The rapid fire clashing of blades was a cacophony to the ears of the mages present, but a veritable symphony to the swordmasters observing. Sweat streamed off the two lone combatants, locked in a duel under the mid-day sun in which neither had been able to get the upper hand. One was a near perfect balance of technical precision, speed, and power. The other was far less powerful and slightly less precise, but held a clear advantage in speed to offset those disadvantages.
"How long have they been going at it like that?" asked Roberto, walking up and joining the crowd of spectators.
"All out like that? About 15-20 minutes I'd guess. About an hour all total," answered Chrodechild, her eyes never leaving the action. Asad nodded in agreement next to her.
Roberto whistled appreciatively at the endurance on display. "Who's winning?"
Meruvis shrugged. "Neither, really. They're too familiar with each other, they are able to anticipate what the other will do and counter practically on instinct."
"Think she can take him this time, Meruvis?" asked Liu.
"Only if she can show him something unexpected. She's faster, but that advantage is lost because he can predict her moves."
"So they'll just go on like this all day?" asked Erin.
"No," replied Chrodechild, "his physical strength will wear her down. The longer the duel lasts, the more it is to his advantage. What I cannot decide, however, is how much he is holding back."
"You mean like going easy on her?" questioned Liu. "It doesn't look like it to me. He's fighting with a lot of intensity."
Meruvis chuckled knowingly. "One does not need to back off on the intensity in order to be holding back."
"What do you mean?" asked Roberto, interested in the older man's insight.
"Think back on your training, Roberto," his mentor answered. "When there is a significant difference in experience between opponents in a sparring match, the more experienced warrior limits their repertoire in order to make the spar more equitable."
Erin frowned. "So she really isn't doing as well as it appears?"
Chrodechild shook her head. "He is going all out in terms of effort. So she has nothing to be ashamed about, she is holding her own against a formidable opponent. But if the situation was not friendly he would be using greater varieties of styles to break her down. He is a brilliant tactician."
"What do you think, Jale? You know them better than anyone," remarked Meruvis.
Jale grinned slightly. "He's torn. He wants her to win, but he doesn't want her to win." The others looked at him questioningly.
"Don't get me wrong, he's not going to give her anything. If she wins it'll be because she earned it. You know how competitive he is. He's trying to win even if he's scaled back his arsenal of moves. But at the same time, he wants her to be good enough to beat him when he's trying to win. I think it's a teacher/student pride thing, like my mom being so proud of me when I finally won a duel against her after so many years of losing." The others nodded in understanding, and a silence crept back in as the attention returned to the action.
Barely avoiding a stab after being knocked off balance, Marica scowled. Her muscles were on fire, and fatigue was causing her to get sloppy.
"What's the matter?" mocked Fret. "You seem to be getting a little frustrated."
"Stop toying with me!"
Cocking his head questioningly, he asked, "What makes you think I'm toying with you?"
"Because there's no way I should've lasted this long against you!"
Fret shook his head. "Huh… you even considered that maybe if you weren't so darn predictable I wouldn't have lasted this long against you?"
"Yeah, whatever…" she groused.
"Seriously… there have been several times when the only reason I blocked or avoided your attack was because I knew what you were going to do before you did it. You're a heck of a lot faster than me."
"Well, at this point I'm just exhausted. Can we call it quits for the day?"
Fret grinned mischievously at her. "No way, one of us is going to have to win to end this. And if I beat you I'm going to come up with something really obnoxious to make you do as my reward, so you'd better figure out a way to take me down."
Marica scowled again in frustration. She could only imagine what he'd come up with.
"Boooo!" shouted Jale mockingly. "We want action!"
"As you wish, my lord!" replied Fret sarcastically. Twirling his knives in his hands, he feigned a low slash at Marica's legs. When she moved to parry he flipped over her to land behind her, slashing back and catching her in the side while she was turning to face him. The blow didn't penetrate her armor, but served notice that he could penetrate her defenses.
Marica dropped back into a stance that afforded her better counterattacking chances at the expense of limiting her ability to initiate her own offense. Fret smiled slightly before forcing his expression back to neutral, recognizing the stance. It wasn't one he taught her, she had learned it from Chrodechild. He knew that because he'd seen the Blades of Night's Veil commander use it on multiple occasions, and had seen Roberto use it as well. Unbeknownst to them, Chrodechild smiled as well when she saw Marica take up the stance. Fret launched a flurry of stab thrusts to probe her defenses, looking for an opening while being careful to watch for a counter. What he didn't expect was Marica catching one of his knives, trapping it between her own pair of knives. With a sudden twist she wrenched the knife from his hand. Before he could get past the shock of being disarmed, he felt a searing pain between his legs after Marica stepped forward and kicked him hard in the crotch. A string of expletives escaped his lips as he forced himself to roll away into a purely defensive stance while he tried to catch his breath.
