Cassio doesn’t come running.

That’s the first problem.

When someone runs, they hand you weight, intention, line of entry. A hurried body makes a lot of noise. Cassio only steps forward once. Then again. Spear low. Right elbow tucked close to his ribs.

The new guard shortens his reach by a fraction, but it takes my best answers off the table. No big rotations. No clean opening at the shoulder. No more arrogant parade-ground posture built for the crowd. The spear is a tool now.

The leaf-head comes straight for my chest.

Eventide ignites at the last instant. Just enough to push the steel off the line of my heart, the point scratching my shoulder as it passes.

Cassio accepts the deflection and pivots the haft into a spin. I have to drop low. The shaft passes over my head, taking a few strands of hair with it. Before I can rise, the point is already coming back under, aimed at my belly.

He isn’t attacking in separate strikes.

It’s a continuous sentence. Notes in a piece of music.

I ignite Eventide again and slam the shadow-blade against the side of the spear. The vibration runs up my arm. I kill the blade immediately.

[OXI: 2,281 / 2,500]

Cassio’s eyes drop to my hand for less than half a second. But it was enough. He understands I’m conserving energy.

The next sequence comes to make me pay for it. Point at the knee. Haft at the rib. The shaft at the shoulder. Feint at the throat. I give ground twice, parrying only when I have to. On the third retreat, he changes tempo and steps deeper than I expected.

The spear bites into Horizon at the side of my thigh, sparks scattering off the armor scales. The point doesn’t cut flesh, but it kills my base and bruises the muscle underneath. My back foot slips an inch.

Cassio attacks into my opening. The spear comes for my throat.

I throw my body sideways and feel the steel strike instead—this time on the right side of my chest. The sound arrives wrong.

The right side of my body is still full of momentum from the evasion, and Cassio uses the hollow in my timing as if he knew exactly where it was.

He probably did know.

The spear enters this time. A shallow strike. Horizon saves me from being impaled for the second time today.

Cassio, realizing the armor stopped the thrust, yanks the spear back and rotates the haft, trying to catch my face before I can recover. It isn’t a clean strike. I parry it with my bare hand at the last instant, but the blow pushes my entire torso sideways. My knee almost touches the stone while my hand goes completely numb.

’That was almost my funeral and black candles.’

Blood is running now, and the system catches up.

[Status Effect: Bleeding]

[Status: Low-grade bleeding]

[Damage Received: -90 OXI]

[OXI: 2,137 / 2,500]

Cassio doesn’t give me a window.

He advances again.

’Damn it... I can’t let him build momentum.’

I use Pressure Step through the heel of my right foot. A short ignition. Just enough to arrest the fall and throw myself half a step out of his line.

I need to stop reacting to the spearhead.

I can feel something is wrong with his posture, like the blade is a bait. Not that the strikes are fake—they’re very real. But every time I focus on the spearhead, I arrive late. The danger doesn’t start at the steel. It starts before, in his right wrist, in his shoulder, in the pressure of his back foot.

The problem is that Cassio hides those signals far too well.

’Think, Dryden. Think.’

I look at the ground while he is moving the spear, and I have an idea.

The amber light of the Thirstfall sky trembles across the arena in liquid bands. Cassio’s armor catches that light and breaks it into reflections. The spear catches it too. Every time the steel leaf changes angle, a clean white streak runs across my field of vision.

The reflection moves before the sound does.

Cassio is already close enough to hit me. I don’t look at his face. I don’t look at the point. I look at the streak of light on the ground.

The thrust comes high. Following the flash of light, I evade before it finishes. Cassio adjusts his foot. The next one comes low.

I parry it with Eventide—short, almost at the base of the blade. The instant I feel the spear make contact, I kill the shadow.

Cassio had put weight into it, expecting resistance. I make the resistance vanish, using the under-edge of my own blade.

The spear passes a little further than it should have. A small overshoot. Nothing the crowd would notice. But his right wrist corrects at the end of the motion.

And there it is.

The opening in the score his spear is playing. Without that correction, his guard would have been wide open for a counter.

The first mistake isn’t a mistake. It’s a correction.

’I need to make that happen again.’

Cassio reads something in my eyes and changes his grip. Left hand slides up the haft. Right relaxes. Now he can retract the spear faster after a miss.

’The bastard knows I saw it. The fight has finally turned into a conversation.’

He attacks in three beats. Point at the face, haft at the leg, point at the chest. On the second beat, I don’t give ground. I step in.

It would have been an idiot’s entry if he had been aiming at my torso. But he was aiming at my leg.

The haft passes behind my knee without enough weight to drop me. I ignite Eventide low-to-high and force Cassio to defend with the shaft. Again, I only need one touch. I kill the blade on contact.

The shaft sinks lower than he was expecting. His shoulder compensates. His right wrist corrects.

Second correction confirmed. Following the reflection of his blade shows me the telegraphing of his body before the trajectory of the weapon.

Cassio backs up half a step for the first time.

The crowd roars as if he did it on purpose.

He doesn’t look at them. He looks at his own weapon. Directly at his own hand gripping it.

That tells me more than any expression could.

I advance before he can rebuild distance. Not at max speed this time—he’s already read that.

I move broken, irregular: short steps alternating with small Pressure Step ignitions, each shifting my line by a few inches. Nothing pretty. Nothing acrobatic. Crooked and ugly. Just enough to make Cassio doubt.

Cassio chooses to attack my wounded shoulder, and I let it look right.

At the last instant, I lean my body inside the line of attack, ignite Eventide briefly, and touch the side of the leaf-head. I don’t try to win force with force. I just push the angle outward by a fraction.

The point passes over my shoulder. His right wrist corrects for the third time.

This time, my thumb feels something on the hilt.

A pressure. Not a voice. Not a ghost of Eventide speaking to me. Just a dry pressure, as if a hand behind my own adjusted my grip by a centimeter.

But I understand it. It isn’t telling me to cut the trajectory of the spear. Eventide is finally communicating with me somehow.

It’s telling me to make Cassio save the spear until his hand falls behind.

Cassio pulls the weapon back and lowers his guard even further.

His eyes are cold now. No smile. No insult.

He has also understood that I am not trying to hit him. I’m reading him, studying for a decisive strike.

I breathe once and check my OXI.

[OXI: 2,007 / 2,500]

Cassio is coming again. I don’t break the line.

It’s still too soon to take his hand, like I promised.

But it’s already too late for him to pretend the promise hasn’t changed.