The burning shock-wave of light rolled over me faster than I could think. It was exactly like what I thought being thrown into the sun would feel like. The blinding heat burned everything. Eyes. Hair. All exposed skin. All unexposed skin. Flash fried and crispy golden brown in less than a second.

“AUUUUUUUGHH!!” An agonized scream tore itself from my throat.

And then it was over.

The blinding white light faded as quick as it came, my world coming back into focus. I collapsed, knees splashing back down into the frigid quicksilver. (I wish it had stayed warm. This shit was like having ice dropped in the front of your pants, except your whole body.)

“Guuhhhh-huuuuhh-nnnnnngh-what the fuck was that?” I wheezed, breath coming out in ragged gulps and groans. The pain vanished along with the light, but the memory of it lingered, skin tightening with phantom burns. Very, very unpleasant.

“That, my young friend, was just a quick bioscan. Nothing to worry your precious little head about. Side effects should vanish by the time I finish this…particular……sentence!”

Alright, who the fuck was that?

The voice was clearly masculine, with an odd metallic tint, like it was coming down a tin can pipeline. And however pleasantly friendly his tone was, something about it was off. Something…nostalgic, almost? I dunno. But whatever it was made my skin crawl with alarm.

On the other hand, he was true to word. Before he’d even uttered the last syllable, the phantom pains had left without a trace, memory already dull in my mind. So at least there was that, I guess.

“Bioscan. Oh of course, that explains everything!” I said, getting to my feet. “Except not at all. Can I get a little more to go on, pl—” The rest of my sentence died on my lips.

I blinked. Once. Twice. Three times. What the hell?

“Take your time kiddo. I ain’t goin nowhere.”

Standing thirty feet away from me was a young man. A little shorter than average—around 5’4 I’d say— with just a little bit of visible heft around the mid-section, though from what I could see of him under the short sleeved combat jacket (The light armor wearer’s number one spring fashion) and his cargo shorts (Because you always need more pockets, right?), you could tell he put a lot of effort into his body. His arms were shredded, taut bands of muscle while his calves could be succinctly described as ‘beefy.’

But there were two things that really, really stood out to me. First; if my eyes weren’t lying to me, and I really don’t think they were, this man was made of quicksilver. His skin was completely silver, with small globules of the liquid metal constantly dripping off of him and back into the ocean underneath our feet. But surprisingly, that wasn’t the most surprising thing about him, oh no.

It was his face. A face that I’d seen many, many times throughout my life. Sharp eyebrows, almond shaped eyes, a proud nose with just the littlest bit of a bulb on the end. Plus a nice, gently squared chin and full lips. It was a face I’d never forget even if I ever wanted to, and made me quickly realize why his voice had caused my skin to crawl.

IT WAS MY FACE.

“Your Majesty?!” I might have been freaking out a little bit. Cut me some slack. It’s not every day you come face to face with yourself in a literal sense. Metal or not, it’s just disconcerting, to say the least.

There was no response from the King. I still felt the pressure from His gaze, so I knew He was still watching, but must’ve deigned to not respond. Instead, it was me who responded. Uh, metal……me.

“Woah woah, calm down there little buddy!” He stated soothingly, waving his hands in the classic ‘settle down’ gesture. “So I look exactly like you, whatever, it’s not that serious, I promise. Just let me explain.” He spread his arms in a smug ‘may I go on’ gesture.

I nodded yes.

His face—my face—split into a wide, shit-eating grin. “Most excellent. Then allow me to introduce myself.” My doppleganger snapped his left hand to his brow in a crisp salute, face the picture of seriousness. God this was weird. “Welcome Trial-goer! This is your true final challenge of the day! My name is-” With a start, he stopped then laughed and waggled his pointer finger. “Ooops! That’s a secret, actually. My bad.”

The bastard actually winked at me.

“Hah. Funny.” I said sardonically.

And then there was that smug ass grin again. “Yeah, I thought so too. I guess, for our purposes today, you can call me……hmm. You can call me Tobis.”

I quirked an eyebrow at him. “Tobis?”

“Uhuh. Tobis.”

I shrugged. “Alright Tobis. You know, I don’t really even want an explanation. I’d rather just get to the juicy center, know what I mean?”

Tobis crossed his arms and nodded his head seriously. “Yeah, I get it. Okay then. I’ll cut the crap.” He held up a closed fist and began counting off fingers. “That bioscan let me copy your exact physiology. Add a little extra oomph to make it interesting. The challenge is this, fight a better, stronger, faster version of yourself. To the death, of course.”

I stared at him, a bit caught off guard by the sudden frankness. I hadn’t really thought he’d listen. “Oh. Uh. Okay then. I kinda expected that, but yeah, that’s it? You’re just gonna come straight at me to try and beat me to death?”

Tobis nodded his head solemnly, mouth drawn into a thin line. “That’s right kid. I’ll give you as much time to prepare as you need, but once you say ‘Go’, I will go.”

