Purple petals drifted. Lila knelt by Kai, one hand on his chest, water aura pulsing.
"Okay, champ, stay asleep. Your ribs and I are having a meeting."
Aria exhaled once. Sparks crawled up her arms, veins glowing silver-blue.
Spirit Bloom—Spark Rush.
She vanished. The floor cracked under her toes.
William caught her first strike on his forearm; the impact rang through the stone. He slid half a step, still anchored on his tile. Calm. Testing.
She didn't let him breathe. Jab, hook, knee, vanish to the other side, heel for his head. He bent just enough. Air split, leaving a shockline through the courtyard.
From behind a splintered tree at the courtyard's edge, Rin watched, hidden. His Viatra caught every frame the human eye missed—light clashing with lightning. Incredible, he thought. She's faster than Kai, faster than I expected.
Aria's pace climbed. Her hands blurred into afterimages, each strike sharper than the last. William deflected with daylight aura condensed on his arms, glowing plates that turned her blows aside.
But she tagged him. A cross across the ribs, clean. The first mark. His eyes narrowed.
Rin's fingers twitched against the bark. She landed it against him.
Aria pressed. Lightning screamed through her body, limbs moving like whips. Every exchange forced William to work harder on the defensive. His parries grew tighter, pivots sharper.
One more strike, and he gave ground, a complete step back off his mark.
Aria's chest burned, but she remembered the Black Forest, Sidney's smirk, the sting of losing. Never again. She refused it, refused to stop. Spark Rush climbed higher. Sweat steamed off her skin.
William answered. His speed rose. Hands traced light itself, palms, elbows, forearms glowing, movements crisp as blades. Every parry came a hair from counterstrike.
The courtyard collapsed into light vs. lightning. Two streaks collided, rebounded, and slammed, sending shockwaves that shattered stone tiles.
Rin's jaw tightened, eyes narrowing. They're moving too fast... if I didn't have my Viatra, I wouldn't be able to see them. And she's still growing faster. Awe crept in despite himself. Aria... you're forcing him back.
Aria broke his guard again. Knuckles brushed chin, elbow cracked ribs, knee hammered hip. William shifted, another step. Surprise flickered on his face.
She roared, Spark Rush screaming, body wreathed in stormlight. He met her fully now, light condensed over his skin, speed answering speed. They blurred into pure streaks. Every collision left concussive cracks.
When the dust cleared, William's boots stood two tiles off where he began. Aria straightened in the crater they'd made, chest heaving, eyes blazing.
From the tree, Rin's hands curled into fists. She's doing it. She's making him fight for real.
Lila never lifted her hand from Kai's chest. "Hurry it up, Kai."
No words from them. Only fists.
They launched again, faster still.
Aria's eyes narrowed. Spark Rush climbed, clean, bright, merciless.
Flashpoint Strike.
She disappeared on the half-beat before William's blink. A straight blitz, no tell, no shoulder load, knuckles clipping his reaction window. Impact popped daylight off his jaw like a bulb bursting. He absorbed, but his guard lagged a frame.
Valkyrie Dash.
Mid-recovery, she kinked her trajectory ninety degrees in the air, ankle cut, hip whip, reappearing on his blind shoulder. Palm landed at the base of his neck; he pivoted late, shoulders catching instead of throat. He slid a foot. Dust ringed his boot.
Rin watched from behind the splintered tree, breath shallow. She's bending lines. He's reading truth; she's rewriting it.
William's forearms brightened as daylight condensed into tight panes. He tried to smother her with pressure, taking short steps, closing his elbows, and stealing the center with his palms.
Thunder Fang String.
Aria threaded a five-beat chain into his guard—tap... tap... delay... tap-tap. Each micro-pause landed like a strobe, stacking stun in his wrists and collarbone. His parry timing drifted a hair, just enough. The third tap corkscrewed his balance; the fifth sank into ribs with a low thud.
He answered with speed, clean cutlines of light, no blade, just form. A forearm graze washed her momentum sideways, trying to glue her feet to the tile.
Static Grounding.
