Aias had for a long time been training his body, he knew its limitations and how to move it in order to balance himself. However he didn’t think fighting would be such a natural feeling to him. The moment the battle began he could tell everything from his opponent's movements, when, where, and how he should attack in order to bring his opponent down.

Aias was currently eating breakfast in the dining hall with everyone while pondering over how natural fighting had felt to him. What was that feeling of understanding that had flown into him as he entered combat. It wasn’t only in his fight against Jérémie that he had pulled of complex movements, most matches had ended with him doing something that made the eyes of any spectator pop with astonishment.

However after the matches were over everything went back to normal. Everyone congratulated the second place winner for the hard work, which happened to be Midae, the dreadlocked girl. She got a total of seventeen victories which if it weren’t for Aias winning all his matches, was astounding, it was high even when compared to other years standards for best student.

Jérmie also got a high score with fifteen won matches, however unlike during the race he didn’t voice any annoyance or even a challenge for next time to Midae. He instead looked as if he had gotten some enlightenment from today’s exercise and was organising his thoughts.

As Aias was sitting there wondering, a commotion started in the dining hall.

It appeared a dispute had begun with two of the older students. The two of them were around fourteen years old and it seemed they were fighting over a bet they had made in the wilderness a few days prior.

“You were the one who said it, ‘if you can catch a rainbow-tailed swallow I will give you this Sunsilk bowstring and if you can’t you must give me your Korgew potion.’ Well I have it now so give me the bowstring!” one of the seniors yelled at the other while waving a tiny bird in his hand. The bird was tiny fitting completely within his enclosed hand, and if carefully inspected you would notice its tail-feathers were set up as if in a rainbows color pattern.

“Pah! You think i’m going to give you my Sunsilk bowstring when you only claim you caught it, do you have anything that can prove you caught it yourself”, the other senior argued in a condescending and arrogant manner.

This caused the first senior to feel such fury that he almost crushed the little bird in his hand in rage. “You dare claim that I would ask for the help of others to win my bets!!”, the first senior bellowed out of him with the loudest voice he could muster.

Most of the children around at the moment where frightened stiff by his scream and started to back away while other older children got closer hoping to see a duel between the two.

Though the orphanage does have rules that prohibit fighting between students it starts allowing duels once children are over the age of eleven. The rules of a duel must be followed otherwise you may be thrown out of the orphanage and have to survive of what you’ve learned prematurely to when you would usually leave.

In order for a duel to begin two judges must be appointed. This means someone from the caretakers, which isn’t hard to get a hold of since they enjoy watching the children's duels. The rules of the duels are very easy, as long as you don’t aim with fatal or crippling attacks most methods are fine. There are obviously rules against sexual or perverted attacks since the children are going through puberty and doing something like that during combat would tarnish the honor and pride of the assaulted in a crooked way.

The judges are to make sure these rules are kept and also to see to that there isn’t any bullying happening during or after the duel. Some bullying is always part of losing but the judges will overlook that as something the kids have to experience in order to grow stronger and learn that when you lose it’s going to hurt.

“Fine then I will give you a chance to prove to me that you can catch a Rainbow-tailed swallow, here in front of everyone you must catch my arrow before it hits you”, the arrogant senior laughingly challenged the already angered first senior.

The first senior took a moment to calm himself down then asked, “How will that prove that i can catch the swallow?”

The arrogant senior mockingly smiled as he began to explain, “Oh that’s simple! I will regulate my arrow to have the same speed as that of a Rainbow-tailed swallow, and before you ask we will have the judges discern whether the speed is the same or not. If it’s above the swallows speed they will simply hit it out of the way from harming you and if it’s the same or below they will leave it for you to try and catch”.

Everyone seemed impressed by his reasoning. This would prove whether he could catch something as fast as a Rainbow-tailed swallow, a creature well know to be far faster than an arrow leaving the bow. Its max speed is recorded to be a hundred and fifty meters per second so if he can catch an arrow at that speed with his bare hands most will have to believe he could catch the bird.

And similar to an arrow the swallow’s wings and beak are sharp enough to cut on touch.

“And of course if you aren’t able to catch the arrow not only will you get hurt you will have to give me that Korgew potion and speak no further of trying to win my Sunsilk bowstring”, the arrogant senior added.

