WIEDERGEBURT: Chapter 33

Despite the battle beginning, neither Albert nor Eryk made a move, causing many individuals within the stands to grumble in disappointment. Several complaints were expressed by those who weren’t knowledgeable about combat. Fay could hear their grumbling from where she sat beside her dad.

Fay glanced at the two figures standing down below and bit her lip. “Why haven’t they moved? The battle has already started.”

“It is not as easy as you seem to think,” her dad said. Fay looked at her father. When he saw the confusion on her face, he explained. “The battle has indeed started, but there is more than one way to fight. Right now, those two are sizing each other up, trying to determine the other’s strength without raising a fist. It is said that a skilled Spiritualist can determine the strength of another individual with just a glance. I suspect that is what they are currently doing.”

While Fay believed she was getting stronger, she was also aware that she didn’t know everything about Spiritualists or what it meant to be one. Her training was progressing well. She could use the Flesh Step with relative accuracy now. However, outside of her physical strength, the Flash Step, and the one Spiritual Technique she learned from her family’s library, her skills and experience were lacking.

“Do not worry, Fay.” Her dad patted her on the shoulder. “That sort of talent is something you can only gain with experience. With training and experience, you will eventually be able to size up your opponents as well.”

“I hope you are right,” Fay said as she glanced at the stern face of Eryk. He hadn’t moved at all since the battle started. His eyes had a cold calmness about them that chilled her to the bone. At the same time, an odd warmth spread through her chest and cheeks.

“Speaking of training, how has your relationship with that young man progressed? Have you managed to seduce him yet?” her dad suddenly asked a question that caused fire to burn her cheeks.

“T-that’s not something you should ask a girl!” Fay shouted at the man.

Her father laughed at her, which just caused her to feel even more embarrassed. Did this man have no tact?! She’d never felt this humiliated before in her entire life!

“Still, though…” Her dad settled down and glanced back at the arena and, more specifically, at the two figures standing several meters away from each other. “It’s odd.”

Having calmed down herself, Fay frowned at her dad in confusion. “What is odd?”

“That young man you are so fond of.” Her father’s eyes narrowed. “I’m not much of a Spiritualist these days, but I at least have the experience to recognize when someone else has seen combat. The eyes of that young man tells me that he has experienced a lot of battles and bloodshed in his life. I wonder just what sort of life he’s lived up to now?”

Fay glanced at the young man her heart yearned for and slowly clutched at her chest.

Down in the arena, Albert and Eryk continued their standoff.

***

I watched as the frown on Albert’s face grew increasingly dense, not letting a single emotion show on my face. It was hard. Part of me wanted to smile. I could already tell this man was losing confidence because he couldn’t see through me, couldn’t estimate my strength the way I could his.

This standoff was pointless.

“Are you not going to attack?” I asked softly.

“It would be foolish of me to attack you when I am not certain of my victory,” Albert said, clutching the sword in his hand—his hand that was shaking, I might add.

I spread my arms wide. “You would say that now, after having met me in this arena for the sake of incriminating me with the crime of harming two nobles? Were you not the one who challenged me? What use is there in challenging me to an Honor Duel if all you are going to do is stand around? Shall we remain in this place in perpetuity?”

Albert frowned as his grip on the broadsword tightened. He knew he couldn’t afford to not fight me, yet he also couldn’t see through my strength. For a Spiritualist, not being able to see the strength of your opponent was a dangerous thing. It meant there was a good chance that your opponent was stronger than you.

I waited patiently as the man’s eyes finally hardened, showing a determined gleam that made me drop my hands. Albert shifted his feet, and then blasted off the ground, racing toward me at a quick trot. Given that he used no Spiritual Power, he actually moved quite fast.

It was still too slow.

Albert’s first attack was a downward hack. He raised his broadsword above his head and sliced it down as though to cut me in twain. I stepped to the side and turned my body, facing the sword as it fell through the place where I’d been standing. My eyes narrowed as I timed my next move. I pushed my finger against the blade’s flat side and took another step back. My actions knocked Albert off balance and caused him to stumble.

I could have attacked him then, but I didn’t. I hung back and waited for him to recover.

