"We have a fight now, folks. It looks like the man at the center has grown monster arms and is taking on Ortega. Ortega looks beaten, but he''s still standing up. Look at him go, ready to fight!"


    Alex knelt on the ground, clutching at his chest as he forced himself up with his staff to his feet. Lucien watched him, his chin up as he looked down on Alex. Alex would wipe the smile off that face if it were the last thing he did. He drew in a deep breath to tamp down the anger in him. He needed an edge if they were going to survive.


    Aether flowed through his body. Though he wasn''t healed, he could stand. He could fight. He just needed a moment to think. However, as he saw the glint in Lucien''s eyes, he knew that he would never get that moment.


    "Step."


    Slam. Crack. Boom.


    His legs burned as he disappeared and jumped back and away from Lucien. Lucien''s strike carved into the ground, and the sound wave shot across Alex''s ears like a buffeting wind as he landed on one knee against the ground.


    He looked over to Sayed, and the swordsman was also getting up. They shared a look. Sayed was a warrior. Someone who had fought in countless battles, even before the nightsea or the arena. In his eyes, Alex saw acceptance. Sayed knew he was fighting someone out of his league but would fight anyway.


    Alex nodded at him, and Sayed nodded back.


    "You know, you were always a jerk," Alex said as he stood up again, holding his staff against the ground to keep his balance. "You keep saying you''re strong, but all you do is pick on people who can''t fight back against you. Anytime someone gets close, you kill them before they have a chance."


    There was one extra piece. Alex didn''t know where Erin was in the arena. She might have run, and she had been the stickiest part of his plan. Whether or not she did as she was asked would have determined a lot. However, he had a good feeling about her. She didn''t seem like the kind of person who would just run off and leave them to die, even if that meant she could get out.


    He would have looked around for her, but Lucien was already approaching, casually walking as he flexed his monstrous arms.


    "Your words are nothing." Lucien smiled. "Like all beasts, you throw out anything you think will make you survive. It is no different than the yips and whines of a beaten dog."


    Lucien disappeared, and Alex reacted, holding up his staff as the hit came. He didn''t have time to dodge or time to do anything else. A sledgehammer the size of a bear slammed against his staff, and Alex could do nothing to stop it.


    Thump. Crack. Pop.


    Alex''s staff shattered next to his face as the hit came, breaking into splinters and chunks of hard, heavy wood and flying into his face. Lucien followed the hit through. The momentum carried into his shoulder and sent him flying. His staff fell out of his hands and onto the ground in two pieces.


    "Oof." Alex wheezed as he hit the ground for a second time and rolled to a stop.


    "A heavy hit on Ortega, folks. Whoever this mystery man is, he''s wiping the floor with a bona fide outlaw."


    Alex''s mind reeled as he pushed himself back up from the ground. His arms burned, and his shoulder was numb, but he wasn''t just going to lie down and take it. Again, Lucien walked toward him at a slow, steady pace. There was no rush in him. He knew that he had won already.


    "You think that''s anything?" Alex''s head spun, but he saw Sayed lining up behind Lucien.


    "I think this fight was over before it began," Lucien said as he looked up at the stands. "A pity. Your last moments will be lying in the dirt here."


    "Step."


    Alex charged forward this time, wrapping his arms around Lucien''s stomach and holding on as hard as possible. Lucien''s heart beat next to his ear, slow, calm, and steady. Nothing Alex was doing threatened him.


    "You are a disgrace. I thought you would be a worthy opponent here, but this is what you bring to bear?"


    "Demon''s Thrust!"


    Alex had seen Sayed''s approach from behind Lucien. It wasn''t much, but all he needed to do was hold Lucien still so Sayed''s attack could hit. Even if they couldn''t kill Lucien in one hit, if Lucien couldn''t dodge, Sayed may have been able to slow him down.


    Clang.


    Alex looked up where Lucien''s arms had reached around his back at an unnatural angle. They held Sayed''s sword hand firmly, and the tip of Sayed''s hot orange blade merely touched Lucien''s armor.


    "Excellent attempt by Sayed there, folks, but it looks like this mystery fighter is just too good for anyone to take down!"


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    "Pathetic."


    "Not yet. Demon''s Claw!"


    Sayed pulled back from his trapped hand and used that to pivot his free arm forward, his claws glowing brightly in a blur as he slashed across Lucien''s face. Black blood arced through the air as the hot metal cut a line across Lucien''s cheek.


    The air around them stood still as Lucien glared at Sayed. Alex held on with all he was worth, but Lucien''s previously glacial heart rate accelerated next to his ear. It beat faster and faster until it was practically a drum set being beat on by twenty drummers at once. Alex had the presence of mind to catch Sayed''s eyes, and Sayed looked at Lucien in fear as Lucien looked at him. They both knew Lucien would no longer hold back whatever was about to happen.


    "A solid hit from Sayed, but it doesn''t look like it did anything to the mystery man!"


    <hr>


    Erin looked out into the arena from the rock she hid behind. In the distance, she could see the fight, and she wanted nothing to do with it. An ex-Apostle wasn''t something that she could handle, even if Sayed and Alex were in the fight. They were crazy to think that they could do anything to the man.


