The Ninth Wonder-Chapter 31: The black winter (6)

The knight stood motionless between them, its black armour gleaming faintly under the pale ravine light. Cracks spiderwebbed across its chest plate where Vernox’s flaming blade had bitten deep earlier; frost leaked from the fissures like slow-bleeding smoke. For the first time since the fight began, it did not advance. It did not speak. It simply... waited.

Harley tightened his grip on the silver sword, breath fogging in sharp bursts, still sitting on the ground. Vernox stood a few paces ahead, black curved blade still wreathed in low, hungry flames that hissed against the unnatural cold.

The knight raised one gauntleted hand—slow, almost weary—and grasped the edge of its helmet.

A low metallic groan sounded as it pulled.

The visor lifted away.

No face greeted them.

Only darkness stared back—an empty, bottomless hollow where a head should have been. Wind howled instantly from within the void, a freezing gale that exploded outward in every direction. Harley staggered, boots skidding on suddenly slick ice; Vernox planted his feet and leaned into the blast, his black cloak snapping violently behind him.

The cold wind sliced through clothing, through skin, straight into bone. The ravine walls frosted over in seconds. Skeletons rattled harder, their empty sockets seeming to glint with sudden interest. Harley’s teeth chattered; he could feel the chill trying to crawl inside his lungs through his open wound.

Vernox snarled through clenched teeth.

"Ruin answers ruin." The sword flared up in bright flames upon uttering it’s verse.

The heat constantly clashed with the cold and Vernox approached the knight a step at a time.

The knight still held its sword, remaining still.

Vernox raised the black blade high. The runes along its length flared brighter—crimson, then white-hot. Thick flames roared to life, licking up the curved edge and wrapping the steel in a mantle of fire that fought back against the frost. Steam exploded where heat met ice; the air around the sword warped and shimmered.

The knight tilted its empty helm once, almost curiously.

Vernox charged.

Flames trailed behind him like comet tails. Each step cracked the forming ice beneath his boots, but the cold was faster now—greedy tendrils of frost snaked up his calves, slowing him, locking joints. Still he pressed forward, sword blazing and fighting against the ice, eyes fixed on the hollow darkness beneath the helmet.

Harley moved the instant Vernox did.

Vanishing from the place he laid. Vernox gasped, expressing shock as he felt a presence behind him and he knew it was Harley, even if he couldn’t see him.

Vernox reached striking distance.

The knight raised both arms in a slow, deliberate cross—wirldinh the sword. Frost surged from the ground in jagged spears, spearing toward Vernox’s legs. The flames on the black blade roared in defiance, melting spear-tips into hissing steam, but the ice kept coming, thicker, faster. Vernox’s boots froze solid to the ravine floor. He roared, twisting to swing—

—and in that split second of distraction, something moved from behind Vernox. Manifesting into reality as a person.

He planted one foot on the back of Vernox’s thigh—using his friend like a springboard—and vaulted high.

Time seemed to stretch.

The knight’s empty helm turned toward the sudden motion.

Harley twisted in mid-air, silver sword flashing silver-white under the weak ravine light. Every muscle screamed as he brought the blade down in a single, brutal arc—two hands, full body weight, all the rage and cold determination he had carried since the pirate ship.

The edge met the base of the knight’s neck with a sound like an axe splitting frozen wood.

*Crack.*

Black metal parted as he sliced off the helmet permanently. There was no blood whatsoever, the snow seemed to stop as the knight stopped moving.

Only a long, hollow sigh escaped the void as the helmet—and the nothing inside it—tumbled free.

The headless body stood for one heartbeat longer.

Then it collapsed.

Armour clattered against ice in pieces, frost exploding outward in a final dying pulse before it simply... stopped. The wind died. The cold retreated like a receding tide. The ravine went unnaturally still.

Harley landed hard on both knees, sword tip driven into the ground to keep himself upright. His arms shook. Blood—his own—trickled from a split lip and dripped onto the frost.

Vernox wrenched one leg free of the thawing ice with a grunt, flames on his blade guttering low but still alive. He stared at the scattered armour, then at Harley.

For a long moment neither spoke.

Then Vernox let out a rough, exhausted laugh.

"Remind me again who chose this particular target and almost killed us?"

Harley instantly felt a killing intent coming from Vernox as his golden gaze met him.

Harley wiped blood from his chin with the back of his hand. Then he smirked, trying to stand up.

All of a sudden his vision went blurry and he collapsed onto the ground.

"Hey!"

Vernox dismissed the black blade and a symbol burned onto his arm, the symbol of a ring of fire.

Around them, the skeletons finally stopped rattling. The ravine felt smaller somehow—quieter, emptier.

Vernox lifted Harley slowly, walking out of the ravine with steady steps.

Harley, who still had consciousness, let himself relax as Vernox carried him on piggyback. He knew he would be safe in the hands of someone like Vernox.

...

"Ungh." Harley grunted, waking up to see a brown fabric ceiling over his head.

He stared at it with stern eyes, and just then, the events that transpired before he went unconscious resurfaced in his mind and he sprung up.

"Ahhh!"

He looked to the side, seeing a woman who fell on her bosom as she was startled by Harley.

"Who are you?" Harley asked, looking around for his sword.

The possibility of being kidnapped was high as the entire trial was created to kill him. So this person in front of him could be trying to kill him.

A killing intent surged from his body, washing over the lady on the ground. She whimpered and she looked up at him and then, the entrance of the tent fluttered open as two figures walked in.

"Calm down Harley." Vernox’s voice made him relax instantly and Harley finally smiled, letting relief wash over him.

Beside Vernox he saw a woman who had a blindfold on her, but she was looking directly at him with a smile.

"Leave Uma." The woman spoke in a calm voice, and the woman who was tending to Harley left the tent.

"Harley, this is the Seer that is with the princess. I know you haven’t rested well, but the scenario is about to end."

Harley’s shoulder fell in dejection as he sighed tiredly...