No one expected it to end with one fight.
That was the last mistake.
"Together," Aria said.
One word.
Flat. Calm. Final.
For half a second, no one moved.
Then old instincts kicked in.
They spread.
Angles corrected.
Lines formed.
No wasted motion.
This wasn't chaos.
This was training that had once kept them alive.
Noah's fingers tightened on the doorframe.
"…That's a bad idea," he muttered.
They Come at Her as a Unit
Three advanced at once.
One high.
One low.
One cutting across her blind side.
Perfect timing.
Perfect spacing.
Aria stepped forward.
Not away.
Straight into the convergence point.
The first strike never landed.
She redirected it—not blocked—turning the attacker's shoulder just enough to crash into the second. Momentum folded. Formation cracked.
The third adjusted fast.
Too fast.
She used that.
Physics, Not Violence
Aria's heel hooked an ankle.
A knee struck support, not muscle.
A wrist turned past tolerance.
No bone snapped.
No blood spilled.
But balance vanished.
One body hit the floor.
Then another.
Then another.
Dominoes falling without drama.
They Try to Recover
Someone shouted a warning.
Too late.
Another rushed in to cover the gap.
Aria was already there.
She slipped past the guard, used his center of gravity against him, and sent him stumbling into the next man.
They collided hard.
Both went down.
Breath gone.
The Last One Hesitates
The final attacker froze.
A fraction of a second.
Enough.
Aria stopped in front of him.
Didn't strike.
Didn't touch him.
Just looked at him.
"…You already lost," she said quietly.
His hands lowered.
His shoulders dropped.
He stepped back.
Sat down.
Silence Claims the Corridor
Bodies lay scattered.
All breathing.
All conscious.
All defeated.
No one moved to get up yet.
Because standing too early would mean misunderstanding the lesson.
Aria straightened her jacket.
Smoothed the sleeve.
Unbothered.
Noah Sees It Clearly
This hadn't been a brawl.
It hadn't even been a test.
It was a reminder.
They hadn't lost because they were weaker.
They lost because she decided when it ended.
The Final Word
Aria looked around once.
Counted.
Satisfied.
"One fight," she said.
"All down."
She turned away.
And behind her—
No one followed.
No one argued.
No one tried again.
Because the hierarchy hadn't been broken.
It had been reaffirmed.
And they had all felt it in their bones.