The sand was red.Not with dust, but with blood. The arena floor looked less like a battlefield and more like a butcher's yard.
The gong's echoes had barely died before the Top Five carved their dominion. Doran's hammer had shattered spines and skulls alike, Selvara's sabers painted silver arcs across flesh, Vaelor's flames burned men into ash, and Ilyra's arrows fell like judgment from a silent god.
None survived.None but them.
The crowd once roaring like a storm was struck breathless at the slaughter. Whispers flitted across noble balconies, half in awe, half in dread.
"It's finished already…""They stand alone, as expected…""No… wait…"
The whispers turned. The silence grew. Because there was one more.
At the edge of the blood-soaked sand sat Rigorus. Barefoot, shirtless, his silver hair ghostlike beneath the sun. Scars lined his body like scripture. He hadn't moved since the gong. Not one strike. Not one step. He simply sat, watching… as though none of this carnage concerned him.
Selvara's lips curved, not into a smile, but a sneer."He sits while we dance in blood?" Her voice carried sharp and cold. "What arrogance…"
Vaelor cracked his knuckles, crimson fire licking up his arms."Or what cowardice. The brat hides because he knows he's unworthy."
Doran Veyth spat into the sand, his hammer resting on his shoulder."Survived Vaelus or not, I see a boy. Not a storm."
But Kaelen Vorath Nemoran, the Imperial Protector, had not taken his eyes off Rigorus since the gates opened. His gaze was not disdain. It was weight. His gauntleted fingers flexed once, the only sign he felt the shift in air.
"Leave him," Kaelen rumbled, his voice steady but carrying across the coliseum. "He is not like the others."
The crowd gasped. The Protector never spoke without purpose.
Vaelor scoffed, flames flaring hotter."Not like the others? He's nothing but luck wrapped in scars." He stepped forward, sand hissing beneath his fire. "Watch, Protector. I'll snuff out this Draeven ghost myself."
The people leaned forward, whispers spilling over themselves.
"He dares strike him?""Does he not hear the Protector's warning?""Rigorus Draeven… is he truly just a survivor of chance?"
Vaelor blurred forward, his fist sheathed in scarlet fire, screaming through the air with the force to shatter stone.
Rigorus's eyes opened. Calm. Cold. A preacher before his congregation.His lips parted, and the words fell like scripture.
"Absolute Halo."
The world bent. In less than a heartbeat, Rigorus was gone from where he sat and in the next instant, he was there. Right before Vaelor.
His fist sank into the Crimson Monk's gut.
The shockwave cracked the air like thunder. Dust exploded outward in a rippling storm. The ground split beneath Vaelor's heels, blood spraying from his lips as his body rocketed backward.
Gasps choked the arena. Nobles stood, cups spilling. Commoners shrieked.
Vaelor's body nearly toppled out of the ring his torso leaning over the edge, arms wide, barely clinging to balance. His eyes bulged, muscles locking, as though every fiber in his body screamed in rebellion.
What the hell…? his mind reeled, panicked and trembling. Who the hell is this child? That strike it forced me to tighten every muscle just to survive…!
He tried to step forward. His foot faltered. Blood sprayed from his mouth as he dropped to his knees, coughing, the sand darkening beneath him.
The coliseum erupted.
"Impossible!""He… he stopped Vaelor with a single strike!""No he nearly killed him!"
Selvara froze mid-step, her blades lowering, eyes narrowing with uncharacteristic caution.Doran gripped his hammer tighter, stormlight crackling as his jaw clenched.Ilyra's bowstring creaked, her hand trembling, though her face betrayed nothing but a flicker of unease.
And Kaelen the Protector watched in silence. His expression unmoved, but his aura sharpened like steel drawn from its sheath.
For the first time, the Top Five looked not at each other… but at the shirtless figure standing calmly in the dust.Scars across his chest. Silver hair catching the light. A faint blood-red halo shimmering behind him.
Rigorus Draeven did not smile. Did not speak further.He simply lowered his fist, his gaze calm, unshaken, as though swatting aside a lion had been nothing more than brushing dust from his robes.
The silence that followed was heavier than thunder.
And in that silence, the name whispered once before began to rise again.Soft. Awed. Terrified.
"Rigorus…""Rigorus Draeven…"
The roar of the coliseum had not yet settled when Selvara stepped forward, sabers glinting silver in the harsh sun. Her eyes, normally cold, burned with something fiercer an old fire that had never gone out.
