Chapter 42
At all Battles of Dragons, except for the time I was training under Master Hon, I was alone. Without companions, without invitees, without friends. I didn't get close to anyone, didn't make friends. Generally communicated only out of necessity.
The organizers have always shown me respect, ever since I fulfilled that little request of theirs. And especially when I first won the Championship in 1835... At 73 years old. The respectful attitude of the organizers became completely justified then.
Except I didn't use it: I slept in the forest or in the mountains, depending on where the Battle was held, like a wild beast, hiding and covering my tracks. I came only for the fight itself, after which I immediately went back into hiding. And I had my own reasons for that: after all, no one forbade killing fighters outside the arena. Let alone limited the number of people who could participate in this killing. And my hatred with mages was completely mutual.
True, the fact that I hid did not cool down the desire to hunt me in any way. And they hunted. In whole "hunting parties". They even set up a sweepstake: will they catch him or not, will they kill him or not...
That was also an exciting adventure, no worse than the fights themselves. After all, it was still a question of who was hunting whom!
Adrenaline, excitement, passion... The opportunity to let my Beast run wild. Full dedication and full use of my strength, cunning, mind, bloodlust... I called this the Wild Hunt to myself.
And I'll tell you honestly: the Battle of Dragons without the Wild Hunt... is too bland. Like boiled meat without salt and pepper—it seems filling, but the taste isn't right.
But Suo is used to something else... And now we are playing by her rules: a separate house, service, increased attention from the organizers. Everything is decorous, noble, official, it even gives me shivers down my spine from such a sharp break in the behavioral pattern. But on the other hand—I asked her for it myself.
Moving towards our small cavalcade was a company of seven men in traditional mage robes. Slightly ahead moved one of them—judging by his facial expression, eyes, movements, posture, gestures, their leader.
And this company purposefully moved to approach us. When there were three to three and a half steps left between us, the one walking first opened his arms in a welcoming gesture and, smiling nastily, let out, drawing out the syllables.
"Oooold woooman!" rage was hot, like lava, blinding like lightning. It surged so sharply that even if I had wanted to, I wouldn't have had time to raise my willpower shields. Rage, literal frenzy, overwhelmed me completely in a single instant.
A mawashi geri swept away, splashing into bloody dust and bone shrapnel, the head of this freak, and my hand was already tearing out the heart of the next one, standing behind his left shoulder. Immediately my right leg struck from the side into the neck of the third, sharply and forcefully, breaking his cervical vertebrae.
Only at this moment did I realize that I had used the "freeze frame" during my attack. But I didn't give a damn. Especially since I used not only it, but also the "jump". And shit on it! I am enraged! The body was saturated with Qi to the brim, using it for acceleration, strengthening, and striking. The thing is, Qi techniques are not blocked by magic. Just as magic is not blocked by Qi techniques. So right now, everything was decided by speed. Shields and passive defense seemed not to exist at all, whether for them or for me. It's like two samurai without armor, armed with monomolecularly sharpened katanas—it is impossible to stop a strike, only to dodge or deliver it first.
The "freeze frame" ended, but I didn't stop, already attacking the next one on the death row list, punching straight through his head.
"Jump" again. The "freeze frame" triggers again, and fiery runic circles of some spells that didn't even have time to activate freeze in the air. Right there in the air freezes the head of this mage, chopped off with the edge of my hand, and his arms, also no longer connected to his torso.
The "freeze frame" ends at the moment when I tear the penultimate of this company into two halves (right and left), let out a frenzied roar, just as generously seasoned with a Qi strike as all the previous movements, right into the face of the last one, knocking him off his feet with this roar.
Him and basically everyone who found themselves on that half of the packed, unpaved "square" that we had just stepped onto. Including three saddled small dinosaurs.
"She is my woman!!! Any questions?!!" without lowering my tone or volume, I asked him. He frantically shook his head in a gesture confirming that he had no questions... as did about a dozen people and not-quite-people lying on the ground closer to us. Terror mixed with madness splashed in his eyes. A puddle slowly spread under him. And a characteristic unpleasant smell began to spread.
I slowly swept the surrounding area with bloodshot eyes.
Behind my back came the sound of an abruptly emptying stomach. And it seems not just one. I was in no hurry to turn around—first I had to get my rage under control. Try to master my beast at least a little bit, otherwise I risk doing something stupid... and possibly getting smacked in the face by Suo (I think she doesn't wear the title of Sorcerer Supreme for nothing—she has enough power to magically restrain one enraged mutant).
