Aster leapt at Etoile, sending them both to the ground as he sent them both through a nearby empty wooden table that had broken at the impact. His sudden strike had caught Etoile off guard and temporarily stunned him as his headbutt had broken Etoile's nose, causing red blood to pour down from it.

  As they hit the ground, Aster could see that the angry fury on his face was matched by Etoile’s own.

  They rolled on the grassy surface, each trying to gain the upper hand on the other as they sent punches at each other, growling as they bared their teeth at one another.

  Even if it was hypocritical of him, he wasn’t going to let Etoile mock someone like Filarina, that girl who had been someone so kind she had been called a saint, who had deserved a better world than the one she had been born in on the surface.

  Damn the End War.

  Damn the Astral Nova.

  Why did any of it need to matter anymore?

  And why did any of these things even have to happen in the first place!? If only things had been different. If only that stupid war hadn’t happened. If only the Settlement Front Alliance, which had been born out of the orbital and lunar colonies that rebelled against the Gaia Sphere Federation, could have just resolved things peacefully.

  If only people could have understood each other. Then, then…

  Then someone like Filarina wouldn’t have had to suffer and die for some stupid ingrates who hadn’t deserved it.

  Then someone like Filarina could have been born in a better world than the one she had.

  It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair at all!

  Aster managed to roll on top of Etoile, who dodged a punch Aster sent downward. Then, Etoile kicked him in the stomach, sending him flying backwards off of Etoile.

  They both rose quickly, both dirtied from their fight on the ground.

  “When will you grow up from your childish delusions?!” Etoile glared.

  “Funny you should call them that, since you had those same delusions too!” Aster said as he charged in.

  Aster and Etoile exchanged several more blows, both of them deftly blocking each other’s strikes as they punched and kicked at one another.

  Yet, their movements continued to quicken and their strikes toughen as both of them held back less and less.

  Their movements began to blur as their trained reflexes took over, every punch and kick sending wind flying that would shatter boulders.

  Etoile had thrown a rock at blistering fast speed at him, enough for it to crack the air, and he had knocked it aside, breaking it easily with his forearm.

  “The difference between us is that some of us grew up Aster!” Etoile replied. “Something it seems like you failed to do.”

  Aster leaned his head backwards, dodged a punch, then closed in, locking fists and arms with Etoile. They glared at one another. “So what? What does that have to do with anything? When you, Arnis, and I were kids, we all shared that same dream of being a hero!”

  Etoile grit his teeth in anger at the word hero, then took the opening that came up to headbutt Aster.

  Aster felt his nose break as he stumbled backwards, the blood streaming down his face. He kept his eyes on Etoile, not giving him another moment to take advantage of.

  Etoile grinned in angry delight at returning the favor that Aster had shown him.

  Both of them wiped their faces at the blood spilling down from them. Aster and Etoile huffed in exertion as the crowd around them looked on tensely. The crowd was unsure what to do, even as those within continued to make subtle movements, positioning themselves for what may come.

  Then, Arnis came in from behind Etoile’s blind spot, taking advantage of the lull in the fighting between them. Etoile twitched as if he could sense Arnis sneaking up on him, then he dodged a flying hook from Arnis.

  Arnis dodged a counter punch from Etoile, then pinned Etoile’s arms. “I got him Aster! Kick his ass!”

  Aster immediately rushed in, grinning happily as he sent several gut punches in quick succession to Etoile’s stomach, who gritted in pain at the strikes that landed with heavy thuds.

  Etoile kicked Aster back as he sent an elbow into Arnis’s gut, then sent his head backwards into Arnis’s face, which freed him from Arnis’s grip.

  Before Arnis and Aster could recover, several people pinned them down, holding them in place.

  Etoile grinned as he approached Aster, ignoring Arnis, then returned the gut punches that Aster had given him. The pain made Aster wince as he received the gut punches.

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  Then, Aster threw his upper body forward, tossing one person behind him over himself and crashing into Etoile. As he did so, he freed himself of the others who had arms pinned. He kicked one, then elbowed the other.

  As the new assailants recovered, they themselves were assaulted from behind.

  Everything turned to chaos as a general brawl broke out among all those present. Aster found himself lost among the crowd as more people joined the fighting, drawn in by the sight of those they knew being attacked by others. In the sea of chaos, with its dizzying array of individuals present from all the peoples of the Despar Dominion—skin, chitin, and scale—wing, tail, and horn—fang, tooth, talon, and claw—Aster could see that the fighting had devolved into a dividing line between SETI and AXIS, rival organizations within the Despar Dominion.

  It wasn’t that hard to tell those apart. Those of SETI and AXIS either knew each other or were wearing their black and dark red uniforms, the badges of their respective organizations displayed on their uniforms’ shoulders or breast.

  SETI’s badge was a picture of Gaia with a large stylized sensor dish above it, the Astral Bird of Gaia in gold in the background, with a golden laurel wreath that framed it.