"We cannot let him stand," she hissed, voice low but cutting. "If he takes this tournament, the Nemorans will rise unchallenged. I won't watch another land fall to their shadow."
Doran hefted his colossal hammer, storms crackling faintly across its head. His muscles tensed, veins bulging, sweat already running down his neck. "Aye. I watched my clan burn when the Nemoran banners came. I swore if ever I stood at the edge of their reign again, I'd strike until my bones snapped."
Ilyra drew an arrow with silent grace, her eyes glinting green beneath the shadow of her hood. She did not speak, but her thoughts were knives. The Nemorans… my mother's blood stained their swords. My brothers' screams were their music. If this man is what stands in my way then he shall perish
And Vaelor still coughing blood, kneeling in the dust—forced himself to stand again. His crimson aura roared back to life, cloaking him in fire. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, smearing blood across his jaw. His gaze locked on Rigorus, wild and furious, but beneath it burned grief."I didn't train for twenty years in exile just to fall to a boy! I didn't crawl through famine and plague just to die nameless in this sand!"
The crowd roared as one, sensing the shift. The Top Four once rivals—now turned, shoulder to shoulder, against a single man.
Rigorus stood calmly, the faint red halo glowing behind his head like a saint's crown. But his jaw tightened. His bare chest rose and fell heavier than before. Four against one was no sermon. This was crucifixion.
Selvara moved first blades blurring, ribbons of silver light weaving death. She aimed not at his chest but at his scars, as though cutting open old wounds. Rigorus raised his sword just in time, sparks screaming as fang met fang.
Doran's hammer came next, splitting the air like thunder. Rigorus leapt back, the ground exploding where he had stood. Dust and blood mist filled the air.
But Ilyra had been waiting. An arrow whistled, vanishing from sight, and Rigorus barely twisted aside before it buried into the arena wall, stone cracking like glass.
Then Vaelor came, fire-wrapped fists raining like a storm, each strike carrying a decade of rage. Rigorus blocked one, two, three but the fourth slipped through, a blazing punch to his ribs that sent him staggering. Blood ran down his side.
The coliseum shook with screams.
"He bleeds!""They've wounded him!""Perhaps he is not invincible after all!"
Rigorus gritted his teeth, his sword trembling in his grip. His mind whispered calm, but his body screamed pain. They weren't mere warriors. They were forged in hatred, tempered by loss. Every strike they threw wasn't just a weapon it was a story.
Selvara's story: a little girl watching her family executed beneath Nemoran banners.Doran's story: a boy digging his kin from rubble, swearing vengeance with bloodied hands.Ilyra's story: a hunter chasing shadows of her slaughtered brothers through forests that no longer sang.Vaelor's story: a survivor of famine, clawing through death with nothing but stubborn flame.
They weren't fighting him for glory. They were fighting him for the right to erase a bloodline. To erase Nemorans. To erase him.
Rigorus parried, dodged, struck but the storm never ceased. Sweat poured down his face, his lungs burned, his arms trembled under the weight of four titans pressing from all sides.
And for the first time, Rigorus Draeven felt the taste of desperation.
Selvara slashed his chest open thin, but deep enough to paint his ribs red.Doran's hammer clipped his shoulder, sending agony rattling down his bones.An arrow nicked his cheek, blood trickling down like a tear.Vaelor's fire caught his side, burning flesh with savage heat.
Rigorus staggered, knees threatening to buckle. His sword dug into the sand for balance. His breath came ragged.
But his eyes… his eyes did not fall.
The Mourning Halo shimmered brighter, whispers of the fallen echoing louder in his ears. They weren't just his ghosts they were the ghosts of every soul Nemorans had slaughtered. And they screamed now, not for sorrow… but for retribution.
Rigorus wiped the blood from his mouth. He raised his head, calm as a prophet at the gallows.
"You've suffered much," he said, voice carrying through the coliseum, heavy with sorrow. "I see it. I hear it in your strikes. But know this…" His sword rose again, steady despite his wounds. "…I am not your Nemoran tyrant. I am the Saint ...the saint Rigorus..king of the Draeven's..survivor of saint's hallo..i shall step on you to see beyond...beyond these wretched eyes of mine."
The crowd fell silent.
The Top Four hesitated.
And then, with a roar that split heaven and earth, they struck again four storms against one man, each clash rattling the world itself