"I don't understand." Garen awkwardly scratched the back of his head, looking completely bewildered. "Achilles outclasses our commander in every way. He's faster, his strikes are more powerful, and his Centurion rank allows him to use magic. So why is our boss still holding on? He even seems to have the upper hand! Can't Achilles just overwhelm him?"
"Because Achilles is about to break his sword, you idiot." Zebra patted the big man's shoulder. "Sir Grey is far more skilled than Achilles and makes better use of his advantages. You could call Achilles self-taught, but every one of Grey's movements shows careful calculation and refinement. That's something you can only achieve under the guidance of a powerful expert."
"Then why hasn't he won?"
"Because he can't land a hit. Achilles reacts too quickly, and he's gradually getting better."
And that was exactly how it was.
Achilles was simply on a whole different level compared to Grey.
Whenever Grey managed to catch his opponent making a mistake and tried to press his advantage, the Centurion's body would flare with power and speed, wiping out everything Grey had gained.
Achilles was a talented fighter. He had a keen sense for danger and reacted to threats almost instantly. Anyone else in his place would have undoubtedly made a mistake and lost by now. But Achilles held on, growing better with every exchange.
At some point, the spectators fell silent.
They watched intently.
The duel was simply too spectacular and captivating.
Two handsome young men crossed swords again and again, each trying to catch the other off guard.
What could be more pleasing to the eye?
If their performance had been open to the public and tickets had been sold, even the descendants of noble aristocrats would have gladly paid to watch, hoping to learn a thing or two or simply enjoy the spectacle to their heart's content.
"They're... evenly matched?" Cheryl asked uncertainly.
"No." Lily shook her head.
Her eyes remained fixed on the duel.
"It's just that each of them is struggling with their own weaknesses, trying to overcome them."
As if to prove her words, Grey and Achilles stepped apart.
For several seconds, neither moved. They used the brief pause to catch their breath. They were expending enormous amounts of energy, and their reserves were far from endless.
"Looks like we're not going to get anywhere if we keep this up." Achilles gave a crooked smile, admitting that he couldn't defeat Grey.
Grey raised an eyebrow, silently urging him to continue.
"This fight is completely pointless. You're too slow to land a hit on me, and I don't want to break my sword. This isn't a fight to the death, and we're only getting more and more exhausted. Sooner or later, we won't be able to control our movements anymore. Then it'll all come down to who makes the first mistake. And chances are, one of us will end up seriously wounded or dead."
"Then what do you suggest?" Grey asked, making no attempt to dispute Achilles' reasoning.
"We'll settle this like men. With our fists. But I won't use mana anymore."
"Are you planning to lose?" Grey asked with an amused smile. Even a fool could see that Achilles' technique was nowhere near as good as his own.
Achilles didn't answer. He simply tossed his sword aside and clenched his fists.
Grey said nothing and followed his example.
His dagger and gladius sank into the ground up to their hilts, even though Grey hadn't put much force into the throw.
Achilles' eyebrows twitched as he realized his suspicions had been correct.
Now, nothing stood between the two fighters except the distance separating them.
Grey quickly shook out his arms, trying to loosen his shoulders, then assumed a boxing stance. His eyes never left Achilles, who, for some strange reason, now seemed much more relaxed.
Achilles wasn't blindly overconfident or arrogant.
He could see that Grey's swordsmanship was a whole level above his own, but he had complete confidence in his hand-to-hand combat skills.
This was his battlefield.
He had been fighting in the streets since early childhood. Brutal clashes with no rules, where only the outcome mattered. He had grown up in an environment where he had to fight for every scrap of bread. There were no weapons, only the primitive and savage law of survival. Achilles had absorbed those rules with his body long before he ever learned to hold a sword.
"Let's begin," he said, clenching his fists so tightly that his knuckles cracked.
Without waiting for a reply, he immediately lunged forward.
His first punch was simple, a straight shot without any unnecessary flair or elegance, but Grey didn't dare underestimate its power. He could see that Achilles wasn't simply throwing punches. He was putting his entire body weight behind every blow.
Grey dodged, stepping sharply to the left, then immediately countered with a short punch to the body, trying to catch his opponent off balance.
But now Achilles wasn't afraid to block Grey's attacks.
He took the blow on his forearm and pushed forward harder. The series of sharp movements he unleashed was so smooth and fast that one might have thought he'd been a boxing star in a previous life.
The punches came one after another, so quickly that Grey could barely keep up with the blocks.
Shoulder. Ribs. Face. Body again.
Achilles didn't care about clean movements or putting on a good show like he did with swordsmanship. In a fistfight, he preferred raw efficiency.
Grey approached things differently.
As always, he tried to disrupt his opponent's rhythm.
He shifted to the side at the last moment. Crashed his shoulder into Achilles' shoulder. Deflected his fist to the side. Sometimes, he would even deliberately take a hit just to land one of his own and gain half a step for his next move.
At that moment, Grey regretted not paying enough attention to close-quarters combat during his training in the Abandoned Village.
Because of the environment he had grown up in, his perspective had been rather limited.
In his eyes, fistfighting had always been something street drunks and thieves engaged in. In other words, commoners. Real men settled their disputes on the battlefield, putting their lives on the line.
