Chapter 21: Final Matches

-Ashton, Lacour Castle battle arena

The arena was quiet and still as the first rays of dawn trickled in the windows. Late night carousing kept people from being in here this early and the first matches of the day wouldn't be until late morning. Due to that, the few guards that were in here didn't mind him being in the arena itself for some practice. And even of them, no one was watching. That meant it didn't matter if he kept failing.

Maybe you should just give up on that, Gyoro said after a few times.

"Well I don't plan on using it today," Ashton said. "But I don't want to give up on it fully either. Sword Dance is what Elurian heraldic knights are famous for and it's disgraceful if one can't use it. Although... maybe if the ghosts of my kingdom won't forgive me, I won't be able to. But father said it had to be done so I should be able to, I think. I hope so."

I don't think it's that,Ururun said. I haven't felt any hateful spirits whose hate was directed at you. 'cept Gyoro, and that's cause he's a grumpy grump. Besides, since it is a loyalty-based heraldic move, it ought to do something nasty to disloyal knights that use it. Like make them chop off their own heads, or brand them with something really embarrassing like a tattoo of a monkey butt on their forehead. You just freeze up, so I think it's just something in your head that makes you not let yourself use it.

"I don't remember it having any measures like that," Ashton said. "Maybe I didn't hear of it. And I hope it's not because I have a part wrong; I don't think there's anyone I could learn from now."

Gyoro grumbled. That's why I think you should give up on it; you're worrying too much. Let's just kick *** and be done with it.

But he'd be awesome if he could! And that would make us awesome because we're with him.

You do have a point there. Okay, let's figure this out together!

"Oh now you want to be cooperative," Ashton said sarcastically, although smiling. "Sure, let me run through this again."

Since he's paying attention, go through each of the four parts you have, and then we'll see about making the transitions work. I mean, we're not used to a human body, but heraldic stuff is easy.

While he was following Ururun's suggestion, someone else came into the arena. "Good morning, Ashton," Claude said.

He paused a moment. "Good morning Claude. Thinking about practicing too?" He finished off the step, then put his swords down.

"Yeah," he said. "If the step up from yesterday is any clue, there could be some tough fights ahead. Especially if I get to the finals as it'll probably be Dias."

"I'd say that's almost certain," Ashton said. "You're doing well. Any plans for if you do have to fight him?"

"Try not to get hit the first half-minute?" he said, rubbing his forehead. "His Air Slash is far faster than mine, so I think I need to close the distance quickly. But then I also need to try dragging the fight out. He's used to very short battles, so if I can block him a few times, it might get easier."

"I think you could also take advantage of his habit of resheathing after attacks," Ashton suggested. "Strike when he doesn't have his sword out, or even force him to keep it out to throw off his normal pace. You're more used to changing when you need to."

Claude nodded. "I think it would be interesting to see how he deals with an unexpected style change. Although, it'd be far safer to see it when I'm not the one fighting him." After a short chuckle, he said, "Mind sparring with me? The only duel-wielding monsters I've seen are those teleporting ant queens, but they are nasty to deal with."

"Sure." He didn't try any of his special moves, and Claude did the same as neither of them were trying to win the practice spar. But it was a nice chance to talk.

Several hours later, Ashton was back in the arena, but the atmosphere was drastically different. It was back to the noise, excitement, anticipation, and pride that made up this showcase of battle skills. And the person he looked at entering the arena wasn't someone he was familiar with, might not be someone he'd talk to normally. He wore full body armor in the colors and style of the Lacourian military, save for large portions of it converted to chain mail rather than plate armor in an attempt to lighten the weight and allow better movement. Like Ashton, he had two blades. Because of those clues, he knew even before the announcer said just who this would be.

