His hands clenched and his eyes never left the other’s. You could see everything you needed to see in a fight in the eyes of your opponent – besides he had insanely good peripheral vision. No great fighter stayed that way without it, after all. At first, he just stood there, sizing up the apparent fear at the appearance of a ghost. Especially one so known and renowned as Julius fucking Ceasar himself. Well, everyone who wasn’t used to this sort of thing would be afraid. He did have a fair advantage in that regard, having travelled as the slave of a God for so long, being put into fights he had no business being in – and seeing things no mortal man should have to see – he wasn’t put out when ghosts appeared. 

But, apparently, not everyone was as well-traveled as himself. Which wasn’t surprising, he didn’t even honestly know what year he was in – but he could tell from the uniforms and people around that it wasn’t exactly during a time where time-travel or dimensional awareness was a thing. He couldn’t help but wonder where he was, or more accurately when he was – but his inquisition stopped the moment the fight began. See, you can’t really throw something without telegraphing it. The shoulder tensing, the arm moving, it all belied only two possibilities. A shield-punch, which with the distance he couldn’t even hope to reach him with his arms. Or, and the most likely, a throw. The angle of his arm also belied a likely target, and he immediately began moving. He swung his arm around, letting the length of chain gather force. 

The chain, heavy and durable, slammed into the side of the shield when it was about a foot from his legs, pushing its trajectory off to the right – letting it eat and bite down into the sand. He made no counter-move. Once the shield bit into the ground, he stood there with his eyes still focused on the other. His cold, dead eyes. There was clearly no soul behind them, no life. Whatever the God did to him, it was an atrocious act.