Albert he turned around and glared at me, his face marred with an intense frown and an embarrassed blush. It was hard to tell if he was displeased or frustrated. I finally allowed myself to smile and beckoned him over with my hand.

The next attack that came at me was a horizontal slice. If it hit, I didn’t doubt that a normal person’s stomach would have been split open, but I moved back a single step and kicked the flat end with my boot. A loud clang! rang out across the Colosseum as the sword was knocked high into the air. Albert managed to keep a hold of his sword, but it cost him dearly. His entire torso was completely exposed. If I had wanted to, I could have shoved my fist through his chest.

I didn’t. Once more, I backed off and allowed the man to recover.

“You are toying with me.” Albert frowned at me.

I merely smiled. “How can you say that when you have yet to use a single Spiritual Technique? As a member of the Himmel Family and a former graduate of the Spiritualist Academy, I know you must have at least several.” The smile left my face as I narrowed my eyes. “I want you to show me those techniques of yours so I can break them. I will defeat everything you throw at me. That way no one will be able to claim I cheated.”

I could tell from the look in Albert’s eyes that he understood my intent, which made this all the more difficult for him. If he did use his Spiritual Techniques on me, and I did break them, it would cause his family to lose a lot of face among the other nobles. Their reputation would plummet.

“Very well.” He let out a deep breath and shifted his stance. A bright red aura erupted from his body. “I’ll show you my Spiritual Techniques. However, do not blame me if you wind up getting seriously injured. You asked for this.”

“Don’t worry.” I gave him a dense smile. “I won’t.”

Albert shuffled his feet along the ground, the smooth dirt shifting beneath him as he bent his knees. He adopted a stance where his dominant foot was placed in front. He held his broadsword near his face. The blade was pointed straight up as though to pierce the sky. With his gleaming armor reflecting the Sun’s glare, he looked very much like a heroic knight doing battle against a Demon Beast.

Two seconds past before Albert moved. He took two steps forward, spun around, and swung his blade. The swing started from his right shoulder and moved across his body until the sword was pointed toward the ground near his left hip. A powerful wave of fire burst out from the swing, shaped like a crescent wave as it flew toward me. However, he didn’t stop there. Spinning around once more, Albert thrust out his sword and released a strained yell. More fire exploded from the tip, taking the shape of an arrow as it slammed into the crescent wave, increasing both the speed it moved at and its power.

I could feel the heat from where I stood, feel the sweat that broke out on my skin, but I wasn’t bothered by it. Honestly speaking, the Endless Desert was much hotter than this.

Still wearing a calm smile, I raised my left hand above my head. I gently released just a tiny trickle of Spiritual Power into my hand. A thin blade of water formed along my raised hand, completely invisible to the naked eye. I doubted there was anyone present who could see it. As the giant crescent wave came closer, I took a single step forward and swung my arm down.

Albert’s attack was sliced in two.

***

“What was that?! What just happened?!” Geirolf shouted in shock as he stood up in his seat. Kari couldn’t really blame him. Even though she had expressed confidence in Eryk’s abilities, she could not help but feel shocked as well.

Down below, the fire technique that had been blazing toward Eryk was flying off in two separate directions after having been split in two by Eryk’s hand. The two halves eventually sputtered out as they ran out of power. No massive explosion happened. They just disappeared into thin air like wisps of smoke, typical of a C-rank Spiritual Fire Technique.

“He just… split Albert’s Spiritual Technique in half like it was nothing,” Mikkel murmured, his eyes wide as he stared on to the arena floor.

“Ho… that was really something.” Rainer stroked his faint beard as he studied Eryk with keen eyes. “I am impressed. Even I cannot tell how he cut that Spiritual Fire Technique in two.” He glanced at Kari’s blood father. “What about you? Could you figure out what happened?”

Valence stared into the arena for a moment longer, his eyes hard, and then shook his head. “No. I also could not tell what just happened.”

“It was water.”

“Mother?” Kari glanced at her mother, who had locked her eyes onto the young man down below. Her face was impassive. Kari couldn’t figure out what this woman was thinking.

“Water?” Valence, Rainer, Geirolf, Mikkel, and Earlend all glanced at the empress as well.

