The Simulacrum - Chapter 80~ Part 1

Sword fighting in media always has a kind of primal charm to it. Arcing swings meeting in the air, sparks flying, and combatants gracefully stepping out of the way of incoming harm. The back and forth is easy to follow and has a rhythm to it. In many ways, such fights are little more than a dance. A choreographed, rehearsed, and meticulously performed one that just happens to involve weapons. Real swordfights were rarely so glamorous. Case in point…

“Take this!”

The Knight girl yelled out and lunged at me with a low thrust aimed at my thigh. I moved my sword to intercept it, and she instantly changed the trajectory of her attack into an upwards slash with my upper arm as its target. It was impossible to readjust my parry angle at this point, so I didn’t even bother, and instead I stepped in while twisting my upper body just enough so that her blade harmlessly glanced off my spaulders. This put her into the perfect position to swing down onto my head once she reaffirmed her footing, so I didn’t let her do that and used my momentum to hit her with the same shoulder, pushing her back and nearly off her feet.

This was how all our exchanges went. She was always on the offensive, while I turtled up and exploited her openings to keep her unbalanced. She was faster than me, but she had comparatively little weight behind her attacks, while I could use a combination of my size, reach, and those ever-useful precognitive reflexes to neutralize her assaults. The result was the equivalent of watching someone trying to break down a brick wall with their forehead.

If I had to say why this was the case, I had to admit that it had little to do with skill levels and magical enhancements, but rather a fundamental difference in our approach to armed combat.

There was a reason why I complained about movie fight scenes just now: Miss Unicorn was fighting like we were in one. Every swing, every thrust, every single flourish was telegraphed like she was afraid that I wasn’t paying attention during the rehearsals and I was about to miss my cue. All of her attacks were wide and easy to predict. Now, I admit that this might very well be a ‘me’ problem, as I had both my sixth sense, I’d excessively observed and memorized her habits in combat, plus there was a theoretical possibility of some muscle reflexes resurfacing from the sea of my lost memories. With all of those things stacked in my favor, it would’ve been embarrassing if I couldn’t at least keep up with her.

On the flip side, while she was fairly predictable, she was also really freaking fast, and she was getting faster with each exchange. I didn’t know when she would reach her peak, but for the moment I could still keep the pace, even if I had to run my armor’s enchantments just under the red line. I hoped things would stay like this a while longer, but I knew better than to bet on that, so I already primed one of my hidden cards using my Phantom Limbs.

Oh, a moment. She’s doing a thing. After our last exchange, Miss Unicorn somehow backflipped about five meters from a standing position, and upon landing, she crouched down and planted one hand onto the ground. Her boots flared up with colorless light, gradually growing in intensity as she maintained the posture, and then she dashed forth like an arrow freshly loosened from the bow. Or maybe not, as last time I checked, arrows didn’t travel in a zigzag pattern. What was the point of that? Was she trying to confuse me? Was I a crocodile? Or were those effective on alligators? Either way, I waited for her to get closer, and the moment she was about to take another turn, I dashed right at her. Magic or not, momentum was a thing, and so she had to dissipate some of it before she could go from a ‘zig’ to a ‘zag’. That was my window of opportunity, and I certainly wasn’t too shy to exploit it.

She realized what I was doing just a moment too late and raised her sword to defend herself. Since my goal wasn’t to skewer her, I aimed at the weapon and used all my mana-enhanced strength to swat it out of the way. Ignoring the blinding sparks of magical discharge exploding from the point of contact, I swept her guard away, and once I was right next to her, I stomped my foot hard and used my upper body to sharply shove her.

It was my own bootleg version of a martial arts move the princess used the last time we sparred. I think she called it ‘body checking’. As for how effective it was, let’s just say that my opponent was sent flying. Literally. Parabolic arc and all. Maybe I should’ve expected this much considering the size difference and the mana-enhancements, but it’s hard to prepare for the sight of ragdolling someone. Miss Unicorn wasn’t much worse for wear though, and she landed on her feet, drawing two parallel grooves into the muddy ground in the process.

