BOOK II OF III: The Reign of the Sultan (13 page)

Meanwhile, Baltor had just begun to tightly
rotate both of his wrists into a figure “8” pattern, which caused
his swords to form that same pattern on a much-larger scale—in the
very next second of time, the first two daggers straight away
became deflected by Baltor’s swords, landing on the ground
nearby!

The hilt of the final dagger, a split-second
later, astonishingly became caught up in the “gravitational pull”
from Baltor’s swords, which swords continuously spun around in the
“8”.

Six astonishing seconds later, and without
his hands having physically touched the dagger even once, he
flicked both sword-bearing wrists still a different way, which
caused that dagger to launch straight and true for where Vaspan was
now running!

Only a second before the dagger could impact,
Vaspan dropped and rolled out of harm’s way, but one of his
officers standing right outside the circle wasn’t so lucky as it
plunged to the hilt in his heart, killing him before his body had
even hit the ground!

Baltor’s troops had begun to cheer—Vaspan’s
began to boo! In fact, several of that officer’s underlings got so
infuriated that they tried to charge into the ring in order to kill
Baltor, but their buddies from the same platoon tightly held them
back, remembering the commands from Sultan Vaspan that “any
interference means death.”

As for the man himself, he had already neared
the closest weapon lying on the ground, which was a spiked mace—he
picked it up and turned to face Baltor.

“You got lucky with that dagger, boy!”

While waiting in the ready position, both of
Baltor’s eyebrows rose sharply before he asked with a laugh, “Think
so?”

Without answering the question, Vaspan’s face
instantly contorted to rage, just before he cocked back his mace
and began charging for his opponent at top speed. What had pissed
the man off wasn’t Baltor’s question, yet the “really snotty way”
he had asked it!

Once he had neared his opponent, nearly
fifteen seconds later, his hands widely swung around his mace from
back to front, so that it would flatten his opponent’s head like a
pancake.

However, Baltor was already prepared with a
good defense. At the very last second he took a very large step to
the right, which caused the mace to instantly miss and thud into
the ground—without delay, he kicked his left foot hard into the
back of his still-running opponent!

As a result of the kick, Vaspan flew out of
control through the air until crashing on the ground several feet
away, which caused him to see shooting stars everywhere.

From that maneuver, many more of Baltor’s
troops began to cheer, while just as many of Vaspan’s began to
boo!

Before Vaspan could stand back up onto his
feet, Baltor had already arrived, crossing both swords right in
front of him into an “x”—the edges now lightly pinched up both
sides of Vaspan’s neck. Though neither sword yet drew blood, Baltor
said neutrally, “I don’t believe in luck.”

Vaspan’s rear hand had already grabbed a
handful of dirt, flinging it hard into his opponent’s face and
eyes—Vaspan’s body rolled out of the way a nanosecond before
Baltor’s swords uncrossed.

Surprising to everyone present, Baltor did
not try to remove the dirt in his blinded eyes, as his opponent
began to run away—instead, he simply chose to hold onto both swords
in the ready position and simply wait in silence and blindness.

Meanwhile, Vaspan was already nearing the
border of the ring of torches, checking his neck with his left hand
to see if it was bleeding, discovering happily that his hand didn’t
have any blood on it, and looking for the next best weapon to
use.

Once he saw what he wanted, he instantly
averted his running direction straight for them—two curvy sabers!
He picked up both weapons, ran to the nearest torch, and swiped the
blades through the oily wick at the same time. With sword blades
literally on fire, he next turned back around, and then began to
run toward his adversary’s unmoving location, while gleefully
noting that Baltor’s eyes were still sealed shut.

As Vaspan began to near, perhaps twenty
seconds later, he leapt high into the air—while flying, he threw
the flaming saber in his left hand straight for Baltor’s head, but
kept a very firm grip of the other saber, readying it for a
downwards slice.

Even though Baltor couldn’t see a thing, he
did hear the whirring sounds of the spinning weapon flying toward
him. His hands instinctively crossed his swords right in front of
him, which not only deflected that saber that caused it to hit the
ground and the flame to go out, yet deflected the second saber
attack that Vaspan had just launched.

