ELARION : The Echo Breaker

CHAPTER 2: The Price of an Insult

The midday sun stabbed without mercy.

Number Seven was dragged out of the medical tent. Fever burned his shoulder and ribs, making the ground beneath him feel tilted. But worse was his right hand.

His fingers trembled wildly without rhythm, sending constant pain signals to his brain. Without the medicine Arok promised, that hand was no longer reliable.

Damn it, he thought, grinding his teeth against the dizziness. I have to hold the sword with my left hand.

Hundreds of Kaijin soldiers surrounded the field in a perfect square formation. Silence. No rough cheering, just a cold wall of discipline.

"General Arok is picking up trash again," Sora’s voice was calm.

He deliberately used the Trade Tongue, the coarse language used by merchants and cross-border bandits. So everyone, including this wild dog, could understand his insult.

"He’s letting a stray dog into the wolf's den."

The prisoner didn't answer. His tongue felt stiff. He only swallowed spit that tasted like sand. His left hand, wrapped in filthy cloth hiding the cracked bell, gripped the borrowed bokken.

On the command balcony, far from the dust of the field, two figures watched.

General Arok stood with hands gripping the wooden railing. Beside him sat a woman who looked out of place in the dirty military camp.

Lady Kaida.

She wore gray silk robes with a sharp cut. Her black hair was in a tight bun held by a silver pin. Her eyes, sharp as a scalpel, scanned the data. She assessed angles, posture, and survival probabilities.

"His right hand is permanently disabled. The elbow tendons are severed," Kaida murmured, her voice cold and sterile. "He’s left-handed by necessity. His posture tilts fifteen degrees to the left to protect his broken ribs. Judging by his lean, he’s lost before the sword is even drawn."

"Look again, Kaida," Arok answered quietly, his eyes never leaving the field. "Look at what he is not doing."

Kaida narrowed her eyes. "He isn't breathing in rhythm with Sora. He is... waiting."

On the field, the silence stretched.

Sora didn't move. He didn't shout. He just stared, measuring distance, calculating angles. To him, this duel was mathematics: distance divided by speed equals death.

He shifted his right foot an inch. The tip of his sword dropped slightly. His upper chest was exposed.

It was a false invitation.

Number Seven didn't move. His eyes saw the gap in the chest, but his ears heard something else, Sora's calf muscles coiling tight. It was a trap. If he attacked that open chest, Sora's sword would rise and slash his neck from the side before he could blink.

"You didn't take the bait," whispered Sora, a hint of disappointment in his voice.

Suddenly, Sora vanished.

Not magic. But a burst of pure speed.

He shot forward, body low, skimming the ground. His sword dragged at his side, ready to slash upward in a diagonal line.

Number Seven knew he couldn't parry. His wooden sword would snap if forced to block that running momentum.

He dropped himself.

Not a graceful dodge. He dropped into the mud like a rice sack with a cut string.

Whoosh!

Sora's wooden blade passed an inch above his head, splitting the air where his neck had been a second ago. The wind from the slash messed up his dirty hair.

Sora didn't stop. He spun on his heel, elegant and deadly. He didn't let his momentum go to waste. He flowed immediately into a fast side slash toward the ribs.

Number Seven rolled in the mud, looking awkward and desperate looking like someone who just wanted to survive. He didn't try to hit back. He just tried to get away from the reach of that blade.

His breath ragged. Air entered like needles. Cold sweat soaked his back.

Small laughter broke from the ranks of soldiers. Polite, but stinging.

"Stand up!" hissed Sora. His face remained flat, but his breathing rhythm began to change. He failed to kill in one clean strike. That was a flaw in his art. "Stop crawling. You are ruining this art."

The prisoner rose slowly, knees shaking.

He knew he had no energy for a long duel. His breath would break soon. The world was too loud for him; the sound of hundreds of soldiers breathing, the heartbeat of a panicked horse, and the friction of Sora's light armor.

I need that medicine, he thought, glancing briefly at Arok on the balcony. His right hand was still trembling madly at his side. I need my right hand to be quiet.

Sora returned to a neutral stance. Sword raised to eye level, tip pointing at his opponent's neck. His right side was closed tight. He didn't attack blindly. He changed tactics.

