A drop of blood slowly slid down the exposed neck of Diomedes, tracing a crimson path over his tense skin, marked by the relentless edge of the axe. The steel kissed his throat with a promise of silent death, a lethal whisper amid the clamor of battle.
Slowly, the son of Tydeus rose to his feet.
Behind him, Achilles gripped the weapon with unbreakable firmness, as if the axe were an extension of his own divine arm.
The arrogant smile that had lit his face at the beginning of the duel had vanished completely, replaced by a mask of fierce concentration. His eyes, wide and gleaming like stars in the night, did not blink for an instant. A mixture of irritation and respect mingled in his gaze.
"I will offer it to you a second time" said the son of Peleus, his voice low but sharp as bronze. "Do you surrender?"
The stands remained in sepulchral silence.
From the Olympic box, Hephaestus watched with a furrowed brow. His hands, accustomed to shaping volcanoes and divine swords, clenched with displeasure.
"Tch… I thought he would put up more of a fight" murmured the smith god, his voice hoarse like the echo of a struck anvil.
Beside him, Ares did not answer immediately. He cast a sidelong glance at his brother; in his eyes, red as fire, a spark of secret knowledge flashed. Then he turned his gaze back to the arena, and his lips curved into a subtle smile, laden with anticipation. He, the god of slaughter, knew it better than anyone.
This was not over. The real storm had only just begun to roar.
________________________________________
In the arena, Diomedes remained silent at Achilles' offer. His body stayed tense, a divine bow on the verge of release. The blade still brushed his neck... and yet he did not tremble. There was no surrender in his posture, only the stillness of a stalking lion.
Achilles narrowed his eyes, a hint of doubt crossing his mind.
The Achaean turned his head slightly, fixing his gaze on his former comrade-in-arms, now turned adversary. There was no fear in those eyes forged in the fire of battle. There was no hesitation. Only a pure blaze of determination. And then, Diomedes smiled.
It was not a smile of raw defiance. It was something worse: playful, almost mocking, as if pain and threat were mere games on the board of the gods.
Achilles frowned, confused for an instant. And that instant was enough.
With a sharp and precise movement, Diomedes knocked the axe away from his neck with his armored forearm, spinning on himself in a whirlwind of sand and fury. His fist closed like a clamp of divine iron, concentrating within it all his unbreakable will. He took a firm step, driving his heel into the golden sand, and hurled all his weight forward in a punch that could have toppled walls.
But the blow touched nothing.
Achilles was no longer there. For him, the world had become slow. Too slow. He saw the fist approaching as if it were moving through thick water, and simply leaned his torso aside, letting the attack slice through the air in front of his nose.
"Too predictable, Diomedes" said Achilles
His tone was a mixture of mockery and disappointment, his voice resonating like an echo of thunder
"Is that all Athena taught you?"
His counterattack was a flash of immediate brutality.
He closed his fist and drove it into the son of Tydeus's abdomen with brutal violence. The impact was so fast, so devastating, that the air around it exploded in a thunderous sonic wave. The ground trembled beneath the spectators' feet, as if the earth itself protested against such power. With absolute ease, his blow had surpassed the sound barrier,
Diomedes' feet left the ground, the world spun. His body was hurled like a projectile toward the opposite end of the arena. In midair, with his lungs emptying of air and blood gathering in his mouth, he managed to extend his arm and seize an abandoned shield.
An instant later, he crashed into the wall of the coliseum.
The stone shattered. A crater opened in the wall with a crash that echoed like thunder. Blood was vomited from the warrior's mouth upon impact.
His body collapsed to the ground, left sitting among the smoking rubble, his back resting against the crater he himself had carved with the force of his impact. He coughed violently, spitting red onto the dusty sand.
But there was no time to recover his breath; danger loomed like an inevitable shadow. He raised his gaze and saw the threat approaching, so he lifted the shield with a defensive growl.
Just in time.
Achilles had no intention of granting him even a moment to breathe; with a fluid motion, he took a spear and hurled it without hesitation. The projectile tore through the arena, ripping through the wind; the sound was left behind, unable to follow its trajectory.
Diomedes raised the shield with both hands. The clash was deafening.
The tip of the spear struck the bronze with a metallic crash that thundered throughout the entire coliseum, making the stands tremble and echoing like the roar of an awakened titan. The ground shook once more. The force of the impact drove the son of Tydeus even deeper into the crater, his bones protesting under the colossal pressure.
The spear rebounded, spinning upon itself in the air, suspended in an eternal heartbeat of emptiness.
But Achilles had already moved, vanishing from his position like a golden phantom. In less than a second, he crossed the entire span of the arena, a gleaming flash that the audience barely perceived as a blur of light and supernatural speed.
His hand closed around the shaft of the still-spinning spear, stopping it with inhuman precision.
And when his feet touched the ground in front of Diomedes, his eyes burned with the fire of imminent victory, an inferno that promised to consume everything in its path.