"Heeeeere we have the final match for the dazzling and demanding class of Heraldic Weapons, something that is sure to be astounding. Already amazing is that we have a close match to the final battle from last year's tournament, between two heraldic knights of different nations! On the west end, we have the son of last year's Heraldic Weapons champion, Sir Ashton Anchors of Eluria, who has confounded his foes with the power and grace of a dragon! On the east end, we have our own heraldic knight who made it to the finals last year, Sir Matthias Kierkegaard, who is known for having the power and speed of lightning! Who will come out on top in this clash of sword and sorcery?"

We need to show him why it's a ****ing bad idea to face an dragon in metal armor, Gyoro said, grinning.

Aw, but then I won't get to have fun, Ururun said, dropping his head.

"No, I think working with the two of you will be better than working with one here," Ashton said quietly. Then the buzzer sounded and the match began.

Matthias made a yellow flicker appear around one of his swords. Having seen him fight, Ashton knew it was a bad sign. This knight would be too fast and nimble to make adequate use of Dead Triangle with, since he'd just be able to get out of its damage circle. And unless he got caught in an elaborate move, Northern Cross would be too slow as well. Because of that, he called up Leaf Slash to get across the arena quickly.

And just in time, as Matthias let loose a giant horizontal bolt of lighting at the spot he'd been standing in. Ashton got a free hit in, but Matthias quickly turned and began sparring with him. It had been a few months since he'd properly fought someone else who duel-wielded and this knight was skilled. While he got hit a few times, his armor absorbed the blows and his opponent was taking the same beating. After a minute, both of them moved back to reassess the situation.

Ashton took the moment to think to his companions. Okay, I want you two to use your breath attacks against him, when the moment's right.

Okay, but is mine gonna do anything significant? Ururun asked.

Who knows? Gyoro said. But it'd be far more uncomfortable for him to be hit with both at once.

Matthias then took a very familiar stance, then launched into Sword Dance. Knowing how the move went, Ashton dashed out of the way before he tried lunging forward as part of the move. In doing so, he saw what was wrong: Matthias wasn't using heraldic energy to do this. He was merely imitating the form. Ashton attacked him at an opportune moment when he was trying to do a turning move, then thought, Okay, now!

The two dragons were already inhaling great energy. A second later, they blasted the other knight with twin streams of energy. It wasn't nearly as large of an attack as what they'd done to Ashton back in Salva Drift. But it was still effective; in the middle of the attack, there was a crack as something about his armor failed. The chain mail shirt fell off him completely, partly melted and partly shattered. But that wasn't the end of the attack. They ended up toasting the undergarments and belt Matthias was wearing. The attack ended with the other knight not wearing much at all besides some burns and frostbites.

Howling with laughter, the audience loved it. Down on the arena floor, Ashton could see how embarrassed Matthias was. But his honor was such that he wasn't going to give up, not while he was still on his feet. Ashton humored him for a moment by letting him step out of the leg armor before meeting him in a clash of blades again. Since he didn't want to kill him aw phooey, I wanted to eat him,it was harder to fight him this way. But once his burns started bleeding and he began to look tired, Ashton ended the fight by striking him low with the flat edge of one of his blades, knocking him down.

"Amazing match, wasn't it folks?" the announcer called. "And our winner for the heraldic weapons bracket is Sir Ashton Anchors! I guess it's true that there are no equals to the Elurian heraldic knights even in our powerful kingdom."

Ashton might have felt flattered by that, if it didn't make him think of his fallen comrades and family. "Can you make it to the infirmary on your own?" he asked Matthias.

The Lacourian knight was getting back to his feet, determined to ignore the audience due to the state he was in. "As long as I can get to the door here, I don't care if they carry me the rest of the way," he said. "I can do that much. Good match." He offered a handshake, which Ashton accepted. Then they parted and walked back to their opposing entrances.

See, told you we didn't need some fancy-smancy heritage move Gyoro said.

I dunno, what we did was pretty fancy, Ururun countered.

"I'm still going to master it some day," Ashton said.