“Are you saying he used a Spiritual Water Technique to cut the flame in half?” asked Valence. “Without using any forms or movement?”

“That I am not certain of.” Finally, a small crack appeared in her mother’s calm mask. Kari was shocked to see the uncertainty on her mother’s face. “He did not channel any Spiritual Power through the use of forms and movement like a Spiritualist would, so I cannot determine if he used an actual technique or not. However, I can say with certainty that when he raised his hand, a nearly invisible sword made of water appeared around it.”

“A water blade?” Rainer muttered in a soft voice as he looked from the empress to the arena. “So he has an affinity for the water element then?”

“It seems that way.” Her mother confirmed with a shrug. She then glanced at Kari. “This young man of yours is most interesting. I wonder what other secrets he has hidden up his sleeves?”

When Kari saw the smile on her mother’s face, she could not think of anything to say, so she focused back on the arena and tried to pretend her face didn’t feel like it had been struck by a fire technique when her mother called Eryk “her man.”

***

I stood back up and let my hand fall back to my side after cutting the Spiritual Fire Technique in two. Albert was staring at me with shock clear on his face, his eyes rapidly blinking as if he was trying to process what he’d just witnessed.

“Is that all you have?” I asked, modulating my voice to make it sound like I was disappointed.

Albert frowned, but then he took a step forward, retracted his sword until the pommel was near his torso, and thrust it out. Fire exploded from the tip and shot forward like an arrow. It wasn’t as hot as the previous attack, but it moved much faster.

I shuffled my feet against the ground and bent my knees. I raised my left hand as though to grab the technique. Meanwhile, I tucked my right hand into my torso and clenched it into a fist. I channeled a very small amount of water toward my fist, surrounding it with a thin layer that was almost completely invisible. As the fire arrow sped toward me, I took a deep breath…

“HA!”

… And then expelled the oxygen in my lungs, twisted my torso, and punched the arrow with my right fist. My fist slammed into the fire arrow, which exploded on contact. Steam hissed as some of the water on my hand evaporated. It wasn’t much, though. What’s more, the fire arrow was completely obliterated. Small wisps of fire scattered everywhere before disappearing.

“Hmm…”

I retracted my hand and stared at it. There was a small black mark where the fire arrow had struck, showing that my control over my Spiritual Power still wasn’t as good as it could be. I would have to rectify that.

Albert’s expression had finally turned ugly. He raced toward me. As he came close, he swung his sword in a move that would have cut me open from my left hip to my right shoulder had I not taken several steps back. Then he spun on the balls of his feet and attacked from the opposite direction. The blade caught fire as he did. Waves of flames spewed from the blade with every attack he sent my way, forcing me to move back even further.

As I backpedaled to gain some distance, Albert chased after me, constantly moving around and swinging his blade, which released numerous flames that sought to burn my flesh. I didn’t know what this Spiritual Technique of his was called. I could only tell that it was a C-rank technique like the last two. However, it seemed to rely on constantly moving the sword and his body to make flames surround the sword, which increased his attack power and caused anyone fighting to become sluggish from the heat.

This must have been his ultimate technique. His trump card. His ace in the hole.

Learning Spiritual Techniques was difficult, requiring years of practice to truly master. It required constantly practicing the forms and movements needed to direct the flow of Spiritual Power. If even one wrong move was made, the Spiritual Power would reverse course and cause irreparable damage to the Spiritual Pathways. Because of the difficulty when it came to learning Spiritual Techniques, most people only learned two or three at the most, though some of the more talented Spiritualists learned as many as ten or twenty.

That Albert already knew three Spiritual Techniques was a testament to his talent. He couldn’t have been more than 25, but he already knew enough techniques that the elders of his clan were probably green with envy. However, for all his talent, I still found him lacking.

At 20 years of age, Kari had already completely mastered four different Spiritual Techniques, while this man hadn’t even scratched the surface of the techniques he had learned.

Albert continued to attack me, swinging his sword, shuffling his feet. He used primarily wide arcs when swinging. A diagonal slash from above or below. A horizontal cutting attack toward my stomach. Each attack was wide and therefore easy to spot and avoid, though the heat from the flames would have made things difficult for any normal Spiritualist.

