The heavy wooden axe slammed against Terync’s thigh, eliciting a shout of pain and a resulting hobble. Four sharp whistles sounded almost immediately and Terync swore under his breath, pulling four of his five remaining missile weapons out and tossing them to the side of the ring.
With only a single weapon left against Lewis’s seven, the underclassmen knew he had very little chance to win this bout. The same fear and panic he felt in the semifinal match seemed to return. His breathing started to come in short, rapid gasps and beads of cold sweat started to form on the back of his neck. He knew that if he couldn’t control himself, he would be paralyzed with the fear of losing.
Since first-years rarely made it so far in the Spring Tournament, there wasn’t really a good reason for Terync to have a fear of failure. He had exceeded his own expectations by coming first in the class, but the idea that he could fall so quickly and decidedly to an upperclassman was tantamount to complete humiliation.
Even now, he could picture all of the other students sitting in the stands, laughing about how poorly he was fighting and how it must have been luck only that carried him this far. He could imagine the ridicule they were preparing to pile down onto him once the match was finished, which… if he couldn’t keep his head in the game, would be over in about three more seconds.
Something in the back of his mind seemed to take over just then, and he instinctively did a little hop and a twist in the air, letting two of Lewis’s throws narrowly miss. A roar went up through the stands as nearly every member of the watching crowd could scarcely believe that Terync was able to perfectly dodge the attack, especially given that he hadn’t been facing Lewis to see it coming.
Lewis was slightly rattled now, and Terync could almost see the fear shift from him to his upperclassman. It seemed to melt off him like a morning mist rolls off a sunlit hilltop except in sickly yellow-green tendrils that seemed to reach out and swirl around Lewis.
The strange vision blinked away as Terync wiped the sweat from his brow, but the idea stuck with him that he could hopefully turn the tide of the match by using a bit of psychological warfare. Not being sure exactly how though, he just tried to be as creepy as possible.
First, he tried to put on the most menacing face he could. It felt a bit like grimacing through constipation, but he hoped that was just his perception and Lewis would feel more ill at ease because of it. His opponent’s narrowed eyes and slight frown gave him a bit of hope that he was somewhat successful.
Next, he took his last remaining axe and slowly, in the most exaggerated manner, licked it from the bottom of the haft to tip of the blunted blade. It tasted salty and faintly of palm oil, and the combined taste nearly made him gag, which only seemed to reinforce his crazy-eyed look.