The crowd's screams, the gamblers' shouts, it all echoed above him, a distant storm muffled by the pounding of his own pulse. None of them were his real opponents.
His enemy was already waiting at the center of the arena.
Elioth the Headsman.
Gaël didn't need the announcer to bellow his name to know who stood before him. He knew the moment his eyes fell on him.
A colossus.
Elioth was a mountain of muscle and old scars. His bare chest was a battlefield of half-healed wounds, each one a tale of savage violence and relentless survival. His entire being radiated the brutality of a man forged in pain and blood. Greasy blond hair clung to his sweat-slicked face, falling in thick strands over a cruel, twisted grin.
But that wasn't what made Gaël flinch.
It was the sword in his hand.
A massive straight blade with dull steel glinting in the torchlight. A near-perfect replica of Fenrir.
Gaël didn't need to be told what he already knew. Everything about Elioth, his stance, the slight bend in his knees, the way he shifted his weight in the loose sand, the fingers brushing the guard of his weapon, was imitation.
He was copying Brann.
No. He thought he was Brann.
Gaël clenched his jaw and drew the weapon slung across his back.
A crude slab of unpolished steel, heavy and barely sharpened. Brann had forged it for him himself. It was too heavy, unbalanced, a far cry from a real blade.
Laughter rippled through the stands.
It began as amused whispers, then erupted into mocking jeers. A kid armed with scrap iron, facing a butcher wielding the shadow of a legend? This fight was going to be short.
Elioth raised his sword in a mocking salute, muscles bulging as he grinned like a wolf savoring the kill.
"Hah! What are you gonna do with that lump of metal, boy?" he growled, his voice deep and gravelly, like a whetstone worn to dust.
Gaël didn't answer.
He took a deep breath, trying to calm the frantic pounding in his chest. He had to forget the crowd. Forget the laughter. Forget the fear.
The gong struck. Heavy. Final.
Elioth stomped the ground and lunged forward.
Fast. Far too fast for a man his size.
His blade sliced through the air with a sharp hiss, a brutal arc, perfectly executed, a flawless replica of one of Brann's strikes.
Gaël barely dodged. Steel ripped through the air just inches from his shoulder. He felt the sting of displaced air graze his bare skin, the shockwave slamming into the ground behind him. Sand erupted in a burst of dust.
Elioth followed up instantly, his movements fluid despite their sheer brutality. It was a macabre dance, an illusion carried out with eerie precision. His eyes gleamed with manic exhilaration.
Every motion, every stance, every strike, an imitation. No, a parody of Brann. But where Brann cut with ruthless clarity, Elioth swung with pride.
A vertical slash. Crashing weight. Killing intent. Gaël barely deflected the blow, stepping back again. His body moved faster than thought, dragging the heavy blade in his grip and carving furrows into the sand.
He blocked another strike, but the impact numbed his arms. The man's strength was monstrous.
"What's the matter?" Elioth sneered, pressing into the guard. "Starting to feel the gap?"
Gaël clenched his jaw. Yes. He saw it now. A chasm between them, but not the one Elioth imagined.
"You hit hard," he murmured. "Too hard."
Elioth raised an eyebrow."That supposed to insult me?"
"No. Just... a warning."
Gaël pivoted, his blade cutting a slow arc through the air. Not an attack. A probe.
Elioth dodged, but too soon.
'He's reacting, not because he sees, but because he expects. Predictable... patterned,' Gaël thought.
A flaw. It was there. Subtle. Fleeting. But real.
There was something false in Elioth's movements, like a sour note in a song practiced too well. A choreography with no inner rhythm. Strength without soul.
Yes, he was powerful. His breath didn't falter, and his sheer size was intimidating. But every blow, every step, every swing was just an echo. A copy.
'He's mimicking Brann,' Gaël realized, 'but he doesn't understand him.'
Elioth struck wildly, swinging in every direction as if trying to shatter the air itself. But there was no intention. No purpose. Nothing to sever, nothing real.
Just noise.
And in that instant of realization, Gaël stopped retreating.
Sometimes, watching what doesn't work is just as revealing as a flawless technique. The contrast makes the truth sharper.
He dug his heels into the sand, firmed his grip on the sword's hilt. Something shifted in him, a subtle line crossed, silent and unseen. His gaze hardened. Cold. Steady.
He had endured Brann's onslaughts. Had felt the sting of true Severance. He had honed his body on mute stone, strike after strike, until metal, muscle, and breath no longer needed thought to move.
Now, in this moment, he knew.
The Severance thrummed in his hand, a low, deep pulse rising from within. His fear melted away, forged into the steel of his will.
He no longer saw Elioth as a threat.
Only as a poorly carved obstacle.
Elioth froze.
For a moment, his sneer faltered, just slightly. He squinted, trying to grasp what had changed, but couldn't quite name the feeling that crept up his spine.
