The moment the knight lunged, the air shifted—sharp, silent, suffocating. His wooden sword cut through the green-lit silence dome with such speed that Wesley barely caught the movement.
A whistle pierced the air as the weapon swept toward his neck like a crescent of death.
Wesley ducked.
Barely.
A strand of his hair floated down from the breeze of that strike. His heart punched against his ribcage as he twisted away, boots scraping against the arena floor, lungs burning with disbelief.
That wasn't a sparring strike.
That was a kill shot.
The knight wasn't holding back. He wasn't teaching. He was attacking like Wesley was a monster to be culled.
"What the hell—!" Wesley blurted out, panic flashing across his face.
But the knight gave no pause, no warning, and no mercy. Another slash came down diagonally.
Wesley instinctively jumped to the left, rolling over his shoulder and scrambling back to his feet. But the moment he stood—
WHACK!
A horizontal slash roared toward his gut, and Wesley twisted, bending just enough to feel the wind skim across his shirt. Another strike immediately followed, this one aimed at his legs.
Wesley jumped. Another one at his shoulder. He ducked again.
It was relentless.
The wooden sword screamed through the air with every swing, each one fast enough to whistle.
Wesley wasn't thinking anymore—just reacting, muscles moving on pure survival instinct.
The knight's movements were not only fast but calculated—he left no rhythm, no pattern, nothing for Wesley to read. It was a tempest of unbroken aggression.
Slash. Evade.
Strike. Twist.
Thrust. Roll.
His mop clattered once as he deflected a blow out of sheer reflex, the wooden handle vibrating against his sweaty palms. His heart slammed against his ribs like a war drum.
His breath came in quick, sharp gasps. He hadn't been in a fight like this before. Not even close. Not even in games.
This is real, he realized. This guy's going to kill me.
There was no teaching here. This was a punishment.
And yet, he couldn't help but marvel at the knight's sheer presence. His footwork was minimal yet decisive, every step efficient, every swing clean.
He didn't need mana to dominate this space—he was the storm in the eye of it.
The man's discipline screamed from every movement. Even his offhand was ready, calm, precise.
And Wesley?
Wesley was surviving.
Barely.
He somersaulted back, giving himself some distance. His boots slid across the arena floor, and he landed into a crouch, sweat pouring down his brow as he lifted his mop again, pointing it like a spear.
The knight laughed.
"Oh no," the man said mockingly, wiping imaginary tears. "The mighty janitor points his broom at me."
Wesley stood his ground.
The knight raised an eyebrow, voice now sharp and cutting like glass. "Do you even hear yourself? This is how low you've fallen? This is why your noble family threw you away! Not because you had no mana—but because you're arrogant. You lie. You hide behind a fake image. You don't even give your all."
Wesley blinked, still catching his breath.
"You don't fight to win," the knight continued, circling him now, slow and sure like a predator with all the time in the world. "You fight to get by. You fake humility, hoping people underestimate you. That is not grit. That is cowardice. And let me tell you what I see—"
He stopped, pointing his wooden sword toward Wesley's chest.
"I see a brat. A noble who ran away from pressure. Who thought swinging a mop and earning pity would be enough to avoid trying."
Wesley flinched at that. The words hit far harder than the wooden sword ever could.
"And you know what pisses me off the most?" the knight growled, stepping forward now. "You've got something. Technique. Spirit. You dodge with your hips, not your legs. You read my movements with your body, not your eyes. Somewhere, someone trained you. But you wasted it all by pretending to be helpless!"
Wesley was stunned silent.
"That's not humility. That's disrespect!"
And then, without warning, the knight attacked again.
Wesley wasn't ready.
He barely raised his mop in time as the wooden blade came at his side—clack!—the parry sent shivers up his arms. But the knight didn't stop. He slashed again, this time vertically, and Wesley jumped back. Another one—a side swing. Wesley ducked.
He tried to reply, but the knight's voice shouted through the silence dome.
"Why aren't you talking, Janitor?! Come on! Where's that clever tongue of yours?!"
He slashed again—faster.
Wesley couldn't speak. He had to focus just to stay alive. The knight's shouts were ringing, loud and constant. Taunts. Provocations.
"You think I can't see it?! You're not trying! You want me to stop! That's your plan, right?! If you play weak, I'll walk away?!"
Another strike. Another dodge.
It didn't stop.
"You're not dumb, young Janitor! You're manipulative! You don't want help! You want escape!"
Wesley couldn't deny it. Not when he was nearly getting his skull cracked.
Another strike.
The knight's voice roared this time.
"You're not even listening! Because you think you're better!"
Wesley spun around just in time to block. His mop hit the sword midair. The pressure made his arms tremble. Sweat dripped from his jaw.
And then it hit him—the knight was being loud on purpose.
His rhythm, his shouting—it wasn't to instruct.
It was to distract.
Wesley's eyes widened.
Shit. He's talking to shut my brain down. So I stop thinking. So I react slower. So I get hit.
It was working. Every word sank into his skull like poison, robbing him of clarity, of presence.
He's attacking me like a wild beast—breaking my rhythm while overwhelming my senses.
The moment of realization passed, but it gave him the briefest window of awareness—and that, alone, let him duck under the next strike just a little faster.
His knees buckled. But he didn't fall. He raised his mop again. Not as a shield, but as a statement.
The knight halted. Just for a second.
And Wesley, with a shaky breath, met his gaze.
No words.
No bravado.
Just a mop, pointed forward.
