Chapter 47: Shield Against Sword
Eight fighters remained in the waiting room. The space that had felt crowded with students now felt almost empty.
Team Soup had claimed a corner. Renna sat with her feet up on a bench, the towel still pressed to one eye but her energy completely restored. Lyra was cleaning her spear with slow strokes. Emric was bent over his notebook, scribbling calculations.
Holden leaned against the wall eating a protein bar.
"Can I have a bite?" Renna asked.
"Get your own."
"You’re so mean. I’m injured. I’m a war hero. I deserve a bite."
"You got flash-banged by a guy who throws kitchen knives."
"They were barbed kitchen knives!"
Lyra shook her head without looking up from her spear. "Renna, you’ve asked him for food four times in the last hour. He’s said no four times. If you look at what happened before, a fifth attempt will end just like the others."
"Things don’t always have to stay the same!"
"It won’t."
The door to the waiting room opened and Maeve slipped in. She’d come down from the VIP stands, her Ashen Bestiary tucked under one arm and her VIP badge still clipped to her collar. She looked around the room quickly, found Holden, and walked straight to him.
But something was off.
She didn’t look confident anymore. Instead, her face was tight and serious. It was the same face she made when she found a problem in her research that nobody else had caught.
"Holden," she said quietly. "Look at the floor."
He raised an eyebrow. "The floor."
"Specifically, the arena floor through that doorway. Watch the surface near the stage edge."
Holden walked to the doorway and looked out at the arena. The stone stage was in the center, white granite gleaming under the lights. The floor around it was standard arena stone, durable but plain.
At first, he didn’t see anything.
Then he caught it.
A quick distortion appeared on the floor. It was a small ripple, like the blurry air above hot pavement. It lasted half a second and vanished.
"There," Maeve said, stepping up beside him. "I’ve been watching it since the top sixteen. It happens every few minutes. The ripple is coming from underneath the arena."
"Underneath?"
"Underneath. The academy keeps monster containment cages below the stadium for training demonstrations. Those cages are sealed by an underground protection array. It’s a massive energy grid that prevents anything inside from breaking out."
She pushed her glasses up.
"That array is flickering, Holden. It is destabilizing. Something is interfering with it from the outside. And it’s getting worse."
Holden looked at the floor again. Another faint ripple. This one lasted a full second before fading.
His eyes moved across the waiting room.
On the far side, Draven sat on a bench with two men in dark uniforms standing behind him. Family guards. They weren’t watching the other fighters. They were watching the same doorway Holden was standing in.
Draven noticed Holden looking and immediately turned away. His shoulders hunched. His guards shifted uncomfortably.
"He knows he can’t win this tournament straight up," Holden said quietly. "He saw what I did to Vance and Malakor. So he’s doing the only thing a Valcrest knows how to do. Cheating from the shadows."
"You think his family is tampering with the array?"
"I think Draven is desperate enough to try anything. And I think whatever they’re doing down there is meant as a backup plan in case he loses."
Maeve frowned. "A backup plan involving unstable monster cages under a crowded stadium?"
"Nobles don’t think about collateral damage. They think about winning."
Bzzt.
"Quarterfinal round. Holden Voss versus Emric Thale. Competitors to the stage."
Holden turned from the doorway. Emric was already standing, adjusting his glasses with one hand and lifting his shield with the other.
They looked at each other.
"Guess this is it," Emric said.
"You could forfeit," Holden offered. "Save yourself the embarrassment."
"And miss the only opportunity I’ll ever have to test my shield formulas against the strongest freshman in the academy? Absolutely not."
"Show me what that shield can do, nerd."
"I intend to."
They walked out together.
The crowd gave them a massive cheer. Two teammates facing off in the quarterfinals was the kind of drama that tournaments were built on. The holographic screens showed both their faces side by side. The slum-rat versus the tactician.
They took their positions.
Emric planted his feet and raised his tower shield. The massive slab of reinforced metal covered most of his body. From behind it, his eyes glinted with something that looked almost like excitement.
"I’ve been running calculations since the ruins," Emric said loudly enough for the crowd to hear. "Your observed strike force during the hound encounter was approximately eight hundred units of kinetic energy. My shield’s maximum deflection is seven hundred and forty. There is a mathematical gap. I want to see if my geometric adjustments can close it."
"Emric."
"Yes?"
"You’re explaining math at me before a fight."
"Apologies. Nervous habit."
The referee raised his hand.
"Begin!"
Holden didn’t hold back.
He activated a fraction of his Asura’s Ignition power. A deep red energy coated his knuckles, giving his punches a heavy, solid feel. In just two steps, he closed the gap between them and slammed a powerful right hook into the center of Emric’s shield.
BOOM.
The impact was enormous. A shockwave rippled across the stage. Emric’s boots skidded backward a full meter.
But he held.
The shield hadn’t buckled. The angle was perfect. Holden’s force had been deflected at a thirty-degree angle, bleeding off almost two hundred units of energy into the ground instead of into Emric’s arms.
"Fascinating!" Emric shouted from behind his shield. "That strike carried over eight hundred units of kinetic force and my deflection model absorbed ninety percent of the transfer! The geometric offset is working!"
"Great. Here comes more."
Holden threw a left straight. Then a right uppercut aimed at the shield’s lower edge. Then a spinning backhand that would have taken a normal fighter’s head clean off.
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.
Each hit was incredibly powerful. The stage cracked under Emric’s feet. The crowd gasped at every impact. The shockwaves went into Holden’s body and compressed his meridians deeper with each collision.
[Foundation stabilization: 87%... 90%...]
Emric blocked the first two with brilliant angles, redirecting force into the ground. But the third strike caught his shield at a less optimal angle. The deflection was only partial. The remaining force hit him square and shoved him backward.
His heel hit the arena edge.
He teetered.
One more push and he’d be out.
Holden pulled his fist back, red energy flaring.
Emric didn’t flinch. He reset his stance, angled the shield, and nodded once.
Holden swung.
BOOM.
The impact was the heaviest yet. The shockwave cracked the stage in a semicircle. Emric’s shield caught it at almost the perfect angle, but almost wasn’t enough. The raw force rolled over the top of the deflection and pushed Emric backward.
His other foot crossed the line.
"Winner: Holden Voss!"
[Ding!]
[Victory registered.]
[+150 KP]
[Balance: 3,640 KP]
[Rank 1 (9-Star) - Foundation: 95% Stabilized]
The crowd roared.
Holden extended his hand.
Emric took it without hesitation. His arms were shaking from the impacts, but he had a huge smile on his face.
"My deflection was eighty-eight percent effective at its peak. I couldn’t deflect any more than that," he said, pumping Holden’s hand. "That’s fourteen percent higher than my lab projections. I need to recalculate my angle formulas based on the live data from this match. Thank you, Holden. This was incredibly valuable."
"You’re welcome. Now go rest your arms before they fall off."
"Good advice."
They walked off the stage together to deafening applause.