The Cold Rose's Winter, Part 16
Mark drew back the greatsword he had just swung, bringing the blade close to run his fingers lightly along its edge.
"My master told me never to use this method unless absolutely necessary," Mark said. "He said it is always best to keep one's hidden cards concealed until the very end. But to think I would be forced to use such a secret technique against a piece of trash like you..."
Rofel had no choice but to keep his distance and observe. The mysterious magic Mark had unleashed severely restricted his vision, and he could tell that Mark's movements were entirely different from before.
Rushing in blindly under these conditions would be nothing short of begging for defeat.
Suddenly, despite being inside a sub-space, the sheer force of Mark kicking off the ground shattered the floor, sending debris flying like dust as he lunged directly in front of Rofel.
It was an incredibly abrupt ambush, launched while Rofel's vision was completely blocked by the surrounding barrier of black light.
Fortunately, the moment Mark's greatsword breached the black barrier, Rofel reacted just in time, raising his mace to block the blow.
But it was a desperate defense at best. Unable to properly disperse the impact, the mace began to crack and splinter in several places.
Giving Rofel no time to breathe, Mark immediately followed up with a relentless flurry of strikes.
At this moment, all Rofel could do was push his concentration to its absolute limit, bracing himself to minimize the damage the instant the greatsword breached the black barrier.
With every heavy blow he blocked, the mace groaned and warped, its metal frame bending and crushing under the sheer weight of the onslaught.
Finally, Rofel pulled back his arm, giving up on using the weapon to block. Though the mace was exceptionally sturdy, he judged it was no longer capable of enduring Mark's devastating attacks.
Instead, he poured every ounce of his focus into dodging the blade entirely.
Yet, the speed of Mark's strikes was just as terrifying as their destructive weight.
It was far beyond the level of something he could dodge purely by sight. He had to predict the trajectory of the blade the split second it entered the barrier and move his body in advance just to barely slip past it.
Naturally, the mental and physical toll on Rofel was immense. At this rate, his stamina would bottom out, and he would eventually take a direct, fatal hit from one of those monstrous swings.
Rofel decided to take a gamble.
Mark was weaving in and out of the blinding black barrier, unleashing consecutive strikes. But even in this repetitive assault, a pattern was bound to emerge.
Though he couldn't be certain, he couldn't afford to let this disadvantageous stalemate drag on. Rofel had to make a choice.
As Mark vanished back into the darkness after a strike, Rofel predicted he would strike from that direction again. He unleashed a highly dense, high-speed magic sphere that possessed physical mass.
Even if it didn't inflict direct damage, it should at least disrupt Mark's rhythm and halt his relentless chain of attacks.
But this decision proved to be a fatal mistake.
Predicting Mark's movement and the direction of his next strike had been correct. However, the sheer power of Mark's current attacks far exceeded Rofel's wildest estimations.
The magic sphere, which Rofel had squeezed out a massive amount of mana to cast, was cleanly sliced in half by Mark's greatsword, dispersing harmlessly into the air.
Though Rofel desperately threw his body backward right after casting, it was already too late.
"Urgh...!"
A massive gash tore across Rofel's torso, spraying crimson blood into the air. Despite moving as fast as his reflexes allowed, the wound was incredibly deep.
Rofel hastily cast a healing spell. Since restoration magic wasn't his specialty, the effect was minimal, failing to completely stop the bleeding.
"Looks like this is finally wrapping up," Mark sneered.
He swung his greatsword through the air, flicking the blood off the blade. With a casual wave of his hand, the barrier of black light that had blinded Rofel vanished. It was as if he no longer deemed it necessary.
He began to take slow, deliberate steps forward, the sound of his footsteps echoing sharply in the empty sub-space.
"Damn it, I'm still not satisfied," Mark muttered. "To think I have to end this after only carving you up a few times. This is exactly why I didn't want to fight you in this state. You're so fragile that a light touch might kill you."
"Haa... haa..."
Clutching his chest where the blood still seeped, Rofel glared at the approaching Mark. His breathing was ragged, and his stamina was utterly depleted. Frankly, it was a miracle he was even standing on his own two feet. Yet, his eyes refused to yield, burning with a fierce, unextinguished will.
"...You really are arrogant," Mark said.
He pointed the tip of his greatsword directly at Rofel's throat. A single thrust, and Rofel's head would be severed from his shoulders.
"I'll show you one last mercy. Kneel... no, crawl on the ground and beg. If you do, I'll make sure you survive this. Barely."
"...Screw you...!" Rofel spat.
With trembling hands, Rofel gripped the mangled lump of iron that could barely be called a mace anymore. In his other hand, he conjured a tiny flame, too pathetic to even be called a fireball.
"Ha... Do you still not get it? The difference in our abilities is night and day," Mark scoffed. "Right now, I enjoy the favor of Principal Rium Kitokal of this academy. Furthermore, my master, the head of the Serion family, Regulus Serion, has personally guaranteed that my talent surpasses all others. On top of that, the current Magic Tower Master, Shangri Kshatri, highly values my magical aptitude. In terms of both reputation and skill, those who can surpass me can be counted on one hand."
"But what about you? Until the end of the semester, I didn't even know a student like you existed. The other students and the faculty probably felt the same. Your family is mediocre, and your skills are even more pathetic. Do you honestly think a nobody like you can defeat me?"
"What... did you say...!"
