Red Around The Neck

The first fight didn't last very long. Over half the contestants were eliminated right off the bat by one of the other contestants. The moment the fight started, a man went around swinging his sword wildly and eliminated a bunch of people by doing just that.

"Oh boy... It's going to be another one of those fights..." Sirks mumbled. He leaned back against his seat and put his feet up. He didn't sound surprised about what happened and sounded like he was more disappointed than anything.

Kies had no idea what he was talking about since this was his first time at the tournament, but from what Falte said, it seemed that this was a common occurrence in the tournament. After eliminating all those contestants, the fighter ran out of strength and collapsed onto the ground. A whistle was blown, signifying that he was disqualified.

Sirks laughed. "Heh, exactly how you would expect it to end."

"Every year there's at least one person who does this..." Iris sighed.

"Every year? Wait, why would people do that?" This made no sense to Kies. Why would there be contestants who purposely blew all their energy to take out as many of the other contestants as possible only to run out of strength and get disqualified?

"It's because they know that they can't win the tournament and so they show off their strength by doing that," Sirks explained. He pointed at the crowd which was roaring with approval for what the fighter just did despite it getting himself out as well. "The crowd loves it. But I guess this doesn't make much sense to you since our goal is to win this thing. And speaking of which, we're going to need a lot of luck..." Sirks pointed back at the fight going on.

Kies didn't get what Sirks was pointing at, but then he saw it. In the middle of the brawl, there was a lone female fighter. She was the only woman in the entire group and all of the rest of the contestants were surrounding her. They were all eyeing her hungrily like a pack of starving wolves that just found a lamb. Even though she was heavily outnumbered and fighting against men who were almost all bigger than her, she cut through the competition like it was nothing.

She had long flowing white hair, and at first glance, Kies thought that he was looking at an old woman, but then he saw how young she looked. She only looked a bit older than him but had a very mature expression. "Is she human?" Was there any human that had white hair and looked that young? Furthermore, her sword skills were out of this world. It must have taken her years or even decades to be that good.

"Yes. Her name is Rui. The reason why her hair is that color is apparently due to her magic."

"Magic? What kind of magic turns her hair white?"

"She uses ice magic."

"Ice? Wait..." Kies remembered Haro telling him about this before. Or was it Ammine? He couldn't remember, but one of them told them that magic has variants and even specifically mentioned ice magic being a variant of water magic. Interesting... So humans can use other kinds of magic.

Also, where has he heard that name before? Rui... "She's not from Otane, is she?"

"No, she's from Silverfield, like you."

"I see."

"She's a very skilled soldier. She got recruited by the queen when Silverfield fell and now serves as a royal guard."

"Huh? If that's the case then shouldn't we go talk to her?" If she served the queen then this was their chance to tell her everything that happened to them. They didn't even need to fight in this tournament at all.

"Bad idea. The royal guard serves no one but the queen. We can't get close to her even if we wanted to. Right now, they're suspicious of the queen's sisters being responsible for the poison."

"Is there no way to explain it to her?"

"No. It's too risky."

Well, that sucked for them then. If they wanted to prove their innocence, it looked like that they would have to do it themselves.

"Ah... For her to be partaking in this tournament... This is going to be hard for us. I swear, why didn't she just stay at the queen's side? Our mission is already hard enough as it is..." Sirks grumbled. But his complaint wasn't without reason. Rui was tearing up the fight and was downing everyone that tried to take her on with just a single stroke of her sword. The way she fought looked more like a dance than actual swordplay.

"So, do you think you can take her on?" Iris curiously asked Kies.

"Take a guess."

"Yes?"

"Of course... not. Are you crazy? You want me to win against that?" Rui was practically fighting everyone left on the field and was winning. She was also doing this with the dull sword that the tournament handed her and not her own sword. Plus, she can also use magic according to what they told him. Unless he went all out and gave up his cover, he had no way of winning. And needless to say, he would rather not do that if it wasn't necessary. But judging from it, he might have to. He would either have to go up against her in the final (assuming he made it that far) or go up against someone who was strong enough to eliminate her.

Ugh, winning the tournament was looking impossible. Was it too late to just snatch the fragment and leave those three to figure things out on their own? Kies really wanted to do just that but decided against the idea. They were good people and have already gone through a lot of trouble. The last thing they needed is for him to backstab them and run away, leaving them to clean up the mess he made as this entire thing was caused by his idea.

"Hmph, what a terrible kind of mentality to have. Don't you know? You're more likely to fail if you think like that. Instead, you should be thinking, I can do this. Who knows, you might actually be able to win against her in a fight," Iris told him in a voice filled with positivity.

"Very funny." Kies couldn't tell if she was being serious or sarcastic with him. If he fought with Rui, calling it a one-sided slaughter would be a huge understatement. Right now, she was fighting against fifty people and winning! And she wasn't just winning, none of the other contestants could even land a blow on her. "Let me ask you this then, if you were to face her, do you think you would stand a chance?" he asked Iris her own question.

"Not sure. Maybe?"

"Maybe!?"

"Yeah, you never know what might happen. Who knows, she might have a slip-up and I win because of it."

"So you're admitting that you can't win either, and yet you're saying that I can."

"I mean, aren't you the best fighter out of the four of us?"

"Am I?" Kies was pretty sure that Sirks is the best fighter out of them. He was an ex-soldier which meant that his skills were already better than the three of them who aren't soldiers. But then again, Kies can also be considered the same thing. He was an ex-soldier for Silverfield some long time ago. But since he only fought one battle, he couldn't really be considered a soldier at all. Anyhow, Kies brought up this point with the other three.

"Isn't Sirks the best fighter here? I mean, he was a soldier, unlike me."

"Blah, the military is nothing. We're just doing drills most of the time. As for actual battles, I've barely fought in any. Judging from the way you move and fight, you have definitely been in more battles than me," Sirks told them. "The army is filled with young people who want to taste blood, but trust me, none of them have actually seen a real battle before."

"Then what's the point of the army if no one there has fought in a battle before?"

"Well, that only applies to the main army I guess. I think I told you about this already, but there are different parts to the army. The real soldiers, the ones that have gone through countless battles are the royal guards and those in the commander's battalion."

"The red-scarfed soldiers?"

"Yes. And speaking of the devil, there's one right now."

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