Don't Look at Me, I'm Forging - The Test at the Arena

Overhead arc lamps buzzed against t37  The

Overhead arc lamps buzzed against the reinforced steel rafters of

Arena 3, casting a harsh, glare-heavy white light over the central sparring grid.Around the perimeter balcony, thirty third-year and fourth-year

Vanguards leaned over the heavy safety railings, drinking cold protein shakes and trading lazy bets.

The air inside the pit smelled of scorched rubber, ozone, and the bitter, sharp tang of overheated hydraulic fluid from the automated target rigs.Valen stood near the corner locker, his thumb pressing down hard against the biometric seal of a steel transit container he’d just retrieved from

Locker 41-B.”Still trying to clear the

S-rank agility benchmark,

Valen?” a fourth-year

Vanguard called down from the balcony, letting out a short, mocking laugh. “Your wrist recovery on the backhand arc is two tenths too slow.

That titanium sparring bot is going to take your arm off again!”Valen ignored him, though his teeth clamped together so hard his jaw ached.

He popped the container’s brass clasps.Inside lay the shortblade.The eleven-inch cerulean blue blade caught the harsh arena lights, gleaming with a strange, golden undertone along its reverse bevel.

Valen reached down and wrapped his calloused fingers around the hilt, he didn’t feel a heavy, metallic tug.

The weapon felt unnaturally light—almost weightless, as if the

Cobalt-6 had been stripped of mass entirely.”What is that?” his sparring partner asked, frowning as he unslung a heavy training broadsword. “Looks like a glass toy.

You bought that off a flea market vendor in

District 9?” “It came from an encrypted vault,” Valen muttered, his thumb tracing the three razor-thin kinetic-friction runes etched into the blade’s tang.He stepped onto the center of the reinforced permacrete grid, unclipped his practice sheath, and tapped the master console.— ARENA 3 SPARRING SIMULATION —TARGET PROTOCOL:

S-RANK HEAVY VANGUARD BOTARMOR SPECIFICATION:

DUAL-LAYER TITANIUM CHITIN SPEED RATING:

MAXIMUM (LEVEL 5)The balcony went quiet for two seconds, followed by a wave of disbelief.”Is he insane?” someone up top muttered. “Level 5 speed on an

S-rank heavy unit?

His wrist is going to snap.”In the center of the pit, the floor plates slid open with a deafening hydraulic groaning sound.

A nine-foot-tall, dark-gray automated sparring bot rose out of the staging bay.

Its right arm ended in a seven-foot titanium broadsword, its left in a heavy, energy-reinforced tower shield.

The red optical sensor in its skull flared to life with an aggressive, high-pitched whine.3… 2… 1…

S-rank bot didn’t build momentum—it exploded forward.The nine-foot titanium machine bridged twenty feet of permacrete in half a second, its heavy broadsword sweeping sideways in a horizontal arc that blew the dust off the floor plates.Normally, this was where

Valen failed.

To parry or dodge an

S-rank heavy strike required an instant duck followed by a rapid, ninety-degree wrist recovery to plant a shortblade into the bot’s unshielded neck joint.

But standard steel trench knives created too much atmospheric drag; his wrist tendons couldn’t turn the blade fast enough before the bot’s tower shield swung around to crush his ribs.Valen didn’t duck.

He stepped straight into the strike.He raised the cerulean shortblade.There was no sound of wind resistance.

Wind-Runner-infused bio-alloy cut through the air with absolute zero drag.

Valen’s wrist snapped sideways, the three kinetic-friction runes along the tang flared with an ethereal, golden light, multiplying his hand’s acceleration speed by three hundred percent.SWOOSH-CLANG.The strike didn’t look like a swing.

It looked like a flash of blue lightning crossing the grid.Valen’s pale cobalt blade passed through the

S-rank bot’s four-inch-thick titanium neck joint, glided through its internal hydraulic conduits, and exited the other side before the machine’s primary broadsword even completed its arc.Valen landed on his heels three feet behind the machine, his breath coming in a short, ragged gasp, his wrist completely uninjured.For one second, the nine-foot sparring bot stood frozen in the middle of the arena floor, its heavy broadsword still raised.Then, with a clean, smooth slide, the bot’s eight-hundred-pound armored head and primary shoulder assembly slithered off its neck, crashing onto the permacrete with a deafening

BOOM-CRACK that shook the balcony railings.

Internal power conduits sparked violently, spraying a shower of blue sparks across the floor before the severed torso collapsed into a heap of smoking metal.The arena’s digital scoreboard chimed overhead, its green numbers flashing across the giant wall screens:— TARGET NEUTRALIZED —SIMULATION TIME: 01.42 SECONDSDAMAGE EFFICIENCY: 100% (CRITICAL CORE SEVER) NEW ARENA RECORD:

CLASS 3 VANGUARD DIVISION Silence fell over

Arena 3.The upperclassmen on the balcony stood frozen, their protein shakes hanging half-way to their mouths, their eyes wide as they stared from the severed, smoking titanium neck joint on the floor to the pale blue knife resting casually in

Valen’s hand.”One… one point four seconds?” a fourth-year

Vanguard stammered, dropping his slate onto the metal railing with a clatter. “Against an

S-rank heavy unit?”Valen slowly turned the blade in his palm, his hands trembling—not from strain, but from sheer, unadulterated awe.

His wrist didn’t throb.

His tendons didn’t burn.

The blade had moved as fast as his thoughts.”Valen!” three third-years vaulted over the balcony railing, dropping onto the arena floor and scrambling toward him. “What weapon is that?

Where did you buy a

Cobalt blade that cuts titanium without a plasma edge?” Valen looked down at the encrypted merchant tag printed on the shipping container’s dispatch slip.”The

Forge,” Valen whispered, his voice shaking. “It’s an encrypted node on the campus network.”Within ten minutes, the vid feed from

Arena 3’s automated overhead cameras was replayed sixty times on the upperclassmen forum boards.Two miles away, inside the quiet, peaceful alcove of

Kae was sitting at her desk with a bowl of warm cereal, idly scrolling through a digital textbook on heat-sink calibration.Suddenly, her desktop terminal let out a loud, high-pitched

PING.Then another.And another.PING-PING-PING-PING-PING-PING!The terminal chimed so fast the audio speaker began to buzz.Kae nearly choked on her cereal.

She set her spoon down, wiped her mouth with her sleeve, and stared at the blue holoslate interface in absolute horror.— THE INFINITE FORGE :

INCOMING COMMISSIONS —NEW COMMISSION:

CADET 402-9912 [3RD-YEAR VANGUARD]NEW COMMISSION:

CADET 301-1029 [4TH-YEAR DUELIST]NEW COMMISSION:

CADET 204-8810 [4TH-YEAR HEAVY]NEW COMMISSION:

CADET 311-0041 [3RD-YEAR SCOUT]…WARNING:

UNPROCESSED ORDERS EXCEED CAPACITY (38 PENDING)Kae sat frozen in her swivel chair, her cereal spoon slipping out of her fingers and clattering against her desk.Thirty-eight orders.

High-tier upperclassmen, third-year squad leaders, fourth-year tournament duelists, all offering thousands of merits and raw cobalt blocks for a custom blade.”Oh no,” Kae whispered to the empty room, her face turning pale as she pulled her fleece sweater collar up to her eyes. “Oh no, no, no… what did he do with that knife?”