If anything, that spurred Chance to try even harder. He pushed himself, reaching out to his Essence and trying to determine how to interweave it with his movements. It was imperative that he didn’t try to force anything or actually push the Essence in – that was a technique, and it was entirely different.
This had to be natural. It was embodying Essence, not using it. Chance tried everything he could think of, ranging from politely thanking the Essence to begging it. None of it worked, and despite the flow state of the battle, he was starting to get slightly irritated.
As they fought, Chance caught a glimpse of Wren’s face. There was no stress in his features. His eyes were relaxed and his smile gentle. He was helping his opponent train in the middle of an arena with countless people watching them, and there wasn’t a single worried bone in his body. He was just enjoying himself.
Chance disengaged, hopping back, and retracting his urumi. Wren’s eyebrows rose as a flicker of disappointment washed over his features.
“You have not mastered your technique yet. Have you decided to stop training?”
“No,” Chance replied, shaking his head as certainty gripped him harder than ever. “I don’t need this training anymore.”
“You haven’t even done anything yet. I want to fight you at your strongest. Please, continue. I do not mind doing more.”
“Thank you for the offer.” Chance smiled at Wren, letting his body relax. He lightened his grip on the urumi, holding the hilt gently like the hand of a lover. “But you’ve already helped me. I am ready to fight properly.”
“Are you certain? It is foolish to trust completely in something you have not tried yet. You should get a feel for it first, if you believe you have discovered something.”
“I’ve got no need to,” Chance replied. “I already know it will work.”
“Bold. Come, then.”
“Not bold,” Chance corrected. “Lucky.”
He drew in a breath and let it out slowly, allowing his body to relax as if he were in meditation. Yamish had told him what he needed to do many weeks ago, but he hadn’t truly understood what the man had said.
There are many ways to cultivate, huh?
And then, Chance stopped trying. Or, more accurately, he stopped trying to force himself to try. He simply gave himself into the fight. He darted forward, his urumi flicking to life as he flicked his wrist.
Wren thrust his spear, attacking for the first time that fight. A piece of loose gravel rolled beneath Chance’s foot and he slipped back, avoiding the blow. He rolled as he hit the ground, and the tail end of his urumi whistled past Wren’s head, nearly cutting his ear.
Chance rolled to the side and hopped up, pirouetting out of the way of another thrust, then dropping into a small bow. His urumi screamed through the air, carving past Wren and forcing him to retreat.
A laugh slipped out of Chance’s mouth at the ridiculousness of it all. He pressed forward, golden mist wafting from his lips and skin. Wren’s eyes lit up.
“Marvelous!”
The two boys threw themselves into the fight, their weapons singing a song as they danced through the arena. All the while, Chance’s amusement only grew. He didn’t just feel good. He felt giddy. This is what his Essence was. Not just Karma. Not just Luck. It was a little bit of each and then some, with a dash of joy of life splashed in. It was complete faith that things would turn out right.
Chance’s laughter grew at that thought, even as Wren increased the intensity of his attacks, pushing him toward the wall of the arena.
What a simple, idealistic notion. I love it.
The golden mist grew thicker, surrounding Chance in a faint orb. His backpedaling slowed, and his writhing urumi grew closer to actually cutting Wren with every second. Chance stumbled and slipped, avoiding every single one of his opponent’s movements and coming back up as he laughed the entire time.
Wren took a step backward, narrowly avoiding Chance’s fist as it sailed past his head. He was forced to hop back again to avoid a stumbling bear hug. Chance hugged himself, spinning in place and extending his arms, causing the urumi’s arc to widen and nearly catch Wren across the throat.
He continued to backpedal as the tides of the battle shifted and Chance’s momentum continued to increase. Every move Wren made was met with nothing but thin air. Despite his predicament, Wren’s grin didn’t falter.
Then Chance’s urumi, in the midst of coiling back to its resting position, caught Wren’s polearm. Before he could react, the weapon was yanked from his grip and thrown across the arena.
Wren’s eyes went wide, and Chance’s movement slowed to a stop as they both turned to look at the fallen weapon.
“You disarmed me.” Wren didn’t sound like he believed the words himself.
“It’s fine, you can go get your weapon,” Chance said, bouncing from foot to foot.
Wren burst into laughter. “Marvelous. This trip was worth it, Chance.”
“How do you know my name?”
“How could I not? We have been speaking throughout this entire battle. Your dance is so… open. It is a marvelous dance. Will you permit me one more thing?”
“What is it? I wouldn’t have been able to figure this out so quickly if you hadn’t helped me, so I’d love to repay that.”
“I would like to use a technique. I had hoped to avoid it, but I simply cannot hold myself back.”