"Think that qualifies as 'showing him something unexpected', Meruvis?" asked Liu, cackling with laughter.
"I would say so," agreed Meruvis, chuckling along with the others at Fret's expense.
Fret growled, feeling slightly nauseous from the man pain. "Dammit… I guess someone wasn't wanting any tonight…" he grumbled.
"Oh, suck it up you big baby!" she taunted mercilessly. "It's not like I've never racked you before!" "I guess it's been a few years though," she thought to herself.
Throwing his remaining knife aside, Fret unsheathed his two scale swords and glared at Marica. Her eyes grew wide at the sight of his menacing expression, and she felt slightly intimidated knowing that he wasn't going to be taking it easy on her anymore. She quickly drew her pair of ruby daggers, needing the extra blade length over her knives against Fret's swords. She knew the odds were stacked way against her.
He attacked aggressively, his blades crashing down on hers and driving her back. Under the relentless assault, it was all she could do to avoid being overwhelmed. She parried what she could and dodged as much as possible. In the course of trying to desperately stave off Fret's onslaught, something subconsciously clicked in her mind. It started subtly, with a heightened awareness that made her feel like her reaction time sped up. She began to get counters of her own in here and there, forcing him to expend at least some energy on defense.
Ducking a chop from his right blade, she used both of her daggers to knock his left blade in towards his body. Before he could square up his torso, she spun and executed a turn back kick to his exposed left side that caused him to stumble sideways and lose his balance. Reacting instinctively, she took advantage of the distance from him gained by the kick and unleashed a spear torrent that caught Fret completely off guard. The heavy water attack blasted him off his feet and left him lying on the ground groaning in pain.
"Fret!" she yelled in concern that she'd hurt him badly. She dropped her daggers and ran to kneel at his side while the others came over. "Are you okay?" she asked worriedly.
Even in pain, he couldn't help but chuckle. "Ch-cheater…" he grunted painfully but grinning slightly.
Marica smirked at him. "Sore loser…"
"Sore being the operative word, cheater."
"Huh, well… suddenly I can't remember where we put the mega medicines, imagine that…"
"You might want to give in on this one, Fret" Liu jested. The others, realizing that his injuries weren't too serious, laughed in response.
"You know, at first I was nervous about having so many people watching," began Marica. "But now I couldn't be happier to have so many witnesses!"
"Yeah, well… it's safe to say you passed your final exam," chuckled Fret, sitting up while he worked on draining the bottle of mega medicine that Asad handed to hm.
Marica looked at him questioningly. "Final exam? What are you talking about?"
Fret exhaled, shaking off the lingering effects of her spear torrent. "I've got to go check out where the world fusion hit northwest of Pharamond. That place Diadora called Rarohenga after seeing it. Both Diadora and Sophia are insisting on going with me. You know how I feel about being a meat shield for three backline fighters, so I needed to see if you were up to fighting on the front row with me. All kidding aside, you were awesome. I'd prefer you on the back row just because I selfishly want you mostly out of harm's way, but I think you're more than capable of holding your own against tough melee opponents."
Marica beamed proudly at the compliment. She knew he wouldn't say something like that if he didn't really mean it. "Well, I suppose had a pretty decent teacher and all…" she teased.
Laughing, Fret replied, "Yeah, Chrodechild did a great job with you. Switching to that counterattacking stance of hers changed the whole course of the match." He nodded at the princess, grinning.
"That's not what I meant, but yeah… thanks to both of you, really. It's hard to believe how far I've come from being pretty much a pure archer. I mean, I know I still have a lot to improve, but wow…" She shook her head, still somewhat in disbelief that she defeated Fret one-on-one, even if he hadn't used everything he knew against her.
"The talent was there, we only helped unlock it," replied Chrodechild. "You have worked hard. I agree that you are ready to face live enemies with your blades."
"So… I guess your prize for winning today's contest is an all expenses paid trip to Hell," Fret joked, using the term that Diadora said Rarohenga in her world's language translated to.
"You always do take me to the nicest places…" Marica replied sarcastically.
"Whoa! This place is wild!" exclaimed Fret, his eyes scanning the horizon in disbelief. It had been a relatively short trip to Rarohenga, courtesy of the castle gateway working again. The adventuring party had taken the gateway to Pharamond and from there traveled a little ways northwest before running into the place Dirk's redirection of the fusion targeted at Cherem Company headquarters ended up landing. Rarohenga was a twisted, scorched world that seemed to just radiate evil. All the rocky land was hued in dark reds and black, and there was no vegetation anywhere.
