"Lena, is that you?"
The figure of the person remained lying on the floor with no intention of moving. After several long seconds, they replied:
"Who is Lena?"
'So.. she died…' Sylvie thought, closing her eyes.
It was the most obvious and expected outcome. Even so, that didn't change the fact that the realization hurt. Obviously, she hadn't grown attached to the woman. They had only exchanged a few brief words and nothing more.
But she also remembered the genuine smile Lena had given her once she healed her, and she remembered the kindness in the woman's voice.
At the same time, she remembered that she was inside a Nightmare and that the real Lena had died thousands of years ago. Although that didn't make the discomfort of the moment any lighter… there was also the fact that she was inside a colosseum where they were used as entertainment for the masses.
And she still didn't know the reason—or the reason why she was there.
Lena had told her that in this kingdom, a person's value was centered around their beauty. But she had already checked several times, and she had no scars of any kind. Her face wasn't deformed either, and thanks to her Attribute, she could heal herself, so she had no wounds.
Were there other canons of beauty? For example, if you have eyes or hair of certain colors, you don't fit into this… But that was even more superficial, so it wouldn't make much sense… although it could be—it wouldn't be wise to rule out the option.
However, Sylvie was certain that the reason for her imprisonment in the colosseum was due to other things Lena had said.
She had mentioned earlier: "What man would want to be with someone with scars on their face?"
At that moment, Sylvie thought she meant it literally. However, if related to one of Beast God's titles, it could have another meaning.
She or he was the goddess or god of beauty and carnal desire. For her theory, she decided to focus mainly on the second title.
So if she used another of the things Lena mentioned: "Because then your children might turn out weaker because of it."
The key word in that phrase was "children."
Using these three pieces of information, Sylvie could conclude that she was not actually imprisoned for failing to meet beauty standards, nor for having scars that might supposedly make her children weaker. But rather for the fact that—perhaps—she couldn't have children.
In a sexist society where a person's value is judged by their beauty, one could also conclude that their value is centered on their biological utility.
She can't have children? Sent to the colosseum.
A man doesn't fulfill his purpose of providing for his household? Sent to the colosseum.
Obviously, she could be wrong, and there could be another reason lurking somewhere behind or ahead of that. But it was a theory she believed to be solid, so she was going to trust herself.
Something she had learned thanks to Arthur: to trust herself more.
Even though Sylvie had been "born" with Arthur's memories, and even though she had later told him that her life was her own—that no matter how much her memories came from him, what she did with them was her fault and her decision—she was deeply grateful to him.
Not only for giving her a life and a chance to have everything she had, but also because even after spending so long alone and suffering so much to give her what he had, he still worried and tried to take responsibility for her actions. It wasn't necessary—she had made that clear to him—but he kept doing it anyway.
And she hadn't noticed.
She had failed to notice that Arthur felt lonely.
Not in the physical sense—the absence of people surrounding him—but lonely in his position, in his own way of perceiving life.
Since childhood, he had stood out above the rest due to his own devotion to becoming strong and protecting his loved ones. His obsession had been so great that he had only formed one true friendship throughout all that time.
And no matter how much Sylvie appreciated Cassie for it, the latter hadn't been enough.
Not because she hadn't tried, but because of the fact that Arthur was the strongest. From a young age, he had been the strongest, and that brings isolation. It brings loneliness.
Then came his First Nightmare, and he achieved something impossible.
A True Name and a Divine Aspect. Along with Attributes that gave him an affinity for Aether—something completely unknown.
Even so, that wasn't the most significant thing he obtained during the Nightmare. Rather, it was the knowledge that he was a reincarnated being—and a quite powerful one at that.
A Sacred-rank being.
A lesser deity.
Anyone would lose their mind just imagining such an existence. And he had been that.
How could someone not become even more obsessed with becoming stronger, knowing that at some point in the past, they had been a lesser deity?
Obviously, this brought more isolation. Another thing she had failed to notice.
It was no longer the fact that she had failed him… but that she hadn't realized she was doing it.
One might say that if you don't realize you're doing something, then you shouldn't bear so much guilt for it. However, that argument didn't hold for her. Because she had all of Arthur's memories.
