complications were worth it, and there will be those who will bet against me in the next round…