As Arthur's greatsword came down, Roger swung to intercept.
In his mind, the plan was simple: block the blow, knock the boy's sword aside with force, and then follow up with a punishing strike. Arthur would fall to his knees, beg for mercy, and Roger would offer a quip or two for Brynden's amusement before driving his sword through the boy's chest. Clean, theatrical, satisfying.
Hadn't he already imagined the Blackwood lands in his hands?
But plans are made in the head—reality lives in the bones.
And the cold truth was that Arthur's descending strike was far heavier than it should've been. Roger's block came late, and when their blades met, his own sword—gripped tightly in both hands—began to buckle under the pressure.
The force was unnatural.
Arthur, who appeared no stronger than a squire still growing into his armor, fought with the raw strength of a man full-grown and honed. There was no finesse, no clever feint—just pure, brutal power that crashed down like a smith's hammer.
Roger's instinct, forged from decades of hard battle from the Riverlands to the Stepstones, screamed at him: Back off!
He did. The step was sudden, sharp, and necessary. Their blades sparked violently as they scraped past each other, and the force of the blow forced Roger back two full paces.
Brynden Blackwood's eyes went wide. He had seen knights fall to the Mountain, to Ser Arthur Dayne in old stories, but this—this was unexpected. Roger, his cousin and a seasoned fighter, had been driven back by a single blow from a boy who looked like he'd barely survived his first summer war camp.
Behind Arthur, Jules Bracken froze in mid-step, having been ready to slink away if his nephew disgraced himself. His pupils contracted in shock. That strength…
Could even he have driven back Roger like that?
Amber blinked as if seeing Arthur for the first time. He knew this boy better than anyone—had sparred with him, seen him struggle to lift his sword two months ago. But the Arthur now on the field was not the same boy who'd fumbled with his blade in the yard. No—this was something else.
The Bracken soldiers behind them, hardened men, exchanged stunned glances. Not a one of them had believed their young lord would last three passes.
And then came the second strike.
Arthur stepped in and swung again—this time with purpose. Now that he had gauged Roger's strength, he unleashed nearly all of his own. His greatsword howled through the air, a deadly arc of silver that left no room for hesitation.
Roger barely raised his sword to parry, but it wasn't enough. The moment their blades met, the force overwhelmed him. His legs buckled, and he dropped to one knee in the dirt. His palms burned, his muscles trembled, and his arms felt like they were holding back a warhorse.
This was no ordinary boy. This strength was something else—something closer to the beasts that roamed the Wolfswood than the sons of riverlords.
No form. No technique, Roger thought, struggling to stay upright. Just raw, overwhelming power. But in all his years fighting, he'd never met anyone who could use brute strength like this—and win.
Time slowed. Each heartbeat felt like a bell tolling in a silent Sept. He thought of the long summer, of the duels he'd won, of the men he'd killed. He tried to lift his sword to prepare for the next blow, but the weight of Arthur's strikes had numbed his fingers.
Then, suddenly, his blade felt light again.
Relief swept through him.
But it was a mistake.
Before he could recover, Arthur's third strike crashed down.
With a deafening clang, Roger's sword was knocked clean from his hands and sent clattering across the grass. He barely threw himself backward in time to avoid being struck outright. As he landed, he looked up—
And found Arthur's sword pressed cold and steady against his neck.
The steel hummed with the echo of its last swing. Roger's thoughts were a blur. He couldn't move. The blade on his throat silenced his pride, silenced his bravado, and left only awe—and fear.
Around the clearing, silence spread like mist over the Gods Eye. The birds in the canopy above were the only ones left making sound.
The Bracken soldiers gaped, stunned into silence. The "bandits"—Blackwood men in disguise—watched with narrowed eyes, their ruse exposed by their inaction. Brynden, Jules, Amber… no one said a word.
Even the wind in the leaves seemed to have stilled.
How had the boy won?
More than that—how had he won so easily?
Brynden, seated atop his horse, stared down at the scene with disbelief hardening into something else. Awe. Reverence. He looked at Arthur not as a blundering amateur anymore, but as a man who had masked mastery in a shroud of simplicity.
Was it a ruse? No… it was something better.
This isn't a beginner ignoring the rules, Brynden thought. This is a master who knows the rules—and chooses not to follow them.
The young heir to House Blackwood felt a strange twist in his chest.
This man… might be the real thing.