He wasn't ready to win. And sure as hell wouldn't lose standing still.
Outside the barrier of green flames and pulsing silence, a murmur of unease spread among the students.
They had watched the dome rise—majestic, imposing—and seal Wesley and the knight inside as if the rest of the world had no right to witness what would follow.
"What are they talking about in there?" one of the students asked, craning their neck to see past the wall of glowing energy.
Instructor Heiron stood unmoving, his arms crossed, eyes like flint locked onto the dome. "You are not permitted to know," he said, voice steady, but something deep in his tone suggested more weight than usual. "This is a private matter. For the sake of his growth. If—if he has any potential to awaken his Mana… this will bring it out."
Gabe, however, wasn't buying that.
He stared hard at the barrier, his brows knit together. There was something off. His gut screamed it.
He wasn't a genius like others, nor someone hailed by the Academy as a future prodigy. But he was attuned—sensitive. And right now, everything about that dome felt off.
"It's not just that," Gabe muttered.
The girls beside him blinked.
"Huh?"
Gabe didn't answer. His fists clenched at his side.
There's something about him, he thought. That janitor. That Wesley.
He didn't know what it was. But when they fought earlier—he remembered that moment. That moment where his Mana was suppressed for a second. It hadn't made sense. It still didn't. Wesley hadn't even used Mana. Or… had he?
Maybe it wasn't that Wesley lacked Mana. Maybe he was hiding something.
Inside the dome, the arena was silent save for breathless tension and the sound of boots scraping against stone.
The knight stood tall, his blade relaxed at his side, gaze sharp as ever. Wesley, on the other hand, stood tense, sweat dripping down his temple, chest rising and falling like a storm inside him was barely contained.
Then the knight smirked.
"Aren't you going to run?" he asked.
Wesley's eyes twitched.
The knight stepped forward, not attacking yet, just talking—probing, needling. "That's what you've always done, right? That's what your family expected. When they sent you away, you didn't even fight it. You just left. Quietly. No honor. No dignity."
Wesley's jaw clenched.
"You think they care if you die here?" the knight continued, his voice growing louder, venomous. "They won't even notice. You're a discarded heir. An embarrassment."
Wesley didn't move.
"You've got nothing. Not even mana. You're just sweeping floors. A noble that couldn't cut it."
And then the knight's voice turned sharp as a blade.
"You're a disgrace."
Something inside Wesley snapped.
A nerve. A fuse. Whatever it was, it cracked, then exploded.
This bastard—this smug bastard was saying it like it was true.
Like Wesley didn't matter.
Wesley had tried to be low-key, to stay out of trouble. He had lied his way through situations. He didn't want the spotlight; he didn't want to fight. He wanted to keep his system hidden, to be overpowered while chilling.
You know, do some missions and then voilà—get stronger. He was satisfied with that; he wouldn't care about anything as long as he was fine.
But now?
This?
At first, he just wanted to be courteous by leaving early for the other arena and other system missions, but the instructor on the side didn't let him. Wesley couldn't say no because this instructor admired him as a person, so he let things go.
Yet, even that has its limits, and he couldn't take it anymore.
He cannot allow himself to be treated this way, by this bastard in front of him.
The knight smirked. "Even if you survive me, you'll still be a janitor. A lowly cleaner. A servant forgotten by history."
"Fuck you," Wesley growled.
His voice was low. Quiet. Deadly.
And then he moved.
With force.
"Fuck. You. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!"
His mop shot forward like a spear. The knight raised his sword to block—but the mop twisted, spiraled, and then cracked against the blade with unnatural power. The knight's arms shuddered as the sheer weight of the blow pushed him back two steps.
What the—?!
Wesley advanced again, screaming.
His mop became a storm.
It wasn't just a weapon. It was his rage.
The shaft whipped and stabbed, stabbed and slammed. Wesley didn't hold back anymore. Every technique he had learned from watching martial arts videos, from his previous life, from shadow sparring with brooms back home—they all poured into his strikes.
His footwork was clean, refined. Forward steps heavy, balanced by precise pivoting. The mop flowed like a glaive—extended thrusts aimed for joints, ankles, the knight's ribs.
The knight couldn't keep up.
"What the hell is this—?!" he grunted, blocking desperately, backpedaling. The blows weren't just erratic rage—they were controlled, intentional.
And sharp.
He felt it now.
Every time their weapons met, he lost ground.
And Wesley?
He looked furious.
The knight tried to retake initiative, slashing low—but Wesley spun, using the mop's length to bat the sword aside, then stepped in and jammed the mop handle straight into the knight's gut.
"Urgh!"
The knight stumbled, breath lost, eyes wide.
Wesley was screaming again.
"YOU WANT TO TALK ABOUT HONOR?!"
Another jab to the shoulder.
"ABOUT BLOODLINE?!"
A spinning strike that the knight barely blocked, his arms screaming from the impact.
"YOU DON'T KNOW ME!"
Wesley thrust the mop so fast, the knight had no time to parry. It slammed into his chest and launched him backward.
The knight skidded across the floor, landing hard, breath ragged.
His sword clattered beside him.
Wesley approached, still breathing like a beast. Eyes wild. The mop pointed downward.
One more attack.
Just one more—
"I… admit defeat," the knight gasped.
His voice was hoarse, but clear.
Wesley froze, mop trembling in his grip.
The green flames around the dome flickered. Silent energy pulsed. Instructor Heiron watched without a word.
And slowly, Wesley exhaled.
Not from relief, but from restraint. His restraint.