It was picked clean of plants and trees—a clean area for training. Soldiers would often come here—Tyler and Kai didn’t. If people came here, it was to test serious magic—not sword skills.
“So we’re serious now,” Tyler mused.
“No, I’m serious,” I said. “You’re going to stay out of it. If you get hurt the day our parents show up, they’ll cling to me like Kline in a bathtub.”
Tyler rolled his eyes. “And they won’t for you?” He looked at Dad, whose face was grim. He shot Tyler a glance, and the latter smirked triumphantly.
“Know what?” I mused. “Fine. I’m sure mom would appreciate you being humbled… in a controlled environment. Bed rest forever wouldn’t be enough for Tanya Hill.”
Tyler turned to Dad. “You just heard her threaten me, right?”
Dad sighed and turned to me, trying to remain straight-faced. “Don’t antagonize your brother.”
“What type of half-hearted bullshit is that?” Tyler cried.
“It wasn’t half-hearted,” Dad said. “But seriously… no one’s actually dying right now, right?”
“Nope,” I said, putting a fourth evolution core into a ward we imported from the Third Domain. “We’ll be fine.”
“This doesn’t look fine!” Dad cried.
“It’s cool. And don’t worry. No offense, but you’re not going to see anything dangerous anyway. Well, maybe the explosions.”
Dad glowered at me. “I can’t tell if you’re serious.”
I smiled sheepishly. “For the first time… I’m actually not.”
Kai unmounted and laughed. “It’s all fear and worry till the mercenaries come. Then, it’s appreciated.”
“Mercenaries already came,” Dad said.
I winced.
“So!” I said with a clap. “What’re the rules?”
Malo spoke. “I’ll avoid magic unless it’s necessary to block.”
“That’s not cool,” Kai said. “You get that I have magic, too, right?”
“I’ll change my mind if you make me.”
Kai pouted and looked at Dad. “I’ll hold back.” He smirked and walked into the middle of the field, unsheathing Vengeance. I hadn’t seen him use it since he was a weak first evolution—after evolving with ultimate purity, just unsheathing it released overwhelming pressure that made Tyler and Dad’s faces grimace.
“What type of bullshit is this?” Tyler cried.
“No offense, but you couldn’t handle that power,” I said gravely. “I’m not sure he can.”
“I heard that,” Kai said, getting into position, swinging his sword for ultimate showmanship.
“Show off,” I said. “Learn from Malo.”
Malo stood in the center of the ring, unsheathing his sword. No power or glowing runes—just a humble sword.
“You need to use your sword one of these days,” Kai complained.
Malo had a unique sword that I saw when he faced the Cackling Kings. It was obsidian and it had white veins on the black sheen. It was a gnarly sword that I was terrified of. He didn’t even use it with Ikala—I had a feeling it was too destructive to have around people.
“There’s some things that should stay sheathed,” Malo said. “But I’ll accept a runic blade if you beat me.”
Kai smiled wryly. Then he looked at me and Dad and said, “Well. Just hope that Mira’s fast enough if your sword’s cut. ‘Cause…” He got into position. “I’m not holding back.”
Malo chuckled and… smiled.
“Did he just smile?” Tyler asked.
“Right?” I asked in wonder. “You must be doing him some good.”
Malo’s smile disappeared.
“Shut up,” Tyler hissed.
I chuckled. “Okay, you want a countdown? Okay. Let’s do this. Three…”
2.
Doug’s heart rattled like a church bell that was hit with a hammer. These people were still kids in his eyes, and they were using real swords. These weren’t practice swords. Kai gave this guy a warning that one bad move was actually going to kill him.
“Two…” Mira asked.
“Uh, Mira,” Doug said hesitantly.
Mira grinned. “One…”
“Mira!”
“Go.”
Kai disappeared. There was a small cloud of dirt from his feet—and then a vibrant explosion of white crystals blasted everywhere.
“Freezing,” Malo said as the dust settled. The two were locked in swords. Malo’s sword and body were fine, but there was frost everywhere. “Well contained,” Malo praised.
Kai grinned. “Who said anything about contained?” His sword erupted in flames and the ice turned into a plume of steam. There was then a flash and another clank.
“Oh, come on!” Kai cried. “What happened to not using magic?”
“Except to block,” Malo reiterated. The steam cleared, and Doug could see Malo in a clear barrier, holding his sword calmly.