She knew every night he had spent wishing for an equal.
She knew every decision he had made to become who he was today.
She knew all the things he had missed out on trying to achieve his goals.
And still, she had failed him.
It should have been clear. Sylvie had access to his runes. She knew exactly what Arthur's Aspect was called—she had memorized it so well from opening his runes every few hours that she didn't even need to do it anymore to recall them.
Aspect: [Singular Existence]
Aspect Description: [You exist as a singularity within reality. Your presence cannot be replicated, substituted, or overwritten by the world. However, what is singular cannot fully belong. The more firmly you exist, the more distant everything else becomes.]
"What is singular cannot fully belong." How had she not noticed it before?
Biased by her own disbelief and then by her role in the castle, she had failed to notice that Arthur—her Arthur—felt lonely.
Remembering how he had taught her to use the sword during their journey through the labyrinth. How she had acted after he killed Harus—something she now realized had been idiotic—to defend her. How every time he used Former King, it made him lose his humanity, and she had reacted in the wrong way.
All of it had been motivated by unselfish reasons. All of it had been ways of sacrificing himself for the good of others, and she had taken it for granted. She hadn't questioned it.
At the time, she had believed it was normal—something anyone would do for another person. Obviously, she had been naive.
Her short life had been based precisely on the memories of the one who made the sacrifices, justifying them by saying they were necessary. Never from a perspective unbiased by those thoughts.
She should have stopped him. She should have told him no—that it wasn't normal to sacrifice himself for the good of the rest.
But how could she have done that? That was precisely the only thing she knew as well.
Now, since she had returned, she had realized it wasn't that way. That there were times when it wasn't worth it—when sacrificing himself in such a manner only brought more complications.
If Arthur hadn't done it, they would surely be together right now, challenging this Nightmare. But the fact that he wasn't here wasn't Arthur's fault either.
It was her own.
The blame never falls on the one who makes the sacrifice, but on the beneficiaries who do nothing to return the favor.
The blame falls on the weak. And she never wanted to belong to that category again.
That was the reason she hadn't stopped training since returning from the Dream Realm. That was the reason she was challenging her Second Nightmare only eight months after Awakening.
She would never leave Arthur alone again. She would never let her own weakness separate her from him again.
If she had to kill the entire kingdom to overcome the Nightmare, she would do it. If she had to challenge the Third Nightmare in less than a year, she would do that too.
Weakness is a sin at the end of the day.
At the same time, Sylvie wouldn't let herself be blinded by this desire to become strong—precisely because she had Arthur as an example.
Weakness is a sin in this world, yes. But strength—strength brings complications as well. It brings responsibilities that can weigh more than the heaviest thing in the world.
But she knew Arthur wouldn't stop in his pursuit of strength. So neither would she.
If strength brings responsibilities and complications, they would bear them and overcome them together.
Sylvie took a deep breath, and when she opened her eyes, they were full of determination.
"So then, what's your name?" she asked the woman beside her.
She was still lying on the floor. After a few seconds, she turned with trembling arms and managed to sit up.
"My name is Siord," she said with a tired voice.
Sylvie's eyes widened. What were the chances that Siord would end up right next to her?
She approached the cage beside hers and said with a slight smile: "Siord, I'm Sylvie." Then she made a gesture barely perceptible in the room's low light. "Come closer. I can heal you."
Sylvie noticed how the woman's body tensed slightly upon hearing who she was. Then, with whatever strength she had left, she finally approached, and Sylvie began to heal her.
Moments later, Siord was completely healed and let out a sound of satisfaction.
"Thank you, Lady Sylvie. What a coincidence that we ended up in the same place."
Sylvie smiled. "You're welcome. And yes." Then she turned her head from side to side, observing the room they were in, and added: "Though I wish it had been under better conditions."
Before she could say anything more, Sylvie asked: "What happened to you that left you in such bad shape?"
"They threw me into a fight against three Fallen Monsters, but one of them was a perfect counter to my Aspect, so I barely managed to survive."
"You did well to survive," Sylvie said as a compliment.
Siord accepted it, lowering her head slightly. "Thank you, Lady Sylvie."