-Opera, Lacour Castle

"They're sure making a killing off this event," Opera mumbled to herself. It was noon on the last day and as usual, there were a number of vendors, mostly food and drink related, in a couple of long halls around the arena. They weren't allowed in the hall just outside the seating area, but in the straight halls around it? There wasn't an empty space against the walls, as if the usual city market had been moved in here for these three days. However, the prices were slightly higher than before.

There were no fights going on at the moment, as they had gone on break for lunch. At the moment, she was looking for something to eat so she could go back to the spot where their group had arranged to meet up. But then Opera had gotten distracted in asking a few questions of people. It seemed the vendors were required to pay a booth fee that was higher than the marketplace fee, but most felt it was worth it. Not only that, but a few vendors were directly from the castle, giving their profits to the Lacour government. People grumbled about taxes, but it didn't seem much of a burden (although most noted that the Lacour military took a big cut of it). It was all interesting information towards building a socioeconomic and political picture of this planet. But then, not much help in getting back to her friends with lunch.

Another thing that wasn't much help was that even though a lot of people were here, Ernest wasn't one of them. Opera thought there might be a chance he'd come. Although he wasn't the kind of guy who'd go out to watch a fighting tournament, he might come for the same reason she liked being here, seeing a special event in a completely unstudied civilization. He should be pretty obvious. Blond hair like both of them had was unusual, as this world favored blues and greens in hair coloration (not to mention the dead-giveaway eyes). Also like her, his 'average for Tetragenes' height should stand out too. But, no sign of him here either. Where was he? Hopefully he hadn't already left Expel when both she and Claude were stuck.

"Oh my goodness!" someone squealed near her. Opera paused and looked over in time to see a young woman with a long brown pigtails bound over to her. For some strange reason, she had a cloth hand on a large stick attached to her back. "M'am, sorry, but that bracelet you have, is it really...?" Her attention was glued to the little golden bracelet on Opera's wrist.

Wait... "I still have it on?" she asked. "I thought I'd given it back. Sorry, but I borrowed it from a friend and I really should return it to her."

"It's Mischief, isn't it?" the young woman said, barely heeding what Opera was saying. "Wow, I thought I'd never see one in person! This is so amazingly rare, you know?"

"Is it?" She gently pulled her hand away. "I'm sorry, but I'm not able to sell it."

She quickly waved her hands in front of her face. "No, no, I wouldn't dream of it! Serious! But, I was thinking... oh, I should tell you who I am, huh?" She smiled. "Hi, I'm Welch! I'm a creator... not wait, an inventor of things. That's right, almost go carried away, hah ha." She rubbed her head. "Nice to meet you."

She nodded. "Nice to meet you too. I'm Opera. And as I was saying, this actually belongs to a friend. She asked me to hold onto it for an experiment and I should give it back." It had been an interesting experiment. Just like with Rena, items would appear without warning in her bag: herbs, those poison checks, this planet's money, even small pieces of gold and silver. But strangest of all, one time she found a coin from Tetragenes that she knew hadn't been in there. She left much of that money back on her home planet and in spending around three months on this planet, surely she would have noticed it. That coin spooked her; she had intended to return the bracelet right away, so that she wouldn't accidentally pull another and have to explain it to the natives.

"Because it pulls items to you without your notice, right?" Welch asked, tilting her head in a cute way.

"Yes, exactly that," Opera said. "What do you know about it?"

"I know that no matter how good I get at making things, I might go a lifetime without ever making that," she said. "It's a really really rare result of... well, a result, you know? And really rare. But actually, as it is now, it's incomplete."

"Is it?" she asked, glancing at it. "I have noticed that there's space for more beads."

Welch nodded. "Right. A complete version would have a totally different name, not Mischief. Aw man, I can tell how to work with it, to put it closer to its final form... do I have the gear to do it all with, though? I really want to work on it, it would be a once-in-a-lifetime creation! Even if it's already created and just needs modifications to give it a better item pool..." She rubbed her chin.

"Then it's supposed to give you random things?" Opera asked. "Why?"

