After dusting himself off and muttering about how much he despised Luran under his breath, he sat on the edge of the training ground, watching the rest of the warriors. The area was filled with the constant clacking of wood on wood as each warrior strived to improve. It was like watching a group of gladiators training. Well, in reality, this was a harsh comparison, as their technique was far better, but they gave off a very similar image. The ekari were natural-born warriors, no doubt about it. And their two horns and chiseled bodies only added to their menacing image.

  Each warrior demonstrated such command of the sword that they appeared destined to wield it. The skirmishes mostly played out like dances, beautiful displays balancing offense and defense. The brutality of the battles only came to light when impact was made, when sword struck flesh, accompanied by a deep thud and an audible groan.

  Yet while every ekari warrior demonstrated skill in their own right, it was clear that some demonstrated skills superior to the rest. Luran, he already knew, was seated among the elite, but he caught another eleven or so of impeccable skill with his untrained eyes. Of these eleven, seven wielded weapons besides the sword, all made from wood.

  He looked around these skirmishing warriors to find those same weapons cast in metal—they were carbon copies made from wood for training. It was then that he recalled his time at the weaponsmith. Kinji had spoken of custom weapons that were earned through skill and feats of prestige. True Warriors, he had called them.

  So these warriors were the best that the ekari had to offer, it seemed. Each wielded a truly unique weapon: a scimitar, hooked swords, a war club; each was different from the last. Only two resembled one another, two warriors electing for polearms. Yet there were differences. One was longer, with what appeared to be a sai at the end, whereas the other instead had a short blade that resembled the end of a machete. The former was wielded by none other than Akesh.

  He focused his attention on only these select warriors. As the best of the best, these were the ones he should observe. Upon doing this, he noticed it wasn’t just the custom weapons that were common among them; they each bore a facial marking. It appeared to be some kind of tribal tattoo. He had noticed it on Luran the first night that they met, but hadn’t been presented with the right opportunity to ask.

  The tattoo was thin and black, adorning the upper cheeks. It made the wearers seem more imposing, which he supposed was the intent. That, and to distinguish them from the other warriors, like a badge that one never took off.

  Turning his mind back to the fights, he saw that only two of these so-called True Warriors were sparring together, so he directed his attention to them. To his surprise, he recognized it to be Krag and Elarissé. Krag wielded a ginormous war club and shield, while Elarissé held two short axes that looked a lot like tomahawks.

  Elarissé was lightning fast, diving in and out of range like a rabbit. It was clear she had the speed advantage, as she was able to execute several strikes before withdrawing. Yet Krag’s defense was impregnable, his hefty shield covered the bulk of his body, and his war club was no joke.

  Twice as thick as a sword at the base, it sported an absurdly bulky end with spikes. No doubt, it was the most intimidating weapon he’d ever seen. Regardless of its wooden composition, he was horrified to think what kind of damage it would do if it struck Elarissé—even if he did kind of hate her guts.

  But Elarissé always seemed too quick for Krag. She would dart out of the way in the nick of time before his war club clattered into the ground, sending out a deep rumble. As the fight progressed, Elarissé found more success, flanking around Krag’s shield and striking exposed areas. Nothing significant, but damage nonetheless.

  The success sent her into some kind of frenzy, and she cackled with each attack, becoming more animalistic. Krag didn’t seem to mind. In fact, he appeared to enjoy it. Laughing as he swung his war club to fell his weaker foe.

  But that’s when Elarissé made her mistake. She darted into Krag’s range before attempting to flank to his blind spot, but her foot slipped on a piece of rock. This forced her to her bottom, stripping away her speed advantage. Krag smiled, withdrawing his war club and striking downwards with all his might. Elarissé managed to get to her feet, but there wasn’t enough time to evade. Optionless, she locked out her elbows and positioned her axes in an X shape to take the blow.

  Thomas expected the war club to brush through her defense like a knife through butter, but amazingly, Elarissé’s defense held. The force knocked her back, though. Through gritted teeth, she counterattacked, darting forward and jumping for Krag’s neck. This caught the large ekari by surprise.

  On this occasion, he was the one without options. Unable to swing his war club in time, he drew up his shield and ducked behind it, but he didn’t stop there. He smashed into Elarissé with an upward strike of his shield, forcing her further skyward. Seizing the opportunity, he once again readied his mighty war club for a downward chop.