She probably needed a few seconds to recover from that, so… where was I before her stunt? Oh, right. Phantom Limbs. Speaking of which, I used the downtime to quickly check the internals of my armor. Everything was in working order, but that didn’t mean there was nothing to be improved, so I quickly tweaked a few output values and lowered the function boosting my reaction time a little, as it caused me to overreact whenever I was warned by my dodging sense, and it threw off my timing. The whole process was a little more involved than just tweaking a few knobs and sliders, but I’ve been doing it so much in the past two days that it became second nature, and once I was done, I quickly faced her again. As expected, she was still in the process of recollecting herself.

By the way, no, I didn’t forget trying to use my Phantom Limb on her armor. It was simply ineffective because, surprise-surprise, it was a plot device. It wasn’t as completely restricted as Cal or the anti-dragon spear, but it was still impossible to tweak it on the fly without relying on loopholes and exploiting magical coding errors, neither of which was feasible during a battle. On the bright side, this confirmed my suspicions about her being an important Main Character, and more than likely the Knight love interest option for Josh (though at this point they got along as well as oil and water). I mean, why else would her gear be a plot device if not to serve a crucial role in our dastardly Narrative’s designs? This, in turn, meant that she herself was also crucially important. Or at the very least more important than me or Mr. Griffon, as neither of us got any fancy plot device gear. Though again, that was actually a good thing, so maybe I shouldn’t complain.

Oh, but speaking of the other knight, since my opponent still wasn’t coming at me, I quickly sneaked a peek at the other battle unfolding not too far away from us, and just caught the Griffon Knight take to the air with a pair of large, translucent wings. It was an unusual, but not exactly unexpected sight. Each of the Knights specialized in something. Mr. Minotaur could monitor and lock down the space around him to prevent his opponent from running away. Miss Unicorn was specialized in defending against and disturbing magical effects. Mr. Eagle was an archer type focused on mobility and long-range sniping, while the man trying his best to rise over the canopy was the group’s aerial combat specialist. That might’ve sounded silly for a knight who, by definition, wore heavy armor and used melee weapons, but considering that dragons, and even mature Draconians, could also fly, it was undeniably a necessary role to have.

“I’m not impressed!” Josh called out from the dark. I focused in the direction of his voice, and quickly noticed the glow of another pair of transparent wings unfolding. “I can do that too!”

With that, he also rose into the air, though considerably less gracefully than his opponent. Huh. I didn’t expect him to break out his Celestial transformation under these circumstances. I also wasn’t entirely sure trying to engage the aerial combat specialist in the air was a great idea, but who knew? Maybe he had a plan.

More importantly, all of a sudden I was felt my sixth sense blaring at me. I didn’t argue and raised my sword, just in time to block a horizontal cut aimed at me. I’m not going to lie, I was a little surprised. Miss Unicorn covered the distance so fast that, without my fraudulent forewarnings, I probably wouldn’t have been able to catch her strike. The impact of her sword was also slightly heavier and sharper than before, which meant she was still ramping up. That… wasn’t exactly good news for me, but to be fair, I was already amazed by how well I was doing without full armor output, let alone going into overdrive, so I decided to cut myself some slack.

Thinking so, I set my feet and pushed back against her. This time she wasn’t fully unbalanced, but instead retreated out of range while also making another poke to keep me back. It was so off the mark that I didn’t even bother to parry it, but before I could chase after her, she was already way out of reach and circling around me. Then came another strike, this time aiming for my legs. Once again, it wasn’t hard to stop her, but I couldn’t get a good parry angle, so I had to settle for a static block, and by the time I could counter, she dashed back several meters again.

Okay, that settled it. It was time to move the fight to the next stage, and I meant that literally. After powering up and getting used to the slick ground, staying in the open gave her too big of an advantage. If I wanted to maintain the balance of the duel, I needed to limit her movements a little, and what do you know? We just happened to have a bunch of trees right over there, perfect for breaking her line of sight! It’s almost as if someone set the stage on purpose or something, eh?

Getting there was a little trickier, but not an insurmountable problem by any means. I simply waited for her to pick a suitable angle of attack, and then when he rushed at me, I coincidentally lost my footing and staggered in the opposite direction.

“Oh, that was a solid hit!” I called out to her. “Come on, give me another!”