Siord's Aspect helped her perceive changes in the air currents around her, and she did this mainly through her auditory system. So a creature that generated a lot of auditory noise was a clear counter to her.
After that, they both began to catch up on what they knew about the Nightmare. It was mainly Sylvie who told Siord what she knew. The latter had been fighting Fallen Monsters for quite some time and hadn't managed to gather any information about the Nightmare's conflict.
One thing Siord had overheard the guards talking about was that in a week, there would be a tournament within the colosseum. She hadn't caught who would receive the winner, but the fact of a tournament was a great opportunity to find Seishan and Ceres—if, unfortunately, they had ended up in the same place as them.
After a few minutes of conversation, Sylvie heard again the noise of chains on the floor approaching their cages.
Sylvie's jaw tightened because she was already starting to hate that sound. However, when the giant approached this time, it wasn't with the intention of taking them to the arena.
In both his hands, he carried two trays of food.
He left them resting on a grate on the metal door and left without uttering a single word. Even so, Sylvie managed to identify that he was wearing a smile on his face.
Disgust and rage began to form inside her, but she crushed these emotions immediately. They wouldn't do her any good until she figured out how they prevented all these people from escaping, in addition to how they controlled them so that no one rebelled against them.
The moment those last thoughts formed, her mind became a little blurry. As if she had thought of something that didn't make sense.
Sylvie shook her head to get rid of that sensation and went to grab the food tray. Siord was already doing the same.
Then they sat down next to each other—each still in their own cage—and went to take the first bite. The tray had a piece of roasted meat and beside it, a vegetable soup. The meat was cold and seemed tough, and the soup was cold as well.
Even so, it was the only thing they had to eat, so there was no other option.
Sylvie picked up the cold soup and was about to take a sip, but at the last moment, she stopped.
Her eyebrows furrowed, and she began to smell the soup.
Ever since the Queen had given her Beast God's lineage, her sense of smell, primarily, had improved considerably. Now she could smell things that supposedly shouldn't be there. This was precisely one of those cases.
The soup smelled of the various vegetables that made up the broth, but there was a strange odor in it.
'Does the broth smell… like blood?'
Why would the broth smell like blood? But it wouldn't be accurate to just say it smelled like blood. Sylvie realized that this smell was special.
'It smells similar to the Queen's blood.'
Noticing Sylvie's strange behavior, Siord stopped and didn't eat anything. However, she also didn't voice her concern or ask any questions.
Sylvie lowered the soup and, after a few movements, pushed it as far away from her as possible. She realized what would happen if she drank that broth, and she believed it was the answer to why she had that strange reaction earlier when thinking about escaping and rebelling.
The same reaction, but a few degrees stronger, tried to appear in her mind, attempting to cloud it and make it blurry, but Sylvie remained strong.
The intensity of the reaction began to increase and increase until Sylvie had no choice but to open her runes.
She quickly set hers aside and focused on Arthur's.
Name: Arthur Leywin
True Name: Paragon of Purity
Rank: Dreamer
Looking at Arthur's runes helped her anchor herself more firmly in her own identity.
She closed her eyes and began to take deep breaths until she managed to focus again.
Then she opened them again and focused on Siord. Fortunately for her, her actions had been so strange that they had caught the woman's attention, and she still hadn't eaten anything.
Hurriedly but with a dry voice, she ordered her: "Don't you dare eat that."
Siord—who within the Nightmare had long brown hair instead of her short black hair, and whose completely green eyes were now black—raised one of her eyebrows and set the tray on the floor.
Sylvie then explained: "The soup broth has blood in it. From the smell, I suspect it's the blood of the King of the kingdom."
"You said the King is a Blessed by Beast God… could it be that his blood has some special power? Related to his Aspect, perhaps?" Siord asked, already knowing the answer.
She nodded her head as she sat more comfortably on the cold floor.
"I just felt a strange sensation enter my head when I thought about leaving or rebelling. My theory is that if any of us drink that broth, and therefore the King's blood—" She paused and then added more seriously: "It will surely become impossible for us to escape afterward."
"So the King has some mind hex powers," Siord concluded.