  As Elarissé was airborne, she was powerless to evade. Yet speed and coordination were not Krag’s strongest qualities, and he lost precious fractions of a second getting into position. This gave Elarissé just enough time to roll out of range upon landing on the ground. Krag’s axe came crashing down like a handheld meteor, and it shattered into thousands of pieces as it struck the earth.

  Left with nothing in his hand but a splintered handle, Krag tossed it behind him and bellowed in amusement before flexing. Elarissé joined his side to poke his bicep before hitting a flex too. The pair chuckled in shared joy.

  “Luran. I broke another one!” he called.

  “Kragtherion!” Luran squeaked, marching over to him. “What is the matter with you? Stop breaking all the war clubs. This is the third one this week.”

  “Not my fault they’re so puny!” he protested, giving Luran puppy-dog eyes. Luran stood arms crossed with squinting eyes, unmoved by Krag’s excuse and affectionate appearance.

  “Come on, Luran. Lighten up!” Elarissé interjected. “Wood isn’t exactly in short supply. It’s all around us!” she defended, taking a lock of Luran’s long black hair and putting it across her upper lip like a mustache. He snatched it back.

  “And you! Why do you fight like a beast?” he snapped, switching targets from Krag to her. “You were winning the fight, and then you got reckless! Wasted your advantage! If this were a real fight, you would be dead.

  “Oh relax, grandpa, would you. I don’t need a lecture. I fought just fine.”

  “I thought she was pretty good,” Krag added. “She’s like a rat. I couldn’t get a hold of her.”

  “A rat?!” Elarissé boomed, “I’ll have you know I’m a refined woman!” she added, before punching Krag in the arm with far too much force. Krag didn’t react. Thomas imagined it felt like little more than a tap to him.

  “You’re no refined woman, let me tell you that!” Luran countered. Elarissé grunted and turned on her heels, flicking her dazzling red hair as she did so, and walked off. Luran’s unenthused expression slowly softened as he redirected his attention back to Krag.

  “Look, Big Guy,” he said, putting a hand on his shoulder, “Just try to be more careful with your clubs from now on. You don’t know your own strength. It’s not fair to Fodarn. He’s the one who has to keep making them just for you.” Krag hung his head.

  “Okay,” he mumbled. The pair walked off, playfully knocking into each other as they did so.

  Thomas spent the remainder of his resting time reflecting. Luran had brushed aside his attacks like taking candy from a baby, and he needed to come up with a new strategy; otherwise, the outcome would be the same.

  Luran had mentioned it was all in his stance, but could this truly be all that was at play? He’d been deceptive. He knew he had. Or perhaps, what he considered deceptive is what all beginners tried when they first wielded the sword. How was he to know? He scratched his head furiously, trying to draw out an answer.

  Elarissé and Krag were both experts, yet she was able to land on numerous occasions against him. This meant there had to be ways to exploit Luran’s defense.

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  So what was Elarissé doing that he wasn’t? There was, of course, the fact that she was as skilled as they come, but what specifically about the way she fought was so different from him? Was it her movement? She was superb at getting into striking range, attacking, and then retreating before Krag could attack. But that seemed to be more of an adaptation to Krag’s slower and stronger style. Luran also wasn’t attacking him, so that, in particular, wouldn’t be of any great help here.

  Her stamina was also undoubtedly far superior to his. She and Krag were expending vast amounts of energy with all of their movement and heavy strikes, and the pair barely seemed out of breath when their duel concluded. Of course, there wasn’t much he could do about his lack of stamina. He had to work with what he had, just like with his lacking swordsmanship. Closing his eyes, he replayed the fight over in his head, and a plan slowly formed.

  It exploited the rules Luran had imposed and certainly wasn’t in the spirit of a swordfight, but then again, that deserved Luran for phrasing the contest the way he did.

  Previously, he had been throwing everything into his strikes, and it had drained him like a sponge being squeezed of its contents. A better approach would be to ditch power almost completely in favor of speed. The two are closely related but undeniably different. He didn’t need to try and cut Luran in two as he had been doing—he just needed to touch him with the sword. That was the task, after all.

  Luran told him to land a single strike. There was no mention of how hard this strike had to be. He felt a little guilty creating such an underhanded plan, but certainly not guilty enough to abandon it. It may not have been sporting, but it gave him the best odds at success.