He stepped back, involuntarily cautious, one eyebrow raised.
"Oh?" he said, his smile tight and forced. "Finally decided to fight, kid?"
Gaël didn't answer right away. His gaze fell on Elioth like a sheathed blade, silent, unreadable, but full of promise.
Then he spoke. Calm. Sharp.
"I'm not here to pretend I'm Brann."
He stepped forward. Lightly. Deliberately.
"And neither are you."
A shiver ran through the air, silencing the murmurs of the crowd.
Elioth laughed, hollow and forced. He tried to mask his unease behind a veil of arrogance.
"You think you've figured it all out, huh?" he muttered. "Think this is your big moment?"
Gaël didn't respond.
He took a deep breath, and struck.
Not with the surgical precision of a master, nor the raw fury of a berserker. No.
He struck as Gaël.
A clean blow. No frills. A strike forged by a body honed on the stone of a broken world, and a mind that had heard the call of the Severance.
His blade met Elioth's with a ringing clash of steel. For the first time, the colossus lost ground.
Elioth grunted, forced to shift his footing mid-swing, not because of the blow's strength, but because of its clarity. But Gaël didn't give him time to find his rhythm. A second strike followed. Then a third.
Each impact rang through the arena like a tolling bell.
The crowd's laughter died.
A new rhythm emerged.
Not the rhythm of a fight for spectacle, but of a battle where someone was learning to choose what must be cut.
Frustrated, Elioth broke the exchange and leapt back. He was panting now, his bulging arms trembling slightly under the strain.
"Hah... ha..." he panted, licking his lips. "Not bad, kid. Really."
But his gaze had darkened. Something inside him, a certainty he had clung to, had cracked.
"Then let's see how you handle this!"
With a bitter grin, he shifted stances.
This time, blade raised, elbow tucked, eyes locked forward.
Gaël blinked. 'Again? Another shadow. Another imitation. That stance...'
He had never seen it before, not exactly, but he recognized the source. Even if it was hollow.
There was no intention.
Only pretense.
Gaël tightened his grip, anchoring his feet in the sand as one would carve truth into stone. His breath slowed. His heart beat, not with fear, but with the anticipation of the coming cut.
"Come on," he whispered.
Elioth roared and charged.
A thunderous dash. A flawless arc. A strike meant to crush the world beneath it.
But Gaël didn't move.
He watched.
He didn't see the blade.
He saw the flaws.
The tiny twitch in the shoulder. The unbalanced momentum. The lack of intent, replaced by a need to impress.
And in that suspended moment...
Gaël pivoted.
Slightly. Naturally. His body moved before he even told it to.
And he cut.
A simple motion. No flash. No fury.
But perfect.
Steel met steel with a crisp, clean crack, devoid of flair. Elioth staggered. His body faltered under the blow, but it wasn't the force that struck him.
It was the judgment behind it.
Shock spread across his face. He didn't understand. He hadn't been overpowered by raw strength. He hadn't been crushed by a mightier swing.
Gaël's voice, low, almost gentle, echoed like a verdict.
"You try to hit hard. I aim to hit true."
"No! Impossible..." Elioth growled, stepping back, his blade trembling in his grasp.
Gaël took a step forward.
Elioth flinched, recoiling by instinct. His stance was gone, replaced by something primal. Animal.
The arena fell silent.
Even those who had bet on the colossus went still. Something had shifted. Gaël was no longer just a fighter. Not just a young warrior trying to prove himself.
He was walking a path they feared to understand. They could feel the shadow of the Severance, even if they couldn't see its edge.
A shiver crawled across Elioth's skin.
He felt it.
Instinct screamed: he was no longer the hunter.
He had become the prey.
And Gaël… was the blade deciding his fate.
But then, in the abyss of that reversal, a flicker of madness lit up Elioth's eyes. Something broke in him, or maybe… something opened.
He smiled.
A smile of ecstasy.
And suddenly, he let go of his weapon.
Steel dropped into the sand with a dull, unreal thud, stirring a puff of dust. The moment froze, unbelievable. Unreal.
In one fluid, terrifying motion… Elioth dropped to his knees.
He spread his arms wide, and offered his throat.
"The blade that cuts me… will be that of a Brother of Fenrir..."
His voice trembled with a wild mix of devotion and delirium. His eyes, wide and unblinking, gleamed with a light that was almost religious.
"What better end… than to fall beneath the Severance of a Brother?!"
The silence in the arena grew heavy. Grave. Like a temple desecrated by truth.
Gaël felt his breath catch.
He had won.
But this wasn't a triumph.
Elioth was still smiling, arms spread, neck offered like a sacrifice.
"Don't hesitate, boy!" he cried out, elated. "You're walking the right path!" He inhaled sharply, trembling. "Carve your way in my blood..."
Then he closed his eyes.
"I will be your baptism."