For the first time in the entire battle,
Baltor immediately began to launch a series of offensive strikes
that lasted nearly a minute! Not only had Vaspan successfully
countered every attack, yet he had managed to pick his other saber
off the ground, and was now even turning a few of his own defenses
into offenses that surely would have taken out most opponents!

Despite the fact that Baltor was still
“completely blind,” it was instinctively easy for him to deflect
every single various type of attack that Vaspan had thrown so far,
which had already turned out to be dozens upon dozens—after all,
Baltor had truly mastered “the art of blind-fighting.”

As for the armies on both sides, many now
began to believe that Baltor was unbeatable, even by one of the
greatest warriors of all the surrounding lands—many soldiers within
Vaspan’s army began to cheer for Baltor now.

While still engaged in swordplay, Vaspan
decided to try an offensive tactic he had earlier unsuccessfully
used—again, he performed a double roundhouse swing with both sabers
going in the same direction—one right after the other!

Unlike the previous time, Baltor somersaulted
to his right, which caused both sabers to miss—before he had even
regained his standing position, he had swung his own left sword up
and around aimed for Vaspan! As for the sword in Baltor’s right
hand, even though it wasn’t in attack range, it too swung up and
out … both swords literally “sang” through the air!

Even though Vaspan was successful in
deflecting the first attack by using both of his own sabers—almost
unbelievably, except for the fact it was true, Baltor’s sword
literally had cut through both sabers, turning them into four
pieces halfway down the blade.

The two ends of the sabers dropped straight
to the ground—as for Vaspan, he hightailed for the edge of the
circle as fast as he could, dropping his broken sabers and then
looking for a new weapon.

As soon as Baltor had heard his opponent’s
footsteps begin to run away this time, he used that time to shift
the sword in his left hand into his right, and with his free hand,
clean out the dirt still lodged in his eyes.

Ten seconds later, once the last of the dirt
was removed and he could now see, he observed that Vaspan already
had a weapon in his hand, in which he was now hurriedly unwrapping
it at the edge of the circle. This weapon looked both strange and
unfamiliar to Baltor.

After Baltor had shifted the extra sword in
his right hand back into his left, a split second later, he began
to run at top speed for Vaspan, forty feet away.

Only seconds after he had begun running, he
observed that Vaspan was now unwinding his new weapon—Baltor
couldn’t understand, however, how it would really be very useful
against both of his swords.

After all, Vaspan’s weapon consisted of two
steely nightsticks—attached between two of the ends was a metallic
cord made of small sharp, metallic thorns. Once fully unwound, only
five seconds later, Vaspan began to laugh maniacally, as his hands
speedily and expertly twirled and bounced them all around and off
his body like nunchakus.

Despite Vaspan’s incredible fighting skills,
even with this weapon, this did not deter Baltor whatsoever—he
leaped forward into two tight somersaults upon the ground before
him, back to back.

The split-second before the second somersault
was complete, Baltor immediately propped his legs firmly into the
ground, and with everything he had, he propelled himself forward
into a powerful leap aimed for Vaspan, who was now about twenty-two
feet away!

As he literally flew headfirst through the
air toward Vaspan, thanks to that extra ounce of strength Baltor
had used in his left leg while pushing off the ground, his body
commenced to spin in tight circles—all the while his arms remained
extended straight over his head, and his hands continuously spun
around in the “∞” pattern. Both of his swords looked just like two
large spinning fans!

Meanwhile, Vaspan continued to spin his
nunchakus, while mentally preparing for the moment that he would
simply drop to the ground, which he hoped would cause Baltor to
land outside the perimeters of the circle … and thus, end the
duel.

When Baltor was ten feet away, he slowly
lowered his arms, though his hands and wrists never stopped
twirling those singing swords, which tips were now only inches from
the ground—yet another crazy pattern emerged that caused the
onlookers to gape in awe.

Moreover, what Vaspan saw and heard coming at
him had scared the hell out of him, as it now looked and sounded
like a thousand spinning metallic fans coming at him all at
once—never before had he imagined that such a maneuver could be
performed. Suddenly, he began to greatly fear there would be a hell
of a lot of pain in the instant he died.

