Kieran sat alone in the preparation tent, elbows resting on his knees, hands loosely clasped in front of him. His heartbeat was steady — not calm, not agitated. Just ready.
He didn't pray often. Rarely, in fact. But this time, he closed his eyes and whispered something that wasn't quite a prayer and wasn't quite a wish.
"Please let it be someone strong."
A hollow victory would mean nothing. A challenge — that was where you grew. Where something inside of you sharpened.
He exhaled, stood up, and reached for his blazer. "Where the hell is Roy?"
"Probably already bought popcorn and sat down," Brock muttered from the bench.
"Or on his way," Tanaka added with a shrug.
Kieran grunted — not agreeing but not denying it either — and started walking.
The tunnel to the arena was narrow and dim, torchlight flickering along the old stone walls. Further ahead, the noise grew louder — the crowd chanting, laughing, buzzing with anticipation. And just as he reached the stone arch that opened into the arena—
"And now, ladies and gentlemen!"
The announcer's voice cracked through the air like a whip.
"Our next match a contender favored by many after his flawless prelims…
KIERAN NAZAROFF…!" *
The crowd erupted.
Kieran stepped forward, sunlight spilling across his shoulders. But he didn't smile, didn't wave. He just walked — calm and focused — toward the centre of the arena.
What he didn't know was that if he could save time in a bottle, the first thing he'd like to do is save every minute to savour for the rest of eternity.
Because some opponents don't just fight you. They change you.
"And standing in the opposite corner," the announcer continued, "a transfer contestant from the northern provinces — no recorded losses in certified duels: the man known as The Hourcarver… CYRUS VALEN!"
Silence.
Then whispers. Confusion. The name wasn't famous — but the title was.
A figure stepped out of the opposite tunnel — tall, lean, wearing a long dark coat that moved like liquid shadow around him. Pale silver hair. Calm gold eyes. No weapon in his hands… but around his neck hung a single antique pocket watch.
Cyrus stopped just past the boundary line and snapped the pocket watch open with his thumb.
The second hand inside wasn't moving.
Kieran's brows drew together, interest sparking in his chest.
Cyrus looked up and met his gaze, not smug, not arrogant. Just… steady.
As if he had already seen everything that was about to happen.
Kieran rolled his shoulders.
A Soul Art tied to time…?
The announcer finished the introductions, the arena hushed… and the bell rang.
Cyrus didn't move. He simply raised the pocket watch and clicked the crown.
Tick.
Kieran stepped forward — and immediately felt it. The air thickened.
The sounds of the crowd dulled, as if someone had stuffed the entire world in cotton. His own heartbeat slowed.
Cyrus's Soul Art activated.
"Chrono Fold" — the ability to compress or extend small pockets of time in the immediate vicinity.
Not stopping time.
Not reversing it.
Just… folding it.
Speed becoming heavy.
Movements stretched and dragged.
Or—in Cyrus's case—accelerated in sudden, violent bursts.
Kieran's eyes narrowed.
Damn.
He lunged.
Cyrus flicked his fingers. Tick.
Kieran's punch cut through air, but Cyrus wasn't there. He had already shifted, time folding around him as he sidestepped in a blur. His coat rippled as if underwater.
The next moment, Cyrus's fist was already at Kieran's ribs.
Impact.
It felt like being hit with two punches at once — one in the present… another arriving a heartbeat before it should have.
Like time had stuttered and delivered the blow twice.
Kieran slid back, boots carving a harsh line in the sand.
The crowd gasped.
He steadied himself, teeth baring into a grin.
"Alright", Kieran breathed. "That's more like it."
Cyrus didn't reply. He just closed the watch again with a soft click… and the second hand moved.
The real fight had started.
Kieran's hand moved to the hilt at his hip.
The steel rasped free in one clean motion. No flourish. No flash. Just a cold, honest blade sliding into daylight.
Cyrus watched without a word, one hand resting calmly at his side, the other lightly holding the silver watch. His eyes followed the sword not with fear… but with recognition.
