Soul Forging System

From the high seat of the coliseum, Rikon's knuckles sweated as he gripped the stone railing. His broad chest rose and fell heavily, but no breath seemed enough to steady him. Sweat trickled down his temples as he stared at the nightmare unfolding below.

A third of the proud Orcs, his people, lay butchered, carved apart by threads too swift and merciless to follow. What had been a sea of roaring warriors was now a field of corpses. The rest had broken, scattering in chaos. Screams tore through the arena. Orcs shoved past one another in a desperate scramble for the exits. Some were crushed beneath their own kin, others trampled in blind panic. The once-mighty coliseum now thundered with the sound of fear.

But inside the arena's heart….there was stillness.

Two figures remained unmoved by the storm of carnage, the Great Chief, his double axe gleaming like a mountain of iron… and the human, Belanor, standing amidst ruin with that twisted, murderous smile still carved across his face.

Rikon swallowed hard, forcing himself to keep his composure. The Great Chief hasn't unleashed his full strength yet. Calm yourself. Calm…

But even as he whispered the words in his mind, a darker realization sank into his gut like a blade. Belanor hadn't gone all out either. Every strike, every movement, every taunt, it felt restrained, as though the human was toying with them.

His heart hammered. His tusks ground together. His throat was dry.

"So… that's a human?" Rikon murmured, his voice barely audible over the chaos. His body trembled despite his effort to appear composed. "Could they… could they truly be stronger than the Elves?"

His eyes fell once more on the smiling figure below. The human's expression was wrong. There was no fear, no pain, not even triumph in it. Only hunger. A hunger for blood.

Cold dread coiled around Rikon's chest. The words slipped from his lips before he could stop them.

"The Great Chief will lose…" His voice shook. His tusks clenched so hard they cracked. "He's no match… for that demon."

Below, the Great Chief's tusked jaw clenched. For the first time in his long life of blood and battle, doubt gnawed at him. This was no Elf. Elves were cruel, cunning, but predictable, he had carved through them by the hundreds. But the human before him was something else. Something ancient. Something monstrous.

He shifted his grip on the great double axe until the iron groaned under his strength. His pulse thundered in his ears. If he had even the smallest chance of victory, he would have to unleash everything. No more holding back.

"Then so be it," he growled, low and resolute. "I'll crush you with all that I am."

He planted his feet. With a roar that shook the very coliseum walls, he spun the axe. The air screamed in protest as the weapon carved through it, faster, harder, fiercer than before. Dust spiraled upward. The ground cracked, stones lifting into the air like they had lost their weight.

The spin built to a frenzy. Wind coiled around him in violent currents, pulling screams from the panicked Orcs still trapped in the stands. Dust became storm. Storm became a maelstrom.

And then it took shape.

A towering tornado erupted, swallowing the Great Chief whole. Its funnel clawed at the heavens, tearing open the sky, while within its heart his massive silhouette glowed with the fury of the wind. The ground itself trembled, as though the coliseum would shatter beneath his power.

"WIND COMMANDMENT!" his voice bellowed, carried by the storm like the decree of a god.

And then he moved.He was one with the wind now. A streak of storm and steel, the tornado itself condensed into his charge as he launched skyward toward Belanor.

High above, Belanor hovered serenely, suspended by threads unseen, his coat whipping in the tempest. His blue eyes glowed with madness, his smile sharp and unbroken.

"I think…" his voice cut through the howl of the storm, mocking and calm, "I've played with you longer than I intended."

He raised his fingers.

The storm was about to meet the thread.

The tornado surged upward, the Great Chief at its heart, an unstoppable force of nature condensed into flesh and steel. His double axe gleamed, its edge glowing with the fury of wind compressed to a razor's bite.

Belanor raised his hand lazily, as though plucking at a harp. Invisible threads shimmered faintly in the stormlight, thin, delicate, almost mocking in their fragility.

The crowd,what little of it remained, held its breath.

Then it happened.