  So it was clear speed was the priority for their next duel, and avoiding the use of powerful blows so he could stay in the fight for longer, but were there any other clues that he could strip from watching Krag and Elarissé fight?

  Elarissé seemed rather deceptive; most of the time, he couldn’t predict which way she was going to move or attack. Yet it’s true that Krag defended most of her blows. When had she been successful again? He recalled her landing several strikes to the leg, one to the wrist, and another to the neck. No, wait. Krag had avoided that. Perhaps one to the bicep, maybe? He wasn’t entirely sure. They were using wooden weapons, after all. No blood to paint a picture.

  So what was the common denominator here? Legs, wrist, and bicep. He snapped his fingers in glee. It was the extremities! She’d only landed on the extremities. He’d been aiming for Luran’s midsection and neck, tendencies he’d adopted from his mixed martial arts days. It once again dawned on him how short-sighted he had been. No wonder Luran swatted away his attacks with ease.

  Smiling to himself, he spent the remainder of his time visualizing the impending spar. He didn’t expect to win, but at least he had a fighting chance, and he was certain he would put in a much better showing this time around. Speed, deception, and the extremities. That was his path to victory.

  When Luran called him to go for a second round, the ekari seemed just as smug as ever.

  “I hope you’ve spent this time wisely, human. Did you watch the others as I instructed? Learn anything?” Luran sneered.

  “I might have picked up a thing or two, but there’s only one way to find out,” Thomas said threateningly, drawing his sparring sword and adopting a fighting stance. Luran shrugged his shoulders to echo the sentiment.

  “Find out we will,” Luran laughed, drawing his own sword.

  Thomas advanced as soon as Luran’s sword was ready, and commenced his onslaught. Like before, he chained various sword swings together unrelentingly, not giving Luran time to collect his thoughts. Yet he was careful to take a lot of the oomph out of his blows, which he found made it much easier to recover after a sword swing.

  Luran grinned as he deflected the blows. To his annoyance, it seemed Luran was staring at him dead in the eyes, not even following his sword. He simply knew where it was, so he didn’t need to look.

  In response, Thomas picked up the pace, aiming solely for the extremities and throwing out the strangest of strikes. There was no way Luran could predict these. Just as he thought his efforts were wasted, he witnessed Luran make a wrong move.

  He threw out an overhead swing from his right shoulder, targeting Luran’s left side, but then quickly whipped his elbow and wrist around, switching his target to the opposing side instead.

  Luran raised his sword to defend his left side, seeing the move coming, but when it pivoted to attack the other side, he was caught off-guard, and only narrowly managed to flick his sword across to catch the strike. The smile vanished from his face for a split second before he regained his composure.

  Eager to capitalize on this small victory, Thomas continued to press forward, and to his surprise, Luran continued to make mistakes. Had the ekari not been so quick to recover from these mistakes, he surely would have landed. But there was one big issue—he was getting tired. Really tired. His breathing grew labored, and recovering his sword after a missed swing caused his muscles to scream for relief. Yet he was so close. He couldn’t give up now. One final attack. That would have to be enough.

  He withdrew from the clash of swords to catch his breath, and Luran dropped his sword’s tip to the ground, eyeing him.

  “That’s it then?” Luran asked. “You’ve yet to land a single blow!”

  He didn’t answer and wiped the sweat from his forehead, readying himself for his final attack. At the corner of his eye, he noticed a small crowd of ekari warriors who had started watching. Great! That was all he needed: more pressure.

  He looked at his sword and back to Luran. What was his play here? How should he attack this one last time? What was the path to victory? An idea flashed in his mind, and he smiled eerily in delight. He may win this yet.

  Running at Luran, he twirled his sword unpredictably like a ribbon gymnast. Luran readied himself and followed the sword with his eyes, not defending until the last possible moment. Their swords clashed as he aimed for Luran’s left elbow.

  He recalled the blade and sent out a series of thrusting probes to Luran’s mid-section before turning his attention back to the extremities. He almost caught his ankle, but the ekari quickly raised his foot to avoid the strike. As the onslaught continued, he found that he was gaining ground—he was actually pushing the warrior back.

