Tossing caution to the wind, I tossed my leather pack off to the side and dashed towards Gavin while pulling out my sword. Aiming at his neck, I swept my sword in a horizontal arc, wanting to decapitate him but he had the time to pull out his sword to block my blow. Exerting strength into my right arm, I pushed him off to the side slightly and continued past him onto the wooden bridge. Stopping in front of the torch, I fiercely kicked it off the bridge and sent it flying into The Pit’s abyss. Unfortunately, the fire had already started spreading by the time I got to it.

Before I could start stomping the embers out beneath my boot, I had to spin around and raise my shield to block Gavin’s blow. I wanted to counterattack with a stab to his chest but he planted his own boot right into my chest and sent me stumbling backwards. Catching myself on the bridge’s guard railing that only reaches up to my waist, the creaking from the wooden structure jostling fills me with terror. Glancing over the side of the railing, only darkness awaits below us.

Pulling myself up, I try to bait Gavin with feints to the left and right side of the walkway but he’s not biting on any of it. The bridge we’re on is wide enough for three or four people to walk on it at the same time if they’re shoulder to shoulder but Gavin has stationed himself directly in the center, blocking me from the rapidly growing embers a few feet behind him. He’s standing upright with his knees bent and his feet spread out while he’s holding his sword sort of limply in his right hand. His left hand is empty and ready at a moment’s notice to grab onto whatever he pleases. This is Gavin’s own style and I’ve seen it enough times to know how deadly it is.

After learning swordplay from multiple people, I’ve become acutely aware of different swordplay styles having unique characteristics that I must pay attention to or else I’d get my ass kicked. Take Derriv for instance. The best way I can describe Derriv’s sword is it’s like a tempest. Whenever we’d train together, he’d constantly try to overwhelm me with a flurry of strikes like a fierce gale. As I kept trying to defend each attack, I’d get swept into his pace and all of a sudden, without realizing it, I’d be lost inside a furious storm, forced to weather his onslaught.

Or Angelene even. Angelene fights like a bolt of lightning, incredibly fast and incredibly violent. She really likes catching people off guard by standing perfectly still one moment and then lunging at their face with the tip of her blade the next. She even times her attacks with her opponent’s blinks which makes her really difficult to fight against. One second she’s standing there, motionless, and then the next, she has her sword an inch away from my eye.

Both Quinn and Wraine feel similar in how they fight which makes sense considering Quinn taught Wraine how to fight. Whenever I fight either of them, it feels like there’s an enormous mountain pressing down on my chest, suffocating me with its sheer weight and pressure. Both of them love getting into power battles because of their natural physical strength and most of the time, they easily win them. One mistake, one mistiming, one misjudgment, and that’s all it takes for them to emerge victorious.

Bertrand, who I’ve had the most experience fighting and whose style I’ve incorporated into my own the most, is like a swamp. He fights in a way that bogs the opponent down and stops them from moving the way they want to. All the little trips, the different foot positionings, the range control, and the timing interruptions are designed to seal off the opponent’s strengths and their plan of action. Without being able to fight the way they want to, all they can do is slowly let themselves get swallowed up into the vast swamp.

Gavin is unlike anyone I’ve ever fought before. Every time I watched him fight Vipers over these past few weeks, he’s always surprised me with his clean, lethal strikes. He’s not as fast or as overwhelming as Derriv. He’s not instantaneous like Angelene. He’s not as powerful or overbearing as Quinn and Wraine. And he’s not as suffocating with his sword as Bertrand.

Instead, he’s careful and accurate, which isn’t good for me since I’m the one who’s in a rush. When I walk up to him and slash at his neck, he backs off and gives me space, watching me carefully with a smirk on his face. I do the same thing again and he backs off again. When the embers are right behind him, he takes a glance down at his feet and scoffs at me. Seeing what he’s going to do now, I lunge forward and stab at his face. Rather than backing off again, he lunges forward as well and aims his blade at my heart.

Realizing he’ll kill me before I can kill him, I have to stop myself and raise my shield over my chest, the point of his blade scraping against the wood. At the same time, he raises his empty left hand towards my face while murmuring something, filling me with confusion before ending his whispering with a scream, “Flare!” Taking a desperate step back, I’m shocked to see an orange flame manifest in the center of his palm that instantly grows to the size of an apple before exploding towards my face. This fucker hid his fire magic from me for how long!? Forcing my eyes shut, I brace myself for the impact as waves of heat crash into my face, the flames scorching me for an instant before dissipating.

When I open my eyes again, I see his blade inches from my throat. Knowing my shield won’t make it in time, I try my best to lean as far away from the lethal strike as possible while whipping my sword upwards to batter it away from me. When I make contact with his sword, I feel a gentle nudge on my chest and before I know it, I’m on the ground, on my back, and defenseless. The moment my back lands on the bridge, I whip my left foot at his ankles, trying to sweep his feet out from under him and get us back on a level playing field. Gavin firms his leg and withstands the blow, ignoring it before stomping his foot onto my shield arm and stabbing at my unprotected chest.

