Depthless Hunger

"Well, well, well! I should have known scum like you would immediately make an alliance with the foreigners."

Fhazi Lantrian was a young man almost exactly Kai's age, the newest potential hunter from the storied Lantrian clan. He had the sandy blonde hair and strong jaw the girls in their year considered attractive, though the wealth that came from his position didn't hurt. Even now he was wearing finely crafted boots and an expensive tunic of imported cloth.

He swaggered forward, as usual. The problem was that he swaggered at the head of a group of fighters, also as usual. Fhazi wasn't the most important member of the Lantrian clan, but he was important enough that he always had allies hanging on for his money. This time he also wore a magical breastplate, letting off yellow mana like steam. Most of his group wasn't armed, but he carried a silver sword, likely smuggled in via his family's connections.

"But I don't have time for you today, Kai," Fhazi went on. "The Hunter Trials are too important to waste on trash. Anyone who hasn't awakened on the first day is already behind, don't you know? So we'll be taking all those foreign weapons and any monster cores you've managed to find. Hand it all over and you can stay in the trials."

"Irun has always been a loyal ally of Goralia, and especially Monskon City." Tusquo settled a hand on the hilt of his sword. "We do not deserve this disrespect."

"Do you know how to count over in Irun?" Fhazi made a show of looking between the two sides. "You're outnumbered and outmatched. If you fail here, you won't even be able to awaken your Classes."

"The purpose of this trial is not surrender."

It seemed like Tusquo was going to keep talking, but Kai knew it was pointless. Instead he looked over Fhazi's group carefully. All of them were typical Goralians, pale with varying shades of brown hair. He guessed they'd all had the standard physical training as well, so they couldn't be ignored. The most obvious dangers were a pair of enormous men who looked like they'd gone through the same strength training that Kai had. Even without Classes, their bodies would be using small amounts of mana to strengthen themselves.

Neither of them interrupted the conversation, though. It was a slender woman who stepped from behind Fhazi and hurled a jade needle. Kai tried to move, too late, but Tusquo was faster. He struck it out of the air with a contemptuous swipe, then raised his sword. Immediately everyone on both sides readied their weapons, sizing up their opponents.

While everyone was facing off, Kai switched his sword to one hand and carefully hefted his wooden spear. It might look crude, but he'd put effort into sharpening the point. As soon as the others attacked, he hurled it toward one of the hulking guards.

To his surprise, the spear went deep into the man's thigh. He went down with a groan, clutching the wound, but there was no time to look at him.

Two of the others were rushing at him, so Kai met them head on with broad, sweeping strikes. A more skilled opponent could have exploited his movements, but these two were taken off guard. They were used to bullying in groups, not fighting a determined opponent. Before Kai could press them further, the Irunians moved in and the fight became a brawl.

Kai took a step back to use his sword's range better, and that made him a target. Fhazi rushed toward him, his armor glowing with hot yellow mana. He had a sword too, and he wasn't incompetent with it. Instead of overreaching, Kai engaged his strikes cautiously to test him.

"Come on, is that all you have?" Fhazi laughed and kept striking, blow after wheeling blow.

Though he retreated, Kai quickly realized that he had the advantage. His opponent's style was good for overwhelming opponents, but it was filled with openings. It would be a simple matter to redirect one of his wild blows and then cut him.

That led to the bigger problem: not killing him. Seriously injuring a member of the Lantrian family, much less maiming or killing, would only bring stronger warriors looking for revenge. Kai needed to end the fight without doing too much damage, and that was a problem when he didn't know how strong his opponent's armor really was. For the thousandth time he wished that he'd somehow awakened his spiritual sight before the trials. Only a lucky few got to do that.

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When Fhazi swung wide, Kai tried a direct cut. It glanced off the armor with nothing but a few sparks of mana. Good, it was durable. Fhazi seemed surprised that the blow had done so little damage, glancing down briefly before actually lowering his sword to laugh.

"Are you serious? I could stand here all day and you couldn't hur-"

Kai put his full weight behind a two-handed strike and struck Fhazi across the chest.