This time when I channeled water into my hand, I made sure to properly control my Spiritual Power. I hardened the water coating my hand as I raised it above my head. Albert had swung his sword down in an overhead chop. The flames wafting from his sword were bright red mixed with yellow.

I caught his sword in my hand.

The flames hissed and sputtered out.

***

“Holy—he just caught Albert’s sword!” Geirolf exclaimed in shock.

“That he did.” Mikkel sounded much calmer than his younger brother, but his eyes had grown incredibly wide. Earland still hadn’t said anything, but his eyes were narrowed as he stared at the distant figure of Eryk.

“This boy is very strong,” Valence said. “Even I would not dare to actually catch a sword when it’s covered in flames like that.”

Rainer glanced at him. “Don’t you mean you wouldn’t catch a sword period? I’m pretty sure if you tried to catch a sword, your hand would at least get cut, if not outright sliced off.” Rainer turned back toward the arena. “That said, I do wonder how he managed to catch the sword and not have it at least slice his palm open.”

Everyone in the viewing booth looked at the leader of their family, especially Kari, who could not help but express interest in what her mother had to say.

The empress stared down at the arena floor as Eryk held the blade in his hand like it was nothing. The fire had long since sputtered out. Now he was just keeping it from moving. Meanwhile, Albert’s expression had grown pale as he struggled to pry his sword free from Eryk’s grip.

“It was water again.” Kari’s mother narrowed her eyes in thought. “He encased his hand in a thin but durable layer of water that protected him from both the flames and the sword’s sharp edge.” Her eyes narrowed further. “No… it looks like his skin is also incredibly durable. I suspect a sword made from steel might not be able to cut him even if he wasn’t using the water element.”

Kari looked at the shocked expressions of her family members after hearing the empress’ analysis. She kind of wanted to giggle when she saw the bemused looks they wore. At the same time, Kari was also experiencing that same disbelief. When she had suggested this Honor Duel, she had never imagined it would turn out like this.

“What really makes me curious is that he’s still not using any Spiritual Techniques,” her mother continued speaking. “It is like he can directly manipulate the elements without having to rely on channeling his Spiritual Power through movements. I wonder if that means he has reached the Third State of Spiritualism.” While Geirolf made several choking noises and her two husbands stared at her in shock, the empress suddenly let a smile blossom on her face. “This young man is even more interesting than I could have imagined.”

***

I stared into Albert’s pale face as he struggled to remove his sword from my grip. Sweat poured down his face, neck, and shoulders. Using Spiritual Perception, I could sense that he’d used up almost all of his Spiritual Power with that last technique. Even his Spiritual Aura had evaporated. He no longer had anything left to fight with.

That meant it was time to end this.

Clenching my hand, I shattered the blade in my grip. The broken pieces clattered to the ground. Albert’s already pale face became even worse as he looked at the remains of his sword. His eyes flickered from the shattered pieces of his blade, and then he glanced at the hilt before, finally, he turned his gaze on me.

I smiled at him.

Albert stumbled several steps back. His eyes had widened with fear. Given what Kari had told me about this man, it was likely that he had never suffered such a humiliating defeat before now.

“This match is over,” I said in a cold voice. “Concede.”

Still staring at me with wide eyes, Albert glanced all around as though wondering what he should do. He looked over at Dante, who had not moved from his spot since the match began, and then looked back at me. I could see the sparks flying inside of his mind. He knew what he had to do if he wanted to save what little face he had left.

He gritted his teeth as he made an ugly expression. “I… I concede defeat.”

The sound of Albert’s voice seemed abnormally loud in the nearly silent Colosseum. It echoed to all corners despite the words being spoken so softly, allowing everyone present to hear them.

I nodded and glanced at Dante. The normally laid back man appeared unusually sharp as he stared at me, but then his blade-like expression vanished. He grinned, stepped forward, and raised his hand.

“Lords and Ladies, this Honor Duel has been decided,” he said in a loud, booming voice. “Victory goes to Eryk Veiger!”

No one clapped at the announcement of my victory, but then, I hadn’t expected them to either.

***

Hilda turned away from Eryk to look at Kari as her daughter suddenly stood up. Everyone else also looked at the young girl, but she only had eyes for the figure leaving the arena.

