Viola stepped out from the line of soldiers, her heavy stone sword slung over her shoulder. Her posture was relaxed, but her eyes burned bright with challenge. “As heir to Lord Torvares,” she said, loud enough for both armies to hear, “I give my word. If he loses, we withdraw. That’s my oath — and my family’s seal.”

The battlefield went silent again. Even the wind seemed to hold its breath.

Kharnek’s expression shifted, the smirk fading from his face as he studied her. Then he grunted. “Torvares’ bloodline,” he said, almost to himself. “So the bull still breathes.”

Viola’s grin flashed, sharp and fearless. “Breathing, roaring, and still kicking your kind off our land.” She tilted her head slightly, her tone almost playful. “Honestly, it’s strange I didn’t challenge you myself. Guess I’m feeling generous today.”

Ludger, standing a few steps behind, could only shake his head slightly. Of course she said that.

Arslan gave her a brief, almost imperceptible nod of thanks before turning back to Kharnek. “So?” he called. “Do you accept?”

The barbarian warlord’s hand tightened on his club. The air between them seemed to thicken, mana and killing intent clashing like invisible fire.

Finally, Kharnek bared his teeth in a wide, wolfish grin. “Fine. One fight. One end.” He lifted his club from his shoulder and pointed it toward Arslan. “Let’s see if the bull’s pawns still has claws.”

Arslan drew his sword from the ground, the blade humming faintly with mana. “You’ll find out soon enough.”

As the two commanders began to step toward each other, the armies around them fell silent, forming a wide circle. Soldiers and barbarians alike held their breath.

Ludger’s hand hovered over the earth, his heartbeat steady, his eyes locked on the two figures closing the distance.

The duel had begun.

The field fell eerily silent as Arslan and Kharnek began to walk toward each other.

No orders were shouted. No weapons clashed. Even the wounded stopped groaning for a moment, as if the entire battlefield held its breath. Soldiers from both sides stepped back, forming a rough circle of trampled mud and broken stone.

The smoke drifted aside just enough for the morning light to cut through — a pale, gray beam that fell directly on the two men.

Each step Arslan took was deliberate, heavy, his sword hanging loose in one hand. His armor was battered, his hair matted with dirt and sweat, but his eyes were steady — calm in a way that unnerved even his own friends.

Across from him, Kharnek advanced with the same confidence, dragging his iron club through the dirt behind him. The weapon left a long, jagged groove in the earth. The barbarian’s shoulders rolled with every stride, each movement radiating power and something colder beneath it — control.

The distance between them shrank, step by step.

All around, soldiers whispered in disbelief. Imperial knights, Torvares troops, even the barbarians themselves — none had ever seen anything like this. A duel to end such a battle.

Ludger stood at the edge of the circle, arms crossed, eyes sharp.

Risky, he thought. Too much depends on a single swing.

Normally, he’d never let the outcome of an entire plan hang on something so unstable. But this time… the terms were fair. Simple. Clear. And the alternative — more pointless slaughter, more bodies piled in the mud — was worse.

Besides, he admitted inwardly, it fits him.

Arslan had always been the kind of man who faced things head-on. If this was the path to ending the fight, he’d walk it without hesitation.

Ludger’s eyes narrowed, watching his father roll his shoulders once before stopping a few paces away from Kharnek.

Still, part of him couldn’t help thinking ahead. If he wins… this won’t just be a victory for the town.

He looked toward the men behind Arslan — tired, bloodstained, but still standing tall. They were watching him not as a mercenary, but as something more.

A commander. A leader.

The kind of man people follow willingly.

Ludger’s mouth twitched into a faint smirk. The kind of man who can lead a guild.

He took a slow breath, forcing down the knot of tension in his chest. He didn’t like betting on uncertain odds — but if anyone could pull off the impossible, it was the man walking toward the barbarian warlord right now.

Alright, old man, Ludger thought, eyes hardening. Show them why I picked you.

The two warriors stopped at the center of the circle. The air between them vibrated with killing intent so dense it felt physical — like the battlefield itself was waiting for permission to breathe again.

Arslan lifted his sword. Kharnek raised his club.

Steel met iron with a scream.

Kharnek came in first—no flourish, just a brutal overhead smash meant to smash a man and the dirt under him. Arslan stepped in, not away, raising his sword two-handed and angling the flat. The club crashed down; sparks spat sideways; the shock shuddered through Arslan’s arms and bit into his shoulders. The blade didn’t break—but a fresh notch bloomed along the edge.

