30.

You’ll never die

A gold glow began to seep out from his fingertips. In a split second, it enveloped the man, then spread to the slaves who were huddled behind him.

They felt it. Their seals were breaking. A few hunched over, waiting for the pain that should have returned without the magic circuits that had been keeping them from falling apart, but nothing came. The spell Dominic had cast over them was warm. And although there was a sharp stinging from their backs as it swept through, they were left perfectly alive, with healthy bodies they hadn’t dared to dream of, and completely free from their bonds.

“What…” the man in front of him looked down at himself, stunned. “Who, who are—”

“Do whatever you want,” Dominic said, interrupting the question.

He hadn't planned on answering anyway. It didn’t matter whether they knew his name or not. The only attention he needed was the king’s.

“Fight or run,” he said, “do whatever you want.”

“Fight…”

The man thought about it for a moment, then quickly shook his head.

“No, we can’t,” he replied. “We’ll d—”

The giant dashed in from the center of the ring, closing the distance in an instant. Dominic stood in front of the remaining slaves as the club came crashing towards him. He swiped his hand in the opposite direction, his palm meeting the wood for only a split second.

It was crushed under his grip, a huge furrow appearing in the wood as his fingers dug through it. The sound of the weapon splintering echoed sharply through the stadium as pieces of it flew through the air and scattered onto the floor.

A huge cheer went up in the stands, but Dominic didn’t listen. He watched as the man looked in confusion at his weapon. It was still in one piece, but just barely.

“You…”

He slowly turned his attention to Dominic.

“Don’t like you.”

Dominic frowned at the scent coming off of him. Blood and rotting sewage. Thick, dirty water. Someone who didn’t think of anything aside from making sure the people in front of him disappeared.

He swung his club again, and this time Dominic caught it, the force pushing him back a couple feet before coming to a stop. He held the man in place, the two of them at a stalemate.

“You,” he said, looking over his shoulder at the thin man behind him, “will you fight?”

His face was pale as he stared at the two people that must have looked like monsters in front of him.

“We, we’ll die,” he managed to answer.

“You won’t,” Dominic replied.

He tightened his grip on the weapon in his hands, the wood splinters piercing his skin.

“You won’t die, so choose.”

The man opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. He couldn’t make a decision of that magnitude. He hadn’t known what it was like to be free in a long, long time.

“I’ll fight!”

A woman who looked to be in her 20s stood up from behind him, holding Dominic’s gaze, her legs shaking. She was clenching her fists so hard her knuckles were white.

After a moment, a boy younger than her grabbed her hand, then slowly pushed himself up from the ground to stand beside her.

“I’ll fight too,” he said.

Dominic nodded. The wood crunched under his fingers.

“Whatever you want to do,” he said, throwing the club away. “It’s up to you.”

The man’s arm recoiled, and he stumbled backwards a step. Before he could right himself, Dominic shot forward and struck him in the stomach, twisting his fist.

He flew back through the air, throwing up huge clouds of sand as he skidded to a stop. He rolled to his side and coughed, clots of blood splattering across the ground.

“You’ll never die,” Dominic said, holding up his hand.

His palm glowed. From below his feet, gold mana spread outwards, flickering and racing towards the stands until it covered the entire arena floor in a thin layer that glimmered like glass. A collective gasp went up from the stands.

The slaves felt the power rising from beneath their feet. This was healing magic on an almost unimaginable scale. Anywhere inside its bounds, Dominic could heal them at will.

“So choose.”

They stared at him, then looked towards the huge man’s ragged form, still hunched over on the other side of the arena. Without a word, every single one of them slowly stood.

“What should we do?” the thin man at the head asked, still uncertain.

“This is your battle,” Dominic replied. “I told you—”

He gestured towards the figure opposite to them, just now slowly pushing himself up from the ground and picking up the remnants of his splintered club.

“—Do whatever you want.”

The woman who had stood first charged immediately, a strong shout bellowing out from her lungs as she leapt towards the man, who was taken off guard by her sudden appearance. The others, emboldened, followed. A makeshift battle cry went up as they dashed past Dominic.

The man stumbled backwards as the first woman latched onto him, digging into his skin with her nails to hold on. He attempted to pry her off, his grip shattering her elbow as he pulled. But just as the lightning hot pain began to set in, the bones straightened and mended back together, the joint forming back into its original configuration. She pulled his hand closer and sunk her teeth into his wrist.

“Agh!”

He jolted, trying to shake her off, but when he took a step back, another slave had already latched onto his leg, holding him in place. Blood spewed from his wrist and trickled down his arm, splattering everywhere with his erratic movements. They were all attached to him, holding him down, clawing into his flesh. He couldn’t do anything but stumble around and struggle.

It was barbaric, the way they fought. All they had were their own teeth and nails. Every time a nail snapped off from the force they were exerting trying to take him down, it grew back instantly. Every time they were hit by his flailing arms and stomping steps, their bruises disappeared and their bones were set back into place. They ignored the pain that came with every injury and every cast of the healing spell. They’d been through worse.

Dominic stood back and watched. The scene was almost animalistic, but the mana that fluctuated and radiated from them was very real. Individual lives and individual tragedies that had led, through desperation or otherwise, to the place they were now. These were not mindless beasts bent on revenge. Even as she dug her nails into the giant man’s neck, the woman who had started it all was crying.

