Triumph Cord

"Now, let's carve the Triumph Cord!"

Kleist turned and shouted to the Gladiators.

All the Gladiators immediately rose from the ground and began searching for anything sharp enough to cut with.

Stones, shards, bones left behind by the dead.

"What is the Triumph Cord?" Angron asked curiously.

Kleist was too immersed in his excitement to notice Angron's question.

So Oeno answered Angron instead.

"The Triumph Cord is a ritual." Oeno turned around, lifted his shirt, and showed Angron his back.

Angron noticed a vertical line running along Oeno's spine. It was red and black, resembling some sort of scale.

"Gladiatorial combat is an ancient tradition on Nuceria," Oeno explained. "Long, long ago, there was a tradition in the Arena: the victor would carve lines along his spine, extending down to his waist. Each victory in the Arena meant cutting a small wound, and over time, they formed a line."

Angron was puzzled. "We hate the Arena, so why are we imposing its rules and traditions upon ourselves?"

"Because this tradition is older than the history of the most ancient High-Rider families. In the beginning, it was a way for soldiers in armies to record honor and shame." As he spoke, Oeno handed a sharpened stone to a nearby Gladiator.

Qin Xa watched the scene. He did know of this ritual called the Triumph Cord.

As far as he knew, if things developed as they originally had, Angron would bring this tradition into the World Eaters Legion after becoming master of the Legion.

If the World Eaters Legion failed to take a world within thirty-one solar hours, they would leave a black line representing shame upon their Triumph Cords.

The intermittent red-and-black lines along Oeno's spine were his Triumph Cord. Red represented honor and victory; black represented shame and defeat.

Leaving a red line was simple: make a small wound, like placing a drop of blood upon a straight line.

Leaving a black line required stuffing some dirt into the wound after cutting it open. Once the wound healed, it would turn black.

"Wait, everyone." Kleist suddenly had an idea. "We won today because of this medium-sized fellow. He shared honor and victory with us, so why not let him carve our Blood Lines for us?"

Kleist's idea immediately received everyone's approval.

The Gladiators gathered together and formed a line, exposing their backs to Qin Xa.

Letting a companion stand behind them with a sharp tool and carve a Blood Line was also a way for Gladiators to show trust and friendship.

"Me?" Qin Xa rose and accepted a sharp bone shard handed over by a Gladiator. "All right, but this is my first time. Don't blame me if it goes crooked and ends up on the left side of your ass."

With that, Qin Xa passed behind every one of them.

His movements were swift, and his hand was extremely precise.

He left a small, blood-red wound on every Triumph Cord formed of Blood Lines upon the Gladiators' backs.

Once Qin Xa had added a mark to every Gladiator's Triumph Cord, he stopped and looked at Angron, asking with his eyes whether he wished to accept this tradition.

For Angron, who had yet to receive any education, every kind of tradition seemed meaningless.

But the honor filling everyone's hearts infected Angron. He nodded and revealed his broad, imposing back.

The primarch had not yet come of age, yet he was effortlessly larger than any enhanced Astartes.

"Angron." Qin Xa extended a finger, heat gathering at its tip as he left a small blood-red wound on Angron's back. "This is the beginning of your honor."

Angron let out a muffled groan. The damage and pain psychic power inflicted upon him far surpassed those caused by physical tools, but beyond the pain, he also felt happy.

Because most of the people here were happy.

"Now, carve one for me." Qin Xa handed the bone shard to Angron.

Angron took the bone shard and hesitated visibly, though not because of himself. It was because he sensed that everyone here was confused.

The people here seemed surprised that Qin Xa would ask to undergo the Triumph Cord ritual.

"No offense," Oeno said, "but on Nuceria, the Triumph Cord ritual is considered a tradition followed only by barbaric brutes and fighters. Educated or respectable people hate it."

"We're going to entrust our backs to one another." Qin Xa turned around and exposed his back, joking, "I don't want someone to see a back without a Triumph Cord, stab it, and then discover that back is mine."

"That won't happen. Your back is pretty easy to recognize," Kleist said with a laugh.

Angron took the bone shard and gently cut Qin Xa's back, but found that the thing would not cut through. He threw it away and used his fingernail to leave a small wound on Qin Xa, the beginning of his Triumph Cord.

If Qin Xa had not used psychic power to leave a wound on Angron earlier, Angron would have used his fingernail to mark the beginning of his own Triumph Cord upon his flesh in the same way.

A blood-red beginning.

Late at night.

The Gladiators crowded by the window, watching bodies being dragged outside by Slaves.

The noble sons of the Tark Family, knights clad in golden armor—their bodies lay face-down upon the ground, yet their heads faced the stars.

The Slaves piled the corpses of these so-called descendants of gods together with those of the Servant Knights, loaded them onto carts, and hauled them out of the Arena's combat zone.

"Five nobles died, and they're just letting it go?" Angron worried that the Arena or the nobles might retaliate against Qin Xa afterward.

"When scions of other families die in the Arena, the Gladiators have to be buried with them. But not with the Tark Family." Oeno answered Angron's question. "The head of the Tark Family is fairly just. He would not demand that victorious Gladiators be buried with noble children of his family just because those children came to the Arena to seek death and got what they wished for."

"That really is pretty just." Angron nodded in agreement.

Oeno withdrew his gaze from the Arena and turned to Qin Xa. "Come to think of it, I don't think those Slaughterers acted today like they knew they were facing a wizard. Could it be that no one had discovered you were a wizard before this?"

At those words, Qin Xa, who sat cross-legged on the ground with his eyes closed, twitched an ear. He opened his eyes and returned Oeno's questioning look with one of his own. "I had the same feeling. But even now, I still think the chance that people outside do not know I'm a wizard is far, far too low."

Oeno nodded thoughtfully.

He also understood why Qin Xa felt that was impossible.

It was not as though Nucerians had never seen wizards. Qin Xa's body alone, so different from ordinary people, would make them think he was a wizard.

Things had come to this point. There was no need to dwell on it.

A friend who reads my book asked me to recommend one he wrote himself.

"Warhammer: Rogal Dorn Returns from the Vox-Caster"... a proper ongoing serial!