"Is it really that complicated? Everyone likes to deny it, but our ranks are decided the moment we are born. Geniuses live the lives of geniuses, and those at the bottom must live at the bottom. A talentless, mediocre fool—no, someone even worse than that—should know his place and rot at the very bottom."
"...You've been spouting nothing but garbage since the start," Rofel wheezed. "What is talent anyway? What's wrong with being mediocre? Are you saying... that people like me, who have no talent, are doomed to live our entire lives in defeat?!"
"And is that wrong?" Mark asked, as if genuinely puzzled.
"Studying under Lord Regulus Serion made me realize something," Mark continued. "If a world existed where someone born with everything could lose to a nobody who started with nothing, wouldn't that world be the one that's broken and unfair? In fact, I think it's incredibly shameless for someone born with nothing to even dream of defeating those born superior. So no matter how hard you struggle, it's all meaningless. Any effort you can put in, a genius can easily match."
"Shameless, huh..." Rofel muttered. "Without a prestigious family, wealth, or exceptional ability, trying to change my fate might indeed look that way to you. My desperate struggles might seem pathetic. The harder I ran, the faster the geniuses pulled away. I admit, the way I look right now is undoubtedly ugly. But that is still no reason for me to stop struggling..."
Though he gasped for breath as if he might collapse at any second, Rofel did not stop speaking.
"...I don't struggle because I'm expecting some grand reward. I simply refuse to stop building, block by block, to make today slightly better than yesterday, and tomorrow slightly better than today. And it's not just me. Everyone else, in their own way and in their own fields, is fighting with everything they have to live and move forward. Even if they can never reach the heights of your so-called 'geniuses,' they still strive for a better life."
"Even Seraphina Serion, despite knowing she is overwhelmingly less talented than you, has never stopped training to this very day. I cannot, and will not, forgive you for looking down on the lives of people like that."
His arms and legs shook, and his voice trembled, but Rofel was unmistakably shouting directly at Mark.
"I... I will defeat you here and now! No, I will win! I will beat you and prove once and for all that my struggles, and the struggles of everyone else, are not in vain!"
"All talk and no skill," Mark sneered. "No matter what you say, the mediocre can never defeat a genius in this world. The world is run by the decisions of the victors, and victory belongs to the geniuses. In the end, it is the genius who claims everything. How dare a loser like you try to grasp anything?"
Mark clicked his tongue in disgust.
"I've been wondering this for a while, but why do you hate me so much?" Rofel rasped. "Or... is it that I have something in my hands that you could never obtain?"
It wasn't an intentional jab; it was merely an unconscious sarcasm slipping from Rofel's fading consciousness. Yet, those words struck Mark exactly where it hurt.
"...What did you just say?"
Mark lowered his sword and grabbed Rofel by the collar. Though slightly startled by the sudden, violent reaction, Rofel didn't stop.
"Did I accidentally hit a nerve? To think the rising star of our academy, with all his talent, actually failed to get something. Don't tell me it has something to do with me? ...Well, whatever it is, if it's true, then you've already lost to me once. Because a mediocre fool—no, a piece of trash even lower than that—managed to obtain what a genius never could."
"...You son of a bitch!"
Mark kicked Rofel hard in the stomach, sending him crashing to the ground. As Rofel lay sprawled on the floor, Mark began to rain punches down on his face, over and over again.
This could no longer be called a duel, let alone a fight. It was a one-sided beating fueled purely by personal, petty malice.
Teeth shattered, his nose broke, and blood flowed freely. Only when Rofel was reduced to a battered, bloody mess barely clinging to breath did Mark finally stop.
"...Haa... haa... You arrogant bastard...!"
Even after beating him to a pulp, Mark's rage remained unappeased. How could he break this bastard? How could he make him feel the same humiliating misery?
"...Come to think of it, I need to decide what to do with Seraphina Serion."
The moment that name left his lips, Rofel flinched.
Yes. This is it.
"Yes, Seraphina. Seraphina Serion. What should I do with her...?" Mark mused. "Now that I think about it, I don't know what happened between you two, but you seemed to have gotten quite close. I even heard rumors that you spend every night together until late... I was wondering why you suddenly challenged me to a duel that day. Did you two already go all the way?"
Rofel's fists clenched in a surge of fury.
"Well, that's a real shame," Mark sneered. "Because the result of this duel, which was arranged to decide her fate, will end in my victory. As a prime candidate for the next head of the family, I will take Seraphina as my wife and marry into the Serion family. Tell me, how does it feel to watch the woman you love become another man's possession?"
"In just a few days, I'll be summoning my future wife to my bedchamber. She might resist fiercely at first, but under the pressure of her family and my authority, she'll end up spreading her legs for me."
"In a way, it's almost tragic. A woman who spent her entire life training to become the family head, only to end up offering her body to a man of superior strength. Or perhaps she'll take pride in it, since it's ultimately for the good of her family?"
Rofel's body began to writhe. Even as he lay defeated on the ground, his fists trembled with pure, unadulterated rage. Delighted by this reaction, Mark pressed on.
"Well, I'm a generous man. It's a shame she's secondhand goods, but her face and body are decent enough. Her build is a bit too large and masculine for my taste, but she'll do to 'use' every now and then. Oh, but don't worry. If you want, I can let you watch exactly how I handle her."
"...You... bastard...!"
Just then, the sound of space warping echoed from one side of the sub-space. It was the distinct sound that accompanied the opening of a portal.
And standing in the direction of that sound was a woman—Seraphina Serion.