Earlier that day.

  Grump’s office sat on the upper level of the warehouse, tucked back from the main floor where salvage was brought in and cargo was sorted. It was not a place designed for comfort. It was a place designed to get work done without interruption.

  The walls were bare stone and steel, scarred from years of vibration and heat. A single wide window overlooked the yard below, its glass thick enough to mute the clang and grind of labor into a distant, tolerable hum. Shelves lined one wall, stacked with ledgers, manifests, and sealed metal cases that never seemed to move but were always accounted for. A large table dominated the center of the room, its surface worn smooth by maps, cups, and the occasional fist.

  Grump stood at the window with his hands clasped behind his back, staring down at the controlled chaos of his operation. He looked calm, but the set of his shoulders said his mind was already several steps ahead.

  Otwin leaned against the table, Stormtrooper armor absent, arms folded, expression neutral. DAC was quiet, a rare thing, leaving Otwin alone with his own thoughts. Humbert occupied a chair that had been built for smaller men and protested quietly under his weight. He sat relaxed, arms draped over the sides, broad frame filling the space like it had always belonged there.

  Grump turned.

  “Alright,” he said, voice steady. “The Black Dragon Combat Club controls all the underground fighting in the city. As you know, the Empire outlawed sport fighting several years back. Now it’s all underground. Gangs. Fixers. Illicit interests.”

  Humbert snorted softly but said nothing.

  Otwin tilted his head slightly. “So what do you want me to do about it?”

  Grump walked to the table and rested his hands on its edge, leaning forward.

  “You’re going to enter Humbert into their elimination tournament,” he said. "And you're going to bet on him, bet a lot on him. We're going to use that money to take over the gang."

  Humbert straightened.

  “Hey, hey, hey,” he said, holding up one hand. “I don’t mind a fight. You know that. But what’s an elimination tournament?”

  Grump did not smile.

  “It’s where you go there and take on all comers,” he said. “One after another. No brackets. No rest. When they run out of fighters, it ends.”

  Humbert blinked once.

  “Oh,” he said. “Is that all?”

  He leaned back and grinned, teeth flashing.

  “I’ve seen those so-called Black Dragons fight,” Humbert went on. “Won’t be a problem.”

  Otwin shifted his weight.

  “Not so fast,” he said. “There has to be a catch.”

  Grump exhaled through his nose.

  “Of course there is,” he said. “A big one too.”

  He paused deliberately.

  “Their leader is Baron Tande.”

  For a heartbeat, the room was silent.

  Then Humbert started laughing.

  It came out of him in a deep, booming sound that seemed to fill the office instantly. His shoulders shook. His head tipped back. The chair creaked as his weight shifted. The laughter rolled on, loud and unrestrained, bouncing off stone and glass and metal until it felt like the room itself was reacting.

  Grump frowned.

  “What’s so funny?” he asked.

  Humbert kept laughing.

  It went on long enough that Otwin glanced at him, then at Grump, then back again. A full minute passed. The laughter did not taper off. If anything, it grew.

  Finally, Humbert slapped a hand against the arm of the chair, gasping for breath.

  “Baron Tande,” he managed, still chuckling. “That fraud? If all I have to do is beat him... They might as well just give us all their money!”

  He wiped at one eye with a thick finger.

  “I’d love to do this,” Humbert said. “Love it. Kick my foot right up his....”

  Grump cut him off sharply.

  “What are you talking about?” Grump said. “Baron Tande is one of the strongest fighters in the Empire.”

  Humbert burst into laughter again.

  This time it was shorter, sharper, edged with something that was not amusement so much as disbelief. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, still grinning.

  “Strong?” Humbert said. “Sure. Strong the way loud men are strong. Strong in the way people believe fairy tales.”

  Grump straightened.

  “He’s the Deadliest Man Alive,” Grump said flatly. “Master of the Dim Mak.”

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  Humbert waved a hand dismissively.

  “Titles,” he said. “Smoke. Mirrors. I’ve met men like that before.”

  He looked up at Otwin, eyes bright.

  “You know what Dim Mak really is, boss?” Humbert asked.

  Otwin did not answer. He just watched.

  “It’s fear,” Humbert said. “It’s people deciding they’re already dead before the fight starts. You convince enough fools, you can kill them with a touch, and they stop protecting themselves. They freeze. They hesitate.”

  Grump’s jaw tightened.

  “You’re underestimating him,” Grump said.

  “Maybe,” Humbert replied. “Or maybe he’s been fighting men who wanted to lose.”

  The laughter was gone now, replaced by something colder.

  “I’ve seen Baron Tande fight,” Humbert said. “Years ago. Before he was a legend. Before the titles. He’s good. I won’t deny that. But he’s not what people think he is.”

  Grump stared at him.

  “And what do people think he is?”

  Humbert smiled slowly.

  “They think he’s inevitable,” he said. “I can work with that.”

  Otwin finally spoke.

  “So this tournament,” he said. “It’s not just about money.”

  Grump shook his head.

  “No,” he said. “It’s about leverage. Reputation. If Humbert runs their table, we own a piece of that world. And if he beats Tande...”

  “When,” Humbert corrected.

  Grump ignored him.

  “...then every gang, fixer, and promoter in the city rethinks how they do business,” Grump finished.

  Humbert rose from the chair, the furniture protesting as he stood to his full height.

  “Then let’s do it,” he said. “I’ll walk through their fighters. And when their champion steps in?”

  He cracked his neck once, slow and deliberate.

  “I’ll show them what’s real.”

  Otwin watched Humbert for a long moment.

  The laughter still echoed faintly in his ears.

  ***

  Baron Tande moved through his men like a wave parting around a boulder.

