They probably sip wine and wager on the second I break.

Rage licks at my thoughts.

I roll to my feet, vision smeared with red haze. The Ogre stalks forward. I dart left and right, drawing it across the arena. I lash a Fire Slash at an exposed gap behind its knee. The flames boil, but the brute stomps through them. Its mace crashes down. I barely twist aside, yet the shockwave ripples up my legs and steals breath.

I need another angle. The Grimoire shows eight weak points on the monster, but each one hides behind that armor. I must pierce a joint or sever a chain.

I spring toward the Ogre's right flank, slide under a sweeping strike, and slash upward at the armpit seam. Sparks and a spray of black ichor burst forth.

The Ogre bellows.

The smell of scorched rot hits my nose.

Before I can follow through, the brute spins and slams an elbow into my chest and shatters my Fire Armor on the spot. My breastbone creaks. I fly backward and skid across basalt. My lungs seize. I push up, but my arms tremble. The Ogre advances and lifts both maces overhead. The runes on the heads glow crimson. I sense a mana burst coming.

I summon Shadow Lattice.

The web of dark threads lashes from my palm, but the Ogre's raw power shrugs it off.

The lattice snaps.

I stagger and reactivate Fire Armor.

The maces crash down.

I dive sideways.

One mace shatters the tiles.

The other grazes my thigh.

Agony streaks up my leg, and I drop to a knee.

The Ogre hammers me again and only thanks to Echo Pulse I manage to roll away.

The mace, however, nicks my shoulder.

Plate cracks. I slam into the ground. Dust billows. Pain blinds me.

The Ogre plants a foot on my back and grinds me into stone.

Blood fills my mouth. I gasp for air that will not come. The crystal above zooms in on my ruin.

I can picture nobles in my head losing themselves in laughter. I hear their voices in my skull, each one a nail: "Miner meets real test. Look how fast he breaks."

Humiliation blazes hotter than pain.

I taste ash.

I remember Felisia's faith, the miners' cheers back in Shit's Creek, and Orvick's belief that I could mine the world hollow.

I will not die in front of vultures.

* * *

"Sir Renquell," Lord Clearwater speaks respectfully to the Wandering Knight, "do you think Jacob Cloud has a chance?"

Sir Renquell does not answer at once. He keeps his eyes on the crystal where I stagger under the Ogre's heel. The knight's jaw flexes and his gauntleted fingers tighten.

"He can adapt, but he doesn't have enough time. Look how he's scrambling. He can't deliver damage, he can't trade. He's not even fast enough."

Lord Clearwater feels his chest tighten.

"Are you saying the boy…" the head of Clearwater lowers his voice while everyone else cheers.

Sir Renquell purses his fair, rosy lips.

"For now, yes."

"For now?" Lord Clearwater asks.

"For now, his destiny is to die here. But…" Sir Renquell turns toward Lord Clearwater. "No Knight has ever survived this world and become incredibly powerful without luck, no matter their heritage. I know talents greater than mine who met the wrong monster, the wrong person, at the wrong time. That's all it takes to die miserably."

"So you think luck still might tip the scales," Lord Clearwater says, his eyes fixed on the scrying crystal.

Sir Renquell nods, never looking away from the fight.

"The boy searches for an opening. Some people are destined for greater things and destiny, luck, and fate—they all walk alongside them and become legends. We're about to find out whether Jacob Cloud's legend is about to start or die in the bud."

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* * *

I push against the Ogre's boot, but its weight doesn't budge. Its heel grinds my ribs, grinding bone against basalt. All I can see is grime and blood—until a sliver of gold glimmers through rubble near the arena wall.

A shattered chest—no, half a chest—lies wedged between two narrow stone platforms that rise like broken teeth.

Each platform is only a pace wide and jagged at the edges, stacked in tiers that spiral toward the arena's top rim.

The chest fragment balances on the fourth tier, half-buried under splinters of its own lid and the ash of some other battles.

How did it end there?

And what is it?

The moment the light catches my eye, the Infernal bracelet thrums so hard it bruises skin. Whatever's inside that relic is calling me. I don't know what it is—only that it's my last card.

The Ogre lifts its mace for a finishing blow. I brace my forearms, lash Veins of Fire through every muscle, and shove sideways. The sudden burst of heat loosens the monster's footing for a breath. I slip free, tumble once, and fling myself behind the nearest platform column. The mace crashes where I lay a heartbeat earlier, carving a crater that vomits sparks.

I can't out-run the thing on the ground—not with my thigh torn and my bones cracked. That chest is four levels above, out of reach for any normal climb.