Then Sylvie added: "Those are the worst rivals one can face."
Immediately, the image of Eunbin ordering a Corrupted Beast to drain its own blood so she could give it to Seishan entered her mind.
A few seconds passed in silence, the only change being the shadows cast by the lamp hanging from the ceiling.
Eventually, she let out a sigh and said:
"This explains why none of the people around us—" she began to observe the rest of the cages, "—even try to do anything. They're all under the King's mind hex, forced to be obedient and unable to even think of escaping."
Siord stood up and began to push her tray as far away from herself as possible. After doing so and sitting down in front of Sylvie, she asked:
"So that's our plan?"
Sylvie smiled at the woman in front of her. "Always so intelligent… yes. We're going to have to not eat for the rest of the week and hope we do well in the tournament."
With the plan made and agreed upon, they both went to sleep on the cold floor of their cells.
***
Exactly one week later, they were both being carried to the arena on the giant's shoulders. Both immobilized by chains, with the piece of cloth covering their faces.
Fortunately, they had made it. During the week, they had to fight constantly every day to survive. At first, it was two or three creatures at a time; then it became more and more.
They never fought together. They were always individual fights against creatures. They hadn't faced any humans throughout the week, but that didn't mean they wouldn't, nor did it mean that the number of women locked in that room with them hadn't decreased brutally.
Quite the opposite—many times, only the two of them remained in the room, and they were moved to different rooms that were also full. Until a day or two passed, and they were left alone again.
Now they more or less understood how it worked.
Everyone had to fight constantly against creatures until two weeks had passed, at which point there would be a tournament. What happened during those tournaments, they didn't know, because this would be their first, and none of the people they had managed to ask had been able to answer them.
And now they had started to see men imprisoned as well, but these, like the women, hadn't been able to give them any important information.
This could be for two reasons. One was that they simply didn't really know—but the one they believed to be correct was that the King's mind hex prevented them from talking about it.
Sylvie and Siord had endured an entire week without eating. To do so, they had to erase the evidence that they weren't eating. So the only solution was to give their food to the people in the cages next to theirs…
Neither of them was happy about that, and they hated the fact that they had to do it. But there was no other way.
It was their survival against the survival of others, and as they had told themselves many times before, the others weren't real.
Arriving at the arena, the giant threw them to the ground next to each other, removed the chains that bound them, and left—leaving the pieces of cloth on their faces.
They obviously hesitated about whether to remove them or not, but thanks to the movement of Mana in the environment, Sylvie managed to identify that there were more people around them, and they were taking theirs off.
So with her hands free of the chains, she brought them to her face and removed the piece of cloth.
The first thing she saw was Siord's black eyes. Then, turning her head, she found that all along the arena, there was a line of people standing a few meters apart from each other.
The arena measured close to a hundred meters across, and each person had a few meters between them and the next. If Sylvie had to give a specific number, she would say that about eighty people of both genders were forming the circle.
She narrowed her eyes and began to analyze the rest of the people more closely, and just as they had thought, these people were acting completely normal.
That was the strangest part. In the arena, they acted as if nothing had happened, but when they were in the rooms, the faces of the others were completely empty. They were like shadows of their personalities.
This could confirm the theory that the daily food contained a small supply of the King's blood that induced a mind hex, making them act differently than they normally would, so that the idea of escaping or rebelling never even occurred to them.
After a few moments of silence, the sound of a trumpet was heard throughout the colosseum. The structure of the colosseum acted as an amplifier, making the sound even louder.
She almost covered her ears but managed to resist. Siord, however, did cover her ears, and Sylvie, thanks to her Awakened ability, managed to strengthen her just enough so that the damage wasn't more severe.
Now that they were in the arena, they could use their Aspects freely.
That was something they still couldn't understand—how they managed to prevent them from using their Aspects inside the cages, even when not under the mind hex.
Sylvie was about to think about the theory they had developed, but immediately, a completely oppressive presence made itself felt throughout the colosseum.
The people who had been smiling and celebrating stopped immediately. The Mundanes even began to choke, and some ended up falling to their knees. The Awakened present stood up straight and firm. Even some of the weaker slaves standing in the arena began to stagger.