Tobis raised his hands in front of him, hands gripping the air like he was trying to crush an apple. Around his feet, the quicksilver bubbled up. It gathered and flowed up his legs, splitting into two streams, one down each arm. The extra mass bunched up around his clawed hands. Then it began to darken, from perfect sterling to cold iron. It solidified, sharpened. It gained hard fingers and joints, perfect for punching. Tobis clenched his gauntlets tightly and looked at me pointedly.

“I am going to come at you with everything you have and then some. If you want to make it through this and claim the power you seek, you will have to dig down and find the potential hidden in yourself. I guarantee that if you do not give it one hundred and twenty percent, you are going to die. Take your time, prepare your mind, warm up if you must. Tell me when you are ready.”

Tobis readied his fighting stance, textbook south-paw boxing. I took a deep, deep breath. So it really was gonna be [Me vs Me+], huh?

That’s nervewracking.

But that wasn’t going to stop me. Not when I was this close. Unless I had read that conversation completely wrong, His Majesty had basically guaranteed me an S rank if I beat this. Fuck it, even if I was reading it wrong, that’s what I was going to believe. I could see it. I was at the culmination of my entire life’s purpose, the very reason I was fighting at all. It was right there, past this last hurdle. Past Tobis, my destiny sat glowing with an almighty glory.

I clenched my fists and gritted my teeth. Losing was not an option. It was time to warm up.

——————————————————————————————————

*Fwip!*

“KAH!”

My fist sliced through the air with a crisp sound, followed by a sharp yell. With that exclamation of fighting spirit, I banished the remaining anxiety in me. There was nothing to be anxious about. I knew I had it in me to beat this last trial. And if I didn’t, well. That wouldn’t matter for very long. Either way, the only option was to just give it every thing I had and trust that I’d built myself strong enough for this.

With grim determination, I squared up. Unlike with the imps, I was deadly serious, eyes focused like a hawk on Tobis. My form; tight. Hands up protecting my face, knees slightly bent. I was a spring compressed to the limit, ready to explode with kinetic force.

With one last breathe, I steeled myself, and gave Tobis a single nod of my head. Tobis nodded his head, and moved.

Good Lord Almighty, he hadn’t been kidding about that ‘little extra oomph’.

Tobis was fast. He practically skimmed over the top of the quicksilver, feet touching down only for an instant. I blinked in surprise—a rookie mistake— and Tobis was there, like he’d just cut out the space between us.

Alright, jab’s always the opener. Here it comes.

Tobis’s armored right hand shot out, throwing a jab half again as fast as any I’d ever thrown. The wind from his fist tickled the hair on my ear as I weaved to the left. Even seeing it coming I still almost got clocked. Intimidating, but there was no time for cold feet now. I had to press him back as best I could.

I launched a counter-cross, left gauntlet slamming into Tobis’s face. I smirked slightly when he staggered back. I was half afraid he wouldn’t even take damage. That would’ve been bullshit.

I stopped smirking when I pulled my fist back and Tobis was grinning at me, only a slight smudge on his cheek to show that I’d even hit him. Okay, so there was definitely at least some bullshit.

“Sorry. Gonna need a bit more than that, champ.”

I bared my teeth at him and snarled. “Noted.” The friendly yet condescending attitude was much more aggravating now that he was actively trying to beat me to death. After a failed attack, my first instinct was to leap back, but I clamped down on that hard. With Tobis’s speed, it would be child’s play for him to dash into my guard while I recovered and lay the smack down on me.

So I stuck to the plan and pushed the attack. Though, that was easier said than done. I lashed out at Tobis with a jab of my own, but he weaved around it like wheat in the wind, my hit whiffing completely. Again and again, I lashed out at my quicksilver dobble-ganger.

Jab!

Jab!

Left-cross!

Right-hook!

Uppercut!

He dodged each and every hit.

No matter how fast I threw them out, Tobis would effortlessly dodge, whether it was a rapid bob of his head to dodge a blow aimed for his face, or bending out of the way of my body blows. I couldn’t bend like that! Damn it!

I let up on the fruitless assault and hopped backwards, trying to put some distance between myself and Tobis. He bent his knees and rushed in, instantly switching from defensive to offensive. My arms were already up, prepared to take the attack I knew was coming.

Tobis happily obliged, weaving in close like a gust of wind, a vicious straight left aimed right at my guard. Testing it.

*CLANG*

Tobis’s gauntlet struck my guard with a horrible clang. Pain shot through my arms, followed by an instant feeling of numbness. Holy shit. That wasn’t a punch. That was more like getting hit with a sledgehammer!

The cold look in Tobis’s pale metal eyes sent chills down my spine. He drew his arms back and hit again.

*CLANG*

Burning fire lanced down the front of my arms, far worse than the first hit. I bit down a yell, but held my guard.

Tobis struck again.

Again.

Again.

Every one of those hammer blows struck me directly in the guard, like Tobis was trying to drive a nail through my arms—which were screaming in pain. I could feel the metal of my gauntlets caving in from the force of the blows. Each hit had enough weight to knock me back a step, and under the rain of punches I was forced to concede ground, covering my face with my battered arms like a turtle in it’s shell.

