Chapter 32 The Social Gathering (3)
The small duel that these energetic knights engaged in had unexpectedly turned into the biggest event of the social gathering.
Each onlooker had their own way of watching the spectacle.
Several elder nobles whispered to each other, exchanging gold coins back and forth.
They were placing bets on who would win.
Those who understood the essence of wooden sword dueling foresaw Felix’s upper hand.
Some of the ladies cast admiring glances at Damian’s raised forearms and the skin revealed by his loosened upper button.
In a corner among the crowd, Joyce also stood with his arms folded, calmly observing the duel. Internally, he was almost dying from curiosity about how Damian would perform.
In fact, amidst the rampant rumors, not a single person in that crowd had ever seen Damian swing a sword with their own eyes.
Joyce naturally had his hopes pinned on Damian.
To Joyce, who was well-versed in swordsmanship, it was apparent that Damian was placed at a significant disadvantage.
Felix was likely to charge in, disregarding even the implicit rules of wooden sword dueling.
Simply touching the vital points with the wooden sword would not determine the outcome.
The nobles neither understood nor cared about this issue; they were only concerned with who appeared to be winning to the eye.
Thus, one had to show utter dominance, whether through strength or skill.
Damian was positioned with one hand behind his back, gripping the wooden sword solely in the other hand, indicating he was not planning to counter with brute force.
The referee stood between Felix and Damian, stretching out his arms wide.
Once both were ready, the referee shouted to begin and quickly stepped back.
‘It begins.’
The crowd watched with tension etched on their faces.
Felix stood firmly in place, glaring into Damian’s face for a few seconds.
Damian, too, stood still, awaiting Felix’s approach.
Soon after, Felix charged towards Damian like a bull enraged.
Damian backed up with a few steps and, as Felix drew near, he abruptly sidestepped.
Felix’s sword cleaved through nothing but air.
Simultaneously, the crowd emitted anxious gasps.
Felix turned around and launched himself at Damian once more.
Damian, as if performing a sleight of hand, narrowly dodged the incoming sword, then swept Felix’s leading foot.
Felix’s hefty frame lost balance.
His upper body tilted forward at a 90-degree angle, and he seemed poised to crash to the ground.
Floundering, he finally ended up sprawled face-down.
“Phahaha!”
Perhaps the sight was comically pathetic, for explosive laughter burst forth from the crowd.
Felix’s face flared with humiliation as he lay there.
“Damn.”
At the moment he tried to lift himself to counterattack, the cold touch of a wooden sword met his throat.
Felix became petrified in place.
Damian had approached with his sword’s point already aimed at Felix’s neck.
While a body blow could be ignored, a blade at the throat in a helpless state was a different matter altogether.
This left no room for excuses; it was an undeniable defeat for Felix.
Felix bit down hard on his teeth.
“Damian wins!”
“Wow!”
Applause accompanied by exclamations rippled through the crowd.
Damian, stone-faced, turned around and walked back to the starting position.
Joyce was inwardly impressed. Damian had crafted a no-frills narrative of victory, predicting exactly how Felix would attack.
Felix quickly rose and walked back to the starting point.
Still fired up, he gave Damian a slight prod as he passed by him.
“Are you so scared of clashing swords directly? Just resorting to cowardly tricks, huh?”
Damian wore a face of indifference even in the face of the provocation.
Once the referee confirmed they were ready, he raised his arm and let out a shout indicating the start of the second round.
Felix was a bit more cautious this time; he had a gut feeling that a head-on charge wouldn’t work again.
He faked threatening jabs at Damian with his long reach.
However, Damian didn’t budge at such feints.
“Damn it.”
Impatience got the better of Felix, and he reverted to his instinctual approach, rushing in again.
Damian reacted by ducking down.
Felix’s wooden sword just barely missed Damian’s shoulder yet again.
Damian didn’t retreat but pressed his shoulder underneath Felix’s elbow instead.
This caused their bodies to clash and their arms to entangle, bringing the scrimmage to a halt.
‘What’s going on…?’
Then once more, Felix felt a cold touch at his throat.
Blinking, he took a moment to grasp what had just happened.
Close in contact, Damian’s sword tip was again resting at his throat.
It felt like the duel had ended before anything had actually taken place.
The spectators couldn’t cheer, seemingly unable to believe the quick resolution of the duel.
Joyce too, doubted his own eyes.
While Felix’s fighting style was brutish, it wasn’t so loose that it should be easily dominated.
Yet Damian seemed to effortlessly evade as if exploiting glaring vulnerabilities.
It was as if he were dealing with only a large child.
“Felix loses!”
Only then did a slow round of applause surge from the crowd, their faces an amalgam of shock and disbelief.
Felix was still unable to truly grasp the difference in their abilities.
He merely thought he had gotten entangled in Damian’s tactics.
Once again, he provoked Damian.
“Were you raised on a wizard’s teat to be too cowardly to stand a frontal fight?”
Felix, quite heated, hadn’t realized his taunt was loud enough for the crowd to hear.
Upon hearing his words, the expressions of the noble ladies and fellow knights soured.
It was a blatant affront to Silveryn and Damian.
Such behavior clearly conflicted with the values of chivalry they upheld.
As Joyce moved to intervene, a nearby senior knight held him back. The senior knight gestured to address the matter after the duel had concluded.
Damian did not respond.
“….”
Nonetheless, the provocation had obviously had an effect.
Facing each other again back at their spots, a lethal intent filled Damian’s gaze.
Felix sneered, convinced now that Damian would meet his provocation with a direct confrontation.