Kai grinned. “Well then… guess I don’t have to hold back.” His sword lit up with red flames, and then a rain of sparks shot everywhere, trailing like concert light shows.
“Show off,” Mira said with a dead face, but excited eyes.
“What?”
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“He knows you can’t see, so he made his sword glow so you can see a lightshow,” Tyler said strangely.
Doug watched in amazement as the red streak moved around at rapid speed, covering a distance of a football field in five seconds, then circling around. It was surreal to watch the sparks clashing. He looked at Tyler, since he was the person actually giving any analysis, and saw him pouting.
“What’s wrong with you?” he asked.
Tyler frowned. “This is just… God, I wish they’d just teach me magic!”
“Yeah, and it’d get you nowhere,” Mira said gravely, eyes bouncing around. It was clear by the way she was watching that she could see what was happening. “If someone struck you that fast, would you even know how to block?”
Tyler pouted. “No.”
“Exactly,” she said. “That said… you’re going to need to train with an acceleration spell. I don’t care what they say, you can’t just wait forever.”
Tyler’s eyes lit up. “Seriously?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Make it diamond, too. This is just ridiculous.”
Doug watched in wonder as the sparks kept flying. There was a silver flash and a red flash, and they were sparking a hundred times a second. It felt like he was watching a sports bike wheelie back so far that the back was raining sparks at high speed. That’s what it felt like.”
“I take it, this is good?” he said Mira.
She nodded gravely. “Yeah.”
“Can you beat them?”
She considered it. “I can beat Kai, no questions asked. Malo… I’m glad Malo signed that pact.”
“So that’s a no?”
Mira smiled strangely. “Let’s just say… Malo would die. Probably.” She watched with interest. “I guess we’ll see.”
Doug didn’t like that answer, but the excitement in Mira’s eyes gave him some confidence. He was also excited. He had heard so much about Mira’s apparent power, but he had never seen it. In fact, very few had. Strangely enough, few people he asked had. She had a certain mystique. He even heard there was a coup a while back, and she hadn’t even lifted a hand to stop it.
No one had seen her power, and yet…
Doug watched the swirling waves of fire and sparks. He couldn’t believe that she could move that fast, let alone beat him. He didn’t mean to doubt her, but… Malo was a master, right? Mira was here for five years.
Kai lifted his sword and hit the ground. Wind and fire erupted, engulfing fifty meters of ground in flames that instantly dissipated.
Once the smoke settled, Malo emerged unscathed.
Kai’s eyes flashed with frustration, and he started a barrage of power. They flew into the forest, and Doug watched massive trees fall in flashes of ice and wind and fire. It was a brutal reckoning of magic, but throughout it all, Malo just flew around. He never fought back—Doug could see that.
He saw Kai as a child—and that was terrifying. Kai had destroyed hundred foot trees like he was cutting tall grass with a weed wacker. He slammed through football field sized areas with fire and wind magic. And through it all, Kai kept yelling, “Fight me!”
Then, the third time he said it, the fight abruptly stopped. The moving, the blasts, everything. Kai just dropped onto the ground, and Malo picked him up.
It was incredibly shocking, but Mira and Tyler were grinning.
“You’re not supposed to grin about your boyfriend getting wrecked,” Tyler said.
“That’s not why I’m grinning,” Mira said.
“Then why are you grinning?”
“‘Cause I get to fight him,” she said, accepting Kai from Malo’s arms. The poor guy had tried to show off, and he came back like a drunken friend at a bar. Wasted.
There’s no way that Mira could win against that… right?
Mira held and hugged Kai like a teddy bear and then passed him off… to someone that Doug didn’t see before. She was a beautiful blonde with… chains around her wrists? She was wearing a blindfold, too.
What the hell…? Doug thought. Where’d she come from?
Tyler was as shocked and confused as he was. This freakish woman just came out of… nowhere. Mira grinned at their reactions, and that’s when he realized that something was wrong, very wrong.
Mira stood in the field and said: “I don’t have any combat skills, so I’m just going to try to kill you by any means possible. And I want you to blow off my limbs and test the supreme power of my healing capacities. Do you accept?”
Malo smiled again. “Gladly.”
Kai’s battle with Malo made me realize how much I was lacking. Even with Moxle Dilation, I couldn’t handle Malo’s swordplay. He was able to do what he was teaching Kai and Tyler so fast that it felt ghostly. His body and mind reacted simultanously, which boosted his speed—and I knew he was holding back significantly.