Therefore, as tears began to pour out his
eyes, he instantly dropped the weapon in hands and dropped to his
hands and knees, all the while pleading, “I surrender!”

By the time Vaspan had begun to speak, Baltor
was now six feet away. He instantly sheathed his swords with a
flick of his wrists, and angled his entire flight pattern by
throwing his hands back down toward the ground.

Upon hitting the ground a foot later, he
performed a tight forwards somersault, which maneuver included
getting back onto his feet. In the end, Baltor had stopped but one
foot shy in front of Vaspan’s kneeling position.

Though most were absolutely shocked at the
battle that they had the privilege and honor to witness, all of
Baltor’s admiring soldiers instinctively began clapping and
cheering, as well the majority of Vaspan’s own troops! The only
ones who appeared to be very angry were Vaspan’s five sons, Thorn,
Glacius, and one other “dark soul.”

Not surprisingly, Baltor appeared to be
totally worn out as he was forced to take a couple of stumbling
steps backwards, while slowly breathing out, “Can… we… can we
please, have some peace?” Even though his breathing was haggard,
there remarkably wasn’t an ounce of sweat to be seen on his
body.

Quickly the terrified look on Vaspan’s face
transformed to sorrow … seconds later, he confirmed, “Yes, my
nephew… I… I am sorry…”

The look in Vaspan’s eyes, and the tone to
his voice, genuinely reflected that sorrow—Baltor’s “warning
senses” picked up no hostile-or-underhanded intentions,
whatsoever.

As soon as the word “nephew” crossed
Brishava’s ears, tears began to pour steadily out of her eyes in
happiness and joy, though she didn’t allow herself to make a single
noise so she could continue to hear every single word that was
spoken between her uncle and her husband!

“You are forgiven, Uncle Vaspan,” Baltor had
already responded.

Still on his knees, Vaspan added, “What you
said earlier—you’re right! The whole reason that our Empires do not
encompass and rule the whole earth is because of the division
within our family!”

Baltor first threw a very warm smile, before
he replied, “That’s the way that I see it too, uncle. Now, please,
get off your knees, for you are royalty, and you are family! Let us
go back to Pavelus and celebrate. In fact, let us all go back and
celebrate—we have an empire and a whole world to rule!”

Hundreds of thousands of people cheered at
that last bit of news!

Once the cheering had abated a minute later,
which cheering included Vaspan’s four youngest sons, Vaspan asked,
“Can you help me to my feet, nephew? I’m not as young as I used to
be…”

“Of course, Uncle Vaspan,” Baltor replied
with a warm smile.

As Baltor drew within arm’s reach, he
extended his right hand out, though unsure how his uncle might need
it. Meanwhile Vaspan grabbed his nephew’s forearm with his right
hand, and as he slowly began to pull himself up onto his feet, he
leaned closer and closer into his nephew’s right side.

Upon regaining a standing position just to
Baltor’s right, he began to gaze proudly at his nephew … until
suddenly, Vaspan’s eyes flashed that red color again!

Before Baltor could do anything about it, it
was already too late, for Vaspan’s boot knife was now buried to the
hilt in between his back and right armor shoulder plates of armor,
which five-inch blade had punctured deep into his right lung, thus
causing a whole lot of blood to spray!

Baltor screamed in both pain and anger, just
before his left fist instinctively delivered an uppercut punch into
his uncle’s face very-very-very hard—flying out of control,
Vaspan’s body literally flew up and into the air for an amazing ten
feet before crashing back into the ground! Vaspan had been knocked
out in one punch!

Now grunting both angrily and painfully,
Baltor plucked the dagger out and dropped it to the ground—though
the monstrous beast inside of him wanted to come out and play, he
forcibly kept IT in check!

Instead, with but a flick of his wrists,
Baltor extended his swords out in front of him in the defensive
position, while stumbling toward Vaspan, who he saw was already
returning to consciousness and slowly sitting up although his face
had swollen to twice its normal size!