And then Arthur's voice, calm and unwavering, broke the silence beneath the beech trees.
Weren't you quite talkative just now?" Arthur pressed the blade harder against Roger's neck, a thin line of blood starting to bead along the steel. "Now give me some comments."
The iron chill of the sword's edge bit into Roger's skin, and the look in Arthur's eyes told him that death was not a distant threat—it was moments away. His heart thundered in his chest like the hooves of a charging Dothraki khalasar. Blood trickled down his neck. For the first time in years, the bandit felt something unfamiliar: real, bone-deep fear.
"I surrender!" he cried out hoarsely. "Don't kill me! I surrender, I surrender!"
Arthur's expression didn't shift much, but he eased the pressure, withdrawing the blade slightly. With a casual motion, he turned to where Jules had frozen near the edge of the beech grove. "Tie him up," Arthur ordered, tone flat.
Jules had been inching backward, hoping to fade into the trees, but Arthur's voice rooted him in place. The weight of those calm, cold words was like Tywin Lannister's mere presence at a council table—silent, but undeniable. With no better options, Jules dismounted reluctantly and tied Roger's hands behind his back, using strips of leather taken from the horses' tack.
The reason Arthur hadn't killed Roger wasn't just because of his soul—still tethered to 21st-century moral codes—but because Robert Baratheon still sat on the Iron Throne. The rule of law, though weakened, hadn't yet collapsed entirely. Even murderers had the option to "take the black," joining the Night's Watch on the Wall to escape execution. Ned Stark's justice still held sway in the North, and Arthur knew that if he wanted to build something lasting, he couldn't afford to flout the system so openly.
Besides, Arthur understood the strange law of narrative justice that seemed to govern this world. There was a vicious symmetry in how death found people in Westeros. Ned Stark executed a Night's Watch deserter with a clean swing of Ice, the greatsword of House Stark—and was later executed by sword himself in King's Landing, when Joffrey defied his advisors. Jon Snow killed Qhorin Halfhand with a blade to gain the trust of the wildlings—and was stabbed to death by his own sworn brothers. Robb Stark was stabbed at the Red Wedding, and Roose Bolton, his killer, met the same fate at the hands of his own son. Ygritte, the wildling girl who loosed arrows into innocent villagers, was later felled by an arrow from a frightened village boy. The Queen of Thorns used poison to kill Joffrey, and she too was poisoned in the end by Jaime Lannister. Even lowborns weren't exempt—Brienne of Tarth met three Stark soldiers who had killed women cruelly; each died in ways that mirrored their deeds, the slowest death reserved for the one who had made his victim suffer the longest.
It was a world where karma wasn't just philosophical—it was enforced with steel and fire. Here, kindness and prudence were not just virtues but survival tools.
When Roger was secured, Arthur turned to the remaining young bandit who had been watching with wide, panicked eyes.
"Will you surrender yourself," Arthur asked, voice steady, "or shall I do it for you?"
The youth blinked. For a moment, he hesitated, then blurted out, "Why should I surrender? Can't I just run?"
He spun around and shouted to the other bandits, "Run! Scatter!"
Brynden's idea had seemed clever—but only in theory. The reality was far less forgiving.
Arthur's infantry had arrived, cutting off escape. The bandits whirled and saw, only thirty or forty paces ahead, a line of Bracken soldiers closing in with weapons raised. Behind them stood Arthur, still calm, still deadly, sword in hand. On either flank, the trees of the beechwood forest were dense and tangled.
And trees, at least, didn't swing swords.
[You will meet the opponent's eleven with a team of fifty people]
Arthur saw the moment their will to fight broke. With a quiet nod, he signaled to the six men nearby, drawing his sword again and striding toward the enemy.
The skirmish ended quickly. The bandits, seeing no escape and facing overwhelming odds, surrendered within minutes. By the time the campfire stew was halfway done, all eleven had been captured and tied up, hands behind their backs.
The farmer's daughter and the village chief's wife were rescued with minimal harm. Mercifully, the wife had not yet become what Riverland folk darkly called an "overnight widow."
[Two-handed weapon proficiency +3]
[Task: Find the bandits and help the people recover the stolen property. Completed. EXP +500. Riverside Village Favorability +3]
Arthur was just about to assign the newly gained stat points when one of the prisoners suddenly shouted out from the group.
"You dare tie me up?" the man spat. "Do you know who I am?"