The silence broke—
Like a thread pulled too tight.
Lancer moved first, arms laced behind a sudden burst of pressure. The air screamed. Niko barely had time to react before a spiral of cutting wind slammed into him like a living blade. He skidded back, feet digging through the cracked stone of the plaza just outside the Dark Tower. Rubble flew. Dust veiled the air.
Niko didn't fall. He refused to.
He dashed forward.
His tendril-wrapped blade swung wide, lashing with unnatural length, but Lancer was faster—he glided, really, stepping sideways on nothing, avoiding the slash by fractions. The wind curved in behind him like it adored him. And in truth, it probably did.
"You cling to this dream of escape," Lancer snarled, bringing his leg up and dropping it like an axe of pressure. The ground beneath Niko cratered from the impact, but he rolled away at the last second.
"Escape from what? From fate? From structure? From something greater than you?"
Niko gritted his teeth and retracted the blade's reach with a flick, spinning it once to regain balance.
"From a prison," Niko spat. "A house that takes and takes and feeds on the souls that enter it."
They clashed again.
Niko's blade scraped Lancer's air-shield, unable to connect cleanly—but Lancer couldn't get a proper strike in either. The two began to move in an almost dance-like rhythm, weaving in and out, testing, speaking between swings like fire and thunder.
"You call this place a prison," Lancer barked, twisting his arm and launching another gust toward Niko's feet. "But I call it a throne in waiting. Something to earn. Something to conquer."
"You've never lived outside of approval!" Niko shouted, his voice cracking as he flipped backward off a broken column, firing a tendril from his left to swing wide. "You've never known freedom! You were born to be watched, judged. I chose to fight back."
The blade extended mid-air as Niko slingshotted in for another hit—but Lancer clapped, and a compressed pulse of wind caught him mid-strike, again throwing him back.
His body was trembling now—not from fear, but from strain. And yet, something deeper was burning.
"You think approval makes you worthy?" Niko grunted, coughing blood into the dirt. "No. It makes you a puppet."
Lancer screamed, genuinely enraged.
"Approval makes me real!" he bellowed, voice hoarse. "Without it, I'm nothing but a shadow behind my siblings! I deserve it! I was born with more power than them! I trained harder! I bled more!"
Another surge of wind—this one spiraling like a lance—rushed toward Niko. He didn't dodge.
He charged.
He blitzed through it.
The shock slammed against him like a wave, tearing skin, but Niko's resolve burned. He grit his teeth, blade forward, and with a twist of the tendril from behind, pulled himself back in after nearly getting thrown again.
He closed the distance.
He and Lancer met again mid-air.
"You don't understand what it's like to be invisible!" Lancer roared.
"And you don't understand what it's like to be caged!" Niko shouted back.
Their blades met—metal against compressed air.
Then—
A flicker.
Niko's breathing slowed for a heartbeat. His grip tightened. His blade—a normal knight's weapon, cracked and rattling from the strain—shattered mid-parry.
Lancer grinned. "You're done—"
But—
In the wake of that destruction, in that gap between one heartbeat and the next—
The light returned.
That shimmering silver-blue. Not lightning, not flame—something else entirely. The color of soul-deep rebellion. The color of truth.
A new blade appeared in Niko's hand—clean, elegant, ethereal. A Jian of sheer Essence. The same one that had erupted from him when fighting Chalice.
His dream, his will, his refusal to break—
All made form once more.
Lancer stumbled back instinctively, eyes wide.
"That sword—" he muttered.
But Niko didn't give him time.
With a single, graceful movement, Niko lunged forward. And for the first time—
The air parted.
Essence vs. Gale.
Dream vs. Inheritance.
Hope vs. Desperation.
And somewhere behind it all—tragedy waits.
The shimmering Jian in Niko's hand hummed as if alive.
It did not crackle with flame or sing with lightning—it resonated. Not just with Niko, but with the world around him, as though it too sought freedom.
Lancer's eyes twitched. That blade… the Essence of an ideal made manifest—it wasn't just power. It was conviction. It was proof that Niko had something real to fight for.
And it terrified him.
"Don't get cocky," Lancer hissed. "You think some glowing sword means you've already won?!"
Niko didn't answer.
He was already moving.
With a step so swift it barely seemed physical, he vanished—and then appeared behind Lancer. The prince barely managed to react, hurling a compressed gust in panic. It collided with Niko mid-air, but this time, he didn't get flung away.
The Jian shimmered—cutting clean through the force like a scythe through mist. Niko twisted and slashed, grazing Lancer's side. Not deep. But the hit landed.
The first clean blow of the fight.
Lancer staggered, confused. Angry. Humiliated.
"You're slowing down," Niko muttered, circling him again, eyes sharp and unreadable. "What's the matter, prince? Starting to feel the price of all that wind you command?"
Lancer's teeth clenched. "Shut up—"
But Niko kept talking. His voice was cold now. Measured. The kind of calm that only comes after too many wounds.
"You fight like someone trying to prove something," he said. "You scream louder than your own attacks. You're not a warrior. You're a child throwing a tantrum."
Lancer roared and sent a cyclone crashing down toward him—Niko leapt into it, spinning, letting his Essence Jian guide him as he cut a spiral path through it, wind splitting around him like water.
He landed again, slowly.
"You think becoming king will make your father love you?" Niko called out, his voice echoing with disdain. "He doesn't care. He never did."
"YOU KNOW NOTHING!" Lancer howled.
"I know what it's like to crave something you'll never get," Niko snapped back, eyes glowing faintly. "I know what it's like to hate yourself for it. To ask 'why not me?' every single night until the question becomes a curse. But you… you took that pain and let it own you."
Lancer charged again, air swirling violently around him—but his steps were heavier now. Less elegant. His lungs were working harder.
Niko could see it—he was getting slower.
Still dangerous. Still royalty. But losing control.
"You let your pain become your god," Niko growled as they clashed once more, sword against invisible force. "And now all you are… is a dog begging for scraps of praise."
He ducked under another strike. Slashed again—this time along Lancer's thigh. Another wound.
The prince's breathing hitched.
"You don't want to be king," Niko said darkly. "You want to be seen."
Lancer was panting now, hunched slightly. He tried to hide it behind a glare, but the pain in his ribs and legs betrayed him.
"…You're lying," he muttered.
"No," Niko said. "I'm free. And you're a prisoner inside your own obsession."
Silence fell again between them for a heartbeat. The wind eased.
Lancer stared at him, wide-eyed. Confused. Tired. Rage still curled around him like armor—but it was cracking. Something in him trembled.
Then Niko stepped forward, sword gleaming faintly in the golden dusk light.
And when he spoke next, there was no yelling. Just ice.
"I'm going to liberate you."
"Not by saving you."
"By killing you."
His words didn't echo. They didn't need to.
They just hung there, cold as iron.
The Jian in his hand shimmered brighter—Essence surging again, awakened not just by belief, but by resolve.
Lancer's hands balled into fists. He howled once more—out of fear? Out of denial? Maybe both. He rushed again.
But this wasn't a fight anymore.
This was a reckoning.
And Niko had already chosen what must be done.