She had never felt a presence as oppressive and evil as the one that woman was emitting. And she was certain that none of her sisters who had reached the rank of Saint could emit that much pressure.
After a few seconds, the presence disappeared completely, and the figure of a woman with sky-blue eyes and long hair of the same color became noticeable in the most luxurious box of the colosseum. She wore a completely white outfit with a somewhat tight neckline, small black details, and military white boots that ended at her thighs.
The moment she appeared, everyone—absolutely everyone present—got down on their knees.
The last to do so were, obviously, Siord and Sylvie, who had not expected that outfit at all.
Analyzing the presence, they realized it was that of a Saint—and a very powerful one at that.
Immediately, the image from the beginning of the Nightmare formed in her mind—a figure generating an explosion of ice and consuming the entire kingdom.
After several long seconds of total silence, the woman let out a sigh—as if disappointed—and began to speak.
"Citizens of the Kingdom of Mordrath." She paused and looked again at the slaves in the arena. "I, Isceth, welcome you to the colosseum's biweekly tournament. I assume that by this edition, further introductions are unnecessary." Then her eyes focused directly on Sylvie and Siord, making them tremble under her gaze. The woman smiled and continued: "It seems that in this edition, we'll have some interesting competitors!"
The people began to applaud and celebrate the possibility of good entertainment.
The General let them make all the noise they wanted until a few seconds passed, then she raised her hand, plunging the colosseum back into complete silence.
"Let's not waste any more time, shall we?" she said. "Let's see who is weak enough to die!"
The citizens began to applaud and make noise again, while the slaves in the arena stood back up. Meanwhile, the General took a few steps back and sat down on one of the chairs next to the King's throne. That throne was empty.
The tournament began immediately after the General spoke those words. From different access points in the arena, several guards entered in formation, their armor resonating with each firm step they took. These positioned themselves behind each of the slaves surrounding the perimeter.
Without need for further orders, they began pushing them in pairs toward the center, and then, the fights began.
The first was hard for Sylvie to watch—not because it was impossible, but because of the result and how it came about. A tall, slender blond man faced a woman with tanned skin and black hair.
From the first exchange, it was clear it wasn't a fair fight. The woman could barely stay on her feet; her breathing was irregular, her movements slow. The man didn't hesitate. He advanced with determination, dodged a weak attempt at an attack, and ended the fight with a clean strike to the neck. The woman fell without even being able to defend herself.
The crowd applauded while Sylvie clenched her teeth.
The next fight was more intense. Two women faced each other with a ferocity that completely contrasted with the previous fight. Both were injured, but that didn't stop them. They exchanged blows, dodged by minimal margins, and clung to life with pure desperation. Finally, one of them managed to prevail… but the price was high. Her left arm was severed during the fight, and multiple deep wounds covered her body.
No one came to help her.
She tried to stay on her feet while waiting for the next fight, but before even a minute could pass, her legs gave out. The blood continued to flow uncontrollably, and within moments, her body lay motionless in the arena.
And so the fights continued.
One after another. Without pauses. Without compassion.
Some fights ended in seconds. Others dragged on, becoming brutal duels where both participants seemed like embodiments of pure determination. The pattern was clear: the weak fell quickly. The strong survived… for now.
Eventually, it was Siord's turn.
Her opponent was an athletic woman with visible scars on her arms and face—clear signs of combat experience. Unlike many others, she didn't seem terrified. She stood firm, watching Siord with a calculating gaze, evaluating her before moving.
Siord did the same, but for different reasons. They were looking for Seishan and Ceres. Still, at a glance, they could tell this woman was neither of them.
From the first second, her posture made the difference between them clear. When the start signal was given, the other woman was the first to attack, advancing with speed and launching a cut aimed at the torso.
The attack never landed.
Siord moved with fluidity. A lateral step—precise, minimal—was enough to avoid the attack. Without stopping, she spun on her axis and counterattacked with a speed the woman couldn't follow. The impact landed before she could react.
Her armor held, but her body bent slightly forward, the air escaping her lungs. She tried to retreat, raise her guard, do anything… but it was too late. Siord gave her no space. A second movement, equally precise, and the woman fell.
