Thirstfall - Memory of a Returnee

Freya advances.

The ice scythe doesn’t come like the rapier. No thin line, no testing, no thrust hunting for a gap. The weapon spins between her fingers with absolute fluidity, the haft sliding across her palm before locking into the right grip. The first blow comes from the outside in, wide, heavy, aimed at the side of Undertow as if the shield were an old door she meant to tear off its hinges.

Veric takes it.

The impact crosses the metal and enters his body. I see his left knee bend more than it should. His boot sinks into the dirt of the circle, opening a short furrow. Undertow holds the blade, but it doesn’t cancel the force. Nothing cancels force for free. The body behind the defense always pays something.

Freya doesn’t stop to admire the result.

The scythe rolls off the clash, riding its own rebound. The haft passes behind her wrist, switches hands, and the blade comes back low, hunting Veric’s lead leg. He drops Undertow to cut the line, and the strike arrives from below almost in the same rhythm, as if the first block only wound the second one up.

That’s the difference.

Oliver hit like a collapsing wall. Freya hits like a millwheel built for war.

Every defense the scythe meets feeds the next attack she sets up.

Veric gives ground a step, then another. By the way he keeps his eyes on her and the shield at his center, it isn’t fear. It’s necessity. His shield is superior, his equipment is superior, and still her Rank C shows in the sound of every collision. It isn’t only brute strength. It’s the whole body. Hip, back, shoulder, wrist, all entering together the moment the ice blade meets the metal.

The third strike is a lateral arc, and the block drags Veric nearly two feet back. The fourth comes from above, and the block brings blood to his nose.

Freya smiles without joy. "You defend well."

Veric wipes the blood with the back of his hand, shield still up. "You swing like you were raised by bricklayers."

The scythe spins again.

This time she fakes the angle. The blade comes from the right, Veric turns Undertow to meet it, and Freya lets the haft slip mid-motion, letting the weapon spin through her fingers before catching it in the opposite hand. The real blow comes from the other side, pivoting, short and brutal, using the inside curve of the blade to hunt Veric’s back.

Veric catches it at the last instant and blocks late. Not late enough to lose. Late enough to feel it.

His head snaps with the strange transmission of an imperfect block. A thread of blood runs from his left ear. Rhayne holds her breath behind me, and Oliver goes quiet in a way that, coming from him, looks like prayer. Zhang Xi only watches, but her fingers are already parted inside her sleeve, ready to heal if I call stop.

I don’t.

Veric is still reading. And Freya still hasn’t used Permafrost.

’If she uses Permafrost...’

She’s fighting seriously, but not with everything. That matters. To her. To him. To everyone watching.

Three more blows come in sequence from different angles. Undertow holds them all, but Veric loses ground with each one. Freya isn’t trying to cross the shield. She’s trying to make the body behind it give up. The scythe turns, switches hands, strikes, returns, changes height. A heavy weapon should need a pause. In her hands, the pause becomes rotation and cadence.

Veric finally activates the skill.

"Azure Dividends."

The translucent barrier opens around him the instant the scythe drops on a diagonal. The impact is still ugly. The ground still gives under his boots. But this time his torso doesn’t lose its line. His shoulder isn’t wrenched back. The force spreads across the barrier, cracking into blue light before dying around Undertow.

Freya narrows her eyes.

The next sequence comes lower. She spins the scythe by the hip, using the haft as an axis, and tries to strike beneath the defense. Veric lets Undertow fall with the right weight to keep the curve from rising. The Azure Dividends barrier trembles. I can see the skin of his arm tremble too.

Even so, he holds.

Freya pulls the blade back and strikes again, high now. The defense answers. Metal and ice scream together. Blood runs from Veric’s nose to his lip, but he smiles with red teeth.

"You’re enjoying this too much," I say.

He spits blood to the side without taking his eyes off her. "We were supposed to learn new things, right?"

"That was the idea."

Veric breathes deep, and his posture changes. The gladius appears in his right hand.

It looks small to anyone watching from a distance. To me, it’s enormous. Until now, Veric had alternated between defense and threat. Shield or sword. Endure or finish. Now he’s trying to hold both in the same cycle.

By the face Freya makes, she catches it too. "You’ll die with both hands full, prince."

"Better than living with a mouth full of certainty, dancing on someone else’s strings."

Freya erupts.

The scythe drops in a heavy arc from left to right, the haft spinning at the last instant to shift the point of impact. Veric meets it with Azure Dividends. The barrier flares at contact, steadying his torso against the blow. The force still enters, still bends his knees, still opens short cracks in the dirt beneath his feet. But his chest doesn’t leave its line.

And that’s enough.

The gladius moves.

"Azure Trust."

It isn’t a normal thrust. Veric’s body surges into the space the defense bought, a short, precise burst, using the shield as a wall and the sword as the answer. Freya tries to spin the scythe to close the angle, but the force of her own last blow still holds her left hand in extension.

Her blade reaches Veric’s neck.

They both stop.

The curve of ice rests against the side of his throat, cold enough to lift thin steam from the skin. Freya looks at his face first. She thinks she’s won. Then her eyes drop.

The gladius sits under her left armpit, angled inward, along the lateral path between rib and heart. If either one continues, the other falls with them.

The surprise returns, smaller than before, but more honest.

"Done," I say. "Draw."

The scythe doesn’t move. Neither does the gladius.

Freya speaks without looking at me. "My blade was at his neck."

"And his was pointed at your heart," I answer. "I won’t pretend a neck counts for more just because it sprays when it opens."

The silence holds the circle for a full second.

Then Freya withdraws the scythe. Veric lowers the gladius right after. The Nomine Gladiatus rune glows over the ashes of the leather.

[Nomine Gladiatus ended.]

[Result: draw.]

[Experience transferred: 0%.]

Veric staggers half a step. Zhang Xi moves, but he raises a hand before she arrives, too proud to accept help in the first second after surviving.

"So," he says, spitting out the last of the blood. "I think I can fight her."

I look at Freya. The scythe is still in her hand, and the temperature around her body stays too low.

"She didn’t use Permafrost against you, Veric."

His smile shrinks a little.

"But," I add, "you fought very well. Proud of you. Honestly."

Veric goes quiet.

He understands, and he’s satisfied.

That’s enough.

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