The west courtyard went quiet enough to hear the wind mess with the banners.
Corvathen gave the nod. "Begin."
Seraphina moved first—of course she did. White-blue light flared along her blade, and her boots carved divots in the dirt with the first step. She didn't walk; she launched, the kind of snap-forward that makes lesser fighters blink and miss the entire opening.
Shiki didn't blink.
Hands in his pockets, head tilted, he just… slid out of the way. No stance, no windup, no "I'm about to dodge" telegraph. Seraphina's cut hissed through the space he'd been standing in, clean enough to shave a god's beard, and he was already a half-step to the side like the breeze had nudged him.
Gasps from the crowd. Armor creaked as people leaned forward. A coin someone was flipping never came back down—because the guy forgot to let it go.
Ai didn't gasp. She stared. Knuckles white on her forearms. "Don't get cocky," she muttered under her breath, which was hilarious because cocky was basically Shiki's entire personality.
Lyra clutched her staff like it was a life jacket. "H-here we go…"
Seraphina pivoted. Her second swing chopped in low, then snapped high in a feint so tight it could trick a mirror. Shiki leaned backward like a bored cat watching a toy pass under its nose. The blade kissed air again. He side-stepped the follow-up and—because he's him—sighed.
"New perfume?" he said, not even looking at her, voice lazy. "Jasmine and steel. Ten outta ten."
Her eyes narrowed. "Stand and fight."
"I am standing." He dipped his chin appreciatively, eye skimming down and back up. "Nice waist-to-hip ratio. Your stance makes it pop."
A vein in Seraphina's temple pulsed. Her sword came around in a bright arc. Shiki dipped, the edge whispering past his hair, and he drifted behind her like a shadow that got bored of the ground.
He patted the back of her waist-guard, right where the plated curve sat over the top of her rear armor. Tap tap. "Rear-guard plating—premium fit. Compliments to your smith."
The entire courtyard: "HUUUUHH—"
"Hey!" Ai barked from the rail, jaw dropping. "Hands off other women's—armor!"
Eline laughed, low and sinful. "If he needs a full inspection, I volunteer my uniform."
"Pipe down, cleavage monster!" Ai snapped without taking her eyes off Shiki.
Seraphina's cheeks didn't color, but her aura shifted—more pressure, more heat, the air sharpening into something that stung the lungs. She whirled, blade thrusting in a perfect line for his heart.
Shiki clicked his tongue. "Alright, alright. You want me to 'fight like a man' or whatever?" He slid his right hand out of his pocket and lifted it, palm open.
Steel met skin.
GONG.
The sound rolled through the courtyard like someone had rung a cathedral bell with a meteor. Dust shivered off the archways. Seraphina's sword stopped. In his hand. No blood. No cut. No drama.
Just Shiki, holding a holy war-sword like a dad catching a foam toy before it hit the TV.
Mouths dropped. Someone in the back forgot how to inhale.
"Defensive magic," the male rookie blurted. "Has to be a barrier."
"Y-yeah, like—some god-tier shell—"
Lyra's voice piped up, small but clear. "No. There's… no mana."
Heads turned to her.
She swallowed, ears pink, but kept speaking. "I—I don't feel any barrier, no reinforcement, no external flow—nothing. He's not using magic at all."
The silence af'er that was a different kind—heavy, sticky, the kind that wraps around your throat.
Corvathen's beard-tugging hand paused. "Oh ho…"
Shiki let the blade slide off his palm with a little flourish, like he'd just checked the quality of a kitchen knife. "Edge alignment's clean. You polish daily, Commander?"
"Stop talking," Seraphina said, tight-lipped.
"Can't. Beautiful woman, good lighting, excellent ergonomics—kinda my weakness." His eyes flicked down and back up. "Also, your cuirass—great contouring. Whoever shaped that breastplate? Artist."
The female rookie coughed. The male rookie was whispering to himself, please don't hit me, please don't hit me, for no reason except the universe felt dangerous right now.
Seraphina didn't answer. She simply moved—a chain of cuts that folded into each other like origami, hips rolling through every transition, footwork so clean it left perfect crescents in the dirt. Her sword hummed, the light along it thickening to a pale flame.
Shiki flowed around her, one hand still in his pocket. He ducked, leaned, ghost-stepped. The blade hissed past his cheek; he exhaled like the wind moved for him. She spun; he was gone. She reversed; he was there again, behind her.
His fingers flicked a loose strand at the nape of her neck, tucking it back under the braid. "Hair's in your eyes. Safety first."
"Stop touching me," she said, and her voice this time had that grit in it—the edge of someone who wasn't used to being unable to tag their target.
"Fast hands," Eline sang out. "You should see what he does with a tray."
"I will end you, tavern trollop," Ai growled.
"Love you too, sugar."
The pressure spiked. Seraphina planted her back foot, breath pulled in deep, blade dropping low as a pale sigil rolled across the metal—starbursts, wings, a sun-ring. "Dawnbreaker." Her voice was cool as the far side of the moon.