Focused on defense, I had no time to think about what Tobis would do or plan a counterattack. I never saw it coming. Tobis rushed in, body checking me and knocking me off balance. Then he launched a nasty uppercut at my arms, blowing them wide open.

Oh, that’s bad.

What do I do when the enemy is completely open? Well, that’s when you launch your strongest attack right? Unfortunately, Tobis thought so too. He whipped his arm all the way back, winding up for the daddy of all power punches. He put his entire body weight into it, hurling his arm forward, his gauntlet like the striking head of a flail.

It was a perfect hay-maker.

It struck home, Tobis’s ironclad fist slamming into my cheek with all the force of a bucking horse. Pain exploded in my face. There was a sharp, horrific snap as one of my—no, scratch that, several of my teeth cracked—cruel barbs of agony stabbing into the sensitive nerves of my gums. I immediately tasted the sharp iron-y tang of blood as it began to pool in my mouth.

The powerful blow knocked me right off my feet, sending me crashing face down into the liquid quicksilver with an icy splash. Taking a dip in it once was bad enough. The second time was so much worse as the freezing burn poured over the injuries on my face and stoked them to new, agonizing heights. A scream fought to get out, but with force of will, I managed to hold it back—incredibly uneager to almost drown in it again—and rushed to push myself up.

“Blgh!” I hacked and spluttered in pain, a juicy glob of blood (plus teeth) plopping out of my mouth. Ugh, nasty. With a very gentle touch, I checked my face for any major damage. Actually, let me rephrase that: I checked my face for any vital damage, because basically the entire right side was ‘major damage.’ I could already feel my cheek swelling like a balloon. A quick tongue check told me that I was missing a total of four teeth; two on top and two on bottom. Blood coated the inside of my mouth and constantly dribbled out the side. It was pretty bad.

But nothing immediately life threatening. And that means the fight goes on. I turned to Tobis, giving a bloody, lopsided smile. “Come on Tobis, we’re not done yet!” I got back in my fighting stance-- a loose one this time, bouncy and quick-- and, spitting another splot of blood onto the ground, waved Tobis towards me. “Its round two you son-of-a-bitch.”

It was time for a new strategy. There was no way this was going to be a head on fight. Tobis was strong enough to break my guard like it was nothing. And hitting him was like trying to punch smoke. I couldn’t get hit. I couldn’t land a hit.

Exactly the kind of challenge I was expecting originally coming into the Trial. A test of strength and skill to determine the worth of the challenger by putting their very life on the line. I had not felt like my life was on the line against the imps.

But I felt it now.

The slightest mistake or hesitation here could spell the end for me. If Tobis caught me in a combo, and they were all like the hit earlier? I’d say I could probably last all of five hits tops before getting knocked the hell out. Then it was game over man. Game over.

If this was some random person on the street, I honestly don’t think I could win. He just seemed to outweigh me in stats by too much. But this wasn’t just any random person on the street. I was fighting (in effect) myself. I could work with that. Because I knew how to fight me.

I’ve had people kicking my ass (For one reason or another) for years. I’ve had my weaknesses and tendencies drilled into me until I knew them by heart. Knowing your weaknesses is a great strength in its own right. Plus, who knew my fighting style better than I did?

Tobis rushed me, closing the gap in a second. He danced around to my right, trying to get as far into my weak zone as possible. I swiveled right with him, watching for the first hint of an attack.

It took everything I had to watch Tobis’s lightning-quick motions and look for his attack tells. Even then, it only worked because I already knew what to look for. Every twitch of the shoulders, every slight rotation of his feet. How far apart his hands and feet were, which way his body was tilting. It all mattered. It told me from where his punch would be coming from, how hard it would be. Most importantly, where his openings would be.

Tobis’s right fist clenched tightly, arm tensing and drawing back a fraction of an inch. I sidestepped right a moment before a punch rocketed forward into where my head had just been. I drove a fist into Tobis’s ribs before quickly stepping away again, another jab slicing through the air a moment later. The corner of my mouth ticked up in a grin. I know it wasn’t much, but it all added up, and if I had to ‘death by a thousand paper cuts’ Tobis, I damn well would.

His rear foot pivoted inward, left arm shifting down ever so slightly. I bobbed and weaved, ducking my head, swerving under a sickle like hook. I weaved back right after, using my rising momentum to slug a hard right directly into Tobis’s jaw. He staggered back half a step, grunting. I took my chance and completed the infinity shaped weave, swinging back around even faster, blasting that smug bastard with a fearsome rolling left hook smack dab on the chin.

Tobis’s head was snapped sideways. Stumbling back a few feet, he held his footing, though he had to put his arms out to steady himself. Groaning, he rubbed his chin and stared at me. A slight look of surprise reflected in his silver eyes.

“Hey, that one actually hurt.”

I went back to neutral stance, bouncing on the balls of my feet to stay quick. “Yeah. I hope it did.”

Once more my final obstacle charged at me, and our dance resumed.