The bell's echo had barely faded.
Kieran moved first.
He surged forward, sword flashing in a horizontal arc toward Cyrus's ribs. Sand kicked up in his wake as momentum drove the strike with full intention.
Tick.
Cyrus blurred to the side, the edge of the blade cutting through only a ripple of displaced air. The folded pocket of time slowed Kieran's swing by a half-second—just enough for Cyrus to slip outside the arc and deliver a counterpunch before the blade had even finished its motion.
A flick of the pocket watch's crown.
Tick.
Another fold. The punch arrived twice, overlapping in a disorienting warp of pressure. Kieran's chest jolted as if struck with twin blows in rapid succession.
Pain. Immediate… real.
But Kieran didn't back away. Instead, he forced his forward foot to drag against the sand, using the recoil of the blow to twist his body into a second slash, this time vertical.
Cyrus raised his arm. Kieran saw the motion in real time and watched the fabric of the coat catch the blade, but the moment it made contact, time compressed.
The impact slowed to a nothing-blur… and the blade cut only through a phantom afterimage.
Cyrus had already stepped behind him.
Kieran didn't waste the moment; he spun with the sword in a tight inward circle, swinging upward. Cyrus leaned back, the blade grazing just shy of his nose, silver hair fluttering from its passage.
And through it all, the pocket watch's second hand kept moving with an unnatural rhythm.
Sometimes smoothly. Sometimes skipping backward a fraction of a second, then leaping forward.
Kieran lunged again. Cyrus kicked off the ground, time folding once more. The space between them bent — Cyrus moved farther than should've been possible with a single step, reappearing on Kieran's flank and sending a sweeping strike of compressed time across the air.
An invisible force slammed into Kieran's side, throwing him across the arena like someone had swung a hammer of wind.
He hit the ground, rolled, and came up in a crouch with his blade raised.
The crowd howled.
Dust swirled.
His ribs ached. His breath came sharp and thin. But his eyes… his eyes were alive.
He's folding time in pockets rather than controlling the entire field, Kieran analysed, thumb running along the flat of his blade. Frequency increases when I commit. Delay when I faint. He waits for full commitment before using heavy folds.
He took a step forward — deliberately slow.
Cyrus's eyes tracked every movement.
Then Kieran moved.
Fast.
Three steps. Sword raised. Feint to the collarbone → switch into a thrust.
The moment Cyrus flicked the watch.
Kieran stopped mid-motion.
He pivoted mid-thrust, dissolving the strike halfway and converting it into a kick that landed square against Cyrus's shin. The time fold tried to catch it, but Kieran's sudden stall threw the fold off course; the impact landed, and Cyrus's leg buckled.
In the same breath, Kieran raised the sword and brought it down in a diagonal line.
Cyrus folded time again — but this time… it lagged.
The sword bit.
Just a thin line across the coat — blood beading beneath.
The crowd roared in surprise.
Cyrus didn't retreat.
His eyes narrowed, as if silently impressed.
He snapped the watch open with two fingers, and everything in the arena jerked.
Sound collapsed. The roar of the crowd became distant, stretched. Even the sunlight seemed dimmer. Sand hung in the air in slow motion.
Full fold.
Cyrus moved. Not once, not twice, but three overlapping impacts in a single motion.
Kieran brought the flat of his sword up to block the first; the second slipped through, catching his shoulder. The third nailed his ribs.
He staggered back, knees dipping. Blood in his throat.
Cyrus followed up with a heel kick.
Kieran barely managed to raise his guard. Even then, the tethered time made it feel like the kick happened simultaneously in three directions. He skidded back across the sand, boots carving trenches.
His lungs burnt.
But he didn't fall.
He exhaled slowly, sword still steady in his grip.
Alright then.
The next moment came not from logic but instinct.
Kieran lowered his stance, sword angled down. A stance meant for closing distance, meant for weathering impacts rather than avoiding them.
Come.
Cyrus obliged.
Time folded again.
But this time, Kieran moved into the fold, not against it.