"Of course it is," Welch said, waving a hand while trying to explain. "And it... it just does, you know? It's a prayer to Lady Luck, so to speak, but done up real careful like so it doesn't give you bad stuff. May I work on it, please? I mean, if you're late in giving it back to your friend, why not give it back in a better form? I won't even charge for it, promise! The experience of handling it is worth the material cost."

"How much time would it take?" Opera asked. "Because we might be leaving the continent after the tournament."

"I can have it done in a couple of hours," she said, then pulled the hand on a stick off her back. "Here, you can take this for collateral! It's one of my favorite things, plus I can find it and thus you when I'm done. I'm almost never parted from my handy hand on a stick, but I really want to work with that Mischief."

The... handy hand on a stick? A bizarre thing. But then, forward thinkers and inventors like Precis and Welch here were often eccentric compared to the people around them. Opera smiled and nodded. "All right then, Miss Welch, you have a deal. I hope she'll like it." She took off the Mischief and handed it over in exchange for the handy hand on a stick.

Now she really needed to get going. Opera looked around, eventually picking a vendor that didn't have a long line and seemed to have a palatable menu. That got her a very basic meal of a meat-like sausage in a bread bun with some kind of chunky sauce and melted cheese on it, a local root vegetable cut up and deep fried, and a sweet drink. Yes, even the basics of hot dog, fries, and soda could be found on many planets. Not surprising as they were simple things, but good just about anywhere.

The rest of her friends were already gathered. Bowman and Nineh had joined them, as well as Dias (surprisingly). "Ah, what took you so long?" Rena said with a smile. "We were about to send somebody out to look for you."

"I just don't know how the time flies sometimes," she said jokingly, sitting down with them. "All I did was ask people some questions and all of a sudden, it's halfway through the lunch break. Sorry to have worried you."

"At least you made it," she said. "But what's with the extra hand? Get a third hand to go with your third eye?"

Fortunately, Opera hadn't started eating yet, so it was safe for her to burst out laughing at that. "Sometimes I honestly think I could use one," she replied. "But no, it's... for a secret." She winked, then picked up the hot dog to eat. The sauce wasn't what she expected, but it was really delicious.

Some of the others were already done, like Dias and Bowman. The older man pulled two boxes out of the large pack he was using to sit against. "Hey honey, want to make some music?" he asked playfully.

"I'm still eating," Nineh said, shaking her head.

"Aw, I was hoping for a musical break," Bowman said in mock disappointment. "Guess I'll have to play on my own then. What do you want to hear: banjo or guitar?"

"Whichever," Nineh said, grinning in a mischievous way.

"Are you gonna complain about whichever one I choose?" he asked, laughing a little.

Rena brightened. "Dias can play the guitar," she said.

"Really?" Bowman asked in surprise, looking over at him.

"I haven't in some time," Dias said, sounding disinterested even if he was looking right at the guitar case. "Had to sell mine off a year back."

Bowman ignored the tone and opened up the guitar case, handing the instrument to Dias. "Well here, you can play with me then. What songs do you remember?"

While he took it a bit reluctantly, Dias didn't refuse and even checked the strings to see how they were tuned. "Some? I would play at church services or holidays."

"Opera!" Precis closed a notebook and got on her feet to go sit by her. "Hey, I've got a great idea for Bobot! Remember that guy in the heavy arms matches who had the huge drills for weapons? Well he pitched them in the hall, thinking they were junk, and the weapon store owner didn't even go over to claim them. So I got 'em and showed 'em to Bobot, and he could use them, and I think, after seeing what he did, that I can make a ridey-diggy moley module!"

"Say what?" Opera said, setting her hot dog down to look in Precis' notebook at her sketches. On the ride up here, she had been pestering Claude, so he pointed out that Opera knew about machines too. As it turned out, she knew more about machinery than he did. Along with her experience in skipping around their extraterrestrial origins and advanced technology, Opera was much better suited to talk with Precis about machines.