Kharnek ripped the weapon free and turned the next swing low and mean. Arslan slid half a step, set his stance, and caught it near the forte, letting the blow ride down the steel. Metal screamed, the club’s spikes skittered, and the impact shoved him back a boot’s length, heels carving twin grooves in the mud.

He didn’t give ground after that. He surged right back in.

Kharnek’s eyes narrowed. He aimed for the collarbone. Arslan lifted, met the strike high, then rolled his wrists and slashed short for the wrist that held the club. Sparks. Leather split. Blood dotted the iron haft. Kharnek grunted, shifted his grip, and answered with a backhand that would have pulped a skull if Arslan hadn’t jammed the ricasso against it and shoved, letting the force glance instead of crush.

The ring of metal echoed off the silent ranks.

Another smash. Arslan braced, blade angled, teeth bared. The club hammered down, bounced, hammered again—each hit a testing weight, each parry a calculation: edge? flat? slide? He kept choosing slide. Meet, bleed force, return a cut. Don’t let the club land clean. Don’t let the crowd see you flinch.

Ludger’s brow creased. He’s taking them head-on on purpose. A guildmaster couldn’t dance around a warlord and call it leadership. He had to stand there and show the line what to do. It was working—but against iron, a sword was living on borrowed time.

Kharnek shifted tactics. He stomped once—hard enough that dust jumped—and swept for the knee. Arslan dropped his blade, caught the haft, and stepped inside the arc. Smart. No leverage there. He smashed his pommel into Kharnek’s jaw, then raked steel across the big man’s thigh. Blood. Not deep enough.

Kharnek smiled. “Good hands.”

Arslan didn’t answer. He feinted high, then snapped a real cut for the ribs. Kharnek twisted; the iron club came up as a shield; the cut rang off metal and carved a gouge that made Arslan’s sword chatter in his grip. Tang rattle—bad sign.

The warlord punished it with a vertical piston swing. Arslan braced, choked up, and let the blow drive his blade down to the guard. The impact sent a sting through the bones of everyone close enough to feel it. Viola hissed through her teeth. The edge flashed with another notch.

Arslan blew out a breath, then changed the rhythm. Short steps. No wasted motion. He let Kharnek’s next two strikes land on the flat and slid them off, answering with quick bites to the forearm and hip—cuts meant to add up, not end it. Each time he stepped in close, his shoulder checked, his boot hooked ankles, his sword worked like a lever. Veteran work. Ugly, efficient.

Kharnek grew impatient. He reared the club back for a skull-breaker, overcommitting for the first time. Arslan punished it—half-sworded, drove his left hand up the blade for control, and shoved the point at Kharnek’s throat. The warlord snapped the club across to swat the thrust; steel skidded, sparks flared, and the point scraped along a gorget of layered horn, drawing a red line but not the kill.

They broke apart two paces, both chests rising, both watching.

Kharnek’s grin thinned. He rolled his neck. Then he came like a falling tree—three blows in a chain, high-low-high, each one a finishing swing. Arslan met the first with a glancing bind, took the second on the flat with a step back that bled the power… and the third he didn’t meet at all. He entered. He slammed his shoulder into Kharnek’s sternum as the club passed, chopping down the inside of the arm to the tendons.

The club dipped. Kharnek snarled and jerked it free with raw strength, clipping Arslan’s guard on the way out. The sword screamed and a chunk of edge spat away into the dirt.

Ludger’s jaw tightened. Another like that and the blade’s done.

Arslan felt it too. He shifted his grip, favoring the stronger part of the steel, and stopped trying to win on edges. He started turning every clash into slides and binds, every bind into a shove or a cut to soft places—wrist, inside elbow, hamstring. Kharnek started missing by inches instead of feet, the club chewing air where a skull should’ve been.

Arslan’s breath came out slow—one deep exhale that seemed to empty the battlefield with it.

Then his mana ignited.

The air around him shimmered as invisible heat rippled outward. Mana in the shape of flames licked along his arms and shoulders, faint at first, then bursting into a full-body aura that painted the mud red-orange. The soldiers watching felt it: pressure, focus, will turned physical.

“Overdrive,” Ludger muttered, his eyes narrowing. He could see the flare of power through the thin current of mana that always hummed in the soil. His father’s magic and life force burned hotter, faster, every heartbeat feeding the blaze.

Across the circle, Kharnek planted his club and raised his guard. The barbarian’s face was unreadable—no rage, no fear, only the slow pull of breath through his nose. The glow from Arslan’s aura reflected in his eyes like twin coals, but he didn’t flinch.

Ludger waited for the big man to reach for a vial. That’s what the berserker leaders always did—drink, lose control, drown the field in madness. But Kharnek didn’t move for his belt.