“Please excuse me.” Kari bowed to her mother, ran up the stairs, and hurried out of the exit. All eyes remained locked on the girl as she disappeared through the large archway behind them, and then they looked at her.

“She’s probably going to see that boy,” Rainer mused. “Should we really let her go to him? With that kind of power, he might be dangerous.”

Hilda glanced at Valence. Kari was also his daughter by blood. However, the first man whom she had married remained stone-faced and did not say anything in regard to this matter. It was enough to make her sigh.

“Let her do as she wants,” Hilda murmured. “I do not believe that boy will harm her.”

Rainer and her three sons stared at her with something resembling shock, but then her second husband shook his head and smiled. “I see you’ve been spying on her again. You know Kari is going to be incredibly upset when she discovers you’ve sent people to watch after her.”

“I have not spied on her,” Hilda declared. “However, I did request a friend of mine to let me know if anything unusual is happening around her. Eryk Veiger will not harm her. I have already been assured of this.”

“If you believe this, then I suppose we have no choice but to believe it as well,” Rainer admitted. He scratched his stubble and looked at the arena, which now only contained the defeated Albert and Dante. “Still, I wonder who this young man is and how he managed to slip underneath our radar for so long.”

That last comment caused Hilda to narrow her eyes. She also wondered how such a thing could have happened, but even her friend, whom she trusted completely, did not know the answer.

It was a mystery that seemed to have no solution.

***

As the winner was announced, Fay could do little more than sigh in relief. She leaned back against the seat. Her body felt limp, like all the bones inside of it had been removed. Even though all she had done was sit there and watch, it was almost like she had been the one battling today.

“Ha ha!” Her father’s laughter startled her. She looked up to see the man grinning down at the arena floor. “That little fellow really is something! I’ve never seen someone suffer such a humiliating defeat before! Fay, you really have fallen for a good man!”

Whenever her father mentioned the relationship between her and Eryk, she would often become embarrassed, but perhaps because she was too tired to argue, all she felt was a faint stirring in her chest. Eryk had fought against a noble and won. Not only was Albert a noble, but he was ranked among the top young Spiritualists. There were only a handful of people who could defeat him. What’s more, none of them could win in such a flagrant manner. The method in which Eryk had won made it seem like he hadn’t even tried.

She looked at the arena again, only to see Eryk walking off toward the exit.

“Why don’t you go and congratulate him?” suggested her father.

Fay looked up to see her father smiling down at her. She didn’t disobey him. Nodding, she stood up and moved toward the exit. After walking down a set of stairs, she entered a long, twisting corridor before finally reaching the arena entrance.

Eryk was already there. However, before Fay could approach him, another voice shouted from the opposite direction and caused his head to turn.

***

As I walked off the arena, I wondered what was going to happen now that I had defeated Albert in the Honor Duel. The Himmel Family would naturally be forced to honor the agreements of the duel. There wasn’t much point in having an Honor Duel if people could just do whatever they pleased after a victor had been decided. However, I could not help but remember how it was Grant Leucht who’d told the Himmel Family about my fight with Alf and Arvid.

Something told me the Leucht Family was not going to be quiet after this.

“Eryk!” a voice cried out seconds after I emerged into the curved corridor.

I turned my head, a smile lightning up my face as I saw Kari running toward me. She was dressed in a simple gown with slits on either end, which explained how she could run and not trip. The gown was a light purple with dark purple edgings. Despite how simple it appeared, I couldn’t help but think it looked amazing on her.

“Kari, what did you think of the duel?” I asked as Kari stopped in front of me.

“What did I think? It was very impressive.” Kari smiled up at me. “I already knew you would win, but I didn’t expect you to win so easily. It was like you weren’t even trying. And now that you have won, the Himmel Family shouldn’t cause trouble you anymore.”

“It was never the Himmel Family that I was worried about,” I confessed, causing Kari to grow pensive. “But it is good that this situation was resolved with relatively little trouble. I do not think I will need to worry about anyone trying something to me for awhile. And now that this matter is resolved, I can focus completely on training for the Spiritualist Grand Tournament.”

