Early morning was just beginning to paint the tiled roofs of Orario in soft pastel hues, yet life was already in full swing at one of the Loki Familia's enclosed training grounds. Shielded from the street noise by high stone walls, the air here still held the chill of the night. It mingled with the sharp scent of wax used to polish the wooden platforms, and the heavy aroma of sweat ingrained in the training dummies—the smell of hard work.
I stood in the center of the hard-packed dirt arena, steadily catching my breath. Two short wooden swords rested in my hands. Stripped of the razor sharpness of my usual weapons, they felt uncharacteristically light, but the balance, fine-tuned by the Familia's smiths, was perfect. I made a short circular motion with my wrists, warming up the joints and listening to the obedient, dry whistle of the air.
Opposite me, about four meters away, stood Leo, motionless.
His stance, the way the soles of his boots pressed firmly into the ground, betrayed absolute concentration. The training spear rested confidently in his hands, its blunt tip pointed squarely at my chest. In the spearman's eyes—usually soft and prone to slight panic in critical situations—a stubborn, feverish thrill now burned.
"This time it'll be different, Bell," Leo shifted slightly from foot to foot, finding the optimal distance. A cocky smirk played on his lips, but his white-knuckled grip revealed immense internal tension. "I've spent a long time analyzing my mistakes. Today, I'm breaking through your defense."
I adjusted my grip, bent my knees slightly, and leaned forward, dropping into the familiar fighting stance Rain had taught me over the years.
"I won't hold back, Leo," I replied, and for a moment, even to my own ears, my voice sounded unexpectedly firm, almost like my sworn brother's when he stepped onto the training ground in our home village. "Show me what you've learned."
Slightly off to the side, leaning against a wooden canopy pillar, stood Alice. Her fingers lazily toyed with the bowstring of her unstrung bow, but her attentive brown eyes sharply scanned the arena. She flawlessly read the degree of tension between us. Realizing that further words were unnecessary, she gave a short, sharp wave of her hand:
"Begin!"
His dash was explosive. Stepping forward, he utilized his weapon's main advantage—its reach—to the absolute maximum. The wooden shaft blurred into a streak, and a rapid chain of thrusts rained down on me.
One to the chest. A shift. The second aimed at the neck. The third—a feint just above my left shoulder.
Leo acted quickly, aggressively, trying to crush my defense in the opening seconds. But my body reacted on its own, obeying ingrained reflexes. I smoothly slipped off the line of attack, taking short, measured steps back and to the side. Time after time, the wooden tip cleaved the air mere millimeters from the fabric of my shirt.
Watch the opponent's shoulders, not the tip, Rain always said. A weapon is just an extension of the body. Wherever the shoulder goes, the momentum will follow.
Seeing his direct thrusts bogging down in thin air, Leo gritted his teeth for a moment. Sliding his lead hand back along the shaft, he sharply increased his leverage and, engaging the power of his hips, delivered a mighty, sweeping slash aimed at my legs. The long piece of wood swept in a wide, low arc.
Instead of breaking distance, I merely hopped slightly, tucking my knees. The whistling spear passed right beneath the soles of my boots. My eyes instantly locked onto the opening: after such a sweeping motion, the spearman's right flank was left completely exposed, his body weight pulled by the weapon's inertia.
Time to close in, the thought flashed.
The moment I touched the ground, I surged forward, closing the distance for close combat, where his long weapon should become a useless hindrance.
But Leo had been waiting for exactly that.
He had never once beaten me in a sparring match, and this bitter experience of defeats had forced him to break his own patterns. Spotting my rapid approach, he offered a cunning smirk. Instead of retreating in a panic, Leo lightning-fast shifted his grip to the very center of the spear with both hands, turning it into an improvised quarterstaff.
Crack! Crack!
My two diagonal strikes with the short swords met a solid, unyielding defense. Leo engaged me at close range, blocking the blades with the central part of the shaft. Caught off guard, I hesitated for a fraction of a second—his increased speed and readiness for a clinch were a surprise.
Leo took full advantage of it. Planting his lead foot into the ground, he pivoted on his heel, pouring the entire momentum of the spin into a whipping, devastating sweeping strike with the butt of the spear aimed right at chest level.
I had no choice but to arch my spine sharply and literally throw myself backward. The heavy wood roared past right over my face, barely missing the tip of my nose. A rush of air visibly struck my cheeks. But Leo, having caught his second wind, had no intention of stopping. Without giving me a chance to straighten up, he brought down his next strike from the apex of his spin—a vertical, chopping blow from the top down. He wanted to pin me to the ground while I was in an unstable position.
The ground swayed before my eyes. To save myself, I violently threw my torso to the side, executing a quick shoulder roll, and then, with an explosive backward dash, I broke the distance, returning to safety.
The training ground plunged back into relative silence, broken only by our heavy breathing.
