The First match of the tournament had started, but both of them stood still.
The crowd was certainly not happy, wondering what the two sisters were thinking.
The air between them was thick, suffocating. Lily looked at Vivi. She held her short-sword in a low guard, her posture defensive, her eyes swimming with that same damnable gentleness she always had. She wasn't looking at an opponent; she was looking at her little sister.
Lily, meanwhile, knew that she was not on the same level as Vivi. If Vivi truly did fight her fair, then Lily would lose.
"It is such an irony," Lily said, her voice cutting through the arena's anticipating silence like a whip. "I despise him more than anything, yet here I am trying so hard to change his opinion. Don't you think so, Vivi?"
Vivi opened her mouth to speak, perhaps to offer comfort, but Lily didn't let her.
She launched herself.
Her boots dug into the sandstone floor, kicking up a cloud of dust. Lily closed the distance in a heartbeat, the Thread of Eclipse passively sharpening her vision. She could see the minute twitch in Vivi's shoulder, the dilation of her pupils. The world was high-contrast, every detail vivid.
Swoosh.
Her Katana screamed through the air in a horizontal slash aimed at her midsection. It was a perfect cut.
Vivi didn't block. She stepped back, the movement so fluid it looked like she was sliding on ice. The tip of Lily's blade missed her fabric by a millimeter.
Lily didn't stop. She twisted her hips, turning the slash into a rising diagonal strike.
Clang!
Vivi caught the blade on the crossguard of her short-sword. The impact shuddered up Lily's arms, but Vivi barely moved.
"Lily, please," she whispered, her face inches from Lily's over the crossed steel. "I understand how you feel."
"Shut up!" Lily gritted out.
She then activated the Thread of Oblivion.
She disengaged and unleashed a flurry of strikes—high, low, thrust, slash. Vivi parried them all, her defense impenetrable. But Lily was counting on her perfection.
Lily feinted a thrust to her throat. She moved to parry, but Lily pulled the attack at the last second, purposely missing wide to her left.
For Vivi, the memory of that [miss] vanished instantly. To her, the attack hadn't finished. Her brain stuttered, expecting a blade that was no longer there.
It was her opening.
Lily spun, delivering a roundhouse kick to her ribs. It connected—or it should have.
Vivi used Gate.
Space warped. Lily's shin passed through a ripple in the air, a small portal she had opened right on her flank. her leg exited another portal five meters away, throwing her off balance.
Lily stumbled, catching herself with a hand on the ground. She whipped her head around. Vivi stood there, unharmed, looking apologetic.
Lily's blood ran cold. She was treating this like a sparring match. She was letting me look competent.
Lily stood up, her grip on the katana trembling—not from fear, but from rage.
"Stop it," she whispered, the sound raw in her throat. Then she screamed, "STOP IT!"
Vivi flinched.
Vivi was purposefully trying to lose. But this was making Lily look embarrassed.
"Fight me properly! If you truly respect me as a sister, fight me fair!" Lily roared, pointing her blade at Vivi's heart.
Vivi stared at Lily. The arena was silent. For a long moment, she didn't move. She looked conflicted for a second, then, respecting Lily's wish, she nodded. Then, the air around her changed.