He looked up towards the stands. It was strangely quiet, despite the action happening in the ring, even though he knew that on a normal day, they would have clamored to high heaven for this kind of show. Though many were still jeering rowdily, most had realized that something was wrong. The intruder in the ring really wasn't someone the countess had prepared, despite the fact that she was letting him do as he wished. He was a variable that should not have existed down there in the arena.

The huge man slowly went down under the slaves’ relentless assault. His legs gave out, knees buckling. It was over once his back hit the floor. They pinned him down, stepping on his hands so that his bones cracked, clawing new, bloody marks across the red that already stained his skin. A few of them stood back, physically and mentally exhausted, unsure of where to go from there. Dominic stepped forward.

“Enough,” he said.

At once, they all froze in their tracks, looking towards him. Though still wary, they calmly backed away, extracting themselves from the downed man’s body, and let Dominic come closer.

“What’s your name?” he asked.

The man took raspy breaths as he laid there, gathering the strength to respond.

“14,” he finally replied.

That was a pretty low number. Perhaps he’d been owned for quite a while.

“What do you think of the countess?” Dominic asked.

“Countess…?”

“The woman who put that seal on your back.”

“Ah.”

His eyes gazed only forward, fixed on the lights that spanned the sealing. The rotten, stagnant mana inside him flared for the first time.

“Hate,” he said. “Hate, hate her.”

“I see.”

Dominic raised his hand. The gold mana underneath the man glowed. The gashes that had been dug into his flesh closed, skin smoothing over. His broken bones set themselves and healed back into place. The bruises littering his face and arms paled and disappeared.

“Ah,” the man murmured. “Hurts.”

“It hurts?”

“So warm.”

His eyes turned towards Dominic. He slowly sat up, but before either could say anything, the silence was shattered by the sound of someone clapping.

Dominic looked over towards the familiar front row seats he knew the applause was coming from. The countess’s gaze met his, amusement radiating from her expression.

“What a wonderful show,” she said. “I expected nothing less from you.”

Her smile was terribly wide as she spoke.

“Lio.”

Number 14 started to stand, but Dominic held up a hand.

“Stay here, all of you,” he ordered.

They froze, then stepped back. He alone moved towards the countess.

“You look quite different like this,” she remarked. “So the horns and the hair were a lie? I have to admit, I am impressed. I believed it.”

Dominic pulled down his hood. There was no reason to keep hiding.

“If I may ask, was there a reason you needed to put so much effort into posing as a scholar?” she said. “You’re quite dashing as is, and quite the mage. You could easily have passed as Lord Helwin’s personal guard or physician.”

She would never have allowed somebody as crude as an escort knight into her fold, and a physician had no reason to go out to noble gatherings. But what had mattered even more than those details was the fact that his disguise had been ‘a demon.’ She still thought he was one. He didn’t want to tell her that he wasn’t. Not yet.

The countess sighed at his lack of a reply.

“It’s a shame,” she said, shaking her head. “I quite liked conversing with you, Lio. Were you really lying to me that entire time, or is this just your lord’s orders?”

A warning. This is your last opportunity to go back. We can pretend nothing happened if you blame Thelo for all of this.

“You make me want to retch, Countess.”

Dominic didn’t hesitate to toss away that chance. For once, he wasn’t lying.

Her eyes narrowed, the smile disappearing from her face.

“What a waste,” she said. “You have all the makings of a wonderful demon, but you’re going to talk to me like that.”

“He must not wish to live any longer,” Kilan sneered.

“I had really hoped you would make a wise decision,” the countess continued. “A mage of your caliber is hard to come across. And yet you’re throwing it all away just for a single moment of futile justice.”

She waved her hand. All around the rim of the arena, guards appeared, standing at attention, spears at the ready.

“How naive.”

She shook her head as if she cared. Dominic glanced across the guards, then slowly back to her.

“Did you really think I came just to free a few slaves?” he replied.

“Excuse me?”

“Countess—!”

An aide nearly tripped as he sprinted down to the front row seats, stumbling to her side.

“The exits—” he managed to say between heavy breaths, “—the king’s mages have come! They’re all blocked!”

Her eyes widened, head snapping back towards Dominic. Her gaze bored holes into him as if to ask wordlessly if it was true. He just looked at her, and smiled softly.

He’d felt Yana and her mages taking their places outside the underground stadium from the moment he’d walked out onto the arena floor. He had come inside on his own, but he had never been alone.

“Well what are you doing dawdling here?!” the countess snapped. “Call Count Haema through the gate!”

The messenger dashed off, into the inner hallways. Unrest was spreading through the crowd. The countess turned her piercing glare towards Dominic, grinding her teeth.

“This—You—” she snarled, at a loss for the right words.

There was no reason for him to drag it out any longer. Dominic looked down on his palm, where a little white diamond drawn in mana shined. It was connected to the one he had left with Ian, on the other side.

“It’s time, Ian,” he murmured.

He focused, feeling the mana he had sent out, the shimmering gold color that coated the floor of the arena. In an instant, he let it explode outwards unhindered, flooding up the stands and down into the winding hallways. It filled them, invaded the holding pens and prison-like rooms, blasting through the barriers that held the slaves and sweeping away the accursed symbols on their backs.

There was not a single nook or cranny that he left unclaimed. Everything in Maylia Arena was now his jurisdiction. Everyone here was about to be part of his game.

Dominic clenched his hand into a fist, crushing the symbol in his palm. It dissipated, shards of the mana trickling through his fingers and dissolving into the air.

From underneath his feet, there was a deep, ominous rumble.