  Yet pushing back wasn’t enough. Luran was simply too good with a sword; he needed to take it out of the equation. He threw out a backhand slash aimed at Luran’s neck, forcing the ekari to block. There was no dodging that, especially as Luran was on the back foot. Their swords clattered into one another as the pair fought for dominance, but he wasn’t here to waste his energy in a battle of strength. Again, this would result in a loss.

  He grabbed Luran’s sword hand wrist, thereby immobilizing his defense, and drew back his sword and struck at his free arm. The ekari tried to jolt backwards but couldn’t as his arm was subdued, so he did the only thing he could. He grabbed the wrist of Thomas's sword hand in return.

  It was all too perfect. Without warning, Thomas let go of Luran’s wrist and extended his arm outward, forming a fist. Luran could try and strike him with the sword, but that was against the rules that he, himself, had imposed. At this distance, Luran didn’t have the time to block or avoid the blow.

  As he threw every ounce of remaining energy into his fist, he couldn’t help but feel smug. He was about to beat Luran at his silly little game and get a good lick in for all the beatings he had endured.

  Sure, it might not be in the spirit of the game—the goal was to learn swordfighting, but Luran had only asked him to land a single blow, and as far as Thomas was concerned, it didn’t matter what type it was. As the fist approached, now only a few inches from Luran’s nose, Thomas thought he saw the faint outline of a smile across Luran’s lips.

  The punch landed, knocking Luran’s head back, but it didn’t ground the ekari. Far from it. In fact, it didn’t seem to do anything at all, which is more than could be said for the effect it had on him. His fist crumpled against Luran’s face, leaving him in agony. He clutched at his hand to inspect the damage. His knuckles were heavily grazed and beginning to swell. It felt like he had punched a brick wall.

  “What the hell was that?!” he shouted, falling to his knees.

  The watching ekari warriors erupted into laughter, slapping each other on the back and pointing in his direction. Luran walked up to him and smiled, extending a hand to help him up.

  He smacked the hand away and rose to his feet unaided to meet Luran’s gaze. To his astonishment, Luran’s once handsome face was covered in what appeared to be a rocky exterior. No longer were his features smooth; they were replaced by hardened, angular skin that had thin recesses running through it.

  From far away, he may not have been able to tell, as his skin remained its pastel orange shade, but here, up close, the difference was striking. It appeared as though his skin had become like rock. He was too stunned to speak, so Luran did it for him.

  “What you just experienced is the power of the ekari. I’m surprised you didn’t ask about it before, given it’s specially suited to combat. We can harden our skin to become as impenetrable as rock, giving us the ability to defend against lethal strikes such as those with a sword… or a fist, I suppose,” he laughed, in a rather animated way.

  Skin as tough as rock? That hardly seems balanced! What an overpowered skill! No wonder they were unmatched in combat.

  “You could have warned me first!” he protested, flexing his fingers, which screamed in distress.

  “You,” Luran said, extending the word for dramatic effect, “didn’t ask.” He followed up by poking Thomas in the center of his forehead, probably to test if there was a brain in there.

  “So, how does it work?” Thomas asked, massaging his knuckles to check if anything was broken. “Seems a bit overpowered to me,” he mumbled, not wanting to inflate Luran’s ego any more than it already was. Such an act may cause his head to explode. Luran raised an eyebrow.

  “Oh, you think so?” he laughed. “It’s evident you are wholly ignorant of the powers of monsters. There are powers out there far more potent than our own. Take the monruk. They are quite literally made of stone—ours is merely a poor imitation. We can only harden one area of our body at a time, as it is too taxing on our essence. This means we have to predict where deadly blows will land. What’s more, we can’t remain in this form forever,” he explained, recalling his power, which caused his face to return to normal.

  “Most of us can manage around 30 seconds, but our boy Krag over there can last a full minute.” They both turned to the crowd of warriors to see Krag waving enthusiastically. “That means we have to use our power sparingly. Waste it unnecessarily, and that could be the end. So you see, our superior battle prowess is not a result of an overpowered ability. It is a result of unparalleled training, shared knowledge, and methodical application. If it were not for these qualities, we would have perished long ago like so many others.”

  Luran walked past him to the rest of the ekari warriors, where he received more than a few pats on the back. Silly, really. Was there any pride in beating someone so weak? He called back to Thomas, “That hand looks nasty. Go to the Healer to get it sorted. I don’t want you to miss training tomorrow. I trust you know where that is?”

  He rolled his eyes. This guy really was an asshole.