Leo stood in the center, his chest heaving. His arms, exhausted to the limit from the insane pace and the constant twirling of the heavy weapon, trembled noticeably, but his face... A wide, genuine, and incredibly happy smile wandered across his face. His eyes literally blazed with triumph. For the first time in all our training sessions, he hadn't just withstood my pressure; he had forced me to retreat, answering my attack in earnest.
I looked at him, and a strange, profound feeling washed over me. Confusion gave way to sincere admiration. He really had gotten better. Much better.
And at that moment, Rain's silhouette flashed brightly in my mind. His calm, unyielding figure, his amber eyes looking at me through the twilight of our old home.
There is no place for pity or idle concessions in battle, Bell, his cold but fair voice rang in my ears. To respect your opponent means to fight them with all your strength. If you see them growing, rise even higher above them.
All my youthful softness instantly evaporated, making way for a chilling, absolute focus. I couldn't give Leo time to catch his breath. It was time to end this.
To the surprise of everyone present, I uncurled my fingers.
The two training swords fell to the hard-packed earth at my feet with a dry clatter.
"Hey, Bell, what are you doing..?" Leo protested, panting heavily. He frowned, clearly taking it as an insult or a refusal to continue.
But his breath caught the exact second he met my gaze. The words died in his throat. There was no more friendly warmth in my ruby irises—burning there was that pure, concentrated fighter's fire that Rain had forged in me for years. It was the look of someone ready to go all the way.
In a single heartbeat, I darted forward.
Weaponless and unburdened, my speed, boosted by my stats, increased multifold. It was a blistering approach.
Leo, flustered by such pressure and completely failing to understand how I planned to attack barehanded, succumbed to his very first instinct. He thrust the spear forward, launching a desperate stab to intercept me.
Everything happened in a fraction of a second. At the very last moment, when the wooden tip was ready to pierce my chest, I shifted my torso with a sparse, filigree movement. The spear whistled past, grazing the air just above my shoulder.
That very second, as Leo's weapon reached its maximum extension—its dead point—and he lost his balance committing to the strike, I threw my hands forward. My palms clamped down like a vise on the smooth shaft.
Using all the accumulated momentum of his own lunge along with my speed, I violently yanked the spear toward myself and to the side, simultaneously delivering a short, brutal palm strike to the butt of the shaft.
The weapon, which Leo simply lacked the strength to hold onto with his tired fingers, slipped from his grip with a dry whistle. Spinning in my hands, the opposite blunt end of the spear shaft sank precisely into Leo's stomach with a dull, heavy thud.
"Ghk..!" All the air was instantly knocked out of the guy's lungs.
He doubled over, clutching the bruised spot and throwing his defense completely open. All that was left for me was to finish the motion. Without stopping, I plowed into him with my whole body riding the remaining momentum, sweeping his plant leg and dragging him down to the ground with me.
Bam!
We both crashed onto the hard-packed dirt, kicking up a small cloud of yellow dust. I ended up on top, pinning him down hard and entirely blocking any attempts to get up.
For a few seconds, we just breathed heavily. The fire of excitement in Leo's eyes slowly faded, replaced by exhausted realization. A crooked, halting smirk appeared on his lips.
"Alright... alright, I give up," he wheezed, relaxing his muscles. "You win."
I got up immediately, releasing my grip, and offered him a hand, helping him to his feet.
A little later, we sat on a wooden bench beneath the training ground's canopy, trying to catch our breath. Leo, despite yet another defeat, looked surprisingly inspired. He gestured actively as he massaged his bruised stomach, but there wasn't a drop of resentment in his voice.
"Damn it, Bell, that was close though! Admit it, I almost had you this time!" he said with genuine enthusiasm. "You were actually scared when I switched to a quarterstaff grip, weren't you?"
I pressed a cool, damp towel to my face, wiping away the beads of sweat, and smiled modestly, a little bashfully, looking at him from under my white bangs.
"That was incredible, Leo. Honestly," I admitted truthfully. "I was genuinely impressed. Usually, the moment the fight moves to close quarters, you immediately start to panic and lose control of your weapon."
Leo gave a satisfied sniff, sat up straighter, and with a light, good-natured ego, threw his arms behind his head:
"Just you wait, a couple more weeks of training like this, and you'll be the one begging for mercy! You'll acknowledge my superiority soon enough!"
I only laughed softly and gently at his boasting. But before I could answer, a calm, measured voice came from behind us, hitting Leo like a bucket of ice water:
"The only thing he'll acknowledge is your complete lack of a sense of reality, Leo."
We both turned around. Carol was slowly approaching the bench. All this time she had been silently watching our sparring match, standing a bit further away by the weapon racks. Her face remained impenetrable, and her dark eyes looked at Leo with an arctic chill.