"See?" she said, pointing out several features. "Dig like a mole and pop out to drill enemies! It'd be awesome if I can adapt the drills and probably some armor to Bobot so he can help me fight like that."

And what she was doing was extraordinary. The machines her family had from what seemed to be a wrecked starship were centuries ahead in technology. Such as Bobot: Opera believed he was a remote planetary scout from a research vessel. People on Expel shouldn't be capable of understanding him, but somehow Precis and her family had reverse-engineered that technology to create their own devices. Or in this case, upgrades and even programming to space age technology.

The Underdeveloped Planetary Protection Pact prevented Opera from teaching Precis. Although, she would love to bring the girl back to her university. Even if she'd have an immense gap to catch up on, Opera felt that Precis would be capable of being an amazing student there. But the pact didn't prevent her from looking over Precis' work and asking subtle questions, to make her think and notice problems that jumped out at Opera immediately.

Perhaps a case could be argued that, between the previous accident and the mysterious Sorcery Globe (if it turned out to be the right kind of OoPA), Expel already had a connection with space-age civilizations and contact could be made with them. But if Opera was going to try something like that, it would be a massive help to have Ernest figuring out the evidence and arguments too. Maybe even Claude, if he could use his connection to his father to get the Earth Federation to be lenient in this one instance.

-Dias, arena hallway

Today was a notable one. Not because of the tournament; the semifinal match had been a disappointment too. The final match was coming up, himself against Claude, but it didn't matter to Dias for once whether he won or lost. That was strange enough, but it was more than that. If he'd end up meeting the King of Lacour, the day still wouldn't be any more notable than it already was. Royal status didn't mean much to him. After all, a king was not all powerful and could not defend everyone. No... today was notable because for the first time since his family had died, he'd felt happy.

And it wasn't even a big thing. During lunch, Bowman had roped him into playing a few songs with him to pass the time before the tournament started up again. He had fumbled a bit and some of the songs Bowman suggested Dias didn't know. They'd even made him sing, but... no, they hadn't made him. Playing music again had sparked a bit of happiness again and when Ashton had asked for a song of praise to the gods, Dias just started singing along with Bowman (and eventually most of their group) because it felt right.

He thought he'd never sing that song again. After all, since he'd been left alone so cruelly, he thought the gods had forgotten him and didn't deserve his praise. Yet in that time, with mediocre singing and average playing, Dias had felt like he was a part of the whole group, not just an outsider who was only there because of one of them. Those strange people, it felt like they were all his friends too, no matter how he'd given them the cold shoulder before. He thought that if he had a friend again, he'd desperately want to get out of it so that he wasn't hurt when the friend died. But although the fear lingered, he wanted more to ignore it. He had mastered his father's style; could he learn another to better protect and help these new friends? The best way to know would to simply go with them, if they'd have him.

"It's time," the Lacourian knight on guard said. Dias nodded and entered the arena. The way the light of this time of day fell into the arena, it seemed as though the air was glowing. As the roar of the crowd swelled around him, he shut it out to focus on the battle.

"And now, we have the match you've all been waiting for, the grand finale of the Tournament of Arms, the Swordsmanship finals match! This year, we have two new and exciting challengers to the tournament facing off in a battle of skills and strength. On one hand, we have Claude Kenni from Arlia in Cross who has skillfully made his way through many tough battles to become a darling of the arena crowd. On the other hand, we have Dias Flac, also from Arlia in Cross, who has utterly dominated all of his matches by completely overwhelming his opponents in seconds. Who will come out as the last winner of the day in a hometown rivalry? We'll just have to watch and see."

Truth be told, Claude didn't look as intimidating as others in the tournament. He actually seemed like a simple man, not one who'd be mistaken for the legendary Warrior of Light. His chain mail armor had no family coat of arms, the buckler on his arm was simple in design, the sword he had was nothing fancy. Then again, Dias had seen some impressive looking warriors who turned out to only look impressive, much like other things he'd seen in Lacour. This nation sure knew how to look strong, but its capabilities were starting to lack.

