"Augh!" Erina cried out as her head banged against brick. Her focus broken, the spear dispersed as her feet flailed in the air. One of the other men had her up on the wall by the throat, her hands scrabbling at the arm keeping her in place.

  A dozen thoughts raced through her mind in the same instant. Lifting her one-handed? At this range, she should be able to sense a strength enhancement spell in use, but there was none. How long had these men been following her? Were they part of the same group that found her in the lab? Faint wisps of light green energy smoldered between her fingers as she tried to force his grip open. She should be able to blow them away. Why weren't her spells working?

  "Looks like it's a feisty one tonight!" laughed the man holding her up. She froze as he drew his face right up to hers. "Play nice, missy," he breathed. The air filled with the noxious stench of alcohol. "Don't wanna ruin that pretty face so soon."

  I'm scared. Erina's heart raced a mile a minute as she stared back in silence at the blurry face filling her vision. It was all she could do to keep herself from opening her mouth. She knew if she did, she wouldn't be able to stop a tear from slipping out. What do I do?

  "That's a good girl," crooned the large man.

  "?" called a woman's voice.

  The grip on her throat relaxed and the man drew back. Erina turned her head as best she could in the direction the sound came from.

  A young girl stood in the middle of the alley. She almost looked younger than Erina, and certainly much shorter. She lowered her orange hood, revealing messy blonde hair reaching just to her shoulders. She wore a white cropped top and brown short shorts with an oversized orange hoodie jacket over top, unzipped. One leg was covered by a black thigh-high stocking, the other carrying an array of knives in a thigh holster. Hands in her pockets, head held high, and razor-sharp eyes with irises like golden amber looking down on them, she was all but oozing with confidence.

  Dangerous, was the first word that came to Erina's mind. Right away, she knew those heavy-duty steel-tipped boots couldn't be just for show.

  "Akira." The name oozed through the first man's teeth like venom. "Piss off, will you? This ain't none of your business."

  "Really hate to tell you this," she drawled, "but you made it my business. Didn't you punks learn not to play around on my turf?"

  "Your turf?" He spat to the side. "Missed the part where I'm s'posed to care what shitty hunk o' junk the brat calls hers."

  Akira licked her lips.

  Erina almost didn't see it. One moment, Akira was casually walking up from several meters away. The next, she had her knee in the first man's gut, folding him double over with a painful expulsion of air. A single moment more, and Akira ducked low, inverting herself as her boot snapped around to slam aside his skull—

  Slam through his skull, bringing it to the floor and splitting it open like a watermelon on the concrete with a brutal snap.

  The large man dropped Erina with a yell, a thrown knife suddenly appearing in his arm. The third man drew out the metal baseball bat he'd been hiding, and the two of them threw themselves at Akira, leaving Erina to watch in shock from the floor.

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  A swing with the bat was deflected with a kick, the impact of steel on steel ringing with intense force. Sparks flew as she threw a whiffed kick, leaving a fresh white mark on the wall with the knife hidden in her boot. Akira was a whirlwind, spinning low and flipping high, each motion another attack, every kick thrown transitioning into another and another like a vortex of a dance. The men backed up, unsure how to even approach.

  "What's the matter, mister?" Akira finished in a one-handed handstand, grinning at them upside-down before righting herself. She stuck out her tongue and then spread her arms wide, goading, "Can't even pick on someone half your size?"

  "You stupid fucking brat—!"

  Akira dodged the large man's wild punch by briefly running up the wall, flipping entirely over in mid-air to come down with a falling kick that sent him reeling. Her laugh was zero comedy and all mockery.

  A low groan drew Erina's attention away from the frenetic melee. The first man had gotten up onto his hands and knees—convulsing and ready to collapse at any moment, but alive. Erina couldn't believe her eyes. She knew she saw Akira's boot go through his head up to the calf. The splatter was right there under him, yet there he was with his head—bloody, but intact.

  "Do your best, do your best!" Akira jeered, backing away from her enraged attackers. "I'm cheering for you! Fight! Fight!"

  Almost like a passing thought, Akira crushed the man's skull underfoot a second time before spinning back into the fight. A dark, sickly green trail followed the stomp's motion and lingered as she left, mixed into the mess and festering like a viscous venom that burned in slow motion. This time pounded halfway into the new crack in the concrete, the man's head didn't seem to be growing back anymore.

  Akira laughed as she leaned way back and let the metal bat swing just inches above her nose. She let herself fall back into a handstand and kicked, venom trailing her feet as she swept the man's legs out from under him and immediately swung her momentum into a flip and a heel drop that turned his head to paste.

  "You're not getting away with this!" The large man swung for the head as she got back up—

  She leaned to the side, not even breaking eye contact as his fist smashed into the brick wall behind her. The man could feel her tiny breath out as Akira smirked in his face—and then drove her knee up where it hurt the most.

  "Ooh!" The man crumpled, nearly curling up into a ball in agony. Even so, he raised his head, grimacing through the pain to find Akira looking down on him. "The fuck… do you think you're doing? Patriarch Kirigami will never take this lying down!"

  That seemed to give Akira pause. "Oh?"

  "Li'l shit," he seethed. "This is a declaration of war, you hear me?!"

  "Oh, nooo," she deadpanned. "Whatever will I do? Anything but that."

  The first kick to the gut threw him against the wall. The second drove her boot straight through his face to shut him up.

  "Bootlicking scum." Akira's expression was one of pure disgust as she wiped the soles of her boots off on his back. "This is the most useful you'll ever be."

  An uncanny silence descended on the alley after the chaos of battle. None of the three bodies showed any signs of getting up. The light drizzle continued to fall, indifferent to anything that transpired. Erina let out the breath she didn't even realize she was holding.

  Akira's figure seemed to waver, flickering with a faint fuzz like television static, and then it was gone like a trick of the eye. She turned towards the fallen girl.

  "?" Akira offered her hand. Erina silently noted her thigh holster was filled with knives again. The blood on her boots was gone, and Akira was as dry as if she had only just walked out into the rain. "You'll catch a cold down there. C'mon, on your feet."

  "T-Thank you." Erina wasn't sure what else to say as she helped her up.

  Akira didn't seem to have anything to say either. She only folded her arms and tilted her head. Those cunning gold eyes seemed to track every tiny movement Erina made.

  Why isn't she saying anything? Erina was unnerved. This girl was even shorter than her, yet she radiated a pressure that made it difficult for Erina to meet her eye. There was no magic to it… or maybe it was because Erina could still see those three bodies in the corner of her eye.

  "Hey," said Akira. Erina barely forced herself not to flinch. "I'm feeling hungry. How's ice cream sound?"