I slowly straightened up, lowered my shoulders, and tried to brush the blood off my hands. It didn't work very well. The rage was under control again.
I turned around: Xavier and McCoy were throwing up. Logan, having released his blades, was looking around warily. Erik bristled in all directions with dozens of metal needles hanging in the air and aimed in all directions at once. Moreover, Raven pressed herself against his back, and the cocoon of needles covered her too, as if she were an extension of Erik's own body. Under Suo's feet burned a runic circle of fire, two others hung in front of her arms spread to the sides. Her head was covered by the enchanted hood of her robe.
The guy in the red yifu who accompanied us lay on the ground five paces from our company, covering his head with his hands, legs stretched out in our direction—experienced: the correct reaction to a showdown between fighters of this level. After all, no one will intentionally touch a "red" if he doesn't act stupid and set himself up for a hit.
"Foorrrgive me, Suo," I said to my wife, with still slightly growling notes in my voice. "Couldn't hold baaack. Was he your frrriend?"
"No, Vic," Suo replied, in no hurry to extinguish the runic circles. "He was not my friend."
"Will there be revenge for him?"
"I doubt it. Few people liked Rick. He was a very insufferable personality. Even though he was a very strong mage. Very strong."
I once again swept my gaze over the entire surrounding area, looking for danger. But there was none. No one was rushing to attack our company, which was demonstrating such a high combat readiness (Xavier and McCoy don't count).
"Let's go to the house already," I suggested. Suo nodded and lowered her arms, extinguishing the circles. The hood slid off her head back onto her shoulders by itself. "Hey, guy!" I called out to the "red", imperceptibly stepping on the throat of the last of the seven, who was still lying there. A crunch was heard, followed by a death rattle. The body twitched and grew still. Even if he turned gray in less than a minute, even if he shook his head and looked harmless—he's a mage. I hate mages.
Suo looked at me reproachfully; I only shrugged.
"Yes, Lord Sabretooth?" the "red" answered in a perfectly calm voice, removing one hand from his head and looking up at me.
"The fight is over. We can move on."
"Indeed," he swept an assessing glance over the square. Then he calmly got up, applied some spell to clean his clothes, and moved in the previous direction.
I tore a piece of clothing off the cleanest corpse (the third one, whose neck I broke) and, wiping my hands with it on the go, followed the guide.
Erik retracted the needles back into his armor and kept pace, as did Raven walking next to him. Logan retracted his blades and also walked with us.
Xavier, pale to the point of green, caught up with us at a run, as did McCoy, wiping his face with his paw.
"And now what?" Erik clarified with me. "Will there be problems?"
"No," Suo shook her head. "This is the Battle of Dragons. Everyone here doesn't care about fights and murders, as long as they don't touch the organizers or the service personnel. They specifically walk around in bright red yifu so that they can be distinguished immediately."
"Even if you kill all the 'non-reds'—you are in your right," I added gloomily, recalling that one of the Battles a very long time ago ended exactly like that: the Wild Hunt dragged on then, smoothly moved to the Arena itself and the adjacent settlement. Someone figured out how to escape through portals or something similar, but everyone who stayed died. As a result, I was awarded the Championship without even holding the qualifying rounds—there was simply no one to fight. Moreover, it wasn't me who killed absolutely all of them then. They themselves gladly did this work for me.
"In the right?" Xavier chimed in.
"The Law of the Strong," Suo explained. "That is the only law working here for the duration of the Battle. Strong—means you survived, means you are right."
"How terrible... How can such savagery even exist?!"
"Some people need exactly this kind of savagery. And you would be surprised, Charles, how many there are," Suo noted sadly. "Not a single one of them arrived here by force. All of their own free will, and they put a lot of effort into it."
"Cruelty and aggression are in people's blood, Charles," Erik interjected into the conversation. "I constantly tell you about this, but for some reason, you still don't want to understand it."
"But you attacked them yourself!" Xavier declared. "Out of nowhere, threw yourself and killed!"
"He insulted my wife. In front of me," I answered calmly. "And he is a mage."
"So what if he's a mage?" McCoy didn't understand.
"I hate mages," I explained gloomily, dropping the bloody rag on the ground. Suo sighed sadly. On this note, the conversation died out on its own. Especially since we had just arrived at the house allocated to us.
Suo occupied herself with laying down shields and defenses, and I went to wash up.
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