He just walked closer with a stance ready for a Flowing Parry. He wanted Number Seven to panic, to attack first out of desperation, then Sora would deflect the attack and pierce the heart in one motion.

Number Seven backed away. Backed away. And backed away.

Every step backward sent electric shocks to his broken ribs. His breathing grew heavy. He staggered, almost falling. out of the corner of his eye, he saw the edge of the field, the wooden fence, getting closer.

He let Sora eat up his space. He let Sora feel like he dominated the rhythm.

Then, he heard it. The crack.

Sora was getting bored. Seeing his enemy constantly retreating without resistance made Sora's discipline waver. He felt his enemy wasn't strategizing, but was just a coward running away.

Sora abandoned his defensive intent. "Screw the parry," he thought. "I'll split him now."

Sora raised his sword high above his head. A vertical helmet-splitter slash. The position left his stomach and legs wide open. Sora was sure his enemy was too slow and scared to exploit it.

It was a fatal mistake.

Sora lunged. His sword crashed down from above.

Number Seven didn't retreat. He moved forward. He didn't parry the sword. He let his left shoulder become the shield.

Thud!

Sora's bokken slammed into his already wounded left shoulder. The sound of wood hitting meat sounded sickening. Fresh blood seeped out through his bandages. His collarbone might have cracked again.

But Sora's sword stopped there. Its momentum died because it hit flesh.

Sora’s eyes widened. He never calculated that someone would take a direct hit just to close the distance. It wasn't efficient. It was insane.

The prisoner used that pain as an anchor. He choked down the scream in his throat, then slid inside Sora's reach.

Zero distance. The place where long swords were useless. This wasn't a duel anymore. This was a mud wrestle.

He threw away his wooden sword. He swept his leg behind Sora's heel. His left hand grabbed the collar of Sora's armor, and he threw his own body weight backward.

Gravity did the rest. Sora slammed back-first onto the hard ground. His light armor didn't cushion the impact. His breath vanished instantly. His lungs empty.

Before Sora could process what happened, Number Seven was on top of him. His dirty, rough, earth-smelling left thumb pressed right into Sora's right eye socket.

Not stabbing. Just pressing.

Deep enough to make Sora scream hysterically, shallow enough not to burst the eyeball. But the pressure was enough to send a primal message to Sora's brain: My eye is in his hand.

"Aaaargh! My eye!"

Sora thrashed, legs kicking up dust, but his opponent pinned his chest, locking the Lieutenant's breathing. All breathing techniques, all elegant stances, vanished in the face of the brutality of a thumb in the eye.

Number Seven leaned his face close to Sora's ear. His breath was heavy, smelling of blood and despair.

"You..." he whispered in broken Trade Tongue, voice hoarse. "You were too busy guarding your posture... you forgot to guard your eyes."

Sora froze. The scream stuck in his throat.

Number Seven released the pressure. He rolled to the side, coughing violently while clutching his shoulder which was now throbbing madly. Blood seeped out, soaking his filthy tunic.

Silence.

The field was numb. No one cheered. Hundreds of Kaijin soldiers stared with a mix of disgust and horror. They had just watched an elite officer defeated by a dying man fighting with zero dignity.

It wasn't a knight's victory. It was a survivor's victory.

On the balcony, Kaida's aide looked away in nausea.

But Lady Kaida leaned forward. Her lips parted slightly. Her eyes didn't blink. She didn't see atrocity. She saw Efficiency.

"He chose damage he could control," Kaida murmured. Her eyes glinted, pupils dilating. Not out of horror, but out of rare intellectual stimulation. "...He trades in pain."

Arok smiled thinly, though his eyes remained tired. "That is why we need him, Kaida. We have thousands of samurai who can die beautifully. But we don't have a single demon who can win ugly."

Kaida stared at the thin body trying to get up in the mud. The young man looked pitiful, dirty, and broken. But in Kaida's eyes, he was a challenging puzzle.

"Prepare the contract," Kaida ordered coldly, sitting back straight as if nothing had happened. "And prepare a bottle of Grade One Nerve Oil. I want to see what that broken machine can do if we fix its spare parts a little."

On the field, Number Seven stood unsteadily. He stared at Arok on the balcony.

His gaze was empty. His right hand still trembled violently at his side. That gaze demanded an unspoken promise.

I've done my part. Now give me the medicine.