We were led to a colossal, sun-drenched coliseum carved from the very stone of the floating continent. Bathed in the golden light of the afternoon sun, tiers of stone seats rose like the ribs of some ancient, fossilized beast, already beginning to fill with curious students. Prince Ignis strutted ahead, already playing to the crowd, while I trailed behind, my mind racing. An instructor, a grizzled man with a network of scars across his face that told tales of a hundred real battles, met us at the arena entrance. He listened to Ignis’s grand declaration, his eyes flicking from the preening prince to me, his expression shifting from professional boredom to utter bafflement. He looked at me, an eleven-year-old, then back at the eighteen-year-old Crown Prince, and finally gave a reluctant, weary nod.

  News of the duel spread through the senior campus like wildfire. I had wanted this to be a discreet affair, a quick, quiet resolution to an idiotic challenge. But the peacock prince wanted a show. He kept inventing reasons for delay, waiting for the coliseum to fill, his every gesture a calculated performance.

  My protests fell on deaf ears. "A battle between two great houses demands a proper audience!" Ignis declared, puffing out his chest. "It is a matter of honor! Let them witness a true display of power!"

  Soon, the stands were no longer just dotted with onlookers; they were packed. A sea of senior students filled the stone tiers, their murmurs echoing in the vast space, a low hum of anticipation. I spotted Nyxia in the crowd, her arms crossed, her expression an unreadable mask of cold, analytical curiosity. I sighed and walked over to the weapon rack, picking up a standard longsword. The balance was terrible, heavy and clumsy in my hand. A katana is so much better.

  Meanwhile, Prince Ignis was a vision of gilded arrogance. His armor was an aggressively opulent suit of polished gold, clearly of master Dwarven make, its surface covered in intricate filigree that screamed of wealth, not warfare. His blade was also gold, a perfect match for his spun-gold hair. He was a gilded caricature of a warrior.

  The duel finally began when the stands were full. The whispers had confirmed my identity, and the narrative was set: a battle between the Arcane Kingdom’s Silver Lion and the Cinderfall Hegemony’s Golden Phoenix.

  Everyone thought it was an easy win for Ignis. Knowledge that my dragon companion was still an unhatched egg was apparently widespread, a fact solidified by the sight of Kaelus’s sapphire form hovering serenely beside Patricia and Bob. An uncontracted eleven-year-old versus a senior prince with a fully bonded, hatched phoenix? It was a foregone conclusion.

  The instructor’s voice boomed. “Begin!”

  What followed was, for a time, a duel of breathtaking skill. Ignis, for all his bluster, was good. He lunged forward, his golden sword aimed in a classic high thrust, a move of pure, textbook aggression. He was power, and he expected to overwhelm me with it. Instead of meeting his blade with a direct block that would have sent me skidding back, I took a single, precise step to the side. The tip of my blade met the flat of his not with a clang, but with a soft, singing chime. I didn't stop his momentum; I redirected it. His lunge carried him past me, his own force throwing him slightly off-balance. I didn't press the advantage, merely resetting to a neutral stance.

  He spun, a flicker of surprise in his amber eyes, and unleashed a furious combination. A sweeping horizontal slash aimed to cleave me in two, followed by a rapid vertical chop. His movements were fluid and powerful, his golden sword a blur of light. But to my Tes-enhanced senses, they were telegraphed, predictable equations of motion. I swayed back from the slash, the wind of its passage whispering past my face. The chop I met with a rising parry, the blade angled perfectly to deflect the blow upwards and away, the impact jarring his wrist. My body, a perfectly tuned instrument honed by Tes’s optimized growth protocols, moved with a preternatural, almost mechanical, grace.

  The sharp ring of steel on gold echoed through the silent arena as he pressed his attack, a relentless storm of battering blows. He was trying to break my guard through sheer, brute force. But I wasn't using a guard; I was using geometry. His every lunge was met with a perfectly timed deflection that cost me almost no energy. His sweeping slashes whistled through the air where I had been a fraction of a second before, my footwork a silent, economical dance on the sun-bleached stone. He was a raging inferno; I was the unmoving rock that splits the flame. To the crowd, it looked like a battle of equals, a stunning display of swordsmanship that slowly began to earn their respect. The initial murmurs of pity for me quieted, replaced by whispers of awe.

  I could see the frustration building behind his eyes, the tightening of his jaw. He was used to his power being absolute, his attacks decisive. The fact that an eleven-year-old was neutralizing him with such effortless precision was an insult he couldn’t stomach.

  “Enough of this!” he snarled, leaping back.

  His golden blade erupted in flames. He began weaving fire magic into his attacks, sending arcs of searing heat that forced me to leap and weave, the stone floor cracking and glowing where the flames licked it. Dragon Knights are stronger, yes, but my dragon hadn't hatched. I had no contracted power to counter with officially.

  Okay, new plan. Lose with dignity.

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  The crowd was already on my side. Murmurs of disapproval rippled through the stands. He was using magic on a child, an uncontracted knight whose swordsmanship was so obviously high-level it was already becoming legendary. Prince Ignis wasn't just fighting; he was being dishonorable.