“Please,” Chance said. “Show me.”
Wren extended his hand. His polearm sprung to the air and shot back to him, slapping into his palm. Spinning it around himself, Wren dropped down into a new stance. His smile faded, though a tiny grin still remained, and his features tightened in concentration.
A faint haze rose around Wren. It warped the air around him, making his body and features shift and flow as if they were hidden under a wavy sea. Wren raised his spear to the heavens, then slowly lowered it toward Chance.
“Prepare yourself,” Wren said.
Chance smiled and raised his urumi, matching Wren’s stance. Golden mist swirled around him within the circle, but he could see through it as if nothing was there. “I am prepared.”
Wren didn’t charge. He didn’t even move, as far as Chance could tell. And yet, something changed. His polearm felt… different. Foreign. Like something was vastly wrong with it, and that infliction was spreading through the world around them.
Slowly, Wren pushed the polearm forward. His muscles trembled with exertion and Essence whipped around him in a growing storm. The tip of his spear vibrated, splitting images forming around it as it punched through the air at an incredibly slow pace.
The images warped and peeled back like plants going through their entire life cycle within instants. They formed, bloomed, and withered away all in the blink of an eye. The hair on Chance’s neck stood on end.
Wren flicked the spear upward. Chance spun, his instincts screaming in warning, and he launched himself to the side as hard as he could. As soon as he hit the ground, he lost his footing and stumbled forward. He carried on with the motion, scrambling and bouncing around the arena. Behind him – nothing happened.
The images grew faster, splitting away from Wren’s spear. Chance continued to sprint, the sense of danger only growing stronger. Stones were pulled toward him by some unforeseen magnetic force, making him stumble and trip more than he ever had before.
Several times, Chance felt a gust of wind just barely pass by him. And yet, on the screens above, absolutely nothing was behind him. It felt like it lasted forever, but Wren let his polearm lower after just over ten seconds.
He staggered, sweat pouring down his face. And then, only then, did it happen. A howling wind erupted in the colosseum, screaming across the arena ground and carving it to pieces. It trailed after every movement Chance had made, shredding rock to fine dust. The Essence moved so fast that he didn’t even have a chance to respond to the delayed attack.
Chance braced himself to defend against it, but it passed clean through him as if he wasn’t there. He blinked, staring in surprise as the churning vortex ripped the ground beneath and before him apart before continuing on, not stopping until it had traced every movement he had made. As soon as it came upon him again, it vanished. All it left behind a faint, sweet smell.
“Your instincts are magnificent. Marvelously done.” Wren planted his polearm in the ground and leaned on it, breathing heavily. “How did you know?”
“I didn’t,” Chance replied. “I’m not sure what just happened, actually. I thought you got me.”
Wren laughed. “Not even close. Who is your master? You must have been trained by one of the great cultivators of this city.”
“Uh… Pete, I guess. Whiteheart house.”
“Pete? I have not heard of him,” Wren said. “I will seek–”
A powerful force enveloped Chance, slamming him to the ground and dismissing his golden mist completely. His breath caught in his chest and his eyes widened as he struggled to breath.
Wren sank to one knee across from him, his teeth gritted. He looked up into the crowd, the surprise on his face changing to embarrassment when he made eye contact with someone. Using a supreme force of will, Chance slowly forced himself to turn and follow where Wren was looking.
In the lowest section of the stands sat a plain looking man. He was bald with a gray beard that went down to his chest. His clothes were equally plain, made with unobtrusive colors and, at least as far as Chance could tell, were just rough cotton.
And, without a doubt, the immense energy bearing down on them was coming from the man. There was so much Essence in the man that it was seeping into his surroundings. Tiny wisps of the energy floated through the air toward the arena – but all of them were directed at Wren. Just being in their presence was enough to nearly crush Chance.
An instant later, the feeling was gone as if it had never been there. There was no more Ether around the plain man. He just looked like a kindly uncle that had come to watch the fight. A flicker of embarrassment washed over his face as he made eye contact with Chance.
“What was that?” Chance asked, staggering back to his feet.
“My mentor is displeased with me,” Wren said, rubbing the back of his head with a sheepish smile. “I was not meant to utilize any techniques like that in this tournament. Apologies, Master. I was too caught up in our fight.”
The plain man waved his hand. Wren cleared his throat and straightened up.
“I’m sorry, Chance. We’ll have to end this here. But I’ll be seeking you out again, I promise. This fight was too thrilling to just leave it like this.”
Chance raised his weapons, prepared for Wren to finally go all out against him, but the boy did nothing of the sort. Instead, he planted his polearm in the stone ground and raised both of his hands into the air.
“I withdraw from the tournament.”