The Great Chief descended like a god of storms, axe cleaving downward, the tornado funnel following with the weight of mountains. The very air screamed, tearing stone apart, ripping banners from their stands, crushing everything beneath the might of the Wind Commandment.

Belanor flicked his fingers.

In that instant the storm met the threads.

The world went white.

A deafening BOOOOOOM! exploded outward, flattening the coliseum walls, sending Orcs tumbling like ragdolls. The shockwave rolled across the desert outside, a wall of force that swallowed the horizon in dust. Stone shattered, pillars cracked, the ground itself split open in jagged scars.

For a moment, the storm roared in defiance, swirling in chaotic bursts, then it collapsed in on itself, severed at its heart. When the dust cleared, the truth was laid bare.

The Great Chief staggered, one knee hitting the ground, his chest heaving. Blood ran from a deep gash across his side, his tusks chipped. Worse yet, his mighty double axe had been cleaved in half. One blade lay shattered in the dirt, useless.

Belanor floated above him, untouched. Not a scratch on his body, not a single thread out of place. His eyes glowed with cruel amusement.

He tilted his head, his grin widening.

"Is that it? That was your full power?"

The Great Chief spat blood, fury blazing in his eyes even as weakness seeped into his limbs. He couldn't comprehend it, his mightiest strike, enough to level armies, had been brushed aside like a child's tantrum.

Belanor spread his arms wide, threads spiraling lazily around him like the strings of some cosmic puppet show. His voice thundered across the broken coliseum.

"Now… it's my turn."Belanor's smile stretched wider. He lifted his hand and, with a sharp flick of his finger outward, the air screamed. A single crimson thread tore forward, curving like a serpent, its edge glinting with the promise of death. It wasn't just aimed at the Great Chief, it was angled to slice through him and the terrified orcs scrambling behind.

But this time, the Great Chief did not move aside. His tusked jaw clenched, eyes burning with defiance. With a thunderous roar, he raised his shattered double-axe high.

CLANG!

The broken axe shrieked as it caught the glowing thread, steel screaming against something sharper than any blade. The Great Chief's massive frame shook with the effort, muscles bulging, veins like ropes across his arms. Dust and stone exploded beneath his feet as he dug in, refusing to yield.

The thread pressed forward, slicing trenches into the ground, inching closer to his chest. The Chief roared, a sound like thunder rolling through the coliseum, and with a final heave, he redirected its path.

BOOM!

The thread was forced downward, buried into the cracked stone floor. The arena split open in jagged lines as the deadly strand carved a canyon into the earth instead of his people.

Dust and blood hung thick in the air, the silence broken only by the Great Chief's ragged panting. He still stood, his broken axe buried into the ground where he had forced Belanor's thread away, cracks webbing outward like scars of his defiance.

For a heartbeat, hope flickered among the orcs.

"The Great Chief saved us!" one bellowed, beating his shield in triumph. Others roared with him, their voices rising like thunder, desperate to believe in their savior.

But Belanor only tilted his head, his grin widening, his eyes gleaming with cruel delight. He lifted two fingers, almost casually.

"I'll admit it," he said, voice carrying across the ruins of the coliseum, "that was impressive. But do you really think you can shoulder the weight of all those lives? You can't even bear your own."

Then he flicked his fingers inward.

A sharp snap echoed, unnatural in its precision.

The orc cheers froze mid-cry.

The Great Chief's body stiffened. For a moment, he thought he had resisted, until he felt it. A burning line of pain seared across his waist, clean and merciless.

The coliseum fell silent as a thin crimson glow traced itself across his body.

A single, perfect cut.

Blood dripped, then poured, staining the earth beneath him. The Chief's eyes widened in disbelief as his knees buckled, the broken axe slipping from his grip. The line at his waist deepened, tearing flesh and armor alike as though he were nothing more than parchment beneath a blade.

Gasps, screams, sobs erupted from the crowd of orcs as their mighty leader faltered.

Belanor's threads shimmered faintly in the air like the strings of fate itself, vibrating with quiet menace.

"That," Belanor whispered, his voice slicing through the chaos like the thread itself, "was the price of playing hero."