Chapter 91: Gorak vs Gulag

Gorak stepped back. A single drop of dark blood rolled down his collarbone and hit the stone.

The hundred female Troglodytes in the crowd erupted. They slammed their spears against the floor, creating a deafening war-beat. First blood belonged to the old guard.

Immediately, she unleashed a blinding flurry of strikes from every angle. But as the seconds ticked by, the reality of the duel became obvious.

Gorak was not actually fighting.

The Warlord kept his hands open. He merely parried her weapon, shifting his weight just enough to deflect the blows. He was an impenetrable wall playing pure defense. He refused to throw a single offensive punch.

Up on the balcony, Iron-Scale tapped the polished, razor-sharp blade of his scythe against the stone railing. The ringing metal cut right through the cheering crowd.

“Is this the peak of your devotion, Warlord?” Iron-Scale hissed. His voice dripped with mockery. “You stand there and let her chip away at you. The Creator ripped your weak bloodline apart and forged you into a weapon! By hiding that strength, you insult His gifts! You are insulting God!”

The words hit the forge-pit like a physical weight.

Gorak blocked another heavy swing, but this time, he did not step back. He looked up at the balcony. The Inquisitor was an annoying instigator, but the Kobold was absolutely right. Holding back the power Red had given him was blasphemy.

Gorak turned his attention back to Gulag.

“The lizard speaks the truth,” Gorak rumbled. “I apologize. I was disrespecting both you and my Lord.”

The air pressure in the cavern shifted instantly. Gorak dropped his passive stance. His heavy, bone-plated shoulders rolled forward, and his dark eyes locked onto her with terrifying focus.

She swung her axe-hammer again, and this time, Gorak did not block it.

He stepped inside her guard, moving far too fast for his massive size. He caught the thick wooden shaft of her weapon with one hand, stopping the attack dead. With his other hand, he drove an open palm directly into the center of her chest.

He pulled the punch just enough to spare her ribs, but the sheer kinetic force ripped her off her feet. She launched backward through the air, hitting the black stone floor and skidding violently until she crashed into the base of the arena wall.

The deafening war-beat from the hundred female hunters instantly died. The cavern plunged into dead silence.

She clutched her chest. Her vision blurred, but her survival instincts screamed at her to move. She forced herself up, using the heavy haft of her axe-hammer as a crutch. She spat a mouthful of blood onto the stone and glared at the Warlord.

Gorak was already walking toward her. He did not rush. He moved with the slow, terrifying inevitability of a collapsing mountain. The banked forge fires cast long, dark shadows across his heavy bone armor.

“You rely on blood and training,” Gorak’s voice rolled across the quiet pit. “But the Lord rewrote my bones. He rewrote my muscles. You are fighting the past. I am the future.”

She roared. She pushed off the wall and charged him one last time, swinging her weapon in a desperate, blindingly fast overhead strike meant to crack his skull.

Gorak did not bother blocking. He stepped directly into the swing.

He caught the thick wooden handle of her weapon mid-air with one hand. The impact sent a shockwave through her arms, instantly numbing her fingers. Before she could let go, Gorak twisted his wrist. The dense wood snapped like dry kindling.

With his other hand, Gorak reached out and grabbed her by the throat.

He did not squeeze. He simply stepped forward and drove her backward into the dirt, pinning her flat against the floor of the pit. The black stone beneath them spider-webbed from the sheer weight of his armor.

She struggled, kicking her heavy boots and clawing fiercely at his star-iron gauntlet. It was entirely useless. She was a peak physical specimen of her race, but the stat disparity of the System was an absolute, suffocating wall. Gorak held her down with one arm, utterly unbothered by her resistance.

Up on the balcony, Iron-Scale chuckled. He rested the polished, razor-sharp blade of his scythe over his metallic shoulder.

Gorak looked down at the defeated hunter. The fire in her wild eyes slowly gave way to the crushing realization that she had lost.

“I am broken,” she gasped out, her hands falling away from his armored wrist. “I lost. I am a warrior of Onyx Hall. I demand to die in battle. Kill me.”

“Yield,” Gorak commanded, his voice rumbling deep in his chest.

“No,” she spat back, baring her teeth. “A true hunter dies in the pit. Finish it, Warlord.”

Gorak stared down at her. But he did not tighten his grip.

“You confuse pride with duty,” Gorak told her, his voice echoing in the dead silence of the cavern. “There is a very thin line between dying with honor and dying out of sheer foolishness. Throwing your life away because your pride is bruised is not bravery. It is a waste. Our people do not need dead martyrs. We need strong soldiers.”

Gorak opened his hand and released her throat. He stepped back, leaving her lying on the cracked stone.

“Live,” Gorak ordered. “And make yourself useful.”

Gorak looked up at the silent rows of female hunters lining the stone tiers. They stared back at him in absolute awe. The god their Warlord served was real, and his power was undeniable.

Gorak raised his heavy, bone-plated fist toward the ceiling of the cavern.

“The old Onyx Hall is dead!” Gorak roared, his voice shaking the dust from the rafters. “We serve the Spiral now! And tomorrow, we march to build His empire!”

She lay there for a heavy moment. Her chest heaved as she stared up at the impossible strength of the Warlord. The old world of Onyx Hall was truly dead, and her father’s ways were gone with it.

She pushed herself up from the floor. She looked at her broken weapon, then up at Gorak. Slowly, she lowered herself onto one knee and bowed her head.

“Then let me be useful,” she said, her voice carrying across the pit. “I want to serve this God. Show me the path.”

The hundred female hunters followed their leader, slamming their knees against the stone in unison to acknowledge the new age of the Onyx Hall.

The mutated Troglodytes, the Kobolds, and the Shell-Kin erupted into a deafening, fanatical cheer. A few seconds later, Gulag pushed herself up from the floor. She looked at her broken weapon, then up at the Warlord. Slowly, she slammed her fist against her chest in a crisp, military salute.

Up in the Void, Red leaned back in his chair as he watched the localized feed on his terminal. The outcome of the duel had never been in doubt. He had seen the raw stat difference from the very beginning. Still, watching the Warlord completely break the old matriarchal hierarchy without killing the challenger was a perfect victory.

[UNIT ACQUIRED: FEMALE TROGLODYTE HUNTER CASTE x101]

Red smiled in the dark expanse of his domain. He had just gained a hundred elite, highly trained shock troops without spending a single Divine Point.

“Now then…” He looked at Gorak and Gulag, and the others. “It’s time for a revelation, a new code for the Path of Red Spiral.”

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