The moment I stood, I knew I was outmatched.
Daizan loomed like a walking fortress, with his thick arms coiled with muscle and the red gleam of his saber humming in the air between us. He didn't posture. He didn't speak. He just advanced, each step cracking the floor beneath his weight. His robe had fallen open, revealing a series of crimson runes glowing beneath his skin—his Kettai, fully awakened and pulsing like molten iron beneath the surface.
I shifted into stance as my blade trembled in my grip.
[Combat Sync Engaged – Opponent Class: Warlord | Crimson Bind: Close-Quarter Dominance Detected]
[Advisory: Target Weak Points Identified – Neck Base, Inner Elbow, Back Knee Ligature]
[System Tip: Do not block. Redirect]
I barely had time to process the instructions before he surged forward towards me.
His first strike was a horizontal sweep that would've cut a lesser man in half. I ducked low, sliding to the side as my blade scraped across the lacquered floor. The second came down in an overhead arc. I rolled beneath it with my boots catching on a spilled cushion as I scrambled for footing. Sparks danced in the air where our blades met briefly, and the sound was less a clash than a thunderclap.
The room shuddered.
Daizan laughed, his laugh was loud, real and terrible. "You've got speed, boy. But no weight and no force."
"I have finesse," I managed, slashing upward toward his inner arm. The blade struck, but shallow. His skin was enhanced by the Crimson Bind, it was like reinforced leather.
[System Adjustment: Charging Inazuma Nuki – 62%]
[Warning: Target has begun anchoring Kettai field. Chamber integrity unstable.]
My lungs burned as sweat dripped into my eyes. Every second he stayed on the offensive was a second I survived by instinct alone. I ducked behind a fallen beam, kicked a lantern to trip him, and stabbed toward the soft tissue behind his knee.
It landed, though barely. He growled and backhanded me across the face and I hit the wall, slid down as my teeth rattled in my skull and my hand shook, my vision blurred and the system flickered in front of my eyes.
[Stamina Drop Detected – Sync Holding at 83%]
[Tactical Cue: Exit Point Recommended – Pressure Threshold Approaching]
I looked up, dazed and then saw it. A structural beam cracked behind Daizan as he charged again though the wooden wall behind me had already splintered from his last strike.
I dodged his strike. let him come.
His shoulder collided with the beam and the chamber wall gave out.
We both tumbled through the plaster and into open air. We landed hard on the outer deck with the night air slamming into my lungs like a fist. Dust and fragments of wood exploded around us as we rolled across the polished stone tiles of the central courtyard.
Chaos waited there.
Screams echoed against the walls, firelight flickered from overturned braziers and hundreds of guards spilled through the garden paths like angry hornets. Kento stood atop a statue base, dual-wielding short swords and holding off three of Daizan's men with a speed I'd never seen him use in training. One of them lunged at him but Kento dodged with a flourish that ended in a knee to the chest.
"Could use a hand!" he shouted when he spotted me.
"I'm a little busy!"
Souta was farther back, his blade sheathed but his movements flawless. He redirected attacks with the flat of his hand, disabling soldiers with joint locks and breathwork alone. He moved with such brutal efficiency that it almost looked gentle until one man collapsed from a single palm to the throat and didn't rise again.
But the moment they saw Daizan crash onto the stone beside me, both their eyes locked on mine.
Kento's mouth opened in alarm but Souta's expression didn't change.
Daizan rose slower this time. He wasn't laughing anymore. His lip bled and one of his torn sleeve hung loose where I'd managed to cut through the outer robe. But his eyes—those hadn't changed.
They were focused now.
Predatory.
[System Pulse: Inazuma Nuki Charged – 100% Available]
[New Pattern Unlocked – Variant: Inazuma Kai ]
My fingers tightened around the hilt, the leather grip was warm and damp beneath my palm. Sparks danced at the edge of my vision, but not from the system. They came from within me—a storm that was coiled behind the ribs, waiting for release. Daizan was already moving again, his massive frame crashing forward like a boulder given breath. His Kettai flared wildly around him, a deep crimson aura that seemed to stretch with clawed fingers through the air, wrapping his body in a violent shroud.
But this time, I didn't flinch. I didn't step back. I moved to meet him, with my feet firm on the blood-slicked stone, drawing in one steady breath that felt like it had been earned across weeks of bruises, secret practice, and fear that was swallowed in silence. The system didn't speak this time—not directly—but its presence was there, woven into the precision of my stance and the timing of my heartbeat.
My hand moved, and the blade was already gone from its sheath.
The world around me seemed to stretch, a moment pulled taut like string before it snapped. The steel in my grip hummed, and with it came a sudden flash of light—no thunder, no roar, just a line of lightning drawn clean through the air like a signature carved by fate itself. The strike wasn't violent. It didn't scream or shake the ground. It whispered through the moment with perfect clarity, and when it passed, something in the air had changed.
Daizan's charge broke mid-step. His arms slowed, his saber lowering ever so slightly as confusion flickered across his face. Then his eyes widened, not in pain—but in realization. A thin line traced across the heavy flesh of his chest, just below the collarbone. The wound didn't gush, didn't tear—but it burned. I saw it in the way his body recoiled and how the crimson aura around him flickered once, like a flame tested by wind, and then dulled as his knees hit the stone with a heavy thud.
Even the clash of blades in the background seemed to dim as guards paused, eyes flicking from Daizan's kneeling form to the sword in my hand. The moment held like breath trapped between ribs.
Kento's voice rang out, sharp and stunned. "Did you just—did you actually hit him?"
I didn't take my eyes off Daizan as I spoke. "I think so."
"You marked him!"
"I'll take it," I breathed, chest heaving.
[System Update: Target Wounded – Threshold Reached for Execution Phase]
[Recommendation: Maintain Pressure – Strike Again Within 10 Seconds]
I didn't need the second prompt. My pulse was already surging and my body moved before any thought could interrupt. The scent of singed silk and lightning lingered in the air, and I pushed forward, and lifted my sword high as the weight of my fear replaced by something sharper—resolve.
The mission had never been about glory.
It wasn't about the power I had just tapped or the system that guided my hands.
It was about this one moment—where I stopped running, where I stopped surviving by chance.
This was the moment I chose to strike like thunder and not flinch from the sound.