It didn't pierce his armor, and he'd never intended it to: the sword whacked him like a club. Kai had put all his strength into it, and against a smaller and weaker opponent, it was enough to knock him into the air. Only a few feet, but Fhazi lost his sword and stumbled back. The breastplate hadn't broken, merely leaking mana from a gash across the ornate carvings.

Holding his breath, Kai gripped his sword in an aggressive position and tried to look like he'd planned exactly that. Fhazi stared in horror at the damaged armor, then fled. Kai let out the breath: that was the best he could hope for, defeating his opponent without injuring him.

That bought him some time to examine the rest of the battlefield. The Irunians were fighting admirably, all clearly trained in their chosen weapons. Tusquo was a virtuoso with his sword, far better than Kai's generalist training, and was easily pushing back two people at once. Both women had smaller weapons, but they fought back to back so effectively that they held off all the others.

That left the fourth Irunian, who fought with an iron staff against one of the hulking guards. He wasn't bad, but he couldn't land a solid enough blow to finish the fight. The guard charged in through a glancing blow and struck him to the ground. As the Irunian stared up dazedly, he raised both fists together to hammer into his head.

Kai struck from behind with a swift cut. Just enough to disable the shoulder, not to cut off an arm. His cut drew blood, but not a lot... and Kai realized too late that his opponent had trained his body more extensively than he realized.

The bulky guard lunged at him. Kai threw a desperate thrust, but his opponent shifted enough to make it a glancing blow off his ribs. Then the man's entire weight hit him like a brick wall, slamming him to the ground. Training made Kai keep a grip on his sword, but his arm was pinned and he couldn't bring it to bear.

He lunged in and bit his opponent's nose. That had never been part of his training. Kai had no idea where it had come from. But as he tasted blood, he used his full strength to heave his opponent up and fight free.

Though the brute grunted in pain, he wasn't stunned for long. He hit back, his fist driving Kai into the ground. What followed had nothing to do with the forms and styles he'd learned in training: Kai flailed for his life, landing whatever blows he could. He knew his lip had been torn open and blood was covering one eye, but he just kept hitting back.

When his opponent reared back again, Kai struck on instinct, his nails clawing the brute's eyes. His opponent cried out louder in pain and Kai leapt at him with a roar. Somehow he'd knocked the other man down and he began striking him, over and over, possessed by a rage he'd never...

Never...

Before Kai could decide what he felt, or land another blow, a hand closed on his shoulder. He snarled and looked back, but it was only Tusquo.

"Kai Granfian. You must be calm. The battle is over."

Kai panted for breath, slowly coming back to himself. It really was over. Fhazi's group wasn't defeated or even disabled, but the fight had clearly been beaten out of them. Right now it looked like the noble just wanted to flee with his guards, and Kai recognized that it would be better to let him go.

He wondered if they should have taken monster cores from their opponents, but Tusquo seemed indifferent. Eventually they let their attackers go, leaving Kai strangely dissatisfied. This was about the best outcome he could have hoped for, but he'd wanted something else. Or maybe he was still just recovering from the rage that had overcome him.

Shoving those matters aside, Kai focused on his real goals. Fighting Fhazi was trivial compared to reaching the shrine. If anything, he should be glad that the fight seemed to have improved the Irunians' view of him. They could be valuable allies during the Hunter Trials.

Monsters grew denser as they neared the shrine, but Kai welcomed the distraction. It gave him something to focus on, plus the Irunians wanted his knowledge of the local monsters. Most of them were simple enough to eliminate with a trained group. They even ran into another of the twisted dogs, just like the one that had attacked him at the beginning, but now that he was armed and prepared it wasn't much of a threat.

Of course, all the monster cores were split among the group. By the time they could see the shrine's defensive boundary, Kai had only gained two small cores and one larger. Still, he judged that was a worthwhile trade-off. This competition was a three day marathon, not a sprint where it made sense to go alone.

Plus, the shrine mattered far more. Stepping over the glowing boundary of defensive mana, Kai truly let everything else fall away.

"Welcome." An older man covered in scars emerged from the shrine's first archway. "Until this point in your life, you have been traveling this world blind. But your mettle has been tested, and you may be ready to see the world as it truly is. It is time to awaken your spiritual sight."