TBATE-ONESHOTS

A Promise to Keep 5

As Tessia made her way across the grassy sparring field, she couldn't help but feel a little nervous, yet also excited. Her eyes flicked to the opposite team, seeing Claire taking the right side of the field, Curtis taking the left, who now had his AA-class world lion bond walking beside him, and Arthur heading toward the middle.

"Clive," Tessia began, not taking her eyes off Arthur, watching how he walked with confidence. "You take Curtis. Charles, you take Claire."

Charles grunted, irritation washing over him, "And why exactly do I get to fight the girl."

Tessia stopped dead in her tracks, looking at Charles with annoyance, "Excuse me?" Charles flinched at Tessia's tone, realizing he had just made a mistake. "Her being a girl should have nothing to do with this."

Charles cleared his throat awkwardly, "Sorry." He didn't spare Tessia another glance as he quickly walked off to his designated position.

"Are you sure you want me to fight Curtis?" Clive asked, and Tessia looked at him with a raised brow. Clive jerked his chin toward Arthur, looking at him with disgust, "Arthur may be the captain of the DC, but he is still a commoner. Fighting him isn't worth the trouble for someone such as yourself."

Tessia couldn't contain the sudden rage that washed over her, hearing how Clive spoke about Arthur. She looked and spoke to Clive angrily, "Watch how you speak about him. Go fight Curtis. End of discussion."

Clive looked at Tessia with astonishment, not expecting her to react in such a way. He spared Arthur one more condescending glance before nodding to Tessia and walking off. As he walked off, Tessia's eyes widened slightly with surprise, realizing what had just transpired. She had no idea where those feelings of defensive rage came from. The words just spewed out of her mouth naturally.

Regaining her composure, Tessia proceeded to walk to her designated place and now stood across from Arthur. Arthur, who was previously distracted by tightening his elbow pad to notice his surroundings, looked up and looked at Tessia, surprised, like he had not been expecting her to be his opponent. Arthur looked to the left and right, noticing Charles and Clive standing off against Claire and Curtis.

Seeing Arthur looking at her teammates and not paying her any attention, Tessia grew a little irritated, "What?" Arthur's gaze flicked toward her. "Disappointed that I'm your opponent?" Tessia took out her silver rapier and got into a fighting stance. "It would be wise not to underestimate me."

Tessia half expected Arthur to scoff or roll his eyes. However, genuine surprise struck her as a small, emotion-filled smile graced his lips as Arthur said softly, "I would never underestimate you."

Tessia's lips went slightly agape, her eyes narrowing with confusion. Here Arthur was, the boy she had been wanting to talk to, had dreams of, and who had been ignoring her. She was beginning to think he was ignoring her because he didn't like her or he thought she was annoying. But, now, he struck her with that one sentence, and nothing made sense. And the way he said it and how he looked at her made her more confused, and she wanted to have answers to all her questions.

Arthur's smile slowly faded, and he looked at Tessia with a saddened expression as he got into a fighting stance. Tessia's eyes flicked to his right hand, and she went wide-eyed. A blistering headache hit her like a freight train as she grabbed her head, and her vision faded, seeing the thin translucent teal blade he pulled out of his dimensional ring.

The room was dark and smelled of death. Standing around her were dozens of people she didn't recognize, fear stricken on their faces. Before them lay a hill of corpses that loomed high above everyone in the room. Atop the hill sat a lone man, his arms resting on the hilt of a thin, translucent teal sword that shinned dimly beneath a layer of blood.