Looking up at him, I scream, “Flash!” only to have him close his eyes and briefly hesitate his attack. That incredibly brief moment of hesitation is all I needed. Reversing the grip on my sword, I stab the tip of my blade into his right calf, earning a guttural scream from him as he tries to retreat from me, taking my sword with him. When his eyes shoot open in pain, I close my own and cast Flash, for real this time.

I was trying my best not to use any magic in front of Fold members ever since I made The Climb so that I could keep it hidden for a rainy day. I did a pretty damn good job of it up until the Vipers attacked the citadel and I had to cast Flash once to blind Layton’s horse. Gavin was only a few yards behind Layton at the time so I expected him to know about Flash and to appropriately prepare himself in case we ever fought. From his reaction, it looks like he even knew I didn’t need an incantation to cast the spell.

As Gavin tried to get away from me, fully blinded by my spell, I got back to my feet and dashed at him. Hearing me, he desperately stabbed towards my direction while still blinded. Deflecting his sword with my shield, I follow up by backhanding my shield across his face, sending him to the ground. After kicking his sword out of his hands, I tear my blade out of his calf, mutilating his leg and eliciting an ear piercing shriek from him. Straddling his chest, I sink my blade into his heart, Gavin taking a deep breath in shock. Seeing him slowly dying with short, shuddering breaths, I leaned closer to his ear and whispered, “Nice try, Gavin.”

Twisting the blade in his heart, he let out one final grunt filled with pain before dying. Grabbing onto his face, I push myself off his body while sliding my sword out of his chest. Fuck, the bridge. Turning back, I rush over to the growing embers and stomp each of them out of existence, the bottom of my boots rapidly heating up with each fire I put out. When all the embers are out, I breathe a sigh of relief seeing there’s no real structural damage on the wooden bridge.

Giving Gavin one last glance, I turn away from him and walk to the middle of the platform. Operating The Vessel’s controls like I saw Yoel doing, the wooden box slowly descends into The Pit. While I’m doing all this, I turn to look at all the fires still spreading throughout the citadel. There’s people now trying to carry buckets from the wells to put out the fires but they have a tough job ahead of them.

After The Vessel reached the bottom of The Pit and wouldn’t go any lower, I waited for two minutes before switching the winch controls and bringing it back up. The whole process takes several minutes and each passing second I feel more nervous, afraid I’m going to face severe resistance. But the whole time, I don’t see a soul. When The Vessel finally returns, I see 20 people packed tightly inside the wooden box.

Smirking, I make sure the controls are tightly secured otherwise my reinforcements will go plummeting to their deaths. Walking over and opening The Vessel’s hatch, I grab a hold of Hawthorne’s hand and pull him out. The entire time he’s looking at me incredulously, like he can’t believe what’s happening. As the rest of The Vessel occupants, including Slyvia, file out, Hawthorne looks all around him at The Vessel, the platform we’re on, and the night sky above him in awe.

Breaking out of his astonishment, he looks at me and brightly smiles, saying, “I can’t fucking believe it. You fucking… you said you’d do it. And you did. I… I don’t know how to thank you, I…”

“Well, hold onto that for now. We’re not out of the woods yet. As you can see,” I gesture all the way around us at the spreading flames, “we still have a bit of work to do.”

Grinning at me, he replies, “Yeah, but there’s no fucking way in hell I’ll let us fail when we’re at the finish line.”

As the first batch stand off to the side, experiencing their newfound freedom in different ways, I operate The Vessel again for the next batch. Some of the people around me are excited, happy to be free from The Pit at last. Some are sobbing, glad that their worst nightmare has ended. Some are bloodthirsty, unable to contain themselves with the thought of getting revenge on their kidnappers.

It took four trips to get everyone out of The Pit but I did it and more than 60 people stood on the suspended platform in front of me which might not have been an oversight from me. Jonas and Jonathan were in the second batch with Uda and his boys and the only survivor from Corbin’s clique who I made a deal with came in the last batch along with a strange, raving individual who wasn’t wearing any pants. Giving him a questioning look, Hawthorne explained, “We got your note to stay away from the water and get ready to leave tonight but we were curious what would happen if someone drank the water. We played a little game amongst ourselves and he lost. You weren’t joking about the water.”

“... Right, just make sure he doesn’t fall over the railing as we get off this thing.”

I led my reinforcements off the platform and we walked past Gavin’s body. Everyone gave him a couple of glances and looked towards me. I only shrugged at them in return. The moment his feet landed in the earth though, Hawthorne burst into tears and got down on his hands and feet, kissing the dirt. His reaction elicited similar responses from people who have been in The Pit for years while the newer ones only looked on solemnly, lost in their own thoughts. These people have been robbed of years of their lives and it’s only right they get an opportunity to express that resentment.