Instead, he spread his stance, feet grinding into the dirt, and started to breathe. Long, slow draws that made the muscles under his skin twitch and knot. A strange pulse rolled off him—thick, primal, not pure mana but something older, coarser.

“What the hell…” Ludger murmured, feeling the tremor under his boots.

Kharnek’s skin began to flush, veins darkening until they traced black lines across his arms. The whites of his eyes turned a deep crimson, not wild but focused. Every exhale came out like a low growl, his body radiating raw heat even without flame.

He wasn’t using potions. He wasn’t using standard mana either. Whatever it was, it came from somewhere deeper—something carved into his blood.

The crowd watched in tense silence as the two warriors’ auras collided—fire against pressure, controlled fury against ancient instinct.

Ludger’s hand twitched at his side, feeling the vibration in the ground. So this is what they meant by the old tribes’ strength.

Flames curled higher around Arslan’s frame, and across from him, Kharnek’s red aura thickened until the air itself seemed to hum with heat and bloodlust.

Both men took a step forward.

The duel wasn’t over yet—it was only now becoming real.

The world narrowed to two figures.

Arslan moved first. Overdrive burned across his limbs like molten armor, every muscle drawn tight, every motion a controlled explosion. His sword blurred into a streak of firelight as he swung.

Kharnek met it head-on. His iron club screamed through the air, the swing so heavy it warped the wind.

CLANG!

The impact detonated like thunder. A shockwave tore across the battlefield, flinging sand and loose stones outward in a circular blast. Soldiers stumbled, shielding their faces as grit and wind struck them.

Mana scattered like sparks.

Arslan’s boots slid half a pace in the dirt, but he held. His sword—still intact. Ludger saw the faint glow running up the blade’s length and realized what was happening.

Weapon Enhancing. He’s reinforcing it—timing it perfectly with each clash.

Every strike was a gamble between reflex and destruction.

Kharnek snarled and spun, sweeping his club in a wide arc. Arslan ducked low, dragging his sword along the ground before ripping it upward in a fiery crescent. The edge tore across Kharnek’s abdomen, shallow but clean. Blood hissed on contact with the Overdrive flames.

Kharnek barely reacted. He twisted, brought the club down like a falling tower. Arslan braced again, met it with another perfect bind, and sparks burst outward like a forge under hammer blows.

The sound was endless: clang, crash, hiss, roar.

Every collision split the air, waves of pressure rippling through both armies. The front ranks of barbarians and imperials alike had stopped fighting entirely—watching, open-mouthed, as two living storms traded blows that would have flattened lesser men.

Kharnek roared and drove forward, his strikes turning faster, heavier. Each one struck with enough force to bend steel. But Arslan’s sword—glowing with layered mana—met them all. He angled the flat, turned the hits into slides, redirected the power instead of absorbing it.

The ground beneath them cracked. Dust and embers rose in sheets.

A club swing came low—Arslan jumped, twisted midair, and hammered his blade down toward Kharnek’s shoulder. The barbarian blocked, the iron screaming against steel again. For a second they were locked—mana against muscle, heat against pressure.

Then the explosion came.

The sheer collision of energy blew them apart like thrown stones. Both men skidded backward across the field, boots carving furrows, dust billowing between them.

Neither fell.

Arslan’s chest heaved, Overdrive mana rippling wilder now, licking off his skin like living banners. Across from him, Kharnek’s crimson aura thickened, the air around him trembling as his pupils constricted to slits.

The barbarian grinned, blood dripping from his lip. “You burn well, Imperial.”

Arslan spat blood into the dirt and raised his sword again. “You hit like a wall. Shame I’m used to breaking those.”

They charged.

Another clash, louder than before. Sparks bloomed like fireworks. Each hit sent waves across the ground so strong that soldiers stumbled meters away.

The dueling pair disappeared in a storm of flame and dust—only the flashes of steel and the sound of colliding weapons showed where they were.

Ludger’s eyes tracked them through the tremors under his feet. Perfect rhythm. Perfect reinforcement. His father’s sword flared each time it struck, the mana reinforcement blooming for an instant before fading—precise, efficient, conserving energy even inside Overdrive.

Every soldier watching knew: this wasn’t a brawl. It was artistry disguised as chaos.

Blow by blow, the two men carved their fury into the earth. Cracked stones, splintered weapons, rippling shockwaves—every second was louder, hotter, sharper.

When the dust cleared for a heartbeat, both stood bloodied but unyielding. No one cheered. No one moved. Everyone knew—this duel truly was the best way to decide the war.

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