  In contrast, AXIS’s badge was a picture of Gaia with several circular planes cut through it at different diagonal angles, to show how an Axis of rotation. Like SETI, the emblem of the Astral Bird in gold framed it, surrounding it all with a golden laurel wreath.

  He looked around and saw some of the higher-ranking officers, such as his sister Fia and Mechu, try to restore order without much success as the fighting spiraled further out of control.

  Well… there was no going back now.

  As Aster oriented himself through the fighting, he dodged the occasional strike before finding himself tackled to the ground. He looked up and saw the spitting image of his friend Arnis.

  “Arvis,” Aster said as he wrestled with Arvis on the ground.

  “Aster,” Arvis replied, furious.

  Aster blocked several punches from Arvis.

  Arvis had anger in his eyes, “You bastard! You need to stop being a bad influence on my brother!”

  Aster grit his teeth as he struggled with Arvis. As Arnis’s twin brother, they looked exactly alike, though they couldn’t be more different in their personalities and what they believed in.

  Aster replied with a kick to Arvis’s gut that knocked him off him. Before Arvis could jump on him once more, he was himself knocked to the side with a leaping kick by Arnis, who had come to his rescue. Arnis gave him a thumbs-up and a grin as both he and Arvis melded back into the crowd to continue their fighting.

  Then, Aster sensed someone coming from behind as he lay on the ground. He turned, only to see the person charging fall after being tripped by a leg. His assailant collided with the flood face-first, gripping their face in pain.

  A young girl walked up to him and then held out her hand to him, completely unbothered by the fighting.

  “Rita?” Aster murmured.

  Her hair was as dark as her brother’s, and her eyes just as red.

  “Why are you…” Aster said as he took her hand, rising from where he lay.

  Rita merely nodded in silence, an emotionless expression on her face. Growing up, Rita had been like that. Quiet and reserved. Of little words. Unbothered by things. As if she could see the future at times.

  “Aster…” Rita said. “Be careful. There’s someone here whose hate is more than you can comprehend.”

  “What do you—”

  Then he felt it as if a flash had gone through him. He shuttered.

  He turned to where he felt it from. It was like some kind of pressure that pressed in on him from all around. It felt like it was going to crush him.

  Then he saw it, a figure off in the distance, standing as if bored amid the chaos, completely unbothered by it, and someone whom the others around were deliberately avoiding. They wore the typical black and dark red uniform of Despar, except with higher-ranking insignia that showed that they were a captain of Despar. On their head was the usual peaked cap, also black and dark red, with a black veil that covered their face. They were tall. They were lanky. He could see the deadly dark chitin claws they had for hands.

  But what made them most notable to him was the hatred and anger that they possessed. It was intense. It wasn’t like the flames that radiated from the others. No. It was concentrated, dense. It hung to them like a shadow, like a black hole that sucked in light itself.

  Aster blinked, and the figure disappeared from his sight.

  Where had—

  Etoile charged in from Aster’s side.

  “You bastard!” Etoile roared. “What the hell do you think you’re doing with my sister?”

  Aster moved to the side as Etoile jumped between him and Rita. Etoile held an arm as if to shield his sister. Rita stared on passively, unbothered by the fighting around her.

  Etoile ground his teeth at him, “It’s because people like you are always living in such a childish fashion that the world has become like this! And I won’t let you infect my sister with those childish notions.”

  Aster glared back and took another moment to assess the situation. Captain Bernard, that sleeping dragon in humanoid form, was still sleeping in his rocking chair, far away under the shade of a porch roof of a house by the fields, completely unbothered by the fighting. And whoever was trying to stop the fighting was failing spectacularly.

  Internal fighting within the Despar Dominion wasn’t unusual, though they weren’t common. It was tolerated as a matter of policy, given the wide range of the peoples and cultures that comprised it. It was practicality. So long as someone wasn’t permanently maimed, wasn’t permanently harmed in some way, things were tolerated and overlooked.

  There was an unofficial rule between those within Despar. Fighting between each other was tolerated to an extent. Even a chopped-off limb was fine so long as someone didn’t die, as most physical wounds and injuries could be healed. And of course, given the nature of its people, a mortal wound meant different things to different people.

  In short, everyone took it as an excuse to fight each other at times. To settle issues. A grudge here. An argument there. Fights between competing individuals, groups, even rival organizations and entities.

  Much like now.

  Then, the telltale blue flashes of Arcana lighted up around them.

  Aster and Etoile narrowed their eyes at each other. Then they both took familiar stances drilled into them from the Despar Dominion’s academies as they both inhaled calmly, then exhaled calmly. Aster felt the energy of Arcana flow through him.

  Even without Arcana, both of them were strong and fast. But with Arcana…

  Etoile gave him a deathly serious glare as he formed a blade of pure Arcana, bright blue, then closed in on him in the blink of an eye.

  Well… it looked like they were done messing around.

  Aster formed his own blade of pure Arcana and charged in, meeting Etoile head-on.