“What?! I thought that thing was supposed to be made of wood!” Proto shouted as she pulled back, creating distance between them. She slammed the surface of the ground, sending a shower of stone bullets Seigrat’s way.
Seigrat knocked every last one of the bullets out of the air with his staff before delivering a swift kick to Jin, who had attempted to strike again while he was open. Jin went flying through the air.
“If you show your opponent any mercy, someone could get killed. One of your teammates, or a total stranger.”
Jin hit the ground hard, bouncing head over heels, unable to tuck and roll. She only came to a stop after slamming against the side of the arena. It took a moment for her to stagger back to her feet, her shoulders now heaving.
“I yield…,” she said, admitting defeat as she gasped for breath.
“I have no doubt you’ll continue to get stronger with time. The problem is the remaining four,” Seigrat said, just as poisonous mist began to envelop him.
“Tsutsumi’s poison doesn’t work against everyone. It’s also not a problem so long as you don’t breathe it in. You’ll need to work out another tactic for powerful opponents.”
The mist parted, flowing around Seigrat as if avoiding him. Proto, however, suddenly emerged from inside the mist, swinging her war hammer and ready to wipe the smug expression off Seigrat’s face.
“Physically, Proto, you’re even stronger than Jin. However…”
Seigrat stopped Proto’s heavy attack with a single hand, then poked Proto lightly with his staff. That was all it took to send her into the sky. It looked like Proto was about to fly over the stands and exit the arena entirely, but a magical barrier suddenly appeared, stopping her with a dull thunk.
The wind from Seigrat’s strike scattered the poisonous mist further. Before the mist could clear entirely, however, Psycho and Tsutsumi dashed forward, brandishing their knives.
They were coming at him from opposite directions—Psycho from directly behind—but Seigrat reacted with composure, never panicking.
“Multiple surprise attacks. Excellent idea!”
Seigrat deftly tossed Tsutsumi over his shoulder as she came charging from the front while stopping Psycho’s knife strike with his wooden staff. He didn’t even turn to look at her.
“The hell? You got eyes in the back of your head or something?”
Incidentally, Tsutsumi, who had been tossed in an arc through the air, was caught by Falmeyr in the stands. She was now just another spectator.
Psycho’s surprise attack had been foiled. She made eye contact with Homura, ready to set up their next surprise. Homura immediately caught Psycho’s drift.
“Just don’t be maaad—!!”
Homura responded to the eye contact by hurling a massive burst of flames straight at both of them.
Homura didn’t hold back. But her sense of guilt was stronger than her desire to win, causing her to shout an apology before she let loose. That didn’t stop the flames from erupting throughout the arena at a pace that seemed far too quick to avoid. However…
“I applaud your enthusiasm, Homura, but a surprise attack isn’t much good if you give it all away first.”
“Ouch!!”
At some point Seigrat had appeared behind Homura. He bonked her lightly with his staff. Homura rubbed her head.
“Um…where’s Psycho?”
Ignoring the pain, Homura began searching for her teammate, who had also gotten caught up in the flames. Unfortunately, Psycho was nowhere to be seen.
“She’s gone…”
A cold sweat began to trickle down Homura’s face. Had she just incinerated Psycho?
Seigrat quickly put her mind at ease. “She’s right here, of course.”
At which point Psycho fell out of the sky and landed in Seigrat’s arms.
Psycho blinked in confusion, having absolutely no idea what had just happened. Seigrat had tossed her into the air a split second before the flames enveloped them.
“Now then, as I was saying,” Seigrat said, continuing with his comments as he set Psycho down again. “You have a very strong aptitude for self-buffing, Jin, which is what you should continue to focus on. Your natural physical abilities are quite high. Your agility, in particular, is astounding. But your self-buffing still needs work. This magic is largely used unconsciously, but if you focus on it, you can get much stronger. If you could increase your durability and staying power, I think you might even be able to get in a hit against me.”
“Maybe, but how long will that take…?”
Jin had been able to put up even less of a fight than she had expected. She looked visibly discouraged.
“As for you, Proto, you aren’t able to use magic, correct?”
“Nope, I’m not human.”
Proto had landed in the stands, headfirst. She was still upside down, feet sticking into the air, as she answered him.
“Well, I don’t know much about that…but since you can’t do any fancy tricks with magic, you should focus on studying fighting techniques instead. Both for when you’re fighting alone and with others… Honestly, though, you’re going to have to figure out what you’re capable of for yourself, it’s not something I really understand.”
“If I could just override my system restrictions…”
“Someday I really would like to hear more about what it means to be born beyond the stars, but I guess that will have to wait for another time.”
Seigrat seemed more interested in hearing about the exoplanets right now than he was in giving combat instruction, but he pushed his curiosity to the side for the time being.
“Homura, you’re similar to Proto. When you connect, you’re very strong, but you have trouble actually hitting. To put it another way, though technically strong, you’re extremely weak against enemies you can’t hit. When studying how to control your flames with Carlila, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to think about ways to land attacks against opponents you can’t usually hit, but it might also be a good idea to think about effective techniques to use when you know you can’t miss.”
“You mean like a super secret finishing blow! I’ll have to think up a really cool name for it!”
Homura hadn’t even come up with the move yet, and she was already trying to think up a name.
“That leaves Psycho and Tsutsumi. The two of you don’t have quite the same offensive capabilities as the other three. You might be more suited for support than combat.”
Just like in School Village, Psycho was once again confronted by the fact that she was possibly just a support member.
“I already know I’m useless in a fight; you don’t have to rub it in…”