Everything had ended in a matter of seconds.
The crowd roared again at the level shown by the Legacy.
Immediately, it was Sylvie's turn.
Her opponent was a robust man, with marked muscles and an intimidating presence. He had many scars on his arms and other parts of his body, but they were not deep. Additionally, he seemed confident. He even smiled when he saw her, as if he had already decided the outcome before starting.
The fight began, and the man attacked first, launching himself with brute force using only his fists, seeking to end the fight quickly. His movements were powerful but lacked refinement.
Sylvie decided to wait for him. As her opponent advanced, she recognized that the best thing she could do was end the fight quickly.
This slave was in good condition compared to the others. This could mean he had arrived at the colosseum very recently, or that his Aspect provided him with resistance to physical attacks.
If it was the latter, Sylvie thought he could have perfectly worked as a guard for the King—those types of Aspects are the most common and sought-after for those jobs. She knew this because the same thing happened in the clan.
It would also mean that if he was a slave despite that possibility, it was because he had committed some crime.
Dodging the first attack, Sylvie began to dance. A step back. A spin. A minimal deflection. Each of the man's attacks missed by a hair, passing centimeters from her body.
By the fifth exchange, Sylvie took advantage of one of the man's mistakes.
A clean movement with her sword—almost invisible. There was no explosion of power, no use of essence, no expenditure of Mana. Only precision.
The man stopped dead. For an instant, he seemed not to understand what had happened. Then, his body collapsed to the ground with a wound right at heart level.
Sylvie felt an intense gaze on her back as she returned to her position.
The tournament continued at that brutal pace for hours.
The fights followed one after another without rest. The arena filled with blood, bodies, and echoes of screams that the crowd celebrated as entertainment. Over time, the level of the participants began to rise. The weak were already dead. Only those with real skill, endurance, or some kind of advantage remained.
The fights became longer, more dangerous.
Siord, who until now had dominated without problems, began to face opponents capable of resisting more exchanges. Although she remained superior, some fights left wounds.
Without anyone noticing or drawing attention, Sylvie began to heal only Siord's serious wounds between fights, ensuring she remained in optimal condition, while leaving the superficial ones to avoid raising suspicion. Later, she even began to take damage herself—though minimal in comparison. Still, until none were serious enough, she didn't heal any.
The tournament continued advancing for six hours of uninterrupted combat, where the arena became a field of constant death. When that frenetic rhythm finally began to slow down, only sixteen fighters remained alive.
The rest… dead.
Their bodies lay at the edges of the arena, forming a constant reminder of what it meant to lose. Of what it meant to be weak once in that situation.
It was then that the General stood up from her seat.
The noise of the crowd gradually diminished until it became total silence. All eyes turned toward her as she advanced a few steps, observing the survivors with a mixture of interest.
She smiled slightly.
"You all know the rules of the tournaments," she said, her voice resonating clearly throughout the arena. "I want you to form eight teams of two members each… and the next fights will be group matches."
Sylvie and Siord looked at each other and both nodded.
The first team fight was between two women against a man and another woman. From the start, it was clear that none of the four were going to hold anything back, but neither were they stupid enough to expose themselves thoughtlessly.
The fight was intense from the first second, with constant exchanges of blows, tight dodges, and attacks aimed at clear points, but always with some control. They weren't trying to kill immediately if it meant leaving themselves open; instead, they fought with the intention of wearing each other down while reducing risks.
Even so, that didn't prevent them from taking damage. Cuts, direct hits, and small mistakes began to accumulate over time, and the difference came not from pure technique but from a clear advantage.
The woman on the second team had a healing Aspect, and that completely changed the rhythm of the fight.
Whenever her partner took damage, she stabilized him enough to keep fighting without losing effectiveness. She did the same for herself. While the other team deteriorated with no way to recover, they could remain functional.
They weren't more skilled, but they could endure more, and that was enough. As the minutes passed, the first team began to fall behind—their movements became slower, their mistakes more evident—and when they could no longer keep up, the second team closed out the fight without complications.
