A soft light at first, golden-white, pulsing beneath shredded skin and bruised veins. The glow spread, wrapping over his knuckles, seeping into the cracks, smoothing broken flesh. In seconds, the bleeding slowed. In another second, it stopped entirely.

The wounds sealed. Skin knit together. Bone aches eased. Strength returned.

A collective gasp rolled through the stands.

People had forgotten… He’d shown it once, years ago, in this very arena, fighting children with too-big weapons and too-big of pride. Ludger could heal.

And not just himself, but others. He was a fighter, yes… a mage, a smith,  a strategist… But also, undeniably, a healer. Varkas’s eyes shot wide, breath catching in his throat. Shock broke across his face.

Healing tilted everything. It stole the advantage. It rewrote the outcome. It changed the future. And for the first time since the fight began… fear flickered behind the guildmaster’s glare.

A ripple of voices surged through the audience, loud, sharp, and growing with every heartbeat.

“He’s cheating!”

“That has to be illegal!”

“Nobody regenerates like that mid-fight!”

Dozens of spectators stood from their seats, pointing down at the arena floor. Some were furious, some anxious, others simply bewildered. Whispers became accusations; accusations swelled into shouts.

“No external healing allowed!”

“There’s no way that’s natural!”

“He must be using a relic!”

The panic sharpened when they realized: Varkas’s fists weren’t healing. His blood still dripped steadily down his gauntlets. Ludger’s did not.

Someone from the noble stands yelled:

“Check him! Check his pockets! Check his armor!”

The tension crackled through the arena like lightning. The referee, already sweating through his uniform, hurried forward, raising both hands in a calming but urgent gesture.

“Pause!” he called out.

Ludger and Varkas separated reluctantly, still locked eye to eye, chests rising with breath.

The referee turned to Ludger first. His gaze swept over the boy’s body, searching for external catalysts: glowing talismans, potions, hidden artifacts. He checked the gauntlets, felt the mana resonance, examined the bracers, traced the healing glow.

Ludger didn’t move.Didn’t speak. Didn’t assist. Just waited.

Then, the referee placed his palm against Ludger’s forearm, eyes closing, breathing steady as he sensed the magic. The glow told him everything. Natural mana. Internal source. Self-generated spell. No interference. No trick. No cheat.

The referee stepped back, voice projecting across the arena:

“The healing observed is self-inflicted regeneration.”

“There are no external catalysts.”

“Spell usage is permitted in the rules of combat.”

He glanced between the fighters, then nodded once.

“The match continues.”

The audience reaction was instant and chaotic, a roar of disbelief, a rattle of excitement, gasps of admiration, groans of frustration, awe grinding against outrage, Some still protested.

Others cheered louder. But the ruling stood.

Ludger’s fists flexed, fresh, unmarred skin tightening over hard muscle. Varkas clenched his jaw, fury rekindling into something darker. And the arena understood: if the guildmaster wanted to win, he’d have to break Ludger faster than Ludger could put himself back together.

For a moment, as the referee stepped away and the decision settled into the arena like dust after an explosion, Ludger’s mind drifted somewhere it hadn’t in a long while. He couldn’t help it. Standing again in this very arena, surrounded by thousands of watching eyes, stirred memories from years ago, when the sand had swallowed his boots for the first time, when his voice was smaller, when his reach was shorter, and when there was far more at stake than mere victory.

Back then, the match had been poisoned before he ever stepped onto the field. The rules of the tournament had been bent, twisted, reshaped by those hungry to crush Torvares and everything connected to that name. They wanted to break Viola, break the old lord, and break any future the family might have held in the capital. The hand behind the curtain had been clumsy in its cruelty, too heavy-handed to hide, demanding rule changes mid-event, forcing Ludger into a match alongside Viola, rather than alone, stripping them both of the chance to prove themselves independently. It had worked in reverse.

Instead of humiliating the pair, the sabotage had become the stepping stone that carried them through. But even now, all these years later, Ludger remembered the heat of that spotlight, the weight of an entire arena waiting for him to fail, not because of skill or luck, but because politics wanted him gone.

For a heartbeat, he wondered if something similar would happen now. Maybe someone would shout for intervention. Maybe a noble would demand disqualification. Maybe the rules would suddenly shift, claiming healing wasn’t permitted, or northern magic was illegal, or twelve-year-olds needed chaperones. The capital had never been subtle, and sabotage was tradition here… But none of it came.

No one tried to twist the match. No shadow rose to interfere. Not a whisper of dishonesty drifted into the sand. Ludger exhaled, clearing the thought. He could not afford to drown himself in old echoes. The past was a wall, useful to lean on for reflection, but dangerous to stare at for too long… Because Varkas Stonefury was preparing to move again.