And for Felix, this was a good thing; a head-to-head fight was overwhelmingly in his favor.
The mood among the crowd had dampened.
Were Damian to succumb to the provocation half-heartedly, it would be akin to watching the honor of his master tarnished without retribution; it was time for a decisive reprisal.
Felix’s reckless babble had turned the light-hearted sparring into a duel of honor.
The referee soon announced the start of the third round.
Felix leaped in, bringing down his full weight with the sword onto Damian. His action was excessively large.
He paid no mind to whether Damian would strike at an opening.
And Damian did not evade but parried the sword instead.
‘Huh?’
Unfazed, he countered it.
Felix regained his footing and swung his sword at Damian with all his might.
It was an aggressive, one-sided offensive, quite similar to his bout with Julian.
Everyone anticipated Damian being overpowered.
But the crowd scowled, sending no cheers due to Felix’s uncouth behavior.
Against all odds, Damian held his ground.
Not a single step did he retreat.
And with each clash, Felix’s hands began to numb from the impacts.
It felt like hitting a rock.
‘What in the world…’
Felix was beginning to panic.
He directly crossed swords with Damian, using his weight to press down.
But Damian didn’t budge an inch.
Instead, he took a step forward, pushing Felix back.
It was Damian who was overpowering him with strength.
Felix, flustered, stumbled a few steps backwards.
‘What in the world did he do to have such strength in that physique…’
This was contrary to his intuition.
Shaking off the numbness in his hands, Felix lunged forward again.
He put his weight behind the effort, striking down at Damian with all his might.
And Damian, not evading, counterattacked with tremendous force.
Clang!
The wooden swords collided. Following the loud impact, Felix screamed in agony.
“Aaaaargh!”
The wooden sword flew out of his grasp, and he winced, grabbing his twisted wrist as he staggered back.
Even in a direct confrontation, Damian was utterly dominating.
The moment the sword flew out, the outcome was decided, but Damian appeared unwilling to end it there.
He simply stood, watching.
Silence fell over the training grounds for a while.
Then, after the duel, Damian spoke for the first time.
“Pick it up.”
“…What?”
Felix glared at Damian’s face.
Was he being told to pick up the wooden sword again?
Offering him another chance.
It was a remark that crushed Felix’s pride.
His teeth grated. Felix, red in the face, went to pick up the wooden sword that had fallen.
He got back in stance, but his arms were shaking violently.
Despite being furious, he couldn’t find the will to charge first.
Damian approached him with large, deliberate steps.
Felix’s body involuntarily retreated little by little.
“Ugh, damn it.”
Damian brazenly stepped forward and, with an obvious trajectory, brought down the sword toward Felix.
Clang!
Felix blocked with all his might, but once again the wooden sword was knocked out of his hands.
“Aaaaah!”
And Felix writhed on the ground in pain.
Both his wrists had swelled red from the shock, the tendons looking as if they were torn asunder.
Yet the duel was still not over.
Damian picked up the wooden sword from the ground and casually tossed it back to him.
“Pick it up.”
Felix looked up at Damian.
“Damn, damn, damn it!”
That’s when he realized he had provoked the wrong person.
Felix squeezed his eyes shut and begged.
“Damn it, I lost, I’ve lost!”
Upon his declaration of surrender, Damian finally put down the wooden sword.
Squatting down, Damian whispered something to Felix in a low voice that no one else but Felix, drowned out by the crowd, could hear.
Shortly after, Felix’s face turned deathly pale.
Then Damian walked away through the crowd, leaving the training grounds behind.
Bologna, Nancy, and a few other nobles followed after Damian.
***
“What kind of uproar did you cause?”
After spending a day at the headquarters of the knighthood, Silveryn and Damian set off for home early in the morning.
Damian was resting his chin on the carriage window, admiring the gently flowing scenery of Weisel.
“It was just a light sparring.”
“Light sparring, and those well-mannered nobles were yelling so excitedly?”
“It seems they were really curious about my abilities. As you said, teacher, people here really love their gossip…”
“And why did you get so many gifts?”
Next to where Damian sat was a pile of presents wrapped in ribbons and letters.
“I’m not sure. They just gave them to me.”
Unable to contain her curiosity, Silveryn plucked one of the letters from the pile and read it.
It contained words expressing a wish to stay in contact along with an address in a fiefdom where Damian could send his reply.
“You’re quite the popular one.”
“….”
“And what was all that talk during the duel?”
Damian answered with an expression that said he didn’t know anything.
“Huh?”
“Don’t play dumb. I was watching from the window of the headquarters. Why were you so angry?”
Silveryn, having watched from a distance, didn’t know the exact details.
“He called me a pipsqueak.”
“….”
Silveryn looked at Damian with a momentary pang of sympathy. Damian wasn’t particularly short, but the guy he’d been up against was bulky enough to make it seem so.
“Don’t worry about it too much. You certainly have grown since I first saw you. You’ll be catching up in no time.”
Damian replied nonchalantly.
“That’s reassuring to hear.”
“Are you even listening to me?”
“Yes.”
Damian seemed lost in thought, gazing out at the distant mountains.
“No, so what did you say to that guy?”
“I told him we’d see each other again at the Eternia entrance exam.”
“…?”
Silveryn squinted at him suspiciously.
‘It feels like something is missing.’
There had certainly been some incident the night before, but Damian seemed to have no intention of sharing the whole story.
Soon after, she shook her head to herself and gave up trying to pry.
‘Fine, let him be.’
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