“Fine, we have a deal” was all the no longer angry but instead calm and focused senior responded with.

……

Quickly a shooting range of only 8 meters had been made, and two judges had been found to make certain all rules and promises were kept.

By now most of the younger children had left the hall as they didn’t want to see the bloody showdown between the seniors, some of the other seniors also felt the same as it wasn’t going to be pretty if the first senior was hit by an arrow going at the speed of a hundred and fifty meters per second.

The arrogant senior and the now calm senior were standing ready one with a large bow almost as tall as his own body and the other with protective gloves to help stop his fingers from being cut while catching the arrow.

“You may begin!”, one of the two judges which were standing ready to engage if the speed or trajectory were against the rules shouted out with extreme focus in his eyes.

The arrogant senior began drawing his bow, and as the bow was slowly being drawn so was the arrogant smile on the seniors face disappearing and was replaced with fierce, menacing concentration.

Before he had started drawing the bow many in the audience thought he may try to cheat by making the arrow change trajectory when getting close to the opponent or something else that was within the rules however seemed like cheating. However they could now tell that there was no way he would do something like that, what was in his eyes no longer appeared as arrogance but instead showed confidence. He was not going to do something like tarnish the name of his opponent, all he said earlier was to make his opponent get into this duel for the Sunsilk bowstring against the Korgew potion.

“T’chi”. The arrow left the bow with a sound that pierced the ears of those nearby, and but a moment later the arrow had passed the judges without them touching it.

Most in the crowd couldn’t even react to the arrow being fired much less see it. Even Aias who had trained his eyes for a long time couldn’t keep up with the speed and understood that if he was in the line of the arrow's trajectory he wouldn’t even be capable reacting to it much less dodging it.

But the first senior appeared different, he was still calm. But then as soon as it got within a meter of him his face and body turned fierce and he made a clawlike grab with his hand at the arrow’s tip. He had caught the arrow however now his hand was no longer at the tip, it instead had slid down to the middle of the arrow and the tip was only a few centimeters from piercing into his shoulder.

“Impressive! So you could catch the arrow, I didn’t expect that! It is my loss. You have won”, the senior who had just moments earlier been arrogant instead became very amiable and appeared to take it all as a simple fun show.

Of course no one of the children in this orphanage are especially rich so losing a Sunsilk bowstring would definitely be a hefty cost.

The two bowed to one another and seemed to have become a little closer after the duel. All the spectators also enjoyed the sportsmanship that was displayed and were applauding for the both of them.

Everything slowly went back to normal. People started getting ready for different lessons, or now after the excitement getting to eat their meals in peace.

Aias was a little confused at the end of the match so he decided to ask one of the caretakers who had just been a judge to the match, “Excuse me mister, but what is a Korgew potion?” he said in a very curious manner. Though Aias had studied a lot during his time at the orphanage he didn’t know much about potions so he had to find out its worth in the bet.

The caretaker looked at him, smiled because he was happy over the enthusiasm Aias showed for wanting to learn and the respect he was shown from the young child so he bent down and explained, “a Korgew potion is a low quality stimulant for your eyes, it helps archers see clearer. It’s only side effect is that it will cause tiredness 5 hours after use, and if overused will make your eyes turn red and become itchy”.

“I see so that’s why that senior wanted it so much he would bet spun Sunsilk” Aias pondered to himself with a serious expression.

Sunsilk is something spun by a wilderness beast known as Sunlight-moth, though the silk isn’t rare it is hard to spin into a proper bowstring so it can become quite pricy, plus killing Sunlight-moths isn’t without danger as they are wilderness beasts after all. A Sunsilk bowstrings price can definitely be compared to a low level stimulants.

This was a very interesting battle to Aias as he had never seen someone catch an arrow before nor had he ever been interested in archery so he didn’t know much about the power a bow can contain.

Most regular arrows fired from longbows are shot at a speed of sixty to a hundred meters per second, the reason this arrow was capable of gaining a speed up to one hundred and fifty meter per second was not only because of the quality bow and the power needed to pull it. But mainly from the energy technique used before the arrow left the string.

Energy techniques are not something Aias had practiced yet as he wasn’t old enough and it would hurt his body if he did. Aias could only wait longingly for the day the orphanage allowed his class to start training in special energies.