The Vanguard Training Field. As for why it was called that, it was simple: The Aura Knight division was called Vanguard. The Mage division was called Weaver.
The training grounds belonged to the former.
It was located on the western side of the Aegis Royal Academy campus, basically beyond the Central Academic Plaza.
It was a sunken circular sand pit, roughly 30 meters in diameter, with coarse pale-brown river sand. The pit sat about 1.5 meters below ground level, which meant both Lucian and Travis had to descend a shallow stone staircase to enter.
As for why the hell Lucian accepted?
It was... complicated. Lucian sighed, racking his brain and clicking his tongue inwardly. Of course he, as a novel reader, was very familiar with this trope.
If he refused? Always hiding his strength, where the hell could he flash his pride as a man? But if he accepted blindly like a fool who hadn't done the math, everything would eventually invite trouble.
That was also a dumb decision.
But that was the simple version. The behind-the-scenes looked like this: if he refused, the Committee would freeze his stipend and he'd starve on one silver crown.
If he refused, the fraternity would simply try a different method, somewhere he couldn't see it coming. And if he refused, Seraphina would read it as weakness and keep pushing with the original plan.
I need money... to buy food. Even though I can get it for free, will there always be a beast available like that? Lucian frowned.
That means I can't use my cheat freely. I can't forage for food, and I can't exactly mention that my noble house has been running low on money.
As for working part-time, bad news: in Veridia, titled nobles legally cannot hold wage labor. This isn't snobbery; it's law. Not to mention that even if he could do it illegally, Aegis runs Nine to six, six days a week. The same schedule that killed him the first time.
Morning: General Core theory lectures
Afternoon: Vanguard practical drills and sparring
Evening: Mandatory study, meal, and dorm curfew
Night: The only free time. Which is when he hunts.
Basically, there was no window.
For now, The money question could wait. He had enough for salt and fuel.
What mattered now was what Arthur had done.
Arthur lost that fight. But the novel spent four chapters explaining why he'd had to, the Code, the Witness Clause, the Truth Oath, Procedural Rule Six.
And thanks to that, Lucian had read all of it.
In short, what Travis had said was a legal weak point.
But that point was valid.
The Committee controlled the stipend review board. They could flag a student for "attendance deficiency" or "conduct unbecoming" and freeze payment pending a hearing.
Say he refused: the Vanguard Practical was a mandatory graded component of the first-year curriculum.
Declining a sanctioned sparring session could be logged as a failed participation mark, which would suspend stipend disbursement.
What a complicated mess of rules, he thought, shaking his head.
But if he accepted, the fight would happen in a sanctioned ring, where Article Seven made everything inside the circle legally untouchable.
However, it would also prove he wasn't hiding his strength, and show that beating Derrick was no fluke.
That would probably put Seraphina on higher alert, his beloved fiancée, although she likely already had a hunch that something had changed.
And there was one more thing.
Whether it was her or someone else, someone has been in my room, he raised one eyebrow. Yes, the scent.
He remembered the sulfur and lavender scent from outside his door. Not the person, the marker. Someone had tagged his room.
Now, back to reality.
In the arena, students from Class 1-B, Derrick's peer class, had of course come to watch. A second-year at Rank 2 (Iron Peak) , had been announced for this fight.
Travis rolled one shoulder, then the other, and let his aura bleed out along both forearms in a slow orange shimmer, his fists wrapped in brass-studded combat wraps.
Lucian walked down the stone steps without hurrying, hands loose at his sides. His uniform was the same worn black-and-silver, sleeves pushed to the elbow.
No sword. No sheath. No catalyst. He looked around the pit once, at the sand, at the rim, at the bleachers and then stopped looking around with a vein standing out, his frown deepening.
Just flow like water, he thought, glancing at the transparent screen hovering before him.
[THE GLUTTON'S CRUCIBLE]
Host: Lucian Croft
Vessel: Rank 1 (Ember)
Phantom Starvation: 25%
Active Passive Skills:
[TOXIC IMMUNITY (TIER 1)]
[HARDENED SKIN (TIER 1)]
[DENSE BONE FRAME (TIER 1)]
[IRON BLOOD (TIER 1)]
[PREDATOR'S SCENT (TIER 1)]
The starvation sat at 25%, which he now understood meant the lower the percentage, the more stable his mind was.
Perfect.
Now, with both sides facing each other, the proctor, a short-haired middle-aged man with iron-grey hair, looked at them both and nodded.
"Both parties present." He said it without expression, uncapped a pen that had no ink left, and marked the ledger. "Article Seven, sanctioned proficiency engagement. Ground Four, first bell. I'll be walking you both through this once, and I don't like repeating myself."
He looked at Travis first.
"Sir Cole. You issued the challenge."
"'I did.” Travis answered without looking at the proctor. His eyes were already on Lucian's ribs."
"In writing?"
"Field citation, filed this morning."
The proctor nodded. "Field citation's for disciplinary charges, not engagements. You verbally challenged in Class One-D in front of witnesses, which I'm told there were forty of. That's what I'll record."
He flipped a page. "Officer Cole, one of those witnesses was faculty. That makes it a recorded challenge. You understand what that means?"
Travis's jaw worked once, side to side. The smile stayed. It had gone stiff at the corners. "It means the challenge stands."
"It means the challenge cannot be withdrawn without penalty, and it means you can't claim afterward that he forced you into it." The proctor's eyes moved. "Now. Croft."
Lucian looked at the proctor lazily, then at Travis, then back at the proctor. Will they try to bribe him too? His eyes narrowed slightly.
"Lucian Croft," the proctor said. "You were challenged publicly. You accepted publicly. I need confirmation on the record, in your own words, that you enter this ring of your own will, not under duress, not under threat, and not under any arrangement made outside this ledger."
They thought Lucian would stay silent, but the moment he was asked, "I enter of my own will," he replied, casual as anything.
The proctor wrote it down, then looked up once more. "Understood. Rules." He turned back to the ledger.
"One. No lethal blows. Two. No targeting the eyes, the throat, or the groin. Three. Aura is permitted. Weapons are permitted, practice-grade only. Four,"
And here he actually looked up and met Lucian's eyes, "the engagement ends on knockout, on yield, on ring-out, or on my whistle.
“If you go down and don't get up, I call it. If you say the word 'yield,' the match stops immediately and every strike after that is assault."