Chapter 41: Spar
As I walked up to the stage, I couldn't help but feel like I was strung along, forced to do things one after another. Somehow or another, they ended up attracting way more attention than they should have.
It felt like I was the protagonist when in reality it was Nathan.
Weird.
Regardless, I stepped up on the stage with no real care about winning. On the other side, was some dude from the Louis family. He got up on the stage with a frown on his face. In one hand, he had a wooden shield, while the other had a spear. From the way he looked at me, he seemed to be rather dead set on beating me.
A smirk formed on his face.
"Why don't we make a deal? If I beat you, then you'll let my family share in the business of specially processed meat."
I rolled my eyes and rested the wooden sword against my shoulder.
"I don't see why I should agree to that deal."
The dipshit of the Louis family shrugged his shoulders.
"Then if I lose, I'll allow you to take a great share in my family's businesses and have part of the profits."
I promptly shook my head.
"Sorry, I'm not making any deals."
The dipshit's eyebrow twitched.
"What? But our business generates revenue of tens of thousands every day!"
...Revenue, huh? Since he isn't talking about your net profits, doesn't that mean the amount you're spending is more than what he's making back?
Besides, even if he lost, his goal was to establish a bridge of business between the two of us would be achieved, making it easier to bother me about the special meat.
I waved my hand dismissively.
"I don't care, let's just get this over with."
The dipshit of the Louis family frowned rather intensely but ended up dropping the subject anyway.
"Hmph! Suit yourself."
Douglas began announcing the rules.
"The first person to verbally give up, or fall off the platform will be the loser! Any magical spells will be an automatic disqualification. Now, begin!"
The platform was pretty damn big, so I thought about just walking off. Yet, as I was about to do just that, Raisa screamed at the top of her lungs.
"I bet one thousand gold pieces on you! I'll share half the profit if you win!"
My eyelid twitched. This dumb mother...
Now that I think about it, the root cause of pretty much everything that happened at this ball was actually Raisa. First, she blew up the new meat matter. While that was mostly her father, he wouldn't have cared if Raisa wasn't involved. Second, she begged me not only to stay but to dance with her.
Now, she bet on this fight, with way too much money.
Like, that was enough for one hundred meals!
I felt like I had every single right to just walk off the stage with the amount she dragged me into.
...But she mentioned that I would get half the profits. Half of one thousand was five hundred, and while that wasn't much compared to my stash of one hundred thousand, It was still rather tempting.
I sharpened my eyes somewhat as I stared down the dipshit of the Louis family.
He raised his wooden shield in front of him, hiding most of his body and part of his face behind it, leaving just enough space for his eyes to stare me down. The spear was raised and pointed at me.
From there, the dipshit slowly began inching toward me.
Seeing this, I suddenly bolted forward, taking as much space as I could before he inched any closer. He seemed rather surprised by my sudden movements and remained on the spot, ready to receive an attack.
However, before I got into his range, I simply stopped moving, so that if he wanted to hit me, he would have to take a step forward himself. The dipshit seemed rather confused and just remained on the spot for a few moments.
Similarly, I just stood there as well, planning on being patient for this.
It seemed that he didn't have the same level of tolerance as he took a few steps forth and threw the spear toward me. I took a step back at the same time, and when the spear shot toward me, I grabbed onto its end.
Before he could react, I pulled as hard as I could, causing him to stumble forth. His hold over his shield was no longer proper, exposing his head. Taking advantage of that, I didn't hold back, swinging my wooden sword toward his right jugular.
He didn't even defend as my sword slammed against it. Both his right leg and arm weakened considerably, causing him to drop his shield and partially kneel down. Seeing as he looked like he was stunned by the pain, I released the spear and sent my fist for a liver punch.
With a thump, the dipshit proceeded to let out a cry of pain, keeling over.
To be honest, this was going so easily that it felt kind of strange. It didn't really feel like a fight anymore, but more like I was just a bully beating a guy up.
As a fun fact, the liver was one of the organs that weren't properly protected by the ribcage. When that thing gets hurt, the body involuntarily crumples over due to a bunch of science stuff I don't remember.
It was essentially the same as hitting a guy in the balls, but at the end of the day hitting someone in the balls was kinda gross. More than the moral aspect, I'd just prefer to keep my fists away from those things.
As such, the liver punch was the best alternative, and it would work on girls too.
I actually found this out by fighting with Nathan. By the end, we had both developed a certain amount of resistance to the liver punch, but it may not be the same now because of the changed bodies.
Ah, with that said, the dipshit of the Louis family was now groaning on the ground.