His attitude wasn't necessarily wrong.
Everyone had a limited amount of time. It was impossible to become the best at everything. Grey had made a perfectly reasonable decision to focus on swordsmanship and killing techniques, since those were skills that might one day save his life.
After all, what sane person would choose to fight without a weapon when their life was on the line?
Of course, he couldn't be compared to some complete novice. Neither Catherine nor the other Elders, with their vast life experience, would ever allow such an obvious weakness to remain in their pupil's skill set.
Grey had fully mastered the basic combat training taught to him by Uncle Robert (the witcher). That was the only reason he had managed to hold his own against Achilles for so long.
Once again, they had reached a stalemate, and neither could quickly establish superiority over the other.
Minutes passed one after another.
The fighters were exhausted. Their skin glistened with sweat, and their breathing grew heavier. Their techniques began to fall apart. Eventually, the battle between two high-level fighters turned into something else entirely...
A crude, primitive brawl filled with ragged breathing, growling, and sudden lunges.
Achilles seized an opening and mercilessly struck Grey in the jaw. However, the blow no longer carried the same force as it had at the beginning, so Grey managed to stay on his feet, even though his head snapped sharply to the side.
He realized he was losing.
Even without circulating mana to strengthen his body, Achilles was still a Centurion. That meant he had greater endurance thanks to the passive effects that came with advancing in rank. So Grey decided to do something he would never have done if he hadn't been desperate.
He followed Senior's advice...
Still reeling from the blow, he suddenly stepped forward, closing the distance between them. He got so close to Achilles that their chests collided and their faces nearly touched.
At that moment, Grey swiftly swung his leg back, hooking Achilles' supporting leg, then shifted his weight to the side.
The sweep worked. Achilles crashed to the ground, and Grey fell on top of him. The throw was as clean as something performed by an MMA fighter from Earth.
"What?" Achilles barely managed to utter.
His back was pressed against the damp ground.
He had never seen such a technique before. Simple and primitive, yet extremely effective.
"Another world's skill," Grey rasped indistinctly.
He himself was surprised for several reasons. First, because Senior's advice had actually proved useful. And second, because he had managed to execute the technique on his very first attempt, relying solely on Senior's vague instructions.
Combat wasn't chess.
Even the most skilled poet couldn't explain the correct sequence of movements in just a few words during those split seconds when a decision had to be made. And even if someone could, a fighter simply couldn't process the information that quickly, understand it, and act accordingly.
Yet Grey had done exactly that.
It was as if the exact sequence of movements had been transmitted to him and implanted directly into his subconscious.
However surprised Grey might have been, he didn't let his doubts affect his actions.
He was now on top.
He gave his opponent not a second to think and immediately unleashed a barrage of heavy blows aimed at his face.
Achilles tried to resist, block the storm of attacks, and throw Grey off him, but gravity and the ground were on his opponent's side, leaving him no chance.
First, he took a hook to the jaw, then a straight punch to the eye.
The moment Grey drew first blood, his attacks became even more ferocious. He snarled like an animal, trying to finish his opponent off.
Left fist. Right. An elbow to the neck. A knee to the ribs.
Achilles felt his vision blurring, as if his consciousness were slowly slipping away from his body.
And at that moment, for a split second, his self-control cracked. Almost instinctively, he began circulating mana through his body, stretched out his arms, grabbed Grey's shirt, and tried to throw him off.
Rip.
Grey's shirt came slightly undone. The buttons simply couldn't take it and flew off somewhere to the side.
But beneath it was neither smooth skin nor bulging muscles. There were bandages. Layers of tightly wrapped cloth, darkened by bruises. Dried blood mixed with fresh blood and soaked into the wrappings.
The air filled with a sharp metallic stench mixed with the smell of alcohol.
The fight came to a halt for a second.
Understanding flashed in Grey's eyes. He calmly got up from the ground and adjusted his clothes as if nothing had happened.
"You lost..." he announced calmly. His face remained completely expressionless, as though there was nothing surprising about his victory.
"Yes," Achilles agreed curtly, still feeling disoriented and confused.
Grey nodded and, without waiting for anyone else to react, headed straight for the manor.
"Keep enjoying yourselves! I'll be back soon," he called over his shoulder without even turning around.
Cheryl's eyes were already filling with tears.
She was the only one who could guess where Grey had sustained such serious injuries.
Throughout their fight, she hadn't doubted his ability to win for even a second.
After all, no matter how strong Achilles was, he simply couldn't compare to someone who had stormed a cultist base alone, left fifteen corpses behind, and then calmly returned home to sleep without disturbing anyone.
The only thing Cheryl had worried about was whether the minor healing potion she'd given him the night before had worked. Had yesterday's wounds had time to heal? She didn't want Grey to suffer any complications, but she hadn't dared to interfere.
And now, judging by the strong smell of blood, she knew it hadn't worked.
As she watched his retreating figure, her heart wouldn't stop trembling. With fear, excitement, and admiration.
She couldn't look away.
"Will Cheryl ever be able to walk beside you? Are Cheryl's abilities enough to help you?" she whispered so quietly that no one could hear her.