Anonymous Quote:
"Arrogance is more deadly than ignorance. Ignorance stumbles in the dark, but arrogance walks into the abyss with a smile. It creates blind spots—windows of death your enemy needs only to open. The end of an arrogant man is always fatal."
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Suddenly—movement.
Naze surged forward like a phantom riding the breath of a storm. His feet kissed the fractured earth with fleeting grace, each step so light it seemed gravity itself had lost its claim on him. The cracked ground groaned under the strain of Arkham's rampant magic, yet the Blind Swordsman glided—tiptoeing along fissures, slipping past fault lines with the serenity of a monk and the lethality of a god.
Every vibration, every quake of the shattered battlefield whispered through his bones, guiding him like an unseen map. Dust geysers erupted, clawing skyward in choking plumes, turning the stage into a graveyard of smoke and broken stone. To the naked eye, there was nothing—no man, no swordsman, only chaos.
Except… something was moving within that chaos.
Arkham grinned through the carnage, his teeth bared like a wolf savoring a kill. His voice thundered with self-assured madness:
"Agatha! Do you see me now? Do you see my strength? I can protect you… love you… I will bring you the head of this blind bat as my vow to you!"
His declaration rippled through the Colosseum, twisted and hollow, for even those who once pitied him now looked upon him with unease.
Agatha's lips parted—not in awe, but in disgust. Her emerald eyes burned with cold fury, yet deep inside, fear gnawed at her. Not for Arkham, but for how close she was to being killed just now, and this is because, if the trickster god had not intervened, to stop the rapid expansion of the 4th level spell, everyone—she included—would have been swallowed by the wrath of Arkham's reckless spell. And this fool dared call it love?
The audience, held in safety by the shimmering wards, fell silent save for their pounding hearts. All eyes strained toward the battlefield, but saw only a churning storm of dust and debris. The stage was a warzone. No one could tell if Naze still drew breath—no one except two beings.
Arkham.
And the trickster god, perched with gleeful curiosity like a cat before a dying mouse.
Arkham's confidence wavered as an unsettling prickle danced along his spine. He could feel it—something closing in.
Impossible.
His fingers jerked, his spell swelling to its peak as he pushed the 4th-level scroll to its limits. Earth screamed, magic roared, the ground itself convulsed under his command. But then—
A whisper of air.
A flicker.
A shadow too fast for sight.
Arkham's eyes widened as a figure slid past him—a blur with the hush of death. For a heartbeat, his smirk returned, curling into a sneer.
"Is that all—" he tried to speak but....
The words never left his throat.
Something warm traced his neck. Time froze. The smile died before he realized why. Then—
SNAP.
A thin red line bloomed across his throat like a sinister blossom. His head slid from his shoulders in eerie silence, tumbling with grace to rest neatly at his feet. His eyes—once blazing with arrogance—now stared blankly at eternity.
The 4th-level scroll spilled from his sleeve like a dead secret, fluttering to the blood-soaked ground. The arcane storm shattered, dissipating into an empty hush as the battlefield exhaled its last breath.
Dust settled in slow motion. Silence fell like a shroud.
And there, upon the fractured stage, lay Arkham's headless corpse—a monument to hubris.
For ten long minutes, no one spoke. Not a whisper. Not a breath. The Colosseum held its voice, crushed under the weight of the impossible.
The space beyond Arkham's headless corpse was eerily pristine—untouched by the chaos of the 4th level spell that had ravaged the battlefield. And there, like a shadow carved from serenity, stood Naze. Calm. Unmoving. Twin blades glistening faintly as he slid them back into their scabbards with a soft, almost reverent motion.
For a breath, silence ruled. The Colosseum held its breath, as if afraid even to blink. Then—
An uproar detonated.
Cheers thundered like an avalanche. The arena trembled with the force of stamping feet and roaring voices. It was chaos born of awe. Even those who once spat Naze's name in disdain now screamed it with wild devotion. Why? Because the Blind Swordsman had done the unthinkable. He had survived the wrath of a 4th-level spell—and slain its caster in the same heartbeat.
"Naze! Naze! NAZE!"
The chant grew into a frenzy. The very stones of the Colosseum seemed to vibrate with the weight of his name. For a moment, the people forgot fear, forgot death—they only remembered glory, and the man who stood like an unyielding monolith in its center.