She came in like a comet.
Shiki's hand met the strike again—bare palm, clang—and the ground under them cracked like old pottery. Dirt spiderwebbed. The shock rattled the courtyard walls. Seraphina didn't hesitate; the moment the blade glanced off his hand she pivoted, brought it up from the opposite side, then reversed that into a thrust that should've scored his ribs—
—except he leaned, brushed the knuckle of his index finger against the center of her chest plate with clinical curiosity, and murmured, "Confirmed: dent-resistant. Nice."
Every woman on the railing made some version of tsk or oh my god. Every man took an involuntary step back like they were afraid Ai's jealousy had splash damage.
"Shiki!" Ai's voice carried a warning that could peel paint.
"What? Armor check." He winked, then stepped away at the last millisecond as Seraphina's blade carved a slim crescent through the air where his head had been.
She kept on him, relentless. Her sword sang; the light on it went from candle to furnace. You could feel it now, that SSS-class pressure—like the sky had settled on your shoulders and decided to sit there. The crowd's chatter thinned to nothing. Even the birds shut up.
Shiki stopped cracking jokes for five seconds. He rolled his wrist, caught the flat of her blade on the heel of his palm, rode the force, and tossed it away like he was redirecting a door swinging open. He stepped, toes whispering over the ground, and boop—two fingers landed on the tip of her nose.
Seraphina froze for half a heartbeat, not because of the touch, but because… no one does that. Not in a duel. Not in her duels.
"Boop," Shiki said, deadpan. "Focus breaker."
Her jaw set. "You are insufferable."
"True. But tell me this isn't the most fun you've had in months."
Her answer was a blur of white.
She cut. He folded. She rose—one stride and a leap that would've put her on a second-story balcony. Light coalesced under her boots—three steps of air, feathered sigils flickering and dying as she hit each one—and she kept going, arcing high above the courtyard.
"Air-steps," someone whispered, reverent. "SSS class…"
Shiki looked up.
Then he bent his knees and jumped.
No light. No sigils. No tricks. Just legs and physics flipping both fins at each other. He went up like gravity had lost the argument, meeting her at rooftop height.
The crowd lost them for a second—two streaks, one gold-white, one black-silver, stitching lines across the sun. Steel rang. Shockwaves crumpled the air. Tiles rattled. A pennant ripped itself off a pole and got sliced to confetti by stray pressure.
"I can't see—" the male rookie said, eyes watering.
"Blink slower," the female rookie said, equally lost.
Lyra, breathing through her nose, let a small sphere of water float up, mirrors glittering over its surface. It wobbled as sound snapped it like a drum. "He's—he's not even—Commander's putting everything into angle control and he's just… touching the blade. Changing the vector by millimeters."
"Meaning what?" the rookie asked.
"Meaning she's fighting for inches," Lyra whispered, "and he's playing with centimeters."
Up near the rooftops, Seraphina created a midair ring of sigils, planted a boot, and used the platform to torque her entire core through a cut that should have split a wyvern. Shiki twisted; the blade snagged a hair's breadth of his sleeve and nothing else. In the same motion, his hand landed on the ridge of her backplate over the curve of her glutes—tap—and he pushed off, flipping backward lazily.
"Excellent center of gravity," he called down. "Rear balance spot-on. You squat, right? Definitely a squatter."
Below, Ai made the kind of sound that says I'm going to murder you after dinner.
Eline fanned herself with a menu. "I could squat if he spots me."
"Do it and die," Ai said without looking.
Seraphina didn't answer him. She couldn't—not with oxygen budgeted to every tendon in her body. She chased him down the arc, air-steps flashing and vanishing as fast as thought. They met again mid-descent, two shells colliding; her blade drove for his shoulder; his palm caught, turned, and slid. She turned the cut into a corkscrew thrust. He let it thread past his ear. Her gauntlet flashed, a backfist hidden under the arc—he let it graze his cheek, grinned at the sting, and patted her wrist like nice try.
They hit the ground almost together—Seraphina in a three-point slide, Shiki in a bored stand that barely bent his knees. Dirt billowed around them, painting their boots pale.
Seraphina's chest rose and fell, steady but harder than before. Sweat beaded along her hairline, catching in the blonde.
Shiki… looked like he'd finished tying his shoes.
"Why—" she said, blade angled, voice clipped, "—won't you engage?"
He cocked his head. "Because you're pretty when you're mad."
A hrrrk noise escaped someone on the railing. Might've been Corvathen trying not to laugh; might've been a poor soul suffocating on secondhand embarrassment.
"Fight," Seraphina snapped, and the word cracked like a whip.
"Fine. One exchange."
He took his left hand out of his pocket. Stretched his fingers. Rolled his shoulders like an athlete warming up, except you couldn't hear any joints pop because apparently his body refuses to make mortal noises.
---
END OF CHAPTER : 19 : GOD VS SSS! : 1
---