"See now why I gave it the name of 'Hell' in the language of my world?" asked Diadora. Everyone nodded.
Marica shook her head at the scene. "This looks like utter destruction took place. Do you think the original world looked like this?"
"Destruction is a good way of putting it," Diadora replied solemnly. "This is the One King's doing."
"Perhaps we should see about finding this world's Chronicle before Chancellor Valfred does," remarked Sophia impatiently, ready to move on. She hadn't been in a very good mood on the trip because of the nasty argument her dad had with Fret when Nova found out he wouldn't be accompanying Sophia on the mission. She was upset with her dad for making such a big deal about it in the first place, and upset at Fret for harshly reminding him who decided who went on a mission and who didn't rather than letting her handle talking to him.
Fret nodded at her. "Good point. Hey, 'Chronicle Compass', you picking up anything yet?"
Luo-Tao raised an eyebrow quizzically at the reference. "Chronicle Compass?"
"Yeah, you know, you point the way to where the Chronicles are." Fret grinned at him. Luo-Tao's expression remained as stoic as ever.
"This way," he answered dryly as he resumed walking further west. The rest of the party followed.
"I guess he didn't get it…" said Fret out loud to no one in particular.
"I'm sure he's laughing on the inside," Marica teased.
The group carefully made their way deeper into the heart of Rarohenga, walking in a formation with Fret in his customary position on the left side of the front row, with Marica to his right. Behind him was Sophia, with Luo-Tao behind Marica and Diadora on the right side of the back line. The Cherem Company party hadn't gotten very far into Rarohenga before realizing that the enemies were the toughest they'd faced yet. Even more challenging than those in Mt. Svatgol. Fret had initially felt a bit of panic well up inside him at having brought Marica into this place on her first mission as a frontline fighter, but she had done remarkably well to this point. However, she did get mad and yell at him for jumping in front of her a couple of times to take hits from an enemy that were intended for her when she was only slightly injured. She backed off quickly though when she saw the sincere hurt in his expression, realizing that he was genuinely scared for her. But Marica didn't like anyone treating her like she wasn't capable, especially him.
Thinking about it as they continued marching in silence, she had an epiphany about his over protectiveness. "He's not doing it because he thinks I'm weak, he's expressing love! I get it! It's his way of saying I'm too important to him to risk losing!" She started to become slightly giddy at the thoughts, giggling to herself.
"Wh-what?" asked Fret, looking over at her confused as to what she was giggling about.
"Ohhh… nothing," she replied, grinning mischievously at him in response.
Chuckling, he shook his head and returned his concentration to the horizon in front of them, vigilantly watching approaching enemies.
"Hey…" Marica said to him softly a couple of minutes later. Fret glanced over to see her still grinning.
"I love you too…" she declared, winking at him and then turning her attention back to what was coming up, leaving him even more confused. But he had little time to contemplate what she was thinking, for in the distance they could see a man standing at the top of a cliff.
"You came a long way for nothing!" the old man ridiculed loudly. "I have already obtained the Chronicle!" He held it outstretched, waving it mockingly at the group.
"Valfred!" shouted Fret.
"Fa… err, Ch-chancellor!" gasped Sophia. She had figured he would be the one to go after the Chronicle since all of his Archivists had either died or defected, but even knowing that she was still unprepared to actually see him face to face again.
"What are you doing here, you old kook?" yelled Fret.
"It should be obvious, should it not?" chuckled Valfred evilly. "It seems you have left me without any Archivists, so I had to take matters into my own hands."
"Shouldn't having your best Archivists leave the Order to join us tell you that your plans are misguided?" asked Marica.
Valfred eyed the white haired girl carefully, almost as if actually pondering her question. Finally he shrugged in indifference. "It is of no consequence, the time is almost at hand."
"What are you babbling about?" asked Fret.
"This is the final Chronicle I need to complete the ritual. The time has come to summon the One King and give this world over to him, bringing forth the fruition of the One True Way!"
"No way, kook! We're going to stop you!" Fret unleashed a flame vortex at Valfred that exploded all around him. But when the smoke and dust cleared, Valfred remained standing, unharmed.
"Fools!" Valfred scoffed. "I have the True Chronicle. It is stronger than all of your false Chronicles combined!" To prove his point, he cast an area magic attack that moderately wounded each of the Cherem Company members with bolts of lightning.
