The gorge narrowed to a blade's width. Mist clung to Serena's lashes, each breath tasting of wet iron. Behind her, yesterday's slaughter still steamed faintly on the red stones; ahead, the path funneled into a cavern mouth yawning like a broken jaw.
< 26 days remain >
She paused to tighten the strap across her scythe's curve, then stepped into the dark.
---
The tunnel had once been a mine. Splintered beams jutted from the walls, and rusted pickaxes lay abandoned among drifts of bone-white quartz. Every footfall echoed back in fractured whispers. Umbren's ears swiveled constantly, tracking scuttles too soft for human hearing.
A hundred paces in, the passage widened into a vast chamber. Lanterns of whale-oil burned in iron cages, casting trembling halos over a crude arena hacked from the living rock. Tiered benches were packed with spectators—mercenaries, smugglers, even a few noble bastards wearing masks of beaten silver. All eyes were fixed on the pit below.
Serena's gaze followed theirs.
A man stood alone in the circle, stripped to the waist, skin latticed with scars. He spun twin chain-scythes around his wrists, the blades whistling through the air in tight, vicious arcs. Each link glowed faintly, fed by the same black-iron fragment Serena now carried. The shard at her hip pulsed in answer.
< Signature detected – partial artifact alignment >
The announcer—a hulking woman with a voice like gravel—lifted a brass bell.
"Next challenger steps in or forfeits the purse!"
Coins clattered, wagers shouted. Serena felt the weight of the room settle on her shoulders. She descended the rough-hewn steps, scythe angled across her back.
"Name?" the announcer barked.
"Shade."
The woman grinned, revealing a gold canine. "Rules are simple. Fight until one yields or dies. No outside blades." A sweep of her arm indicated the pit. "Begin."
---
The chain-scythes snapped forward, twin vipers of metal. Serena dropped low, felt the wind of the first blade kiss the hair at her temple. Gravel skittered under her boots as she rolled left, came up inside the arc, scythe flashing in a tight upward crescent.
Crescent Arc.
The curved edge sliced across her opponent's ribs, parting skin with a sound like tearing silk. Blood sprayed, dark against lantern light. He hissed, chains recoiling, then lashed out again. This time the blades crossed mid-flight, aiming to shear her arms at the elbows.
Serena twisted, letting momentum carry her into a spinning back-step. Moonfall Sweep. Her scythe carved a shallow trench through grit and stone; the resulting wave of wind-dark force slammed the chains downward, burying their tips in the ground.
For a heartbeat the man was open. She lunged—Ghost Moon Rend—vanishing as the technique triggered. When she reappeared behind him, the scythe was already descending. He sensed the shift and snapped a chain backward, the glowing link catching the blade mid-strike. Sparks cascaded.
Strength met strength. The chain links vibrated, singing a high metallic note. Serena pressed harder, feeling the grind of steel on steel. A single link cracked—then shattered. The backlash whipped the broken chain into the man's own shoulder, carving a groove through muscle.
He staggered, eyes wide, but did not fall. A ragged cheer rose from the benches.
Serena tasted copper in the air—her own blood from a reopened cut. She smiled, cold and small.
Umbren prowled the rim of the pit, hackles raised, a silent promise to any who tried to interfere.
The man roared, chain-scythes whirling in a final, desperate storm. Serena slid forward, inside the radius of the blades, and brought her weapon up in a perfect vertical arc. Edge met sternum. The clang of impact echoed through the chamber, followed by a wet exhale.
He dropped to one knee, chains clattering against stone.
Yield flickered in his eyes.
Serena spun the scythe once, then rested the flat of the blade against his throat.
"I take your fragment," she said quietly.
He nodded, blood threading from the corner of his mouth. She reached into the pouch at his belt and drew out a second shard of black iron. The two pieces in her storage thrummed like twin hearts finding rhythm.
< Artifact fragments aligned – resonance 34 % >
The announcer rang the bell again, but the sound was muffled beneath the roar of the crowd. Coins showered into the pit, clinking off stone and steel.
Serena stepped back, scythe slick with red. The man remained kneeling, defeated but alive—an echo she might need later.
< Combat trial 3/3 complete >
< Cultivator kill 0/1 complete >
She turned toward the tunnel, mist closing like curtains behind her.
< 25 days remain >