  He seemed to sense the shift and decided to double down, shouting toward the stands, his eyes locked on Nyxia. “See, Lady Nyxia? Only Cinderfall can truly save and secure the Aerthos!”

  Did this due learn politics in kindergarten? Where is the tact?

  But his next words struck a different chord. He parried one of my strikes, forcing me back, and sneered, his voice loud enough for the entire arena to hear. “You fight with surprising spirit, little cub. A trait you no doubt inherit from your mother. She displayed a similar... insistence... last night while pleading for me to be gentle with you.”

  The world didn’t turn red. It went ice-cold. Every sound in the arena the crackle of Ignis’s flames, the thousands of whispers vanished. A switch had been flipped deep within my soul, a cold, silent circuit that bypassed all reason and restraint.

  With a flick of my wrist, I sent my longsword spinning out of the arena, a deliberate, contemptuous dismissal. It clattered harmlessly against the far wall. The crowd gasped.

  I lifted my left hand, palm open toward the sky, and said one word, my voice quiet but cutting through the silence with absolute authority.

  “Come.”

  …

  Miles away, in my workshop, a single Plasma Katana hilt on the charging rack slowly levitated. Its micro-thrusters fired with a silent pulse of blue energy.

  In my meditation room, the massive bookshelf slid open without a sound.

  The hilt shot out of the glowing white portal, a streak of dark metal, and blasted through the open window of my suite, a tiny, purpose-driven missile tearing through the sky.

  …

  Back in the arena, Ignis laughed. "What's this? Surrendering? I knew your family were all just cats!"

  But the comment about my mother was still boiling in my blood. Consequences be damned. I’ll see how many times his little bird can bring him back from the dead.

  A black speck in the sky grew larger at an impossible speed. With a final sonic crack that echoed like a thunderclap, the hilt of the Plasma Katana slapped perfectly into my waiting hand.

  Ignis stared, his laughter catching in his throat. "What is that? A hilt without a blade? Have you gone mad?"

  VWOOM.

  The sound vibrated through the stone, a deep, soul-shaking hum that resonated in the bones of everyone present. A blade of pure, contained azure plasma erupted from the hilt, its light casting the entire arena in an ethereal, deadly glow.

  What followed wasn't a duel. It was a deconstruction. He swung his flaming sword in a wide, panicked arc. I didn't meet it. I flowed under it, and the humming plasma blade passed through his golden sword just below the hilt. There was no clang, only a faint, sizzling hiss. The blade of his sword, severed from its handle, flew off and embedded itself, still burning, in the far wall of the arena. He stared at the useless hilt in his hand, his eyes wide with disbelief.

  That was his last moment of defiance. The lesson began. With a flicker of movement that was too fast for the eye to properly track, I was behind him. The azure blade drew a line of incandescent light across his left pauldron. It didn't just cut; it vaporized. The ornate shoulder piece, a masterpiece of Dwarven craft, was shaved away in a ribbon of molten gold that sprayed into the air and solidified into glittering dust before it hit the ground. He screamed, not in pain, but in sheer, terrified shock. Before his scream could end, I was on his other side, performing the same clinical amputation on his right pauldron. Symmetrical. Deliberate.

  He stumbled back, trying to raise his arms to defend himself, but he was too slow, a clumsy mortal trying to fight a ghost. My blade danced. With two more silent, hissing passes, his vambraces were sliced clean off, clattering to the stone. He was being systematically disassembled, his invulnerability stripped away layer by layer. He tried to run. The plasma blade flickered twice at his legs, and the golden greaves that covered his shins fell away in two perfect halves. He tripped, falling to his knees.

  He was a stationary target now, a monument to be desecrated. I walked a slow circle around him, the humming blade held loosely in my hand. He watched me, his breath coming in ragged, panicked sobs. I stopped in front of him and, with the deliberate care of a master artist, carved a perfect, mocking circle into the center of his breastplate. The metal glowed cherry-red, then white-hot, before the centerpiece simply fell away, revealing his pale, sweat-drenched tunic underneath. With each pass, another piece of his pride was stripped from him, until he knelt there, trembling, in nothing but his noble undergarments, his golden armor lying in a scattered, ruined pile around him.

  The crowd was utterly, terrifyingly silent, a sea of thousands holding their collective breath. They were not watching a duel; they were witnessing an execution of a man's dignity.

  I walked toward him slowly, the tip of the Plasma Katana dragging on the ground, carving a glowing, molten channel in the ancient stone. I stopped, the humming blade inches from his manhood, the heat causing the air to shimmer and his skin to blister.

  Finally, I spoke, my voice a low, chilling whisper that seemed to suck the warmth from the air.

  “What did you say about my mother?”

  He fainted. Collapsed in a dead heap on the floor. I didn’t even get to kill him. I was really looking forward to seeing a phoenix contractor revive.

  Instructors rushed into the arena, their faces pale with shock. Pin-drop silence reigned.

  Shit. Today's call home is going to be a nightmare. How will I explain this mess?

  I deactivated the katana, the blade retracting with a satisfying hiss, and turned to the nearest petrified instructor. "Excuse me," I asked, my voice returning to its normal, polite tone. "Which way to the cafeteria?"