Riven leapt forward, fast — but missed.
Hibana bent backward, letting the blade hiss over his face, then cartwheeled away across the dirt.
The two began to circle.
The bandits who had stayed behind closed in, forming a loose perimeter around them, shouting and jeering. They cheered Riven and mocked Hibana in equal measure.
"You're not an F-tier at all!" Riven snarled. "Stop concealing your real stats!"
Hibana never took his eyes off him.
"You're right," he said quietly. "I'm not human either.But everything else you see — that's real.And it's all you'll get."
Riven lunged again.Hibana dodged, letting the blade flash past his ribs.
"I really don't wish to fight you, Riven," Hibana said, breath steady. "I meant what I said."
Riven growled low in his throat.He dropped into a tight, compact stance — and began spinning his swords like twin windmills, each arc faster than the last.
Hibana tried to back away — but one of the bandits shoved him roughly, forcing him back into the makeshift arena.
He had no choice.
Hibana drew his short sword.
The blade still bore faint stains of Dekar's blood.
The scent of it curled into Hibana's nostrils.
He exhaled and a small, faint trace of smoke emitted from between his gnashed teeth.
No! Hibana thought. I am not going to be what they say I am! I am not a monster!
I was Tetsuo Arata!I was given the name Hibana — a woman's name, an insult!They told me what I would be the very day I was born!
I am Hibana.I am a dragon.I am not a monster.I am a powerful beast born in fire!
If I kill this man, then Hibana the monster is all I will ever be.I must remember what Tsu taught me!
Hibana raised his sword.He watched Riven's swirling blades — no gaps, no openings.
Still, Hibana ran forward.
Not to wound.Not to kill.
To interrupt.
Hibana's blade caught Riven's — but Riven immediately kicked him to the ground.
Riven swung both blades down toward him.
Hibana rolled sideways, gritting his teeth, and punched Riven squarely in the face.
Riven staggered back, blinking blood from his eyes, but regained his composure almost instantly.
"Definitely not an F-tier!" Riven spat, blood trailing from the corner of his mouth."That punch felt like a horse kicked my face!"
Hibana scrambled to his feet, raising his sword again.
"Please!" he begged. "Don't make me do this, Riven!I'm telling you — I want you to join me!It's you who would make Hearthflame stronger!"
Riven cocked an eyebrow."Hearthflame?What kind of stupid shit name is that?!"
He pulled a kunai from his belt and flung it without warning.
The blade struck Hibana's kneecap with a sickening thud.
Riven smiled as Hibana screamed — a raw, tearing sound that ripped across the makeshift arena.
The pain exploded up and down Hibana's leg like wildfire.
Hibana dropped to the ground, gasping, smoke curling in thin, angry wisps from between his clenched teeth.
Riven smirked, strolling toward him with casual arrogance — savoring every step like a man already measuring his victory.
Hibana's hands dug into the dirt. His body shook. His mind buckled against the onslaught.
"I must! Not! Give in!" Hibana roared aloud — his voice cracking like a whip across the field.
Riven faltered mid-step — just a half-second, just half a breath — but it was there.A ripple of something cold running down his spine.Not fear. Not yet.But the first ghost of it.
Hibana shoved himself upright, muscles screaming, blood streaming down his ruined leg.
He ripped the kunai from his kneecap with a brutal jerk and hurled it aside —
— and as it clattered uselessly into the dirt, Hibana staggered to his feet.
His eyes blazed green, raw and unnatural.His nostrils poured out smoke in thick, choking puffs.His body was trembling — but not from fear.From the monstrous force he was keeping caged behind his ribs.
"What the hell are you?!" Riven barked, a flicker of real uncertainty breaking into his voice.
Another kunai whistled through the air — fast, precise —
— but Hibana batted it aside with the back of his hand, barely flinching, as if swatting away an insect.
He smiled — not kindly.Not humanly.
"If I had a gold coin for every time I've heard that..." Hibana rasped, his voice deeper now, roughened by the fire he was choking back.
He raised his sword slowly.His whole body seemed to hum with suppressed fury.
"I'm losing control, Riven," he said, his voice low and rumbling like an earthquake buried under skin."I'm losing my patience."
"I beg you —"Hibana's eyes flared brighter, and the ground seemed to crack slightly under his foot as he shifted his stance.
"If you keep pushing me...
I don't know what will happen."
Riven scoffed.
"You're just some monster in a human skin.A doppelganger, maybe... I don't give a damn."
He sneered as he circled closer, blades flashing in the firelight.
"I've killed hundreds, freak. What's one more?"
Riven's grin widened, mock-sweet, dripping contempt.
"Tell you what, firecrotch.After I put you out of your misery..."
He leaned in slightly, voice dropping low and cruel:
"I'll find that 'Hearthflame' of yours —and make it live up to its name.
I'll burn the whole damn thing to ash.
How's that sound?"
