As soon as the guards moved out of earshot, Grimnir leaned close.
"You actually got them to accept," he said quietly. "I half expected them to kill us on sight."
"Orc culture values strength and honor," Satou replied. "Insulting them enough that they had to prove their courage, then framing the challenge in their own traditions — it forced them to respond according to their own rules. Killing us outright would have looked weak."
"That's well and good," Lyra said, "but you still have to win the fight. What's the actual plan?"
Satou reviewed what he'd worked out in the holding area. Urgak fought one-armed and had adapted around it — that meant full torso rotation on committed swings, longer effective reach than expected, and no second arm to grab or redirect. He was faster than a standard orc chieftain should be, given his size. He would expect a direct fight and be bored by anything less.
The ground was the variable Urgak couldn't plan for.
"I use Earth Manipulation on the arena floor throughout the fight," Satou said. "Not dramatically — small disruptions, just enough to break his footing at critical moments. Stone Spit for pressure and to force him to commit. Pack Leader's Instinct to read his movement patterns. And if I can get inside his reach once — Poison Fang."
"One bite could do it?" Grimnir asked.
"The paralytic is slower on something his size," Satou admitted. "But it accumulates. Two or three bites and it'll start affecting his coordination. He's already fighting with one arm — if that arm slows, he has nothing left."
"What about the Night Hunter skill?" Lyra asked.
Satou glanced at the sun. It was already descending toward the horizon, the sky warming to deep orange. "The fight is at sunset. If it runs into dusk, everything I have gets sharper. That's the reason I want to avoid ending it quickly if I'm still standing — drag it into the dark and the advantage shifts."
"And if it goes badly before that?" Grimnir said.
"You grab Kira and run," Satou said. "We already agreed."
"We promised," Jessica said quietly. "We remember."
Satou looked at all four of them. Then he nodded and turned toward the sound of the horn.
The settlement had transformed.
Torches flared around the arena's perimeter — a circular space about thirty meters across, marked by wooden posts with packed earth inside. Old stains darkened the ground in patterns that didn't require explanation. Orcs filled every available viewing position, their voices already building into the kind of noise that had weight.
At least forty-five of them visible. More arriving from the longhouses.
Satou walked out of the holding area and into the arena, his small form exactly as dwarfed by the space as he'd expected. The setting sun threw everything in shades of red and orange. The crowd's noise when he appeared was amused rather than threatening — the sound of people who had already decided how this ended and were just here to watch.
On the opposite side, Urgak emerged from his longhouse.
He'd removed his shirt. The torchlight caught every scar on his torso — the accumulated record of battles that had cost him pieces of himself without ever costing him the fight. His remaining arm carried a war axe that looked like it weighed more than Satou's entire body. Despite one arm, he moved with the economic grace of someone who had been fighting this way for long enough that the missing limb was no longer a disadvantage but simply the way his body worked.
He stepped into the arena to thunderous approval.
An elderly orc — a shaman by the look of the staff and the carved symbols on his robes — stepped to the center and raised a hand.
"Warriors of the Iron Fang tribe!" The elder spoke in Common, presumably for Satou's benefit, which he filed away as interesting. "Today we witness a challenge issued by this goblin against our chieftain. By the ancient laws of trial by combat, this challenge has been accepted. The fight continues until one combatant yields or dies. No other rules. May the strongest prevail."
The crowd's roar had physical mass.
Urgak and Satou faced each other across twenty meters of packed earth.
"Last chance to withdraw," Urgak called out, his grinding voice carrying easily over the noise. "Admit you're outmatched, bow before me, and I'll make your death quick."
Satou drew his damaged sword and settled into a stance.
Urgak's expression shifted — the amusement fading, replaced by something that looked like genuine consideration. "So be it."
The horn blew.
Urgak moved first.
He closed twenty meters with surprising speed, his war axe sweeping in a horizontal arc that would have cut Satou in half at chest height.
Satou dropped into a roll, passing under the swing. He came up inside Urgak's reach and slashed at the exposed side.
The blade scraped across skin thick as hardwood, drawing a thin line of blood. Nothing meaningful.
Urgak's knee came up immediately, catching Satou in the chest and launching him backward. He hit the ground hard, impact driving the air from his lungs, and the crowd roared.
Satou forced himself upright, pulling a breath in against the pain. One exchange. Already clear that this wasn't a fight he could win with his sword against Urgak's axe in a straight line.
'Don't fight in a straight line.'
Urgak came again — axe raised high, committing to an overhead strike.
Satou activated Earth Manipulation beneath Urgak's front foot.
The ground softened to loose mud under the planted foot, just for a moment — a half-inch of unexpected give. It was enough. Urgak's balance shifted fractionally and his axe blade slammed into the earth eighteen inches to Satou's left instead of into his skull.
Satou stepped sideways and spat. Three Stone Spit shards in quick succession, burning through three mana points — he felt the drain immediately but kept moving.
Urgak twisted his head. Two shards missed. The third caught his cheek, opening a cut that bled freely.
Urgak straightened and looked at the blood on his fingers. Then he looked at Satou with eyes that had changed — no longer amused, no longer performing for the crowd.
"Tricks," he said. His voice was lower now. More focused. "Interesting."
He shifted his stance. Something in how he held the axe changed — the grip point moving slightly, the angle of his shoulder dropping.
Grimnir's warning came back immediately. He adapts. He wouldn't still be leading if he fought the same way he did before.
Satou kept his feet moving, circling right, keeping the softened patch of earth between them as a variable Urgak didn't fully know about yet.
The crowd had gone quieter. Not silent — but the amused roar had become something more attentive.
Satou registered it through Pack Leader's Instinct as a shift in collective mood. They were watching differently now. This wasn't the entertainment they'd expected.
Good.
He needed Urgak thinking rather than performing. A thinking opponent made predictable choices — and predictable choices could be interrupted.
The sun touched the horizon.
The light turned red, then deeper red, and the torches around the arena's perimeter began to matter more than the sky.
And Satou felt it — a subtle, spreading warmth through his muscles and senses as Night Hunter activated.
Everything got sharper.