Chapter 10

  Drakkel couldn't believe what just happened.

  His heart trembled with his weak and shaky body.

  Filled with embarrassment and unable to offer up a word of explanation, he cupped his hands to Rillian Adore.

  At that moment, all the praise and adoration he received from others rang through his ears like a terrible tune, grating yet unable to be ignored.

  He found it hard to breathe.

  With his guilty mind and enfeebled body, he couldn't even hold his own sword anymore.

  Attempting to hide his weakness, he stuck Swift Wind's Breeze into the ground and walked off the field, using the last of his sword energy to leave the middle area of Hell's Mayhem.

  The few spectators laughed and jeered.

  “The oh so famous Drakkel Fin, the Sword’s Wind of the Sacred Sword Swords Clan! One of the most powerful swordsmen! Yeah right!”

  “I can't believe he lost to Rillian Adore, a Sword Fighter who only made a debut in the sword fighting world a week ago!”

  “Ha! Liars will always get what’s coming to them! He probably had some sort of help to gain his reputation!”

  Drakkel silently walked past all of them. Yes, their comments were hurtful, but his mind was really only focused on one thing. His clan, who held their heads high as one of the most powerful Swords Clans, his family, would inevitably suffer a blow from this. He couldn't go back to face them and make it worse.

  He left the area and went to the closest town. Not wanting to leave, he decided to sleep there for the night.

  He didn't dare find an inn, afraid someone might recognize him, so he took up shelter under the cover of an abandoned building

  The next morning, Drakkel had a massive headache.

  As he walked around, he found that his defeat was all anyone was talking about.

  In the streets, kids were even enacting the battle.

  He watched as a group of children were playing on the street. Two stood in the middle, announcing themselves. One said he was The Golden Blade and the other announced himself to be the Sword's Wind. When the battle began, the child calling himself the Sword's Wind didn't put up much of a fight before being fatally stabbed by a wooden sword held in the hand of the child calling himself the Golden Blade. After the fact, the group of children laughed hysterically.

  As he walked around aimlessly that day, he attempted to recall what happened during the battle. But, for some reason, the details of it escaped him and trying to think about it made his pounding headache grow worse.

  So, eventually, he gave up on trying. If he lost, he might have deserved it. After all, although it was unlikely, it wasn't impossible for someone with a lower sword level to beat someone with a higher one.

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  It's just that his skills regressed after that duel and even his appearance had changed. When he caught a glimpse of himself by chance in a puddle of water, he found that his once shiny black hair had taken up a white strand and his eyes had sunken a bit.

  He thought something was missing, but he was incapable of investigating.

  If he wanted to find out the mystery behind it, he would first have to get over the headache he got when he tried to think about the duel and second, regain his previous sword skills which would allow him to traverse the Swordfighting World and find out the cause.

  After a few weeks of attempting to regain his lost skills or at least stop them from regressing, he found nothing worked. For a moment, he even wondered if he should go back to his clan and ask for their help.

  But days turned to weeks and weeks turned to months and as time passed, he couldn't bring himself to do it. The more time he spent outside of his clan, the harder he found it to return.

  Thinking about it, even if he returned and miraculously solved his problems, after the defeat he suffered, who would still believe in his strength?

  Actually, he was probably doing them a favor. With his worsening skills and ruined reputation, returning would only worsen their standing.

  Stuck between a rock and a hard place, he decided not to resist anymore. His skills were not recovering and the tales of him had faded. What was the need to go stirring the pot now?

  Around a year and a half later, Drakkel was sitting against a wall near a bridge on a stormy and cold night in the small inner town of Weathered Edge. He had sold all his belongings of worth and had moved towns several times avoiding his searching clanmates.

  He tried to pick up work during this time, but he wasn't good at much. He was raised around Sword Fighting and not much more. In terms of lower level work, he would get hired just to mess it up and he couldn't get higher level work because he had no experience. The work he could do, he was afraid of. No matter what he did, due to his looks he would eventually gain unwanted attention. And with this attention came the fear that his Swords Clan would find him.

  So, in the end, without work, he was left homeless and destitute.

  In his current town, he tried to find a covered place to stay in, but the ones who inhabited it already had a hierarchy. His Sword skills weren't reliable and his health was weak. When he used the money he got to buy food for the day and kept the rest as savings, those other poor folks would eye him covetously. In the end, he had to choose between eating and sleeping. Not liking either option, he left the place and decided to sleep outside. But who knew that today would be one of the worst days to make that decision?

  He shivered and wrapped his arms around himself.

  He was using a rag from an empty rice sack for cover, but it wasn't working well and he was still getting soaked by the rain.

  His stomach growled and he licked his chapped lips. If he hadn’t used up so much of his sword energy, he could have easily handled this situation.

  He sighed.

  It was fine. He would get through this. But, right now, he wanted to sleep.

  With his body completely soaked, he thought it wouldn't be bad to rest his eyes a bit to distract himself from the pounding rain and hunger in his belly.

  He would recover his sword energy later.

  When the rain let up, he would find a way to eat.

  His eyes began to drift close, but he was suddenly awoken by the sound of heavy footsteps approaching.

  The steps were rapid, yet heavy, as if the person who made them was in a hurry. In Drakkel’s ears they created a sharp contradiction to the calming cacophony of the many rain drops.

  It was dark and he was tired, so he couldn't clearly see who it was.

  The man said something but lightning struck as he spoke.

  Drakkel thought he heard him ask if he had seen something. But he hadn't seen anything important, so he shook his head.

  Then, the man did something unexpected.

  He took off his cloak and gave it to Drakkel.

  Then he handed him a bag and left.

  As the cloak now shielded him from the rain, Drakkel opened the bag. A sweet smell of roasted peanuts and honey drifted out and his mouth watered.

  Taking out a handful and stuffing it into his mouth, he was reminded of the warm deliciousness of his Senior Brother's cooking and like the falling of the pounding rain, tears flowed out of his eyes.

  Drakkel brought his arms and knees close to himself in a cradle as tears flowed ceaselessly down his face. He thought of everything that happened. All the events that led him to this point.

  And he knew that no matter what, he would never be a burden to anyone he cared about again.