Aria stamped. Lightning bled into the soil, charging it to her rhythm. The slip died under her soles; William's light-slick lost purchase. She took center back in one heartbeat.
Valkyrie Dash.
Angle change off a fallen pillar, wall step, ceiling brush, drop at his flank. The elbow is already mid-swing.
Arc Burst.
She detonated the elbow at point-blank, short-range thundercrack. The shock ring blew his hands off her frame and cleared the perch. He skidded, daylight flaring as he struggled to stay upright.
Rin's pupils pinholed. 0.13... 0.11... It's breaking past counting.
Aria chased before the dust settled.
Flashpoint Strike.
A second blitz punch, closer, meaner, clipping the moment he would counter. It landed. His head snapped a fraction; light sprayed like shavings. He reset hard, shoulders low, stance finally honest.
The courtyard narrowed to two vectors.
William surged, palms like metronomes of light, elbows carving razor arcs, footwork carving triangles. Aria answered with storm logic, unreadable feints nested inside single beats, hands moving on sub-rhythms.
Thunder Fang String.
Seven-beat pressure now—tap... tap... delay... tap-tap... delay... TAP. Each micro-stall widened its timing even further. His right forearm spasmed under aura-stun; she slipped through and printed a clean body shot to the liver. Breath left him sharp.
He forced the offense to regain the count, employing a shoulder bump, a knee check, and a palm to the sternum that erased her forward momentum.
Arc Burst.
She popped a knee-burst mid-cancel, shockwave against his shin, reclaiming space and stepping into range on the recoil. No gap.
She remembered Black Forest, the stumble, Sidney's grin—and fed it to the fire. Spark Rush peaked cleaner, not wilder.
Valkyrie Dash.
Ground to air to ground, the third angle appears where the second should have ended. She arrived behind his lead hand and snapped his elbow line with a wrist cut. His guard broke for half a frame.
Flashpoint Strike.
Doorbell on the chin, louder. Daylight cracked without breaking.
William's eyes sharpened. Surprise, then respect. He braced, calves humming with light.
Aria didn't wait.
Thunder Fang String → Arc Burst (Weave).
Tap... delay... tap-tap—ELBOW BURST. The stun stack held his frame just long enough for the burst to launch him off the tile's center. Stone crazed under his boots.
One step off. Then two.
Rin's fingers lifted off the bark. She's pushing him. Faster than he wants to go.
William committed, speed spiking to meet hers. The air sheeted white; shadows vanished.
Aria stamped again—Static Grounding—killing his lingering glare-haze and locking her traction as they broke the sound of the courtyard. Lightning became one drawn line.
She split the line.
Valkyrie Dash (feint) → Flashpoint Strike (true).
Angle flashed high; fist arrived low. The punch clipped the instant before his palm could harden. His heel slid a clean yard; dust chased him.
He set out to counter.
Aria layered the finisher:
Thunder Fang String (nine-beat)—tap... tap... delay... tap-tap... delay... tap... tap—Arc Burst—and a last Flashpoint buried centerline.
Impact blew both into a cratered ring. When the haze thinned, William stood three tiles off his start, chest rising, forearms hairline-scored with aura burn. Aria stood square, steam peeling from her shoulders, eyes bright and unshaken.
From the tree, Rin exhaled, awed despite himself. Aria... you're terrifying.
Lila's palm stayed firm on Kai. "Anytime now," she murmured.
No talk from the ring. Only breath.
William rolled his neck, daylight tightening across knuckles.
Aria lifted her hands, Spark Rush humming, feet anchored to charged earth.
They vanished—faster than anyone but Rin could see.
The courtyard thrummed, cratered stone, white dust drifting.
William stopped moving.
Light gathered without glow. The air tightened, edges sharpening until the world felt cut on every line. Then, he let it out.
Half his aura.
Sound thinned to a pressure hiss. Tiles spider-webbed in a wide ring. Hair lifted on arms. Petals froze mid-fall and drifted sideways like they'd forgotten how to land. Shadows snapped to his shape and stayed there.
