“Graaah!”
With a ferocious step forward, Danita swung her sword down from overhead. Ordinarily, a strike like that should have left her wide-open, but the skill and speed with which Danita was able to execute it was so great, my eyes could hardly keep up with her as I watched from a distance. Ruchika’s Gear had probably predicted this attack from Danita, but the question was whether or not she would be able to respond in time.
“…”
Ruchika didn’t move. She remained in her original battle stance. Danita’s attack came down on her—and the tip of her blade plunged into the arena floor.
“S-such power…,” said Nor.
“That’s Danita for you,” I added.
Danita’s attack had gouged open a large hole in the earth. Even though she was using a greatsword, one normally wouldn’t expect that kind of force from a blade. But people held up this girl as one of the strongest heroes of the next generation for a reason.
“You’re not taking this seriously, are you, Danita? It was crazy obvious you weren’t gonna hit me.”
“Consider it a greeting. If you’re gonna run now, I won’t stop you.”
Ruchika appeared to have anticipated the reach of Danita’s attack. She’d delivered her response with a tinge of exasperation in her voice, and it seemed like Danita had just been warming up herself.
“Looks like they’re back to square one.”
“Pretty remarkable after seeing a strike like that…”
“Yes, normally, you’d expect Danita’s opponent to lose their nerve after that. But all it did was teach Ruchika something about Danita’s fighting style.”
Ruchika wasn’t the type of person you’d expect to flinch back from an attack. But that didn’t mean she could ignore the ferocity of Danita’s overhead sword swings. The blow showed Ruchika that Danita had a move in her repertoire powerful enough to dominate the arena.
“All righty, then I guess I’ll give you a greeting of my own.”
“Ha, that’s more like it. Show me what you got.”
“Okay. Well, here I go! Ready, set…”
Saying this with the same carefree attitude as always, Ruchika brandished her arms above her head.
“Hup!”
“Gah?!”
Ruchika’s fists blew Danita back toward the other end of the arena. Danita had managed to quickly put her greatsword between herself and the attack, but I could tell that if she had taken the blow directly, the damage would have been considerable.
“You damn brat…!”
“Whoa. Nice one, Danita. You’ve got good reflexes!”
“Don’t mess with me… I’ll freakin’ kill you!”
“You finally taking this seriously? Hell yeah! All right, now let’s really do this!”
At long last, Danita had put up her guard and was ready to fight to kill, and Ruchika seemed pleased as punch about this. If it had been me out there, I surely would have been frozen in fear.
From there on out, the two began exchanging blows. Danita unleashed a storm of slashing attacks, and Ruchika wove through them with jabs and kicking techniques. Everyone watching the advanced tactics on display could tell this was a bout between two talented fighters—and all watching found themselves totally absorbed.
“Hey, hey, what’s the matter?! Already slowin’ down?”
“Ugh…! Come on, Proto, I can’t just throw out ice magic at a time like this!”
After a while, the equilibrium between the two contestants began to collapse. Danita had begun to take control of the offensive. Ruchika kept trying to counter with everything she had, but her movements had somehow started to lose their pep. It was like her rhythm was off, or she was struggling against something.
“Enough!”
Ruchika, who had been keeping within range of Danita up until then, took one large leap back to get some distance.
“Proto, I’m sorry, but you’re just getting in my way!”
Ruchika shouted like she couldn’t stand it anymore, and all of a sudden, placed her hands on her Gear and took it off.