    "Looks like we''re in for a beat down, folks! We still can''t seem to get any audio for the area, but I''ll be here to continue to give you a blow-by-blow!"


    Erin started to look over the walls near her. She thought maybe she could scale them if she used her curse to grow some vines. The walls were about four times taller than she was, but they weren''t unscalable.


    The mission came first. That was the lesson she had learned from her time with the revolution. If she could escape, the ones left behind were acceptable losses. Even if she was the one left behind someday, all that mattered was that one person survived to complete the mission.


    "Sayed''s getting up! He''s charging in without his sword. What does he think he''s doing? Our mystery man''s just picking him up like he''s nothing. He''s spinning Sayed around like he''s a ragdoll!"


    The announcer called her attention back to the fight. Sayed had made it up from the ground and grabbed Lucien''s arm. Lucien spun with him on his arm, going faster and faster as Sayed desperately tried to hang on.


    It didn''t take long for Sayed to lose his grip. He flew off in an arc and landed hard on the ground. Lucien immediately turned his attention back to Alex, walking toward where he lay on the ground.


    Erin bit her lip.


    She could do something, but she would just be charging into the same situation. What could she do against Lucien? Lucien was an ex-Apostle. He could take down armies with ease and subjugate entire islands without even a hint of support. The escape plan was busted, which was the only reason the three of them had any hope.


    She could escape. Lucien was distracted, and if she grew a set of vines up the wall she could scramble over and disappear into the crowd while no one was watching her. It wasn''t much different from the original plan. Escape while Lucien and Gulantry were distracted. The only difference was she would escape alone.


    Yet, could she just leave them behind?


    Sayed and Alex were injured. They were no different from patients who battled serious terminal diseases. Would she abandon them to die alone? Same as with Abed, could she leave them both to die in that arena?


    Doubt ate at her as she reached into her bag and drew out her last three bags of seeds. She always kept a good stock of them because of their usefulness for her curse. She even had her own garden back at the revolution''s base. There were more varieties of plants she dealt with, but her black-briar thorn vines were the best she had found on Erth.


    "Our mystery man has Ortega by the throat! What''s he going to do, folks? Decapitation? Strangulation? No, he''s bringing up the other hand!"


    Erin clenched her teeth as she looked down at the three bags and looked back to the fight. She ran, loosening the loops on all three bags. In the distance, she could see Sayed doing the same, rising again and charging toward Lucien, his gauntlet burning bright.


    She only had one thing on her mind. No one deserved to die alone.


    <hr>


    Sayed had been pushed to his limit. His sword lay far off in the dirt. His flames were but fumes in his chest. Inside him, he had nothing left to give. His body was broken, and his mind was wrapped in the haze of battle.


    Yet, he would not abandon his brother.


    "Stop, you foul demon!" Sayed yelled as he charged at Lucien, his clawed gauntlet glowing brighter than ever before with his rage. "Demon''s Claw!"


    "Will these distractions never cease?" Lucien lashed out with his arm, cracking it across Sayed''s body.


    Again, Sayed was thrown across the ground, stone and dirt scraping across his skin as he rolled to a stop. Sayed hated losing to this monster. All of their effort, and he could only scratch Lucien''s cheek. Sayed was no initiate when it came to fighting. He had fought countless battles through his people''s civil war. However, he could not even touch this one man, even when they had him outnumbered.


    "Oh, that had to hurt, folks."


    "Again!" Sayed pushed down with his arm to stand back up, but the muscles refused.


    He fell back down, face-first into the dirt.


    "Again!" Sayed tried again.


    He fell into the dirt once again.


    "Again!" Sayed''s arm refused to respond.


    Tears ran down his face, and he turned to look up at Lucien. Lucien had returned his attention to Alex, holding Alex up by the throat as he held up his free hand with one long white claw pointing at Alex''s heart.


    "Now, so that we can finish without interruptions. I was going to make your death easy, but then you both had to go and mar my face. I can''t let you get off so easily now."


    "It," Alex panted through his constricted throat. "It suits you. You''re finally starting to look as you are on the inside."


    "Oh, you will pay dearly for your mouth, Ortega. I am going to kill you. Then, I am going to kill the insect behind me. Then I will finish off the coward, slowly."


    Sayed blinked away the tears that ran down his face. There wasn''t anything he could do anymore. He had tried his best, but Alex was going to die. Then he would die.


    "I will join you soon in the Crimson Fields," he said as he whispered a prayer to God.


    "What''s Leah doing?" the announcer yelled out.


    As he began to close his eyes, he saw a flash of green. Erin charged at them, her cloak flowing behind her like a flag. She stopped just moments before reaching them, throwing three objects into the air.


    Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.


    Hundreds of tiny black seeds fell across the ground around all of them. Sayed couldn''t move to look, but he knew that it was part of Erin''s powers. She was coming to make a final stand with them.


    "Thank you, brother," he whispered.


    "Thorn Garden!"


    From the seeds, vines erupted upward, growing up and around Sayed and blocking his view instantly. The last thing he saw before the vines cut off his vision was them growing up and around Lucien''s body and tangling into Alex, then he only saw the mass of green and black in the circle around himself.