The bullhorn starting the match sounded. Claude immediately used Air Slash, so Dias countered with his faster moving variant; the two waves of bladed air met on Claude's end of the arena, canceling each other out. In the meantime, Claude used a second special move in order to leap clear across the arena faster than he should have; heraldic energy was good for that. Dias sidestepped out of the way, then drew his sword to slam the blunt side of the sword into his chest.

And Claude blocked the strike entirely. Since that parry wasn't one quick burst of strength like his strike, the blond swordsman was even able to shove Dias back a step when his move should have ended. That was something that Dias hadn't encountered for a long time. The last person who could parry him had been his father during training matches. Because of that, this was already a more challenging match than any other in this showy tournament, certainly more than his match against Zand.

So Dias did something he rarely did: he didn't resheath his sword. Instead, he blocked a few times as Claude took the initiative to attack again. His attacks were simple, aside from the special move (and as far as special moves went, those were simple). But there was true strength behind them, enough that it felt entirely possible that he could lose in one wrong move. Once Claude's attacks began to relent, Dias infused his sword with the chaotic energy of battle and struck hard at his head. That knocked him to the ground, long enough for the bullhorn to go off to end the match.

The announcer went on blathering something about a furiously fast and furious battle, but Dias hardly heard himself being announced as the champion of Swordsmanship. Claude had sat back up, but something didn't seem right. There wasn't any blood visible, expected because he hadn't been using the sharp edge. Still, his eyes didn't focus right and he seemed to be having trouble sitting straight. "Fof zua tii xjev vsadl jov ni?" he asked as he unsteadily got back on his feet. "Us xjev xet vjev?"

Definitely something wrong with him. "You'd better go to the infirmary," Dias said. But when Claude just gave him a puzzled look, Dias waved him to follow and led him out of the arena. He had to help him the last few feet, and then Claude collapsed unconscious in the hallway. When the knight on guard came over, Dias said, "Would you take him to the infirmary? I'm going to get some extra help for him."

"Will do," the knight said. Dias nodded and headed off to where he knew their friends had been sitting at for much of the tournament. Bowman was good, but for this, perhaps Rena's powers would be necessary.

In the stands, there was much excited talking and carousing. Everyone was waiting for the crew to clear up the stadium floor for the awards ceremony. A few people noticed him as he made his way down and tried to call for his attention. Ignoring them, he found Rena and the others right by the shielding wall. As they were friends of participants, they got this choice seating area.

Rena was currently talking to Ashton while searching in her purse. "I hope he does listen," she said, taking out a folded paper, checking it, then handing it to him. "Or try to ask him for a meeting with all of us to get a ship to the continent."

"Certainly."

"Rena," Dias said, coming up behind their bench.

The group looked back in surprise. "Oh Dias," she said, startled. "Aren't you supposed to be waiting for...?"

"There's something more important," he said, cutting her off. Time shouldn't be wasted here. "Claude may have walked out of there, but he couldn't talk or walk straight; I thought he could make it to the infirmary if I walked with him, but he's unconscious now. You should go down there and help out."

That got her concerned. "Really? Oh, sure, um, where is it?" She grabbed her things and got out of her seat, climbing over the bench to follow him.

It was enough of a concern that the three others came along as well (although Ashton probably would have come regardless because of the awards ceremony). Down in the infirmary, they found Bowman and Nineh at Claude's bed, wrapping an ice pace behind his left ear where Dias had struck him. His chain mail cap was by the bed; parts of the links were crushed from the blow and even had some blood and hair in it. It just hadn't bled heavily enough to be immediately noticed. Also, where Claude had been getting tanned lately due to practicing outside the city, the skin around his face seemed pale now.

"How is he?" Rena asked, going over to the bed and clutching her pendant.