It wasn’t like I needed to ask, but my taunting was super effective, as this time she didn’t bother to retreat and followed right after me. I maintained an outwardly frantic yet precise guard as I slowly let myself get pushed back. Even during this time, her strikes were getting harder and harder to intercept and my hands started to feel raw from the impacts. Then, it happened. For the first time, I couldn’t keep up. I saw the diagonal slash coming, but I couldn’t raise my sword fast enough, and the tip of her blade scraped my coat and drew a couple of sparks from the plate underneath. That certainly wasn’t good.

“Come on, kiddo! I barely felt that!”

Appearing as fearless as possible, I gestured for her to come at me again… and immediately ducked behind the huge oak tree on my right.

“Hey! Come back!”

“I’m right here though?” I answered with my head poking out from behind the trunk, and she immediately swung towards me. I don’t say ‘at me’, because her strike obviously wasn’t aimed at my exposed head, and her blade dug into the wood with a deafening crash. By then I was already retreating towards the next closest cover, but what I saw forced several questions to the forefront of my mind.

First, what the hell was with that cutting power? Sure, Sir Griffon also felled a tree, but that was a fairly young one. This was an ancient mammoth of a tree, and yet her sword blew a chunk the size of a microwave oven out of it with a single strike. Also, on a related note: have I been seriously blocking attacks of that magnitude all this time, without turning both of our weapons into scrap metal in the process? That felt wildly improbable, so she was probably holding back. Either that, or I was using way more power than should’ve been safe, but my hand was still functioning, so that couldn’t be the case. Anyhow, Miss Unicorn’s shouting was getting a little annoying, so let’s focus on her again.

“What are you doing? Stop running away!”

“I’m not running. You’re simply looking for me at all the wrong places,” I told my opponent a tad cheekily before ducking behind another tree. I waited for her to strike it, and before she could withdraw her weapon, I popped out of the other side and smacked her on the back of her helmet with my hand. I made sure to be careful, just in case I was unaware of my strength, yet she only let out a yelp in surprise. That meant I didn’t have an unexpectedly high power output, but then how was I blocking her earlier without breaking my arms?

I made a mental note to comb the arrays on the armor again for any defensive enchantments I might’ve missed, but for now, I had to focus on evading, as Miss Unicorn was upon me once again. I was ready to block and dash towards the next tree, but just as she was about to come at me, she flinched and stared right past me. Now, that had the words ‘bluff’ written all over it, so I was ready to ignore it and focus on my defenses, but then, there was a loud, metallic thud behind me. My first instinct was to look over my shoulder, but that was a stupid thing to do in the middle of a duel. My second instinct was to use Far Sight to glance behind me, which was slightly less stupid, so I did just that, and found Josh and Sir Griffon rising to their feet.

My witness looked to be a little worn out, though so did his opponent. I figured my meddling wasn’t strictly warranted, but that never stopped me, so I immediately turned around and dashed towards the duo before my opponent could react.

“Sorry, passing through!” I announced as I barreled past the armored man while accidentally bumping into him. He staggered back, but then nearly got knocked over when Miss Unicorn came to an abrupt stop right next to him.

“Stop running!” the Knight girl called after me, most likely just on principle, and turned back to her unsteady comrade. “Uncle Roland! What’s wrong?”

“There’s something wrong with my armor,” he stated, and as I turned back to face them, I just caught him clenching and unclenching his fist.

“Must be gremlins,” I stated matter-of-factly, drawing all eyes to me. “You know? Tiny little fairy things that mess with technology? You must have a couple in your armor. You see, Josh? That’s why maintenance is important. It’s the only way to keep gremlins out of your stuff.”

Nobody reacted, but to be fair, I only said that to buy my friend some time to catch his breath. At least he appreciated it, even if he only showed it with a skeptical look.

“I’ll try to end this quickly,” Miss Unicorn declared out of the blue, most likely as a way to reassure the still unsteady man by his side.

“Emphasis on the word, ‘try’,” I pointed out, but I was only met with a wall of silence. “What? I’m not wrong. Wasn’t that your plan from the very beginning? Well, here I am, still standing. You should try harder.”

“Dude, why do you keep taunting her,” Josh blurted out on the side, and I raised a finger to hush here.

