The crimson glow of the soul-lamps seemed to deepen, casting long, bloody shadows across the arena as the remains of Vhemrie were quickly cleared away by the hovering brass drones. The metallic tang of fresh blood still hung heavy in the air, mixing with the dense, stagnant heat of the Building of Entertainment. The spectators were completely wild now, their voices merging into a singular, deafening roar that shook the heavy obsidian walls of the coliseum. In our section, Elphyete kept her arms firmly around Salphy, whose face remained buried in the soft fabric of her cloak to block out the sights of the slaughterhouse below. Alea and Hanashighi stood completely still, their expressions unreadable, while Euphyne and Eufrien watched the pit with quiet intensity. Sir Vael was still nowhere to be seen, completely lost to the distractions of the casino halls.
The announcer's voice tore through the chaotic din, stripped of any theatrical build-up and carrying only the cold necessity of the tournament pairings. "Tokine vs Xhi!"
Tokine stepped out of the dark entrance tunnel with a slow, deliberate stride that stood in stark contrast to the absolute frenzy of the crowd. Resting casually against her shoulder was a massive scythe, its curved blade gleaming with a wicked, polished edge that caught the red light of the lamps and reflected it like a crescent moon drenched in blood. She didn't look nervous; if anything, she looked bored, her fingers tapping rhythmically against the long, dark shaft of her weapon. On the opposite side of the sand, a lean, wiry figure emerged. This was Xhi. The moment his boots touched the sand, the air around him began to distort with a frantic, humming energy. He was an extremely fast mage, his body vibrating with a high-frequency aura that made his outline blur against the dark stone background. He didn't stay still for a single millisecond, shifting his weight from foot to foot at speeds that made it look as if he had multiple limbs.
Xhi looked across the distance at Tokine, a confident, arrogant grin splitting his sharp features. "You brought a toy that big into a fight against me?" Xhi sneered, his voice sounding slightly high-pitched and sped up due to the intense velocity running through his system. "Before you can even lift that oversized blade off your shoulder, I'll have run circles around you a hundred times. You won't even see the spell that finishes you."
Tokine stopped ten paces away, tilted her head, and let out a clear, ringing laugh. The sound was bright and genuinely amused, completely mocking the serious, vibrating tension radiating from the mage. "Is that supposed to scare me?" Tokine said, her voice dripping with casual derision as she looked him up and down. "You look like a frantic little insect vibrating in place, desperately trying to convince yourself that you're dangerous. Go ahead and run all you want. You're just making it funnier to watch." She didn't mention her abilities, nor did she give any indication of what magic she used, keeping her weapon resting lazily on her shoulder as if she were merely waiting for a breeze to pass.
Xhi's expression twisted into pure rage at her mockery. The humming aura around him exploded into a violent, crackling field of pure velocity. He dropped into a low stance, and the sand beneath his feet was instantly blasted outward in a perfect circle from the sheer kinetic pressure. He reached his maximum speed instantly, his body entirely vanishing from the sight of the spectators. The air in the center of the pit screamed as a localized sonic boom rippled through the stadium, kicking up a massive cloud of dust.
To my eyes, the fight was fast—like one second long. In fact, it was less than a second. I didn't see anything. I was looking directly at Tokine, waiting for Xhi to reappear or launch an attack, but my vision completely failed to register a single movement. There was no flash of light, no trace of a spell, and no sound of a struggle. My eyes blinked once, a natural, involuntary reflex that took a fraction of a second, and in that tiny gap of time, the entire reality of the pit had shifted. One moment Xhi was a blur of impending destruction on the far side of the arena, and the next moment, the air was entirely still again. The dust cloud that had been kicked up by his launch hadn't even had the time to settle or expand; it hung suspended in the air like a frozen wave.
Suddenly, a series of wet, heavy thuds echoed from the center of the sand. I stared down, my brain completely stalling as I tried to comprehend what my eyes were looking at. Xhi was no longer moving at maximum speed. He wasn't moving at all. His body had suddenly slid apart, collapsing onto the arena floor in a gruesome display. He had been sliced into five pieces, the cuts so impossibly clean and precise that the bone and muscle looked as though they had been severed by a laser. His torso, his limbs, and his head fell away from each other simultaneously, the bright crimson of his blood spraying across the golden grains of sand only after the pieces had already hit the ground. He had been completely dismantled while moving at his absolute limit, destroyed in a space of time that felt shorter than a heartbeat.
Tokine stood exactly where she had been before the blink. She hadn't shifted her feet, and her posture hadn't changed. The only difference was that the massive scythe was now resting on her opposite shoulder, the curved blade completely clean, without a single drop of Xhi's blood clinging to the polished steel. She looked down at the five pieces of the mage scattered across the sand, a cold, satisfied smile playing on her lips.
"Time magic," Tokine said, her voice echoing clearly through the stunned, dead silence of the coliseum. She finally stated what magic she used, her tone casual and entirely unimpressed by the dead man's speed. "You can move as fast as your little spells allow, but it doesn't mean anything when I can just decide that your second takes an eternity to finish. You were standing still before I even moved my wrist."
I stood frozen in our section of the stands, my mouth slightly open as I looked from the bloody pieces on the floor back to Tokine. My mind was completely blank. I hadn't seen the swing of the scythe, I hadn't seen Xhi approach, and I hadn't seen Tokine move a single muscle. It was as if a frame of a movie had been entirely cut out and replaced with the final scene. I turned my head toward Celdrich, my eyes wide with a silent, frantic demand for some kind of answers.
Celdrich was standing with his arms crossed, his black eyes fixed on the center of the pit. He didn't look surprised; his expression was completely neutral, his analytical mind already processing the data he had gathered through his own unique perception. He noticed my confusion and tilted his head slightly, speaking in a low, even tone that carried clearly over the murmurs that were beginning to rise from the crowd.
"You didn't see it because your eyes can only perceive things within the standard flow of the world," Celdrich explained, his voice entirely devoid of emotion. "The moment Xhi triggered his maximum speed and vanished, Tokine activated her time magic. To everyone else, a single second passed, but for her, that single second was stretched into a complete standstill. She paused the timeline of the arena entirely."
I listened, my eyes darting back to the suspended dust cloud in the pit as Celdrich continued to break down the mechanics of the slaughter.
"While Xhi was frozen mid-stride, completely locked in place by the suspension of time, Tokine simply walked forward," Celdrich said, his black eyes tracing the invisible path she had taken across the sand. "She didn't have to race his speed; she just had to walk past him. She took her scythe and delivered five distinct, consecutive slashes to his body. She cut through his limbs, his torso, and his neck with absolute precision while he was incapable of moving or reacting."
Celdrich shifted his gaze back to Tokine, who was already beginning to walk back toward the competitor's tunnel. "Once the five cuts were executed, she returned to her exact starting position, adjusted her weapon, and released her grip on the timeline. The moment time resumed its normal pace, the damage she had inflicted during the frozen interval manifested all at once. That's why he fell apart instantly, and that's why none of us saw the weapon move. It happened outside of our present."
The explanation left a cold knot in my stomach. The sheer, unanswerable lethality of the magic was terrifying. Xhi probably had spent his entire life mastering a level of speed that made him a god among ordinary men, yet he had been reduced to butcher's meat without ever knowing that his opponent had even drawn a weapon.
The announcer's box flickered with a dull violet light as the results were finalized on the screen above. The crowd finally broke its silence, a wave of stunned whispers rapidly escalating back into a roaring tempest of approval for the efficiency of the kill. The announcer's voice boomed through the stone arches, delivering the final verdict with the clinical precision required by the pit.
"Tokine wins!"