Chapter 439: Match Rules
(10 days before the fight, The First Elder’s POV)
It took the Elder’s Council forty-six days of intense debate after the fight between Leo and Aegon Veyr was announced to finalize the venue, the rules, the officiating referee, the ticket pricing, and every other logistical concern that came attached with an event of this magnitude.
This delay was mostly caused by the unwillingness of either camp to compromise or even engage in proper communication with the other, as neither side wanted to appear weak or conceding after their huge internal brawl following the previous Council meeting.
With every elder prioritizing personal pride over practical execution, even the simplest decisions devolved into full-scale arguments that required dozens of clarifications and redrafts before they could be passed.
The venue came first.
After considerable back-and-forth, the match was eventually approved to be held on Planet Tithia, since it housed the largest spectator arena in the entire Cult territory — the ’Dragon Lewis Hamilton Arena’, named in honor of the second ever Dragon of the Cult, Sir Lewis Hamilton.
Naturally, not everyone was happy about this.
Most elders wanted the fight hosted on a planet under their own jurisdiction, and many openly protested the decision through official letters laced with passive-aggressive insults and thinly veiled threats. But in the end, size and neutrality won out, and Tithia was selected as the official venue.
The rules of the fight sparked even greater friction.
Some elders wanted a custom-built fight floor with unpredictable terrain to inject more drama into the fight. Others argued for allowing paralyzing poisons, suggesting Leo be given every possible fallback in case he lacked the strength to win cleanly.
But such allowances were ultimately denied.
It was decided that the match would be held on a flat, circular sandpit under standard Universal Circuit rules. No poison. No terrain manipulation. A pure, unmodified duel between two fighters that would be decided solely on their skill, strength, and weapon mastery.
Selecting the officiating referee, however, was surprisingly easy.
Captain Max Verstappen, a senior soldier in service of the Cult army, was appointed with unanimous approval.
His reputation for impartiality and battlefield excellence made him the rare candidate who was both respected and feared by both sides equally. Not a single elder raised objection to his appointment, which in itself felt like a miracle.
The last and most divisive point of discussion was the ticket pricing.
Everyone understood the financial implications. The revenue generated from a match of this scale was sure to be astronomical, and since Planet Tithia fell under the First Elder’s domain, the default assumption was that all proceeds would go to him.
Naturally, the other elders refused to accept that.
Many demanded that the fight be made free to the public, disguising their demands under the noble idea of inclusivity. But the First Elder knew this was nothing but a strategic ploy to avoid revenue sharing.
Besides, making it free was not only unrealistic but dangerous. With the amount of excitement the fight had generated, an open-door policy would all but guarantee chaos, with stampedes, overcrowded sectors, and potential riots erupting across the arena.
And so, a compromise was struck.
Tickets would be sold on a first-come-first-serve basis at the nominal price of one silver coin per person, with strict booth management to maintain crowd order.
Allocation of tickets would be done proportionally based on each planet’s Cult population, with ticket booths opened across every sector within Cult territory.
It was a delicate balance between fairness, safety, and profit.
Because with how much the commoners believed in the Dragon, there would be no surprise if individual tickets started to sell at upwards of 50,000 gold coins a piece if it were sold via a public auction.
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The reaction of the commoners to the match announcement was immediate and overwhelming.
No sooner had the rules and ticket prices been publicly announced than chaos descended on the streets of every Cult-controlled planet.
Despite the ticket booths being scheduled to open only after forty-eight hours, thousands of citizens rushed to secure a place in line, unwilling to risk missing their only chance to witness what could be the crowning moment of the next Dragon.
Rich merchants abandoned their stores. Poor laborers dropped their tools.
Even the disabled arrived in wheelchairs, rolling over the muddy cobblestones with every last bit of their strength, as they refused to miss this historic moment just because of their physical inability.
Beggars used their last silver coin as a placeholder, defiantly vowing to go hungry for a month or even dying happy if they could witness this fight, as although 1 silver coin was a lot of money for them, they still forked it out for this monumental occasion.
For once, social status ceased to matter within the Cult.
There were no nobles or peasants anymore, only believers in the legend of the next Dragon, each one driven by a shared obsession to watch the ancient prophecy unfold before their eyes.
Jobs got forgotten, meals got skipped and hundreds of families were left waiting.
Because for once, nothing mattered more than this.
Within just two hours of the announcement, ticket queues swelled so drastically that public squares outside booth zones turned into human walls, overflowing with desperate bodies and chaotic energy.
Roads were blocked, shops shuttered, transit hubs frozen.
Daily life came to a grinding halt, replaced by a single, silent urgency that pulsed across the cities like a heartbeat.
Local authorities attempted to step in, after things got out of control.
Police sirens wailed, and baton-wielding enforcers marched in with the intent to disband the gatherings, citing public obstruction and civil disruption laws.
But the people stood firm.
Old men clutched their walking sticks like spears, refusing to move. Some openly wept, shouting that they had waited their entire lives for a moment like this. That even if the police cracked their skulls open or dragged them to prison, they would crawl their way back just to witness the crowning of the next Dragon.
Mothers stood with babies tied to their backs. Teenagers stood barefoot after running for miles. Former veterans saluted each other in the line, standing at attention not for a general, but for the hope of witnessing the next Dragon live in action.
And so, in the end, it was not the people who surrendered. It was the police.
Faced with a crowd too large to contain and too unified to intimidate, they backed down, slowly retreating as city officials scrambled for alternative strategies.
Makeshift barricades were raised to guide the lines instead of disbanding them, and emergency water stations were deployed just to keep people from fainting in the heat.
The same scene unfolded on every planet within the Cult’s domain.
From the icy mining colonies of Planet Gantor to the fertile trade ports of Planet Zian Prime, every booth was now surrounded by a tidal wave of people, each one unwilling to give up their chance to be there in person when history was being written at the Sir Lewis Hamilton Arena.
Because this was not just an ordinary fight.
It was the moment that marked the dawn of a new era.
The moment after which the Cult’s thirty two year long wait for its new Dragon would finally come to an end.