As I backed up, scanning every line across my vision, I suddenly felt two sharp shoulder blades rub against my back.
Every shiver that passed through Haerin's body erupted on mine as well, yet none of us felt exhausted or anxious.
With her back to mine, Haerin casually said, her iron sword now covered in a dark-purple liquid that resembled blood.
"There's more."
She was right.
For every fairy she killed, two appeared in its place.
Initially, when I stepped into the room, only two fairies had appeared, but now there were 32 surrounding us rapidly.
Smiling, I simply raised my sword and said.
"Round 5 out of 10."
I could feel it; the wall that had previously held me from advancing in swordmanship and footwork was crumbling.
Despite the increased number of fairies, I could also see my lines growing more accurate, with there now only being two lines per fairy instead of four.
This was it.
This was my breakthrough.
To advance letter ranks, such as G+ to F-, it wasn't as easy as simply training.
One needed to fight against something, achieve something that should be impossible for their rank.
Victory.
Energy surged through my body as I pushed it to my maximum: my dance was impeccable, no error in my feet's movement.
Just as a piano player needed to move their hands to the correct key to play perfectly, I had to move my legs to precise millimeter locations.
The ground below me was like a keyboard, each tile on the stone platform representing a key.
And my legs were playing the song.
As the 32 fairies around synced up their attacks perfectly, sending 32 purple orbs at us, I lunged my right leg forward, tapping the perfect key for the perfect amount of time.
Boosting off my right leg, I pushed myself to the left and landed on my left leg, executing a torrent step almost perfectly.
Yet...unlike last time, I could feel the discrepancy between my and the white robed man's movements.
Vanishing from the fairy's sight, I watched their controlled purple orbs abruptly halt, losing sight of their target.
Then, taking a step forward and reappearing, I jabbed my Willow Leaf Dao sideways, instantly cracking fifteen orbs in a single swing.
Beside me, Haerin rampaged through the fairies, focused solely on attacking with me by her side.
If one single orb even touched her, she would be knocked to the ground, yet she continued moving fearlessly on the stone platform, each swing of hers bringing down at least four fairies.
Simultaneously, I leaped like a ballet dancer across the battlefield, cracking three orbs aimed at her back and another aimed at the side of her head.
She didn't even have to say anything; the holographic lines I could see appearing atop her sword told me everything I needed to know.
Which fairy was she going to attack, where was she going to go, and which orbs were going to hit her?
I knew it all before she even took a step.
Dark-purple liquid spilled everywhere, coloring the room a devilish red, and high-pitched screams endlessly erupted every moment from the dying fairies, echoing throughout the room.
Haerin's uniform remained a striking red, while grape-purple stains covered my dirty blazer.
It was... amazingly gruesome.
Though I could not see Haerin, at least on my face, a smile appeared as I broke past every wall that had held me back for the past week.
The money no longer mattered.
I wanted to grow stronger. I wanted to become more powerful.
Every time I broke an orb, an excited shiver passed through my body, and the thought of advancing ranks felt more and more real.
I had felt this before.
Whenever I sat down and wrote, escaping from the stress of academics and the real world, this very world, an indescribable joy surged through my body.
It was...passion.
There were so many fairies.
Every step I moved, more than ten orbs shot at me, and every time Haerin moved, over 100 fizzling orbs, waiting to pop, aimed at her.
Yet, with every swing and jab, I took out thirty orbs, aligning all the lines with that of my sword.
Without any input from my mind, I began constantly using Torrent Step, my figure simply an unnoticeable blur to the fairies
Purple fountains of blood leaked from the sky, yet Haerin seemed to move perfectly, not a single droplet landing on her.
We stood next to each other, my back to her right shoulder as I extended my sword above, below, right, and left, in every possible direction to ensure no orbs so much as touched her.
I didn't even look back; simply following the lines of her sword was enough for me to read her mind.
Haerin didn't turn around either, ignoring the hundreds of orbs fired at her, as she simply assumed none would hit her.
256 fairies passed, then came 512, and finally a thousand.
My hair and clothes were so stained with blood that they took on a purple glint.
Only two floating ocean-blue orbs remained within my eyes, moving around at a speed invisible to the blank eye, as my brain read every line.
An indescribable pain surged through my head, as now more than a thousand lines simultaneously appeared on the field.
Every moment was a fight of its own.
In a single second, I had to find every orb about to hit Haerin, find where all the trajectories met, and somehow move my sword to that location.
Haerin's broadsword flew through the air at the perfect angle and direction, accompanying mine.
My sword's goal was to protect, and hers was to kill.
It was almost as if... we were one person, dual-wielding swords.
I knew her every single thought, and somehow...she knew mine.
Haerin's swordmanship..., unlike my footwork, never seemed to reach a peak, only growing and growing.
Her wrist inhumanely snapped back and forth like a rubber band, and her strikes only got faster and more powerful.
That was just the work of her innate ability, Endless Ascent.