“I’m doing a thing, please don’t interfere. How about you capture that guy while I keep her busy?”

“Easier said than done,” he grumbled, then sighed in resignation, and finally popped yet another capsule into his mouth. “I’ll try something new next.”

I wanted to give him some encouragement, but Miss Unicorn didn’t give me the opportunity. I wasn’t staying still either and dashed behind the closest tree. This time she didn’t wantonly swing at it, but tried to round the trunk from the other direction to catch me. She was learning, but not fast enough, and the moment she came into my view, I gave her some of her own medicine by rushing right at her. I swung at her a couple of times, only enough to put her on the defensive, and then I retreated again.

“Stop that! Stand and fight!”

“I’m standing right now. You’re the one who’s still over there,” I answered her from the safety of the cover of my next tree.

“This is dishonorable!”

“What, fighting smart?”

“Yes!”

“… Wow… I didn’t expect you to actually say that.”

Of course, I didn’t forget to keep up the cat-and-mouse game even as I heckled her. It wasn’t completely fair, but it was effective, and I successfully bought another five or so minutes with it. The trees around the clearing didn’t really appreciate that tactic, but to be fair, they were fake Purple Zone trees, so no one cared about their opinions. Then, at long last, I noticed a change. Or rather, a lack of one, and once I did, I stopped my organized retreat and stood my ground. Miss Unicorn didn’t expect it, or maybe she thought it was another trick, so she didn’t put her full weight behind her attack, but it was still enough to confirm my previous observation.

“You just plateaued, didn’t you?” I asked between two parries, and the silence she gave me in return was all I needed to hear to be certain we were reaching the endgame of this duel

Now, let me say something in my defense here: things were going really well. Like, almost exactly as planned. Show me a man who says he wouldn’t be a little complacent at this point, and I’ll show you a liar. It was because of this that I was completely blindsided by her suddenly doing a backflip and, I kid you not, she jumped high into the air and fell towards me in a somersault.

Under normal circumstances, this would’ve been the moment where I pointed out how absurdly inappropriate and ineffective such a move was, but there was a catch: she was fast. Ridiculously fast. As in, before this, she was about fifty percent faster than me, but this time she was at least twice faster than that. He honest to goodness looked like he was on fast-forward. There was no way in hell I was going to block that spinning thing she was doing, so I did my best to get out of the way. I managed, if barely, but I didn’t even get a chance to catch my breath when another strike was coming at me. And then another.

Thrusts and slashes fell on me like torrential rain, their speed and weight incomparable to the ones from before, and I was pushed back both figuratively and literally, unable to break away. Worse yet, I was losing the parrying contest as well, and with each passing second, more and more strikes sneaked their way past my defenses and landed on my armor. It was holding up well enough for now, but it was only a matter of time before the tip of her blade would find a gap between the plates. I had to make a move.

I didn’t have any fancy techniques to bring to bear though. No, what I had was something better: cheating. At least in technical terms. However, I needed a second to initialize it, and I couldn’t do it while I was under her barrage, so I had to do something risky. Shocking, I know. It was also simple. I just had to fail to block one of her attacks. Not just any attack thought, but one that wouldn’t result in losing an eye or a finger, and a candidate appeared in just a few seconds. I didn’t exactly have the time for second guesses, so I clenched my teeth and focused my attention on the tip of the incoming sword.

I watched as it quickly yet very slowly closed in on me, and I had to simultaneously ignore my sixth sense screaming at me and at the same time guide her weapon with my own. I was half-successful, and my efforts bore fruit in the form of a sharp, searing pain in my left armpit, where her sword pierced through the gap between the breastplate and the spaulder.

Miss Unicorn sucked in a sharp breath and froze in her tracks, as expected, allowing me a moment to assess my condition. Call it a side-effect or an acquired skill, but after getting repeatedly bruised for hours on end during Dominance, I developed a keen sense for gauging my injuries and how much they’d affect my ability to keep fighting. This stab? It was the definition of a ‘flesh wound’, though it did sting like hell.

Of course, she didn’t know that, and I liked to keep it that way, so I used my free hand to wrap my gauntleted fingers around the blade to keep it in place. It was a small sacrifice to make for a pause in the combat, and once I had the initiative again, I squeezed out a guttural chuckle.