Fret screamed in rage, the fury guiding his thoughts. Suddenly he began to glow in a soft blue green light. Moments later the glow faded, and Fret felt as strong as he ever had. Glaring hatefully at Valfred, he darkly growled, "Mark my words, we will end you!" He raised his hand and pointed his finger at the Order chancellor, and as if pronouncing judgment on him, Fret uttered, "Die…"
A bluish black light swirled around Valfred. It was Marica's turn to be the one scared for her mate. She knew the deathly glow of the vortex of light represented Fret invoking his dying wish mark of the stars. The same mark that had left him severely weakened the one other time he used it. The cocksure expression on Valfred's face was snuffed out as he began to scream and writhe in pain from the younger man's attack. He collapsed to his knees under the onslaught, panting heavily as the glowing light burst around him and dissipated.
"H-h-how is it p-poss-ible?" Valfred asked incredulously. "H-how c-can this be?"
"It's game over, you old kook!" shouted Fret hoarsely, himself struggling from the exertion of using his most powerful mark. "One… one more and y-you're h-history…" He raised his hand again, determined to use dying wish a second time and end it right here. Marica was horrified. Fret was already bleeding out his nostrils from using it the first time and looked like he was barely standing, and now he was going to push himself even further. She desperately wanted to stop him, but was paralyzed by her fear.
The bluish black glowing light returned, swirling once again around Valfred and racking his body with pain. Fret grimaced, his body in visible distress as he pressed on. Trembling, he could feel consciousness threatening to leave him but fought to maintain control for as long as he could before blacking out. He was only vaguely aware of the screaming around him, and would only later find out that they were the screams of his friends for him to stop, drowning out Valfred's screams of agony.
"I-I c-can't…" were the last words he muttered before the world around him faded to black.
Terrible pain in his head was the first sensation Fret felt when consciousness returned sometime later. Before even opening his eyes he groaned, suffering badly from his overexertion. He felt a cool damp rag press down on his forehead, droplets of water from it trickling down the side of his head and onto his face. He shivered involuntarily in reaction to the cold clashing harshly with the feeling of burning up he felt. Slowly he opened his eyes to see Marica kneeling beside him, gently wiping his brow. The darkened skies and burnt red and black surroundings told him they were still in Rarohenga.
"Ma-Marica…" he whispered, his voice crackling. He struggled to keep his eyes open from the combination of pain and sheer exhaustion.
She leaned forward and kissed him on the forehead, then nuzzled against his overly warm cheek. "Shhh…" she whispered into his ear in return, her voice uneven. "You're burning up with a fever, just r-rest for now."
"D-did I g-get him?" he asked, not opening his eyes. Several moments went by in silence, allowing him to guess the answer. "I-I guess not, eh…"
Marica took a deep breath to calm her nerves. "You… you died before he did…" she answered softly.
"I don't feel dead? Wait, on second thought I guess I do actually," he joked weakly. "But w-weren't we out of revival statues?"
"Sophia has a revival ray mark of the stars," explained Marica gently. "She brought you back. But the chancellor managed to summon a portal and escape."
"I-I just don't get why using the mark killed me…"
Marica sighed. "Diadora said it's called dying wish for a reason. It's like a desperate last ditch effort to take your enemies out with you."
"Wh-why am I so weak? I mean, revival statues bring people back to full health, shouldn't the mark do the same?"
"She said we were lucky that it worked at all. The presence of the True Chronicle greatly weakened all of our marks of the stars. I… I tried to use healing wave after Sophia revived you, but it didn't do anything."
"Guess we need to get back to the castle then…"
"We will. The others are setting up camp. We'll stay here for the night and see if you're up to traveling in the morning."
"Ugh… I'm not going to hold us back… j-just give me a mega medicine…I can m-make it…" He grunted and groaned as he attempted to sit up.
Marica roughly pushed him back down, eliciting a sharp gasp of pain from him as his already pounding head made contact with the hard earth. "Listen to me," she said sternly, "this is not up for negotiation. You will do as I say, are we clear?" She knew if she wasn't forceful enough he'd keep pushing back, and she wanted to nip that in the bud.
"O-okay… I guess… I'm not in any position to argue with you anyway…" he trailed off, grimacing again as an acute pain shot through his head.
"You rest," she ordered gently but firmly. "I'll be back to check on you in a bit."
"Huh?" he asked tiredly. "Wh-why are you leaving?"
"I need to help Diadora get dinner started while Luo-Tao and Sophia finish getting the camp ready. Don't worry, I won't be gone long."
Fret smiled weakly, closing his eyes. "H-hurry back… please?" There was a hint of desperation in his voice that reminded her that he had a similar bout of separation anxiety after his near death experience in El-Qaral early in their adventures. She smiled warmly at him despite her worry about his condition.
She kissed him again on the forehead. "I will," she whispered quietly. As Marica stood, she thought, "You really do need me, don't you?" Before going over to join Diadora, Marica silently vowed to her husband, "Don't worry, I'll do everything I can to always be there for you."