So I look up.

I've avoided showing this trick in front of nobles, saved it for the Hunt's final sprint—but right now secrecy is worth less than breath.

Wings explode from my shoulders.

They hiss as they unfurl, scattering ash like snow.

The burst of heat lifts dust in a swirling column.

* * *

Gasps ripple across the cliff at the same instant. Where moments ago Jacob Cloud lay crushed, he now stands haloed in flame, wings outstretched like a fallen star learning to rise.

"Flight—he can fly?" a young countess whispers, knuckles whitening on the balustrade.

Sir Greyson leans forward, speechless.

Sir Renquell's brows knit.

"That is no common movement art," he mutters. "Feel the resonance?"

Lord Clearwater steps closer.

"Explain."

Renquell inhales, as if tasting the mana across the mirror.

"Legacy Skill. The weave is too intricate, the core too deep. Those are forged from memory, not monster crystal. Someone condensed a life's mastery into one shard and left it for the worthy. Powerful—dangerous."

"Jacob found that in the Crucible?" Lord Clearwater asks, awe creeping into his tone. "And what legacy is it?"

Renquell doesn't answer aloud.

Infernal, he thinks.

* * *

A hooked mace whistles upward. Chain links blur. I try to bank right with a single wing-beat, but the hook catches the trailing edge of a wing and drags me straight out of the air.

The world snaps downward. Basalt rushes up, and I slam spine-first against the arena floor hard enough to crater stone, the air knocked out of my lungs.

Torches swirl overhead.

I launch back up, wings pumping; pain ripples through my ribs. The Ogre snarls, muscles bunching beneath plate, and hurls the second mace.

The chain coils me like a steel serpent, clamps my ankle, and slams me down again—this time face-first.

Tiles shatter, sparks spit across my vision.

My skull rings. The chest gleams temptingly above on those narrow spiral platforms—each a jagged disc of stone protruding from the wall, like the rungs of a broken ladder climbing to heaven.

Four tiers.

One chance.

The chain clatters back to the monster's gauntlet. It rears to cast both hooks at once, eager to grind me into paste a third time.

* * *

High on the viewing cliff, nobles lurch forward.

"Is he trying to run?" a lady scoffs as Jacob launches skyward again. "No one lives through that beast."

"He can fly," a young viscount sputters, cheeks pale. "Why didn't he escape earlier?"

Sir Greyson's knuckles whiten on the rail.

"He's not fleeing. Watch the angle—he's going for something."

* * *

I shoot upward, aiming straight for the second tier, but the Ogre's twin maces flash like twin meteors. The Grimoire feeds me vectors, error margins, chain tension—all in crimson script that scrolls across my sight.

Three heartbeats. Deactivate wings at the apex. Let free-fall outrun steel.

Activate Flameform Blueprint with Flame Walk to propel yourself faster

I tuck my wings and dive. Ember feathers gutter out—instant night. My stomach lurches as gravity clamps me harder than any chain. Wind screams; the Ogre's hooks shriek past my ears, swiping nothing but air.

* * *

Gasps echo from the cliff when the wings vanish.

"He's plummeting!" someone cries.

"He isn't falling," Renquell corrects coldly. "He's aiming."

Murmurs swirl. Guild captains, barons, even Veyl's entourage stare—unable to decide if the miner is mad or magnificent.

* * *

The Ogre lumbers after me, mace heads sparking along stone, but I leap. Ember wings beat once, twice, and I rocket upward. Wind tears at my cloak, blood roars in my ears, but gravity flinches. I dart to the second tier before the monster's chain whips past like a comet. A chip of stone grazes my cheek.

Another beat and I glide to the third tier. The chest shard glimmers one tier higher, wedged between two broken paving slabs. I angle a hard bank—pain screams through my ribs—and land on the narrow fourth platform. The stone wobbles under my boots, threatening to shear away, but I crouch and reach.

Splinters bite my fingers. Beneath them waits a jagged fragment, no larger than a dagger's hilt, dark gold veined with black fire. Cold radiates from the metal; the air itself seems to fold inward. The bracelet tightens like a manacle. I grip the shard.

Power slams through me and from one of my pockets a dark shard levitates in front of me.

The two shards fuse into molten night.

A voice sounds in my head before the prompt from the System.

I hope you like the gift, kid.

Was that King Baalrek's voice? I think, but then I'm suddenly distracted by the system appears.

Dark Blade Shard 2/2 recovered.

Skill Crystal "Dark Blade – Gold" fully restored

Show them what my people's heritage is capable of.

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