The guildmaster inhaled deeply, a low rumble vibrating in his chest. His breath sounded like a furnace being stoked. Shoulders rolled forward, arms widening, posture broadening into something primal and heavy. The energy around him thickened in slow, visible waves, gathering around his limbs and torso in a haze of shimmering heat. His muscles flexed beneath his light armor, swelling with condensed mana so dense it almost hummed.

Then the aura took shape. It wasn’t just a glow, it was pressure. A cocoon of violent energy that clung to him like molten metal, sparks leaping across his gauntlets and bracers, fizzing through the air with a sharp crackle that stung the ear. Each step he took sank deeper into the sand than the one before, small quakes rippling outward as if he were wearing the weight of a mountain… And the intent behind it was unmistakable.

If Ludger could repair what was broken, then Varkas would simply break him faster than regeneration could keep up. The fight had shifted. No more testing strikes. No more probing exchanges. The guildmaster was ready to drive forward with overwhelming force… no hesitation, no restraint.

Ludger rolled his shoulders once, steam spilling from his skin, Rage Flow still burning through muscle and bone like a second heartbeat. The rush of heat, strength, and raw instinct thrummed inside him, a rhythm he had learned to guide rather than drown in.

Thoughts of sabotage, of the past, of tournaments controlled by petty politics slipped from his mind. There was nothing left up there but the present… and the storm waiting to crash into him.

Ludger steadied his breath, steam rolling off his shoulders in slow waves that clung to the heat around him. Beneath the adrenaline and the roar of mana, his thoughts settled into sharp, deliberate clarity. He didn’t want to show everything he was capable of here, there was strategy in restraint, and danger in exposure. Every technique he revealed today would be studied by guilds, spies, and nobles. Every strength spoken aloud in this arena would become a weakness later.

But neither did he want to bleed himself dry just to win a single duel. Pride wasn’t worth walking away half-crippled. Winning was necessary, vital even, but the manner of that win mattered just as much. A victory where he looked untouchable, inhuman, would draw the wrong kind of attention. The empire feared what it could not control. If he demonstrated too wide a gap, people would stop seeing him as a prodigy and start seeing him as a threat. He had to walk the line between these extremes: not a monster, not a victim, but something in between. Someone dangerous, but still human.

The guild’s reputation rode on that balance. His family’s future. His father’s standing. Torvares’s support. The Lionsguard itself. Today wasn’t just about fighting Varkas Stonefury, it was about how he fought him. The arena was full of eyes, and every one of them had reasons to judge him. Some hoped he would fall. Some prayed he would rise. All were watching closely.

And in front of him, Varkas was preparing to strike again. The guildmaster exuded raw power now; mana pooled around him in thick, glowing waves. His muscles swelled with the pressure, boots digging deeper into the sand as his body coiled for a devastating charge. When he launched forward, he was a blur of brute strength and burning fury, his steps cracking the arena floor with each stride. His right arm reeled back, a punch heavy enough to split bone through armor.

This time, Ludger didn’t wait. He activated Overdrive, not elemental, not attuned, but pure, dense mana pulsing into his limbs. It spread through his muscles like liquid metal, anchoring him to the earth. The air around him thickened, shimmering under the pressure of his energy. The sand at his feet vibrated from the force radiating out through his body.

When Varkas’s gauntlet slammed forward, the impact hit like a thunderbolt, yet Ludger didn’t budge. His boots remained planted. The ground beneath him cracked before he did. The shock of it snapped through their bones, and for the first time, Varkas’s confidence flickered. His eyes widened, and his balance wavered.

Ludger seized control instantly. His left hand slid along Varkas’s arm, guiding the massive punch off its direct path. The guildmaster’s fist shot past Ludger’s head, close enough for Ludger to feel the heat of mana scraping his cheek. In the same motion, Ludger drove himself tight into Varkas’s guard. His fists moved in a blur, each one reinforced by Rage Flow and Overdrive, turning his arms into pounding machines of condensed power.

The first punch crashed into the solar plexus, crushing air from Varkas’s lungs. The second buried into the ribs under the breastplate, a sharp, precise strike meant to jolt the diaphragm. The third slammed lower, forcing pain up through the abdomen. Two more followed, hammering the same target points to drive the damage deeper. Each impact echoed with a deep, brutal thud that rippled outward through the arena floor. Metal armor rang, mana flickered, and Varkas stumbled back on instinct alone.

He caught himself after two staggering steps, boots scraping against the sand. His breathing came rough now, his expression sharpened by shock. He wasn’t fazed by the pain, not a man like him, but the realization hit hard: Ludger wasn’t showing everything. He wasn’t close to done. There were more layers beneath the surface, more cards hidden up sleeves, more techniques he hadn’t seen.

The guildmaster narrowed his eyes, chest rising and falling with heavy breaths. For the first time since stepping into the arena, Varkas Stonefury wondered if this duel would truly be decided by strength alone, because Ludger was not just strong. He was resourceful. He was clever. And he was holding back.

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