“Wow. I only let my guard down for a moment, and you totally got me! Good job, kiddo. I knew you had it in you.”

“Stop that!” Josh called out to me all of a sudden, and when I glanced over, I found him wrestling Sir Griffon on the ground. I imagined he was in the process of putting the armored man into one of his chokeholds, but it didn’t make their sprawled-out display any more dignified. Whether he realized I was looking at him or just continued the previous thought, my friend let out a grunt as he twisted the man’s arm and added, “Seriously, you’re giving me goosebumps!”

“Josh, could you please keep quiet for a bit. I’m still doing a thing here.”

“Yes, and it’s creepy as hell!” he continued protesting between strained groans, and since he was uncooperative, I simply ignored him.

Now, where was I? Ah, right. Turning the tables. Step one was already completed, and even while I was arguing with the guy on the ground, my Phantom Limbs were busy interacting with the armor and, more importantly, the undersuit I was wearing beneath it. On the surface, it was a form-fitting wetsuit you’d see on the pilot of a mecha show. It was also bright neon purple, but nobody could see it under the armor and gambeson, so I pretended I didn’t mind. Seriously, I didn’t. Not that it mattered in the first place, as it wasn’t a fashion statement: the whole suit was packed to the brim with enchantment arrays and technical gizmos I didn’t understand at all by my very own mad scientist, and it did way more than just keeping me warm.

As for its actual purpose, it was probably faster to just show it, so I flicked the magical equivalent of a switch inside the central control array, and the whole thing came to life with a low hum. Miss Unicorn might’ve sensed something, as the eyes behind her visor opened wide and she pulled back. Normally this would’ve been the point where someone would grab onto the sword embedded into them even harder and say something like, ‘Oh, you didn’t think you could get away after getting this close to me, now did you?’, but I obviously didn’t do that. Not only because I didn’t want to get my hand cut, but also because Josh was right; that was creepy, and it was about time I dropped the character and end the battle on my terms.

The Knight girl might’ve felt the change as well, as she instantly switched to high gear and tried to put some distance between us. The look in her eyes when I followed right after her, matching her acceleration, was absolutely priceless. Of course, staying so close to her meant that I had limited space to work with, so I could only put so much strength into my swing, and I purposefully hit her breastplate as well, so I did practically no damage. It did rattle her a fair bit though, and allowed me multiple follow-up attacks before she came to her senses and did another unnecessarily flashy backflip to gain some breathing space.

Should I follow after her? The question sunk as fast as it surfaced in my mind. Sure, I could match her speed for the moment, but that didn’t mean that I should start following her example too and do all kinds of silly acrobatics. As for how I could do so, it was obviously thanks to Fred’s high-tech undersuit. Before I explain what it did, let’s touch upon a previously mentioned factoid again, namely that the Entitled Knights all had a specialization. That, of course, raised the obvious question of just what the Lion Knight’s specialization was? Well, simply put, there was none.

The Lion Knight was a perfect example of a ‘jack of all trades, master of none’, trading higher ‘base stats’ for a significantly weaker power-ramping potential over the course of a battle. That sounds bad, but here’s a reminder: I was actually competently keeping up with the fully boosted Miss Unicorn at about half my maximum potential power output. Sure, my sixth sense and dueling experience also played a major role, but the only reason why I could utilize those advantages in the first place was because I had higher base specs. At peak performance, I the Lion Knight was slower than the Unicorn Knight, weaker than the Minotaur Knight, and less mobile than the Griffon Knight. On the flip side, this meant I was only inferior when matched against their strengths and should easily match them, or even win, in every other attribute.

So, here’s a question: what would happen if you pit a Lion Knight against another Entitled Knight, but then used some external means to boost the attribute matching their opponent’s strength? Short answer: this situation.

The undersuit worked by hijacking the connection between the Knight gear and the Oaths, and it effectively added another layer of buffs on top of the one granted by the armor. It was tuned to augment my speed and agility, and it would even bear most of the backlash from pushing my limits. There was no such thing as a free meal though, and the undersuit naturally had at least one crippling design flaw to keep me on my toes, namely that it had its own mana battery, as using my internally circulated mana would’ve resulted in my hand exploding the same as if I pushed the armor into overdrive. Due to this, Fred could only promise a few minutes of peak operating performance before it would inevitably break down.