Hibana's vision grew red. hearing such horrid things. "This insignificant little insect? How dare he mock me! How dare he..." Hibana suddenly went within his own mind. "I have been here before." he thought.
Tetsuo walked down the crowded sidewalk, head low, weaving through the tide of suits and briefcases.
The city pulsed around him — flashing neon, rumbling trains, a million conversations he wasn't part of.
He was minding his own business. Just walking.
And then he bumped someone — just lightly — a salaryman with a phone glued to his ear.
The man whirled around, furious.
"Hey!""Watch where you're going, you useless idiot!"
Heads turned for half a second — then turned away.
Tetsuo stood there, frozen, clutching the strap of his cheap work bag, feeling everyone's eyes scrape over him and move on.
The salaryman shoved past him without another word, already forgetting he existed.
The crowd closed in again.
Tetsuo was swallowed back into the river of strangers —unseen, unmissed, unwelcome.
Suddenly, Hibana remembered.
Remembered what Riven was — and what he was not.
The pain in his knee felt like nothing now. His magic was already knitting it back together.
"This man has no power over me," Hibana thought. "None of them ever did."
He looked at the jeering, mocking crowd, and at Riven — smug, confident, so sure he was right.
Hibana remembered the spell Solryn had cast earlier — and decided to try it.
He unleashed the magic.
The wind exploded outward from him, blasting the crowd back like dry leaves.
Hibana walked toward Riven — slow, steady — while the bandit scrambled to rise.
He felt his magic draining fast from the blast —but he also felt something new.
He could feel Riven.His body.His magic.
As Riven tried to cast, Hibana reached out — not with muscle, but with will —
And seized it.
Riven froze mid-charge, body locked, eyes wide.
"Wh–what?! What have you done to me?!" Riven screamed, thrashing helplessly.
Hibana walked up to him and pressed his short sword to Riven's throat.
"You'll not threaten Hearthflame again. Do you hear me?"
Riven sweated bullets.
"How are you—"
"DO YOU HEAR ME?" Hibana roared.
Riven crumbled. "Yes! I swear! Please! Let me go!"
Hibana's magic was burning out — fast.
"I should kill you, Riven.""But no... As I said — I see potential in you."
"Somebody who could help me see my dreams become reality.""Somebody who could finally live their dream, too."
"You have no idea what I'm offering you, Riven.""If you choose it — come to my home.""It's in the Fey Wilds.""Come in peace, or don't come at all."
"You can't change this world alone.""Let me show you another way."
Riven was silent — for a painfully long moment.
"You fucking creep!" he spat. "I don't know how you did this... This isn't any magic I know... But — the Fey Wilds? Nobody goes there! Nobody can!"
Hibana felt his magic about to fail completely.
"I'm going to let you go now.""If you enter my home with the intent to kill, I will not be held responsible for what must happen next."
"I swear it!" Riven gasped.
Hibana let the spell falter.
Riven immediately raised his sword —
Hibana didn't flinch.
And Riven — after a heartbeat — lowered it again.
"Get the fuck out of here!" Riven spat.
Hibana bowed slightly, turned, and began walking away.
"Wait!" Riven called out.
Hibana paused.
"Yes?"
Hibana was suddenly in his apartment again.
Tetsuo sat cross-legged on his battered futon, sketchbook in his lap, the TV droning in the background.
Terrorists.Floods.Earthquakes.Forest fires.Riots.
The stock market plunging two thousand points in a single day.
The news anchors spoke with practiced dread, each story designed to tighten the noose of fear around the viewer's heart.
But Tetsuo didn't flinch.
He drew.
In his sketchbook, a stoic man in futuristic armor took shape — standing firm against a storm of darkness.
No matter how bad the world looked,Tetsuo always saw the ones who stood against it:
The rescuers wading into flooded streets.The police catching criminals without firing a shot.The strangers driving battered boats toward stranded homes.
The news rarely said their names.
But Tetsuo remembered them.
He loved drawing those kinds of people — the ones who kept the world breathing, one small act at a time.
Maybe someday, he thought,he could reach one of them.
Show them, even in his own clumsy way,
that someone had noticed.
Hibana was suddenly back —standing in Riven's battered stronghold.
Riven stepped closer.
"What could you possibly see in a man like me?"
Hibana sheathed his sword.
"Oh... and bring your friends, too," Hibana said, voice low but steady."I need them as well. If we do this right, you won't have to steal or kill to feed yourselves anymore.""Keep your weapons sheathed, and I promise — no harm will come to any of you."
Riven said nothing.
Hibana walked away, his steps slow and unhurried.
"And should you see the real me when you get there," he called over his shoulder,"ask me that question again. And I will answer it."
Behind him, Riven's sword slipped from his fingers — clattering against the broken stone.
One of the bandits edged up beside him.
"Boss? Are we gonna kill that guy or what?"
Riven stared after Hibana, breathing hard.
"I don't know," he said.