Chapter 43: The Duel Begins (Please bookmark, please vote) My cold is getting worse and worse...

The duel on the second day proceeded as scheduled. For this showdown, virtually the entire city turned out. No one wanted to miss the opportunity to witness the First Knight of Camelot in combat. The love for spectacle is not unique to any single populace; people everywhere are irresistibly drawn to excitement and gossip.

Perhaps mindful of the immense public attention surrounding the duel, King Uther had to deploy countless soldiers and knights beforehand to maintain order at the scene. This also subjected the gathered crowds to an unprecedented sense of pressure.

Kay stood in the center of the dueling arena wearing standard knightly armor, where the Black Knight had already been waiting for a long time. Prior to the commencement of the duel, this Black Knight had stood motionless before the main gate of the royal palace, refusing food, drink, or sleep, standing like a statue for a day and a night—perhaps fearing that Kay, the challenger, might attempt to flee.

Duels between knights typically followed extremely strict ceremonial rules. For instance, before the duel officially began, knights were required to go bareheaded, wear magnificent cloaks, hold their family crest banners aloft, and deliver a speech in the center of the arena.

On such occasions, Kay was invariably the reticent one, as he found these foolish-looking openings deeply awkward. Consequently, he usually limited himself to a brief self-introduction before donning his helmet and awaiting the true start of the duel.

Today, however, Kay broke with his usual routine. He gazed with complex emotions at the familiar Black Knight before him. The crown, the armor, and the heraldic shield were all intimately known to him. They were the very equipment he had worn during his final duel with King Uther.

Tristan had not always dressed in this manner. Initially, like all high-spirited young knights, he favored resplendent attire. Coupled with a visage capable of rendering any woman breathless, he had once been the quintessential prince charming in the hearts of all maidens.

Yet, in the wake of that tragic romance, Tristan felt he had proved unworthy of his knightly status and had forfeited his honor. He discarded his ornate garments and began appearing before the public shrouded entirely in black armor.

To say that Kay felt nothing upon looking at Tristan in this state would be a blatant lie.

Although Kay had possessed a fully formed worldview before his transmigration and held zero interest in hero worship, upon interacting with Tristan, he was forced to concede that some individuals are simply born to be adored.

Take Tristan, for instance: his sincerity, kindness, and bravery inspired deep yearning even in Kay, an old man well into his thirties prior to crossing over. At the time, Kay often found himself thinking how wonderful it would be to become a man like him.

And yet, a romance unacceptable to the world had ultimately dragged such a nearly flawless knight down into the abyss...

To be frank, Kay could not entirely condone the affair between Tristan and Iseult, the Princess of Ireland. Being of a traditional mindset, Kay harbored an innate aversion to love triangles. In his view, such relationships were fundamentally immoral, all the more so because the woman belonged to his uncle—making the transgression infinitely graver. Tristan possessed looks, strength, wealth, and status; what manner of woman could he not have? That romance had been somewhat impulsive from its very inception.

Yet Kay had to admit that love was not something easily reduced to rational calculations.

In short, Kay felt a complex mixture of emotions regarding Tristan's downfall. Above all, however, there was a profound sense of sorrow. Tristan’s mortal life had been tragic enough; who could have imagined that his soul would suffer desecration even after death?

"Good day, Sir Tristan." Kay motioned for the squire holding his helmet to step back, then bowed and executed a traditional knightly salute with his sword.

The Black Knight gave no response, continuing to stare at Kay like a statue. Kay did not mind. Strictly speaking, the present Tristan was not truly Tristan; his soul was saturated with sorrow and hatred, rendering him incapable of functioning as a normal spirit.

"I never imagined our reunion after twenty years would take place under such circumstances. It is truly sigh-worthy. The scenes of two decades ago seem as though they occurred only yesterday. I once believed your silhouette was something I could only ever look up to from afar, never dreaming that one day I would stand before you to issue a challenge."

Though grieved that Tristan’s physical body and soul were being desecrated, Kay could not entirely suppress a sense of fortunate fulfillment. To Kay, Tristan was unequivocally an idol-tier figure. Engaging in a knightly duel against a formidable opponent was practically the dream of every knight, for regardless of victory or defeat, it signified honor. Knightly honor could never be reduced to mere wins and losses.

Having undergone years of knightly education and possessing a martial background to begin with, Kay found that the urge to challenge the strong was practically an instinct burned into his very bones.

Twenty years ago, during the zenith of Tristan's era, Kay had merely been a punk kid unqualified to cross swords with top-tier knights, leaving him with nothing more than daydreams. Now, however, that aspiration was manifesting in an entirely different way.

Kay's nostalgic reverie elicited no reaction whatsoever from Tristan.

Witnessing this, Kay felt a tinge of disappointment. Although his opponent was indeed Tristan, how could a mere puppet driven solely by slaughter and hatred compare to the high-spirited Tristan of the past?

Kay waved his hand, signaling the squire to bring his helmet. Donning the helm, Kay instructed the squire to remove his cloak.

Tapping his helmet, Kay stepped toward the Black Knight, dual swords in hand.

"I have one final request, Sir Tristan. If possible, I hope you will fight me with the bearing of a true knight, rather than insulting your honor through this horrifying and abhorrent guise. I believe you can hear me; after all, you were once the finest knight in this world. You can surely conquer that foul sorcerous trickery!"

While death knights functioned as puppets, their core souls unquestionably remained their own. On this point, there was no doubt.

Like many old-school Chinese, Kay harbored a mystical obsession with the power of the spirit, firmly believing that where there is a will, there is a way. In the early days of the People's Republic, despite facing unimaginable hardships and relying on rudimentary equipment through relentless effort, the nation had successfully developed nuclear weapons and satellites. That was the ultimate proof.

Consequently, Kay believed that with Sir Tristan's indomitable willpower, he could certainly break free from the control of the evil magic.

Kay’s words caused the Black Knight to lift his head slightly. Then, once more, he remained entirely expressionless. Kay could not tell whether his plea had succeeded in awakening Tristan's will.

Regardless, it mattered no longer. The duel had begun!

As the dueling bell tolled, the two knights charged toward one another instantly.

Displaying extreme caution, Kay refrained from launching an immediate attack, choosing instead to probe for openings in the Black Knight’s defense rather than pressing the offensive from the start.

The Black Knight, however, operated quite differently. Showing not a shred of caution, he raised his blade and slashed downward the very instant the match began.

The Black Knight wielded a two-handed greatsword. Such weapons were predominantly utilized by knights for training purposes, rarely making an appearance on actual battlefields. They were simply too cumbersome; unless endowed with freakish natural strength, one could scarcely swing such a weapon more than a few times amidst combat. Furthermore, their strike speed could hardly be considered swift.

Yet one fact remained indisputable: their destructive power was immense. A blow from such a weapon was far more devastating than an axe.

Facing the incoming strike, Kay remained remarkably calm; an attack of this magnitude was not enough to fluster him. Sidestepping smoothly, he evaded the massive blade while simultaneously launching a counterattack with his left hand as his body shifted.