"That spinning attack of yours? Pretty. For a fairground," she began ruthlessly, crossing her arms beneath her chest. "In a real fight, you left your back completely exposed and blocked your own vision for a full second. Had Bell been serious, he would have simply severed your tendons before your spear even finished its arc. Survival isn't about fancy pirouettes."
Leo deflated instantly, his shoulders slumping as the smug smirk melted off his face.
"Aw, Carol..." he muttered.
"No 'aws'," Carol cut him off. Then her gaze, just as strict but with a barely perceptible, strange trace of concern deep in her pupils, shifted to me. "And I have questions for you too, Bell."
I involuntarily straightened my back.
"You hold back way too much," she continued, pronouncing every word crisply. "You had at least two opportunities to end this fight right at the start, when he was overcommitting forward on his thrusts. By dragging out the sparring just to 'see his new tricks', you put yourself at risk. Don't play with your opponent. Eliminate the threat instantly."
I felt the tips of my ears begin to burn, and with a familiar gesture, I guiltily scratched the back of my head. She was absolutely right. Rain's words and Carol's words aligned perfectly in their ruthless pragmatism.
"Sorry, Carol. I'll keep that in mind," I muttered awkwardly.
Leo shifted his gaze from Carol to me, peering intently at my guilty face. Realizing from my reaction that Carol was right and I really could have ended it much earlier, he let out a crushed groan. His energy was completely spent, and he simply flopped onto his back on the grass next to the bench in exhaustion.
"Oh, man..." he sighed into the clear sky, covering his eyes with his arm. "And here I thought I'd gotten better."
"You really have, Leo," I hurried to reassure him, leaning forward from the bench. "I truly was surprised by your feints. If I had dropped my guard for a second and failed to adjust my movements, I would have taken a serious hit. Your progress is obvious."
At that moment, Alice joined our group. A strange, thoughtful smirk drifted across her face. She walked up to where Leo lay and, with a light chuckle, simply tossed her damp towel right onto his face.
"And how exactly did you improve so drastically all of a sudden, huh?" she asked, putting her hands on her hips. As his childhood friend, she knew his former limits better than anyone, and right now she could clearly sense that Leo had unexpectedly leaped far beyond them.
Leo furiously snatched the towel off his face, but instead of acting indignant, he proudly stuck his nose in the air:
"Trade secret! Well, to be exact... Mr. Rain gave me a couple of solid tips on handling a spear when we went down to the middle floors together. He showed me how to use the shaft's momentum at close range. And you know what? Now I absolutely have to beg him to take me on as a permanent student!"
The moment that name slipped from his lips, a ringing silence unexpectedly descended on the training ground. Everyone seemed to freeze, plunged into their own thoughts. Rain's face—calm, confident, at times frightening with a wisdom that didn't match his age—surfaced in each of our memories. Our recent, albeit temporary, comrade had left far too deep a mark to be easily forgotten.
Alice pouted slightly and looked away. During their joint expedition, she had seen how Rain would occasionally dish out valuable tactical advice to each member of the party. But to her deep regret, since she was purely an archer, his tips were of little help to her—her weapon required an entirely different skill set. Seeing how much Leo had changed after just a few pointers from the black-haired warrior, she felt a slight pang of envy.
She turned to me, puffing her cheeks out comically:
"Listen, Bell... Here's what I don't get. I honestly thought Rain was a pure swordsman. Where did he get such knowledge of spear techniques?"
I hesitated, involuntarily smiling at the memory of my brother.
"Oh, about that... Actually, Rain isn't a swordsman in the classic sense. He once told me that to him, a weapon is just a tool. He uses whatever is convenient and effective for a specific, given moment in a fight. Aside from that... he's equally proficient with a wide variety of weapons. All at roughly the same, very high level."
Leo, who had been listening intently to our conversation from the ground, propped himself up slightly on his elbows. The spark of curiosity ignited in his eyes once more.
"Wait, Bell," he turned to me. "If Rain knows everything, and he's your teacher... Does that mean you know how to handle a spear professionally, too?"
I shook my head and let out a sad sigh:
"Unfortunately, no. Rain did, of course, show me the basic movements for all weapon types, so I would at least understand how to defend against them. But all our primary training since childhood has always centered around hand-to-hand combat and short blades. He said it suited my natural agility best."
Leo groaned in disappointment, fell back onto the soft grass, and this time covered his face completely with the towel, cutting off the conversation.
"Well, shoot..." his muffled voice came from beneath the fabric. "So copying the secrets of mastery from you is a no-go. I really will have to track down Mr. Rain in the city and beg him for lessons."
Alice, Carol, and I exchanged glances, and our quiet, unified laughter rang out over the morning training ground once more. Beyond the walls of the Loki Familia, the city was finally waking up, and ahead of us lay a new day, full of the unknown.