Aria's sprint died under her feet like someone pulled the floor out of time. Spark Rush guttered, flickered, stuttered, then dimmed against her will. Breath hitched. Knees said down. Instinct screamed to bow the head.
Her chest remembered the Black Forest; her bones told her this was worse.
Rin flinched behind the tree. Viatra faltered, then clawed back. His fingers crushed bark to splinters before he noticed. Half? The thought didn't finish.
Lila's water aura trembled across Kai's ribs. The pool she held flat rippled toward William and wouldn't calm. "Hey—" She swallowed the rest.
Stone around William lifted in thin plates, rotating slowly, not touching him, as if light had decided gravity was optional. The lines of his forearms wrote perfect quiet. He did not step. He didn't need to. Everything stepped away.
Aria tried once to raise Spark Rush. It crackled, met that field, and folded. Her body powered down on reflex, like a creature recognizing a storm too big to outrun. Shoulders lowered. Hands eased. Eyes stayed up because pride refused to drop them, but the fight had already left her muscles.
William's gaze didn't change. No gloat. No heat. Just pressure given shape.
A long second passed—the kind that stacks in the spine—then he closed his hand and pulled it all back. The air softened. Petals remembered how to fall. The world breathed.
Aria stood there, chest tight, jaw wired, a spark, a slight hum under skin. She swallowed once and reset her guard, not to attack, to hold her line.
Behind the tree, Rin exhaled through his teeth, slow, eyes steeled. Gold. He adjusted his grip on the idea of William, as if it weighed more than he'd planned.
Lila's palm steadied. Water smoothed. "Okay," she whispered, mostly to herself. "Okay."
No one spoke in the ring.
Aria lifted her chin a fraction, let the last of Spark Rush fade, and found the only truth that fit the moment: not defeat, not surrender—recognition.
William rolled his wrist once, nothing flashy, then settled back into stillness, light quiet around him.
The lesson hung there without words.
The courtyard stood still, its broken stone and floating dust giving way to petals drifting again.
Aria's legs buckled. She fell to her knees, chest heaving, sweat hissing into steam. Spark Rush flickered out completely. Pride burned her face, but the words came low, almost swallowed:
"...I can't. Not like this. I admit it."
William lowered his hand, aura already pulled back into calm daylight. His eyes softened by a hair. "You did well. Better than—"
That was the moment.
A whisper cut through the silence, shff.
Rin moved.
From behind the tree, he launched, Viatra guiding each step like a metronome, speed cutting across the courtyard in a line most wouldn't even register. What William did see was a flicker, Aria's shadow stretching wrong, splitting, rising into a human silhouette.
A shadow clone.
It darted, direct, throwing a punch at his chest. William's eyes sharpened, forearm rising instinctively to check the strike. His aura flared on the parry.
Which is precisely what Rin wanted.
Because the real Rin wasn't in front of him.
He was inside William's shadow. Creeping upward, silent, his hand stretching toward the rag tucked at William's waist. Fingers almost brushing fabric. Aura wrapped in darkness to hide the pulse.
Aria looked up through a blurry vision, confused by the sudden appearance of a third figure. "Rin... ?"
William caught the feint with textbook precision, redirected the clone's strike, and shattered it into mist. But the second aura signature from behind? No... from below.
He glanced down.
Too late, Rin's fingers brushed the rag.
A cold thrill sliced through William's spine. His body reacted faster than thought, daylight snapping outward to burn his own shadow bright. The flare forced Rin back, but not before fabric shifted in his grip.
When the dust cleared, Rin stood crouched a few paces away, shadow clone gone, breathing steady, rag not taken but close. Close enough to mean it wasn't luck.
William looked at him for the first time like a peer. Impressed.
"From my own shadow..." His voice was low, amused. "And I didn't feel it."
Rin's eyes didn't blink. "That's the point."
Aria, still kneeling, turned slowly, realizing what had just happened.
William let a breath out, then smirked, not mocking, not cruel. Genuine. "Good tactics. Clean Mutiwork. If I hadn't flared, you'd have had it."
He adjusted his stance as daylight dimmed. "Clever boy."
For the first time in the fight, William looked entertained.