There was no way that I could fight someone like Malo directly. If I wanted to kill someone like Malo, I had to give everything I had, and I was okay with that.
I picked up Kline and held him against my breast. “You don’t count.” I kissed his head and he yowled, shamed by my snuggling on the battlefield.
He wouldn’t forgive me.
Till tomorrow.
I smirked and walked in the middle of the field. “I will warn you, though,” I said. “If you don’t use magic, I’m going to fold you like a camping chair. ‘Cause…” I unsheathed my machete. “I rarely ever use this.”
Malo smiled. “I’ll be honored to use my magic.”
I turned to Tyler. “Give the countdown.”
“Uh… go,” Tyler said.
The roots underneath Malo’s feet wrapped around his feet, and he panicked. I used that to fly forward. Kira blinked behind him. Just like that, we trapped him. Without magic—he was dead.
He used magic.
Swiping his sword, four spheres of light entered the air—and I panicked. The last time I saw a sphere like that come out of his sword—it deleted matter.
I’m glad that I trusted my instincts. I retracted Kira, then formed her into a shield under Moxle Dilation. The spheres then erupted in ultra slow motion, shooting out spikes in all directions like a frag grenade. The ones that hit Malo simply disappeared, but the ones that hit my legs sheared through them like a flame torch against wet paper.
My body instantly healed it, but it didn’t change the intensity of the blast—or the fact that he was swinging his sword at me in the meantime.
I wrapped my machete in aura, then layered mana sharpening on top. My overpowered mana sharpening struck his, and the two erupted like a magical fireworks display—then my aura wrapped sword sliced through his blade as if it were made of soft cake.
I thought the fight was over—but I instantly learned why Malo didn’t feel the need to use a special sword against Kai. A full sword emerged from the sliced blade; this one made of wind magic. I was in a bad position to block—so I cranked Moxle Dilation to the maximum.
I thought it would be unfair, but… fuck this guy. I just said, “By any means possible, right?”
Whatever. I cranked it, and his movements slowed to a crawl. I lifted my hand and blasted the area with so much raw mana from my Kyfer core that his magic blade simply disappeared. His eyes widened in ultra-slow motion, which was grimly hilarious as I punched him in the jaw, sending him flying fifty meters before impact, and then rolling twice that length.
Tyler and Dad thought he was dead—but I hit a barrier and expected that much. I had read Malo’s entire file from history, battles, and tragedies, capturing the three-hundred-year life of a loyal war god that did everything for his rulers and was repaid with…
I gripped my machete—
I couldn’t let my emotions get in the way of this battle—it was too serious. And it was.
Before Malo even finished rolling, blades of light shot at my head from my feet. I jumped back, thankful I had Moxle Dilation—otherwise, that could’ve killed me.
I grinned.
This was interesting.
I touched the ground, and Malo was up. He swiped his sword fragment, and dozens of spheres formed, shooting at me one by one. They hit the ground and blew up areas with ten-foot radii, sending geysers of sand everywhere. I had to use aura sight just to see him—but he saw me just fine.
He blasted through the battlefield, swinging his sword far faster than before. He was now using an acceleration technique as he sliced at me.
Moxie Dilation was still vastly superior. Despite that, I couldn’t touch him. It was hard to explain. It was like anywhere I planned to touch would get shredded with mana.
So I didn’t.
I summoned wings and blasted into the air, summoning Nymbral and charging a hurricane arrow. Malo responded with a barrage of flying homing golden blades, hoping that I would be too focused on dodging to shoot. Unfortunately for him, Kira had a mind of her own, so she flew while I finished charging the arrow.
Doug only saw two things in Mira’s fight with Malo. The first was Mira hitting Malo in the face so hard he flew over a football field’s length. Then, the ground exploded ten times in a chain reaction, and he couldn’t see anything. Once the dirt settled, Mira was flying as golden blades flew at her like homing missiles. She dodged them like a hummingbird.
Doug wanted to be impressed—but he was terrified for his life. Tyler didn’t make the situation better. His face was white as bleached salt, and it only got paler. Doug couldn’t see how Mira could survive the onslaught of explosions—
Until the bow came out.
Mira summoned a golden arrow, and water flowed around its tip in a spherical hurricane that kept getting larger by the second.
Doug’s amygdala hijacked his brain, telling him to run—but it was too late. Mira took a deep breath—and released her arrow.