  They made room for him without being told. Some bowed their heads. Others stepped back quickly, eyes down. He felt it, that familiar tightening in his chest that came whenever he entered a space already primed for violence. The air itself seemed to lean toward him. Sweat, blood, old sand, and cheap magic hung thick, but beneath it all was something better. Expectation.

  He rolled his shoulders once as he walked, letting his robe settle. The body beneath it answered easily. Strong. Conditioned. Tuned. The big man in the pit had been working all night. Five fights. Three difficult ones. Tande could see it in the way Humbert breathed, the way his weight sat just a fraction lower now, the way the muscles along his back no longer flowed as smoothly as they had when the night began.

  Fatigue was a language Baron Tande spoke fluently.

  He passed beneath the hanging lanterns and let their light rake across his beard. He had shaved it that morning, careful and precise, carving the lines into shapes that meant something to him. Patterns that spoke of mastery. Of discipline. Of distance from the soft, unimpressive boy he had once been.

  Ed Jones.

  The name flickered through his mind like something he had scraped off his boot years ago. A dentist’s son. A university lecturer’s disappointment. A childhood of quiet expectations and constant correction. Sit up straight. Speak clearly. Do not embarrass us. Do not waste your potential.

  When he had chosen to fight, they had called it childish. When he had opened his first dojo, they had called it irresponsible. When he had started winning, they had said nothing at all.

  So he had become Baron Tande.

  Titles mattered. Names mattered. He had learned that early. People believed what you told them if you said it often enough and loud enough and wrapped it in the right rituals. And the Dim Mak, the so-called death touch, had been perfect. Ancient. Exotic. Terrifying.

  It did not need to be real.

  It only needed to be believed.

  He glanced to his left and caught the eye of Ben, his bodyguard. The mage stood near the edge of the pit, expression neutral, hands folded loosely in front of him. There were faint glyphs worked into his gloves, subtle enough not to draw attention, powerful enough to do their work quietly.

  For just a moment, Ben’s composure slipped.

  He leaned in slightly, close enough that only Tande could hear him over the noise of the crowd.

  “I don’t like this, boss,” Ben said, voice low and controlled. “That guy is good. Better than the others.”

  Baron Tande did not look at him.

  “He’s tired,” Tande replied. “And tired men make mistakes.”

  Ben hesitated. His eyes flicked back to Humbert, lingering a fraction longer than necessary.

  “Boss, I know about this guy. He's.. Well, he's something,” Ben said quietly.

  That did it.

  Tande turned his head then, just enough to fix Ben with a cold look.

  “You worry too much,” Tande said. “That is why you stand outside the pit. Just be ready with your magic if I have to use the Dim Mak.”

  Ben held his gaze for a heartbeat, then inclined his head.

  “As you say,” he replied.

  He stepped back into place, expression carefully blank once more.

  Tande nodded.

  Good.

  Baron Tande stepped forward and let his presence announce itself before his voice ever did. The crowd reacted the way it always did. The roar shifted. Cheers turned sharp. Whispers skittered through the stands like insects. This was not another challenger being pushed forward by desperation. This was the ending they had paid for.

  He stopped at the edge of the sand and looked across the pit at Humbert.

  The man was enormous. There was no denying that. Bare-chested, marked now with bruises and streaks of blood, chest rising and falling in slow, heavy pulls. His hands hung loose at his sides. His eyes were fixed on Tande without blinking.

  Baron Tande smiled.

  He stepped into the arena.

  “You,” he called out, his voice carrying easily over the noise, practiced and resonant. “Humbert.”

  The big man did not respond.

  “You have defeated three of my men tonight,” Tande continued, pacing slowly along the inside of the pit. He made sure the crowd could see him from every angle. “You have humiliated them. Shamed them. And for that, you should feel proud.”

  Humbert’s face twitched.

  Just a little.

  Baron Tande saw it and felt a warm certainty bloom in his chest.

  Fear.

  “But now,” Tande said, lifting his chin, “you face me. Baron Tande. Master of the Dim Mak. The Deadliest Man Alive.”

  The title rippled through the crowd. He could feel it settle into them, heavy and familiar. He had heard that phrase spoken back to him a thousand times. In taverns. In alleys. In rooms where men begged to be taught secrets that did not exist.

  Humbert did not move.

  Tande circled him slowly, hands clasped behind his back, boots whispering through the sand. He studied the man openly, the way a lecturer studied a failing student.

  “So nothing to say, Big Man?” he asked. “Do you wish to go silently into the darkness?”

  He stopped directly in front of Humbert and looked up, beard catching the lantern light.

  “Do not think I will show you mercy if you become humble now,” Tande said, voice hardening. “I will avenge the defeat of my disciples with your blood, worm.”

  He waited for the flinch.

  It did not come.

  Instead, Humbert raised one hand.

  Slowly.

  Calmly.

  And beckoned.

  The gesture was simple. Almost casual. A curl of thick fingers, an invitation offered without words.

  The crowd inhaled as one.

  Baron Tande felt a flicker of irritation cut through his certainty.

  It vanished just as quickly.

  Arrogance smoothed it away.

  Of course, the man was trying to project strength. Of course, he was trying to bluff. Tande had seen it before. Big men always tried to pretend exhaustion was nothing. That pain was nothing. That belief could not touch them.

  Belief touched everyone.

  He turned his head slightly and caught Ben’s eye again. Another nod. Subtle. Almost invisible.

  Everything was as it should be.

  Baron Tande rolled his neck once and let his hands fall to his sides, fingers flexing. The crowd leaned forward, hungry now, caught between fear and excitement.

  He smiled at Humbert, slow and confident.

  Then he stepped in, already certain of the ending.