The next fight started very similarly. Four combatants, exchanging attacks, trying to control the distance and avoid being at a disadvantage. During the first moments, it seemed like it would be another long fight decided by endurance, but the difference appeared much more clearly this time.
One of the women had an Aspect that allowed her to manipulate the sharpness of the weapons, and that completely broke the balance.
Sylvie noticed this when one of her opponents managed to land a clean attack on her armor. The blow was good—direct and well-executed—but it produced no damage. It left no mark. It was as if the edge had simply ceased to exist at the moment of impact.
In contrast, when she attacked, the difference was immediate. She didn't need exaggerated strength or speed; a simple cut was enough to cause a much deeper wound than normal.
From that moment on, the fight ceased to be balanced.
Her opponents had no real way to defend themselves or replicate that effect, and although they tried to adapt, it wasn't enough. Sylvie watched everything attentively, analyzing every movement, every exchange, and came to a clear conclusion.
'She's dangerous,' she thought without looking away.
The fight ended shortly after, with the other team unable to do much to reverse the situation.
The third fight was completely different from the previous ones.
From the start, it was clear that the four combatants were at a higher level—not only in strength but in experience. There were no unnecessary attacks or impulsive movements. Everything was measured; every action had intention, and no one made serious mistakes.
This caused the fight to extend much longer than the previous ones. Several minutes passed without anyone managing to gain a clear advantage. They struck each other, wounded each other, pushed each other to their limits, but no one fell.
The fight became a test of endurance. Ten minutes, fifteen, twenty. By that point, the four were visibly exhausted—covered in blood, breathing heavily, their bodies at the limit of what they could endure. But they kept fighting. Not because they wanted to, but because there was no other option.
One from the first team fell first, then another from the opposing team. The two remaining could barely stay on their feet, yet they continued exchanging blows until finally, only one remained alive.
The last fight of that round was Sylvie and Siord's, and the difference from the previous ones was evident from the start. Their opponents tried to organize themselves, tried to coordinate and fight like the other teams, but they weren't at the necessary level. It wasn't an even match at any moment.
Sylvie and Siord controlled the situation from the first exchange, neutralizing every attempt by the other team without needing to exert themselves too much. There were no moments of real danger, no situations where they had to react desperately.
It was a short, direct fight.
Neither of them liked killing humans—that was evident—but they couldn't stop either.
While all this was happening, in the royal box, the General was watching the fight with total attention, sitting with her legs crossed, evaluating every movement. The sensation she transmitted was cold and constant.
The fight ended quickly, closer to an execution than a real fight, and shortly after, the semifinals began.
The first semifinal match was between the two teams that had won their first encounters, and the result was not surprising.
The woman with the Aspect that manipulated the sharpness of the weapons once again made the difference, while the healer on the opposing team was the first to fall. Her opponents tried to adapt, but the problem was the same as before. They couldn't defend themselves properly nor generate consistent damage.
The other semifinal was different.
Sylvie and Siord entered the arena ready to fight, but before the match could begin, the situation changed completely.
The woman who had survived the third match—the same one who had won after twenty minutes of fighting—walked toward the center. Her condition was evident. She was at her limit, physically and mentally. She stopped in front of them and smiled slightly while holding her sword for a second… and without saying a word, drove it into her own heart.
Sylvie and Siord were completely shocked. Their eyes widened fully, and a shiver ran through their entire bodies.
They could see the blood beginning to flow from the wound. How her body began to lean forward, while the smile on her tired face began to fade. Finally, what broke them completely was watching the spark in her eyes vanish.
But that wasn't the worst part. The crowd's reaction was.
Instead of silence or respect, the citizens began to boo her. They rejected her, as if what she had just done was an offense rather than a desperate decision.
Sylvie looked up toward the royal box almost by instinct, searching for an answer, and found the General.
She didn't need to hear her. She could read her lips perfectly as she murmured a single word:
"Pathetic."
At that moment, her blood began to boil. The General, as if she had noticed her gaze, turned toward her and held her stare for a second before smiling at her. It wasn't a casual smile—it was intentional.
Sylvie broke eye contact, steadying herself, and refocused on what remained.
The other duo was still alive, and moments later, the trumpet sounded again, signaling that the final was about to begin.