I stepped on the wooden spear and held down his head with a hand.
"I'm assuming this is the part where you surrender, right?"
He didn't respond, but it wasn't because he was being stubborn or anything. Rather, it was the fact he was still recovering from the pain. It seemed that nobody had hit him there before, so it took a little while for him to gather his bearings.
Eventually, he weakly muttered his surrender, after which I backed off.
Once again, everyone was looking at me like I was a freak.
...Hm. Now that I think about it, maybe it was my fault things like this were happening.
Ah, whatever.
Douglas let out a laugh and slapped his knee several times after seeing that display.
"I believe that may have been the fastest spar I have seen where there is no immediate surrender. It truly seems you are an Arden son."
I shrugged my shoulders.
"I guess that's cool."
From there, I simply walked off the stage. Douglas continued to look at me for a little while but moved on. He then announced more people to get up, and they all had spars as well.
I watched the fights continue on and noticed that most of them didn't really...
Hm. I guess the only way I know how to put it, is that they weren't really fighting.
I could tell just from watching them that they had obviously trained, learning proper techniques and knowing when to use them. However, it was nothing like a real fight. It looked like both sides would always give each other unnecessary leeway, giving up opportunities to attack for no real reason.
It seemed as though while these people had practiced, none had actual fighting experience. I guess they might have fought against their guards, but I doubt those people would be truly trying to win.
More spars continued to happen, as people were called up one after another. I couldn't help but notice that none of the archdukes had been called up. It was at this point that I took the time to count the number of dukes, realizing that there were twelve of them in total.
That would make it somewhat hard to organize this kind of format. Regardless, that wasn't my problem to deal with.
Though, soon enough, I would see the solution.
"The Arden Family will now go against the Stewart Family. The winner will fight one of the archdukes!"
So basically, the archdukes were given a skip on the battles, while the strongest of the dukes would have to fight them. That was pretty unfair given that the Dukes' side would probably be quite tired from two fights, but I didn't linger on that thought.
Instead, I got up, and my opponent did the same.
He had what looked almost like a mandible. It was a fairly long sword with the top part curved forth, similar to a scythe but with a less aggressive bend. If I had to guess, it looked like something you would use to pull away a shield or attack behind one. He used two hands to hold onto it properly, given that it was relatively large.
There were a fair amount of people that did have a shield, making that a pretty useful weapon. However, it put him at a slight disadvantage since I just had a normal sword.
There was a cordial smile on his face, and he didn't say a word as he looked at me, not bothering to try and wrangle a bet like the others. However, when I thought he was going to say something, he suddenly spoke.
"Could you not fight in such a dishonorable way?"
I raised an eyebrow. Huh? Since when was I fighting dishonorably? For starters, I had held myself back and wasn't even fighting dirty.
With a stiff smile, I responded.
"And how in a fight is it dishonorable?"
The guy from the Stewart Family furrowed his brows slightly.
"Is it not obvious? You use tricks in the fight, unfairly throwing your opponent off guard."
I rolled my eyes.
"When you fight against a true enemy, do you really think they'll care about something called honor? You can cling to that all you want, but at the end of the day, the one whose heart is still beating is the victor."
The guy's expression twitched. But after a few moments, a small smile formed on his face.
"I suppose I cannot argue with that logic. Very well then."
Douglas hummed to himself but didn't wait too long before announcing the start of the fight.
"Begin!"
I rushed forth like last time, and the Stewart guy had the same idea. Once again, I stopped right out of his range, and he did the same. From there, we just looked at each other awkwardly.
He looked back at me intently. From the way the guy looked, it was pretty clear he had no intention of going first, especially after seeing what happened to the dipshit Louis guy.
Though, making the first move was only bad if the other knew how to take advantage of it.
With that in mind, I abruptly sprung forth holding my sword out like a rapier, but not holding it out all the way.
The Stewart guy stepped back but wasn't able to move far enough to avoid it. Though, he was still able to bring his own blade over fast enough. If it kept going like this, then he would whisk my blade away.
Naturally, I changed it up, letting my sword suddenly dart upwards, this time putting my all into thrusting it toward his neck. Yet, to my surprise, this Stewart guy was even prepared for that, shifting his blade to guard his neck. He didn't really have to move the blade much since it was already pretty long and covered most of him already.
With a loud slam, the wooden weapons collided. He was able to nullify most of the impact.
However, he ended up leaving the rest of himself unguarded. While both of his hands were wrapped tight around the handle of his weapon, my fist shot toward his stomach just as it did with the dipshit Louis guy.
Once more, a thump resounded and a cry of agony followed.
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