"He took a hard blow to the head," Bowman said. "It makes it hard to do much to help him. Sometimes patients recover on their own, but sometimes it's eventually fatal." Opera then said something weird, to which even Bowman seemed puzzled. "What about concus?"

"Oh, never mind," she said, putting a hand on her neck. "Something I heard of."

Rena had already tried casting her healing spell once. "Can you recover someone from that?" Bowman asked.

"Um, I have before," she said, closing her eyes and now putting her hand over Claude's head. "It's, um... this feel worse... I should be able..." She cast again, the faint sparkles of heraldry falling from her hand.

Since that was taken care of, Dias turned to Ashton. "We should get going."

"Right," Ashton said, although he seemed worried about Claude still. "I hope you can save him."

If anyone could, Rena was the one. Dias didn't worry himself about it and instead went back to the arena. He hadn't planned on coming. After all, with the poor showing the regular shops and the rest of the fighters had put on, it was a slight embarrassment to accept the award for winning. Plus all the crowds and the people; he'd rather get out of here before he might get swarmed with attention. But that happiness from lunch made him change his mind. He wasn't sure if they'd all accept him, but Rena at least would convince the others to let him stay. Dias didn't know what his next purpose in life could be, but maybe if he stuck around these people long enough, he might find something.

The Lacour military brought out trumpets and drums for the awards ceremony, with flag-bearers in the back and some pretty girls around to hand out trophies and reward money. There were seven champions there for all seven categories. Keeping the royal favorite of Swordsmanship for last, Ashton got called up fourth to accept his award and a handshake from the king. The two of them spoke briefly, unheard by even Dias with the noise of the crowd around them. Strangely, he didn't see the letter from the Cross king pulled out.

Ashton looked nervous when he came back, holding onto a medal for winning his category and a pouch of fol. When Dias raised an eyebrow at him, Ashton rubbed his head; Ururun poked at the hand. "He said he wants to talk to me later this evening, as a representative of Eluria," he said quickly. "I wasn't trained for political negotiations."

"You're likely the only possible representative," Dias replied. Ashton had some rank as a knight, but others who had fled from Eluria had no rank at all, and thus little weight in representing the fallen country.

"True," he admitted. "And, there's something else going on that's making them cut this short. I think it's trouble."

They were going through the awards rather quickly, Dias thought. Other than Ashton, the king had only said a few words to the other champions. More proof came when, without warning, a cannon boomed in the distance. The crowd quieted briefly, but most soon decided it must be no big deal. "And finally, we have the winner of the Swordsmanship division!" the announcer said. "He has put on a display of absolute mastery at a young age, as only the final match gave him any difficulty. Please give a round of applause for Dias Flac!"

Dias walked up to the King of Lacour, looking him in the eyes without worrying about decorum. He wasn't much older than Dias' father would be, but his hair was completely white and his face showed wrinkles of worry and age. They also showed a few old scars. Apparently, the king had been quite a fighter in his youth, even participating in the tournament under an alternate identity. Probably swordsmanship, given how he favored it now.

"Congratulations, young master Flac," the king said, offering his hand.

He shook it, but asked quietly, "What the hell is going on out there? If it was meant for this, it would have been timed better."

The king narrowed his eyes for a second, but then relented. "The front line on the northern fort has fallen," he admitted quietly. "A few monsters from Eluria are trying to breach the city walls. You'll hear it in a few minutes, when the announcer warns people not to leave the city."

So, the war against the invaders of Eluria was growing more serious.

Since I did the Linga events before the tournament, I had to bump up the monster invasion to this point. Normally you'd go to Linga, then return to the castle and find the town near empty as everyone evacuated to the castle. It's spooky for a bit with the change in music and all, but the sense of danger doesn't really stick round. The monsters on the world map are the same as before and you can still wander around to do PAs in other towns.

And we have Welch! It's been a while since I saw her in SO3, and I don't have the PSP version of SO2, so my apologies if she isn't quite right. But she was one of the characters I really liked from SO3.

Also, Claude's weird lines here aren't just nonsense.