But not everyone celebrated.
Above the pandemonium, the trickster god reclined in his invisible throne, his smile sharp as broken glass but stripped of joy. His fractal eyes narrowed, flicking over the swordsman below like a gambler watching his dice betray him.
Every opponent he had thrown at him—every "guaranteed death sentence"—had ended in humiliation. Naze did not crumble. Naze did not falter. Worse—he grew stronger. Each fight tempered him, each victory fed his legend, until even the trickster god began to taste bitterness.
A slow, poisonous thought coiled in the trickster god's mind:
Perhaps it is time I end him myself. Break the toy before it becomes a thorn.
The idea slithered and pulsed, but before he could act—
A voice cut through the storm.
"I challenge the Blind Swordsman!"
All eyes pivoted toward the source.
It was Winston Carlos.
After Winston Carlos' voice thundered across the Colosseum, silence reigned for a heartbeat—thick, suffocating.
The words cracked the air like lightning. The cheers faltered, shock spilling like water over a shattered dam.
Gasps rippled across the Colosseum. Heads turned. Eyes widened. The impossible had happened—someone dared to step forward.
After the challenge by Winston Carlos, there was initially silence, but then some couldn't just bare to hold in their glib...
Then the dam broke.
Laughter, gasps, and venom-laced whispers spilled from every corner of the stands. The air buzzed with disbelief and morbid excitement.
"You cannot challenge a living deity and live through it!" one man barked, his voice trembling with a mix of awe and mockery.
"Does he even understand the weight of that name? The Blind Swordsman…" another hissed, leaning forward as if tasting the dread in his own words. "Do you think because a man bears it, he is mortal? Fool! That is a living god!"
A woman shook her head in pity, lips curling in a bitter smile. "They never learn their lesson, do they?"
And then came the cruel laughter. "Another headless corpse… just another trophy for the Sword God!"
That phrase—Sword God—slipped from her lips like an ember, and in an instant, the wildfire began.
"Sword God!" someone echoed, louder this time.
"The Blind Sword God!" another bellowed.
The chant spread like flames leaping from hay, devouring every whisper of doubt. "Sword God! Sword God! Sword God!" The Colosseum thundered with it, until the very stones seemed to shiver under the weight of the name.
No longer was Naze merely a man with blades. In their eyes, he had transcended. He was myth wrapped in flesh. A deity cloaked in mortality. And Winston Carlos—poor, brave Winston—had just offered himself as the next sacrificial lamb to a god of steel.
Above it all, the trickster god smiled thinly, his eyes glimmering with malice and amusement. He hadn't planned this, but chaos… chaos was his playground.
Even after witnessing the grotesque beauty of death, even after watching Arkham fall headless beneath the cold grace of Naze's blades… someone had the audacity—the suicidal courage—to speak those words.
Not minding the crowd and the chaos, Winston Carlos strode into the open with iron in his spine and fire in his gaze. His jaw was set, his voice carrying a weight of conviction that silenced even the boldest hecklers. And then—he looked at her.
Agatha.
"Agatha…" His voice softened, raw and trembling with emotion long buried. "I've always admired you. From afar, I watched… waited. When Arkham claimed you, I stood back. I thought you wanted him. But now that he's gone…" He drew a sharp breath, chest heaving with a cocktail of rage and yearning. "Permit me the honor of fighting—for you."
The arena erupted—not in cheers, but in even more chaos. Half the crowd roared in disbelief, the other half in bloodlust. Bets were being placed already. The ground felt alive with tension.
And Agatha—
She froze.
Her throat tightened as hundreds of eyes pinned her like daggers. Her heart fluttered in confusion, anger, and something far more dangerous: curiosity. Why? Why did so many men hurl themselves at death for her? She was no saint, no savior. She was beautiful, yes—striking, busty, statuesque—but hardly the kind of woman bards wrote about.
Yet here was another fool, willing to gamble his life for a fleeting chance at her affection.
Heat bloomed in her cheeks—part shame, part… wonder. And deep inside, a whisper she dared not name stirred:
What kind of man survives the storm? And what kind of man would die just to prove his worth?
Agatha's lips parted, but no words came. So she did the only thing she could—she watched. Because sometimes, fate speaks loudest through the clash of steel.