"I don't know why you hate me so much," he says, circling you with a blade in hand, there were a handful of visible cuts on his body, "I've barely just got here."

That was just it. He is the new guy, a nobody, and the new praetor. He stole the position you'd been striving to fill for years, right from under your fingertips. What was there not to hate?

He was a skilled fighter, you could give him that. Without the use of his special water powers, he was touchable. Granted, had this been a full battle powers and all, it'd probably lead you both back here but on a more drastic scale.

The visible, fresh scars on his body were from you, the son of Neptune gifting you with the same in return. An hour maybe? You've been out here for longer than most spars usually last, some campers coming and going to watch.

He was right, he could never understand why you hated him. Or hated the way you didn't hate him, he'd never understand that either. Percy always got what he wanted and more, through hard work or by other means, he got it. As a result, he became praetor and you in his debt for saving your camp.

Was this fight out of pity? There was no way to be sure. Maybe he was mocking your ability, proving to you just how you didn't meet the mark. Knowing him, that probably wasn't the case, but thinking so only added more fuel to the fire that was your anger.

Percy pierced his sword into the ground, he was forfeiting. There was no way he wasn't mocking you, the son of Neptune surrendering to you? What a joke.

"Let's end this with words, please?" All he really wanted was one, real conversation. It's about time you stop avoiding it like the plague.