"Pathetic... So damned pathetic..." Ayame sighed.
She arrived at every opening the instant it formed, her katana at the gap like it had always been part of the choreography, the water along the edge sealing each wound with a cold sting that made Kaede flinch harder than the steel.
"Stop..." Kaede swung wide and ragged.
"You're telegraphing again." Ayame flowed around a demonic arc that cratered the ground beside her, bending at the waist in a hip rotation so smooth it turned the evasion into a dancer's half-turn.
She came out of the bend already cutting, water trailing her katana in a spiral that hung in the cold air like brushwork before dissolving.
Shoulder. Ribs. A line across the collarbone that drew a collective wince from the nearest tiers, each cut placed where muscle met tendon, where the next swing would cost a fraction more effort than the last.
Kaede's body paid the toll of a hundred small debts while the relic demanded movements she could no longer afford.
