“Figures…” Layne sighed, regret drifting over him like cold mist at dusk.

Exactly what he dreaded, like storm clouds rolling toward a lonely hill.

The duel had barely begun, and Lance was already mired in a thicket of stone and heat.

“Useless. This wall will block every flame you’ve got.” Sheltered by a mountain that surged from the earth, Gret grinned like a cat on a warm ledge.

“Coward, aren’t you?” Lance spat, his anger frayed, like a banner torn by wind.

He sighted the gap and lashed out with Secret Sword Blazing Fire, a comet arcing through winter night.

A dragon of flame dived, and the impact shook the rock wall into flying shards like a broken cliff.

“Did it work…?” Hope flickered in him like a lone ember in ash.

The next heartbeat, the cracked wall rewove itself, as if time rippled and flowed backward like a river under moonlight.

When it settled, the surface was smooth as a river stone, no battle scars left in the dust.

His strike had failed, like a wave that kissed rock and slipped away.

But the wall didn’t only endure—it bit back.

Before Lance’s fire fully faded, the smooth face spat a stalagmite like a lightning bolt from a gray sky.

It speared for his throat, a hawk diving for a rabbit’s shadow.

Lance moved with thunder-quick precision, his hands lifting a fraction, like reeds swaying before wind.

The Sirius Sword’s blade angled, and the killing spear glanced away like rain off steel.

The stalagmite slammed into a side wall with a boom, and the stone collapsed like a felled tree.

A thin red line marked Lance’s cheek, a willow-leaf cut barely seen.

“Beautiful defense! He’s truly the Blazing Fire Knight. Anyone else would’ve been a corpse, laid out like frost at dawn!”

The emcee’s voice surged like surf, loud enough to rattle swallows from the rafters.

The crowd saw Lance standing and breathed out together, a tide pulling back from a reef.

In the family box, Jeremy hopped up, flashing a “heck yeah” pose, his joy bright as noon.

“Our boss did what we couldn’t, easy as blowing out a candle. He’s just amazing!”

The retainers cheered, their voices rising like sparrows at daybreak.

Layne’s brow stayed knotted, like a cord pulled tight on a sail.

Jasmine felt a chill of worry, like dew on a blade. “Can Lance… win?”

Before Layne answered, Gret began to boast, his words rolling like gravel.

“Rock looks heavy, but that weight is a façade.” Seeing Lance’s fatigue, Gret grew smooth and relaxed, like water finding a groove.

“As their master, I flex them. I attack, defend, or toy with weaklings like you, using Battle Aura rock like clay.”

Whoosh!

A new stalagmite sliced the air, a swan’s neck turned spear, deliberately wide right of Lance.

Boom!

It hit the platform, the sound like the earth groaning under winter ice.

Lance stared tight-faced, still as a pine in snow, refusing the bait.

“He can win… but he’s too passive,” Layne said, words clean as a blade’s edge.

“Attack rashly, and he’ll eat a counter from those stone spears. One slip, and that’s a grave on the hill.”

“Defend and wait, and Gret can do the same. He’ll stall till Lance’s strength ebbs like evening light.”

“That’s despicable!” Jasmine gasped, a hand to her lips like a lily folding.

“No help for it. Knights don’t always fight straight. Sometimes the method matters more than the moon over steel.”

The duel locked up, a dead knot like vines strangling a gate.

Gret chose appeasement on purpose, a slow grind like a river wearing down a canyon.

Seeing the young knight hold distance, he leaned into taunts, his tongue whetted like a rusty blade.

“You call me a coward. Why not charge? Afraid? Or are you the real coward?”

He drank his own laughter like cheap wine, satisfied in a way that had nothing to do with banners or bloodlines.

People had said that was why he stagnated, like moss on a shaded stone. He didn’t care.

At the same time, Lance’s anxious look rattled his supporters, a wind through bamboo at night.

But if he won, each thread of worry would turn into trust, woven thick like a winter cloak.

That was what Lance wanted—or more precise, what Fulin wanted, a hope lit like a lantern in fog.

Then, suddenly, Lance shed fatigue and panic, relaxing his guard like a bow unstrung.

“Losers don’t get to call me a coward,” he declared, voice steady as iron in rain.

The audience balked and bristled, a flock stirred by a barking dog.

On the platform, Gret did too, anger rising like heat from cracked stone.

“Loser?” He needed a few seconds, his mind clanking like a mill wheel. “What a colossal joke!”

“I thought you and I were both chained by ‘mediocrity,’ shackles cold as iron at dusk.”

“Now I see you’re not only mediocre, you’re made stupid by arrogance, like a moth charging a bonfire!”

Gret laughed loud, drunk on his own script, a theater of sand and echo.

By his plan, the young knight would be eliminated in shame, tossed like chaff by wind. Everything aligned.

“Is that so?” Lance’s contempt was cool as shade. “Rock’s heaviness is a façade. Rely on façades, and victory becomes one too.”

“What do you mean?!” Gret flared, like a forge sputtering, confused and snared by his own words.

As he had pitied Gret at the start, Lance pitied him now, a calm hand over heated coals.

“I don’t do puzzles,” he said, voice simple as rain on a tile. “So here’s plain speech.”

“I’ve seen your weakness.”

Gret tried to laugh, but his gut screamed like a hawk, sharp and sure.

Something was about to go wrong—he felt it like a tremor underfoot.

For a breath he understood, then doubt returned, a fog rolling back in.

Oh—so that’s it.

By the time realization struck, he was already scorched, his body scrawled by bite-marks of fire like wolves at night.

He flew like a torn kite and crashed with a thud, consciousness snuffed like a candle.

Above the platform, a mushroom cloud bloomed like a gray chrysanthemum in storm.

The commentator stared, stunned silent, and finally breathed one word, thin as smoke. “Explosion…”

He snapped back into fervor, voice bright as trumpets, chest beating like drums.

“A Battle Aura-triggered explosion! The Blazing Fire Knight is bold and brilliant!”

“This young knight mixed fire-seeds into the rock as the Bedrock Knight formed the wall!”

“He was doing it from the very start! Those earlier attacks weren’t wasted at all!”

“And he just made it work!”

The crowd erupted, cheers cascading like rain over tiles, a river in flood.

In the VIP seats, it felt like another world, sealed off like a quiet grove.

Maple City’s nobles lost their poise, faces shifting like reeds in a sudden squall.

The mood changed fast, a boulder dropped into a calm lake.

“So this is the Blazing Fire Knight’s power?”

“No wonder Jiao values him,” someone murmured, like a fox scenting a trail.

“Thought he was a showboater. He’s deeper than he looks, like ink in a well.”

The referee’s voice rang like a bell, cutting through the roar.

“Winner of the duel: the Blazing Fire Knight, Lance Morrison!”

Then, unexpected as a gull’s cry:

“Will the final winner of the second-round Selection Rite proceed at once to the palace’s grand hall to meet His Majesty—confirming entry in the Knight Festival!”