More than enough time if you ask me.

Once Miss Unicorn landed, I scanned the area one last time, and quickly noticed something potentially useful. Josh more or less finished subduing Sir Griffon, and he was heaving on the ground with his legs wrapped around his opponent’s upper body, pinning him onto the ground while securing his outstretched right arm. I think it was some sort of joint-lock, but I wasn’t well-versed in grappling, so I couldn’t say for sure. More importantly, since the Knight was out of commission, I figured he wouldn’t mind if I borrowed his discarded saber, so I made my move.

My own opponent reacted just a hair too slow. She tried to intercept me, but we were close to on par right now, so she had no chance to catch me. When I got close to the duo on the ground, I lowered my center of gravity and stuck one leg out, entering into a slide tackle, and due to the tremendous momentum I had, it carried me a solid five or so meters and allowed me to deftly snatch the fallen sword off the ground. The moment I had my hand on the hilt, I sprung to my feet, just in time to face the charging Knight girl coming at me.

“I’ll be borrowing this for a moment, if you don’t mind,” I told the man on the ground while simultaneously parrying her with the saber and also stabbing at her with my original sword. She let out a surprised yelp and tried to retreat out of range, but I kept the pressure up by aiming the saber at her shoulder on the back draw, forcing her to divide her attention. Dual-wielding was tricky, but nothing I couldn’t manage. It was thirty percent practice, twenty percent flailing around and hoping for the best, and a solid fifty percent of being an Entitled Knight proving to be fraudulent once again.

Simply put, just like how the other Knights had something unique about them, the Lion Knight did as well: weapon-mastery. Unlike the rest, who specialized in certain weapon types, the Lion Knight was naturally proficient with all Knightly weapons. That made a lot of sense, considering my track record. More troublingly, it also answered a question that nagged at me for a while: who was supposed to use the dragon-slaying spear when none of the Named Knights on the island were spearmen? Who knows? Maybe in a parallel universe where I didn’t lose my memories, I would’ve gotten my hands on the spear during the natural course of the plot and then used it against Elly and my prospective in-laws. A disturbing thought indeed.

More importantly, while I still didn’t quite understand how this ‘weapon affinity’ thing worked, it allowed me to dual-wield like it was nothing, and when combined with my temporary speed boost, I had Miss Unicorn on the ropes. She tried her best to defend herself, but being able to automatically parry with one sword using my sixth sense while simultaneously attacking with the other was absolute bullshit, and I almost felt sorry for her as she frantically tried to defend herself. But then again, I imagine that’s how I looked when I was defending against her assault, which considerably dampened the guilt I felt.

Not that there was any time for such emotions, as I had to end the duel before the undersuit ran out of juice or she got a heroic second wind, so I grit my teeth, focused, and for the moment I ignored all forms of sentimentality as I raised my blades and lunged after my retreating opponent. What followed wasn’t very graceful, nor was it particularly dynamic. I simply swung my swords really, really fast, one after the other, without letting her catch her breath. With each strike, her poise crumbled further and further, right until I found the opening I was looking for.

First I let her dodge one well-telegraphed overhead strike, followed by a thrust for distraction, and then when she tried to parry, I put all my weight into it, twisting her blade to the side. Simultaneously, I swung the saber up, hitting the bottom of her forearm and wrist with the spine of the blade. Thanks to that, I could put extra leverage onto her sword, and with a pained hiss, her fingers gave out and lost their grip on her weapon. In for a penny, in for a pound though (no pun intended), and since I figured a climactic battle required a climactic ending, I pulled back just enough to let me flourish my weapons at the same time and then cross them right in front of her neck because dammit, this was a long day and I deserved to do something uncharacteristically flashy every once in a while.

And with that, the duel came to an end, and with it, a deafening silence settled into the Purple Zone.

“So… I think this is my victory,” I stated, sounding more uncertain than I intended, and the magical whatchamacallits of the Arbitration also agreed with me, as we were both enveloped in enchanted light. It lasted for a few seconds, and I had to endure the constricting sensation again, but once it was over, I could finally let out a pent-up breath of relief… only to immediately get alarmed by the noises the girl in front of me was making.