He stepped forward as the pressure increased, sword raised across his chest to block the incoming triple strike.
The arena rippled.
Steel met fist once, twice, thrice, but Kieran's forward motion shaved away the doubled impact. The sword buzzed in his hand from the force but was held.
His momentum carried him straight into Cyrus's guard. The sword reversed into a tight backhand cut.
Blood flicked into the air.
A clean cut across Cyrus's shoulder.
For the first time, Cyrus actually stepped back.
The crowd erupted.
Kieran didn't stop. He pressed with a flurry — slash, thrust, heavy overhead, each strike blended with footwork designed to force Cyrus into tighter and tighter space. Rather than trying to keep up, Cyrus began folding smaller pockets of time around his own body, localised distortions to deflect the blade at the last millisecond rather than trying to reposition entirely.
Smaller radius. He's conserving energy.
Cyrus's watch ticked again
And Kieran shifted to full offence.
Another flurry of slashes; this time using short, sharp strikes instead of committed swings. Denying Cyrus the window to fold larger pockets.
Cyrus flicked the watch again, bending time
Kieran stepped into it, letting the fold tug his sword forward just enough for him to reverse-grip and spin into a strike from the opposite angle.
Steel cracked against the coat. Cyrus flinched.
For a heartbeat, their eyes met — gold and red — and in that instant, no one needed to speak to understand the thought passing between them.
You're mine.
Cyrus stepped back, breathing steady but heavier now. He rolled his shoulders once and flicked the watch shut.
And drew a small dagger from his coat.
Kieran blinked. He's switching styles.
Close-range fold against a blade.
Thunderous cheers shook the arena walls.
Cyrus rushed in. Time folded in a narrow tunnel around him, a direct line of accelerated space. Kieran met him head-on.
Sword and dagger clashed. The fold accelerated Cyrus's stab three times over, but Kieran parried all three replicas with a spinning deflection, ripples of force radiating off the blade. He twisted his sword and drove the pommel toward Cyrus's jaw. Cyrus folded sideways in a distorted skip, reappearing behind Kieran.
The dagger flicked forward.
Kieran ducked. He felt the blade whisper past his ear. His foot snapped back in a heel kick. The strike landed, a partial hit against Cyrus's shoulder. Cyrus rolled with it, coming up in a crouch and slashing with the dagger across Kieran's thigh, but the blade caught only the fabric of his uniform as Kieran pulled his leg back in time.
They separated. Breathing hard now. Sand and dust swirling between them like storm clouds.
For a long moment, neither moved.
Then Cyrus slowly lifted the watch and closed his eyes.
One last fold.
The second hand spun backwards one, two, three seconds. Then snapped forward.
Final acceleration.
Cyrus vanished.
No blur. No trail. Just absence.
Kieran tightened his grip and lifted his sword; Cyrus appeared directly in front of him.
The dagger thrust out.
Kieran didn't block.
He sidestepped.
It was less than an inch, but it was enough.
The dagger missed.
Kieran spun around Cyrus's back and — full body rotation — brought the sword down in a brutal diagonal slash.
Cyrus's coat split.
Blood arced.
The acceleration collapsed instantly. Time slammed back into normal. Cyrus stumbled forward, catching himself on one knee, his hand pressing against the bleeding cut crossing his back and shoulder.
Silence.
The crowd stared, stunned.
Kieran stood behind him, sword lowered, chest heaving with every breath. Sweat dripped from his brow. His ribs screamed with every pulse of his heart.
Cyrus rose, slowly, and turned.
For a moment, Kieran thought he might continue.
Instead… Cyrus lifted the watch to his chest…
…and bowed.
A deep, respectful bow.
Kieran exhaled, lowering his sword and returning the bow with equal respect.
The bell rang.
The arena exploded with cheers.
Kieran closed his eyes for a moment — not to savour the victory but to hold the feeling of it.
The pain.
The pressure.
The way time itself had bent and cracked under the weight of their fight.
If I could save time in a bottle, the first thing I'd like to do is save every minute to savour for the rest of eternity.