Marcus stood with his hands tucked casually behind his back. Prince Asher, Sofia and the foreign delegates watched the battlefield, standing behind Marcus.
Asher was eager to see House Hayes’s strength while others were waiting for the show to start.
"Roland," Marcus did not raise his voice.
"Take the one on the left. He’s at nascent Manifestation stage and have just broken through." His eyes stayed on the guards. "Push against his control and learn how he shapes the elements. It’s about time you start breaking through."
Roland’s throat was dry. "Yes, Father."
"Thomas, take their senior officer and Garret, the remaining two."
Neither replied but obeyed the command with their body. Garret’s great sword was already out and Thomas, he was already gone, folded into the dark between two trunks as if the forest had swallowed him whole.
The guards also went towards their opponents, not by choice but by absolute authority Marcus commanded over them.
On Marcus’s left, the battlefield belonged to Thomas. He stepped out of the shadows, his hands clasped as he was completely relaxed. In front of him, the senior guard had already drawn his blade, his armor shining in defensive runes.
On Marcus’s right, Garret stood straight, gripping his sword as he eyed the two guards who were on alert.
And lastly on middle, was Roland. He wielded a sword, clearly nervous and excited about the battle ahead. In front of him, was the last guard and the weakest guard of the four. He was young and had high future potential.
The guard breathed in, and a essence of fire covered his armor instantly. The plants near him blackened as a thermal wave exploded outwards, mostly towards Roland.
Seeing this, Roland also wrapped himself in the essence, lunging himself forward. His was fast as he cut clean through the heat to execute a straight pierce beneath the guard’s chest plate.
The guard didn’t even bother to parry as he wielded his fire element outward, once again.
BOOM.
An explosive fire essence erupted from the imperial armor, blowing Roland backward. He twisted mid air, his boots scraping against the ground to stabilize himself. The skin across his upper left hand blistered.
"Vessel is just a container, boy," the guard sneered as he closed the gap with slow and heavy strides, burning the surrounding with each step. "A container that will break when the insides will boil."
The guard drew his sword. Hot fire essence coated the sword as he prepared for a strike.
Seeing this, Roland quickly got up and tightly gripped his sword.
The young guard glanced once at Marcus. We’ll definitely die today but I hope we can take someone with us. He thought as he gazed back at Roland and moved.
The first strike came in a wide overhand arc, and Roland barely got his sword up in time. The impact drove through his wrist, almost faltering his grip of the sword.
Fire leapt from the guard’s blade to his own as it raced up the steel toward his hands, and the sword began to falter in his grip.
Roland kicked the ground off as he went rolling backwards. His blade came with him with a trail of fire. He channeled a large amount of his essence into his body, and put off the fire on the sword.
He recovered his footing instantly and drove his entire weight forward into a two handed strike, channeling his essence towards his hand to the fullest.
Clang....
The guard caught the blade, coating his hands in his own essence but the raw strength of Roland’s condensed essence strike imbalanced his footing. For a split second, Roland saw an opening and drove his elbow straight into the guard’s side profile.
"Heh," the guard scoffed.
The fire aura surrounding the guard solidified as the fire wrapped around Roland’s blade, burning the flesh of his palms. Before Roland could disengage, the guard drove his knee straight into his rib cage.
CRACK.
The sound of fracturing bone was loud as Roland was hurled fifty meters through the air, crashing violently into a massive tree trunk. He fell into the mud, coughing up a thick dark blood.
"Roland!" Sofia gasped from the edge of the battlefield as she was about to interfere.
Behind her, Marcus didn’t move. His eyes remained fixed on his son. "Stand down, Sofia. He can handle himself well, and a fierce battle was needed for him."
"But Marcus, see his conditi-,"
"No buts. I know my son well enough. After this battle he will try to breakthrough in the estate," Marcus interrupted Sofia firmly but deep down he was ready to interrupt any life threatening injuries that may occur.
In the dirt, Roland gasped as he pushed himself up. His one rib was completely shattered and his upper clothes burnt. Yet, his grip on his sword remained. His eyes held a manic and stubborn focus.
The guard walked forward with slow strides. He was exhausted mentally as he used too much of his essence quickly. I need to finish it quickly.
"Your father is just watching you die," he laughed as he tried to pressure Roland mentally as he raised his weapon.
He’s gathering.
Roland had watched him do it already. Each time the guard used something big, he paused, but even if he predicted the strike, his exhausted body would still move slow.
The guard’s fire condensed blade began to descent.
Roland tried to move to the left side but his body was giving up before his mind could. He couldn’t move fully from the range of the strike as his right shoulder and hand remained in the strike zone.
Then, something shifted. It was a small shift, almost invisible to anyone below soul forge stage.
Marcus didn’t move his body but a single and condensed needle like soul strike pierced through, entering the guard’s body as it restricted his essence pathway for a while.
Instantly, the guard’s circulation locked up as his essence collapsed. The violent back draft of essence interruption caused him to freeze.
His sword came down but it didn’t cut through Roland as it was meant to be.
Seeing this, Roland gripped his sword tightly and drove his entire weight into the guard’s neck region. He use last bit of his essence as he exploded forward, ignoring the pain in his lungs and chest. His blade carried pure physical momentum.
His sword pierced straight through the guard’s throat as the blade burst out of the back of the guard’s neck, blood spraying out like a fountain.
He didn’t think why the guard paused or anything. He just acted out on his pure instinct.
Roland let go of his sword as the guard began to collapse forward. He moved to the side as the guard’s collapsed fully, twitching as a wide pool of dark crimson rapidly expanded.
His legs gave out and he sat down in the mud. He looked at his hands which were somewhat burnt. He was exhausted as his vision began to blur out.
He could feel his father’s eyes on his back but he did not turn around. He leaned over to a nearby tree as his body finally gave out.