“What are y—?”

“Waaaaah!”

Okay, that was… unexpected. Also, mildly distressing.

“Wait, hold on. Why are you crying?”

She didn’t answer me and only continued bawling, going as far as to take off her helmet and throw it onto the ground so that she could rub her eyes.

“Come on kiddo, there’s no need to cry. It’s just a silly ritualistic duel you lost. It’s not the end of the world.”

“How the hell are you so popular with girls when that’s your best attempt at consoling someone?”

“Could I ask the peanut gallery to stay silent for a second?” I snapped back at Josh. He shrugged and continued to nonchalantly grapple with the, at this point no longer resisting, Knight on the ground. By the sound of the groans he was making, he was more exasperated than in pain, and I shared his sentiment.

Meanwhile, Penelope collected herself a little, though her face was still a teary, snotty mess.

“I lost, and I couldn’t defeat you, and you beat me, and now you are going to keep dating that wyrmblood, and then you are going to be kicked out of the brotherhood, and I’m no longer your sisteeeeeer!”

Okay, so based on how much emphasis she put on that last part, I was about ninety percent sure she was still shaken by my previous taunts. I said I would apologize, but I didn’t think I’d have to do it right away, but it looked like we would be getting nowhere fast if I didn’t do so.

“Oh, come on, kiddo! I didn’t actually mean that.”

“You… You didn’t?”

“No. I only said that to rile you up so that you would fight me seriously.”

I could practically hear the gears groaning under stress in her head as she tried to make sense of what I just said. After wiping her eyes one more time, she cocked her head to the side a little and said, “You wanted me to fight seriously? Was it… because you wanted to be sure that the results of the Arbitration would be indisputable? So that nobody could say that you won because I let you win? Was it because you wanted me to acknowledge your determination? Was it?”

“Erm… sure, let’s go with that.” Her eyes opened wide, probably making some further completely off-base conjectures, but so long as they were in my favor, I didn’t mind. “Anyhow, I’m sorry for saying that and making fun of you. It was a necessary evil, but I might’ve gone a little overboard.”

“I see, I see…” she nodded along with an expression that said she didn’t really get it at all but already stopped thinking. “I mean, I don’t even know why I got so worked up. I am your sister after all, right?” When I didn’t nod along right away, her brows rose in panic and she stressed, “Right?”

“It’s actually a little complicated at the moment, so…” Oh crap, she’s about to cry again! That was, once again, mildly distressing, so I reached into my toolbox and applied the one that never let me down so far: head pats! “Here, here. I tell you, it’s not so simple, so how about we…?”

I got that far, but then I noticed that contrary to my best head patting efforts, she already had tears running down her cheeks. Before I could figure out why though, I was startled by her suddenly throwing herself at my chest, and a moment later he started bawling from the top of her lungs again. Seriously, I was getting mixed signals here.

“I do not wish to interrupt your bonding,” came a deadpan voice from under Josh, and when I glanced over, I found Sir Griffon twisting his neck to be able to look at us. “However, I’m starting to feel a little uncomfortable, so now that the Arbitration is over, why don’t we sit down and discuss the situation like reasonable adults.”

“Says the ‘reasonable adult’ who tried to cut my freaking head off just a few minutes ago!” Josh grumbled as he readjusted his grip on the Knight.

“It was a perfectly rational reaction to your comments,” Sir Griffon responded, earning him a glare from the guy. “If we were in the same situation, I would do so again.”

“Those are some brave words from a guy already caught in an arm-lock!”

“Cut it out, you two,” I told them with some trepidation while simultaneously trying to keep Penny from wiping her snot on my armor as she sobbed. “I promised that we’d have a long discussion. Things haven’t fully wrapped up yet, so I might as well explain my circumstances and why we had to go through this whole Arbitration.”

And with those words, the curtains closed on the duel, leaving us with some downtime to clear the air. Unfortunately, this was but a short segue leading me to another battlefield, though this time a more metaphorical one, but a break was a break, and I really needed one at the moment. The night was far from over, and I still needed my wits. Also, some bandages for my armpit, but that’s another matter entirely.