Kari blushed to the roots of her hair. I was pretty sure she was remembering what I had promised her, that when I won, I would request that her mother allow her to explore the Demon Beast Mountain Range with me.

“You will have to fight people a lot stronger than Albert,” Kari muttered as she gazed at me with a face that was both embarrassed and worried. “While my brothers are not allowed to compete, Grant Leucht and several other powerful Spiritualists will be taking part in the tournament. There’s also no age limit for who can and can’t compete. I would not be surprised if several of the older and more experienced members of the various noble families decided to compete as well.”

“I know. Do not worry.” I placed my hands on Kari’s shoulders and smiled. “Even if I have to go up against Nevaria’s most powerful Spiritualists, there is no way I will lose.”

Kari stared into my eyes, an unknown glimmer appearing within them. Her cheeks gained a slightly rosey hue as she nodded once.

“I know you won’t,” she said in a soft voice. “I believe in you.”

Still smiling, I slowly drew Kari to my chest, giving her plenty of opportunities to push me away. She did not resist. She leaned into my chest as I wrapped my arms around her shoulders and pressed my nose into her hair, enjoying the soft, floral scent of the soap she used.

I had a lot of problems on my plate. I needed to train Fay so she was strong enough to make her own life decisions. I had to defeat Grant Leucht so he would no longer go after Fay or Kari. I also needed to compete in and win the Spiritualist Grand Tournament. This was on top of trying to learn more about those people who had attacked Lin, saving Nevaria from the Demon Beast Invasion that would happen about two years and seven months from now, and growing strong enough to kill the Great Overlord of the Seventh Plane.

There was a lot for me to worry about and do, but in that moment, the only thing I cared about was the girl in my arms.

***

It was later in the evening. The day had passed and everyone Albert knew was discussing his loss to Eryk Veiger. He had heard their remarks when he passed them in the halls of the Himmel Family’s manor: “Can you believe he lost?” they would say. “This person has brought great shame upon the Himmel Family,” they would judge. He couldn’t lie and say their words didn’t hurt, but Albert could only snort in contempt. He didn’t think any of these people who scorned him for losing would have fared better against that boy.

Albert was sitting in the training hall, his calves tucked underneath his thighs in a more formal posture than sitting cross-legged. His broken sword lay at his side. He had done his best to pick up the pieces that had been scattered on the arena floor, but even if he’d collected all of them, there was no way this sword could be reforged.

He didn’t know how long he’d been sitting there. Albert kept replaying his loss over and over in his mind, rewatching the battle to see if there was anything he could have done to avoid losing. There wasn’t. No matter how many times he reviewed the battle in his head, he couldn’t think of a single strategy that would have allowed him to win. From start to finish Eryk had just been toying with him.

“I was wondering where you wandered off to after the Honor Duel. So you were in your family’s training hall this whole time,” a familiar voice said.

Albert opened his eyes and turned his head toward the doorway, where a familiar young man wearing an expensive tunic and boots walked toward him.

“Grant,” he greeted.

“I cannot believe you actually lost to that peasant.” Grant sneered.

Albert didn’t let himself be bothered by the unpleasant expression on the other man’s face. “That ‘peasant’, as you call him, is an incredibly skilled combatant. Even you would be hard pressed to defeat him.”

“You think I would lose?” asked Grant.

“It is hard to say.” Albert glanced at his sword. “I have never been able to win a match against you in all the years we have sparred. However, neither have I ever been so easily outclassed by you like I was by him. None of my attacks were able to even make him sweat. He thoroughly defeated everything I had thrown at him, and then overwhelmed me with a casual ease that I still find shocking.” Looking up from his sword, Albert glanced at Grant. “When you face him in battle during the Spiritualist Grand Tournament, I recommend you not underestimate him.”

Grant snorted. “Your advice is appreciated. However, a peasant is still just a peasant. I’ve always held back when you and I spar on account of our friendship. I won’t hold back against him. I will crush him into dust, and then I’ll be sure to invite him to my wedding when I marry both Fay and Kari.”

Albert looked at Grant, whose eyes had grown hard and cold like diamonds. He sighed. They had always been friends, but more and more, Grant seemed to be turning into someone that he didn’t recognize.