"You can't be serious, you cheating bitch! Polaris, keep the cheating fae in check while I'll deal with its cheating master! Don't interferei in any other way!"
"Nrao!"
Blanid couldn't just keep silent, facing such ridiculous behavior, yet she only shouted to her fae, making the golden bear cub respond with a reassuring growl.
While the two remaining spell swords occupied two of Blanid's, Saria alone was ferociously taking on the remaining four while running head-on at the disguised girl!
"RAAAAA!"
With a frenzied roar, Saria reached Blanid, seemingly unstoppable in her charge.
Blanid did the only rational thing, she started backing off, her wooden sword raised defensively and…
*TWACK*
"A-auffgnngh…!"
Seventh ephemeral sword materialized right under Blanid's raised guard and shot through an opening in Saria's onslaught of attacks, pommel-first, striking the silver-haired girl's nose for the fourth time since the start of the duel, this time forcing out an actual pitiful sobbing cry out of her mouth.
The slow drip-drops turned into gushing as the blood poured down Saria's chin, spraying on her clothes, shoes, and ground...!
Saria's remaining two ephemeral swords faltered and disappeared as their caster lost the focus necessary to maintain them…
But Blanid did not take advantage of that, instead recalling her spells and just standing tall with all seven ephemeral swords hovering around her head like a halo, observing the silver-haired girl whose chin and shoulders were trembling while she attempted to contain the sobbing by biting her lips.
"EKhem. Young Lady. Give up. You're weaker than I expected. By a lot."
"Shuth uuuph! Screff yhou! I sthill cfan fghiht!"
Blanid cleared her throat, making a show of composing herself, and said coldly, but her words only infuriated Saria, giving her back some energy even though her response was just yelping through tears streaming down her face.
That said, when she lunged at Blanid, Saira's attacks were nothing to scoff at. As if hell-bent on proving the saying that the wounded beast is the most dangerous, the ferociousness, not to say savageness, of Saria's attack increased several fold!
…alas, Blanid was matching all of the attacks, defending and deflecting all of them!
Far a few heartbeats the two appeared to be perfectly matched, but just as the audience members were beginning to regain their voices and starting to chear out, Blanid's attacks gained weight… then speed… and before another heartbeat resounded Saria ended up completely overwhelmed, her sword deflected with so much force her arms jolted back, giving Blanid an opportunity to drive her knee right into Saria's solar plexus!
"GUGH-GHUAGHAHA…!"
Bent in half, Saria stumbled back with her golden eyes bloodied, coughing, spitting, gasping for air as everything was turning dark for her!
"It's just a duel. A friendly skirmish to compare our skills… You already decided to defile it by breaking the rules we agreed on and ordering your fae to attack me. You should lose then and there, but let's forget about it. After all, I will not call it quits until you give up. Knowing to retreat when it's still possible is also an important skill. One that you desperately need to acquire. You can treat it as part of me helping you with your studies. So give up."
"...!"
Blanid sighed, shaking her head as she spoke, her wooden sword lowered, making Saria tremble with her words.
"..."
"..."
The silver-haired girl gritted her teeth and raised her head, glaring hatefully at her indifferent opponent.
The fact that Blanid had Amelia's illusion spell, making her appear masculine, was only making things worse.
Losing to a fake?
One taught by that trash of a cousin of hers?
How could Saria accept something so humiliating?!
"Nho! No whay in hel!"
Saria spat to the side as she backed off, wiping her mouth with her sleeve and staining it with a copious amount of blood from her nosebleed.
"Screff all of this…! Descent of the Sile… ah…!"
She snarled furiously, straightening her back as much as she could and focused on a spell, only that her eyes widened and she let out a gasp of realization as one of Blanid's ephemeral swords launched at her.
An opponent wouldn't wait for her. Neither in the real fight nor in that very duel.
*CLANG*
"Ghhh!"
Saria had no other choice but to stop the incantation and defend, but even the initial blow was too strong for her and completely threw her off balance, sending her stumbling back even more as she wheezed through her teeth.
"!!!"
It wasn't the end, though, and Saria's golden eyes trembled in shock when she realized that Blanid herself was already right in front of her…!
*WHAM*
*BUGH-GU-GUAAAGH…!"
When Blanid's heel was driven into Saria's solar plexus, air from the silver-haired girl's lungs escaped through her mouth together with a bile rising from her stomach, making for a display that was as spectacular as it was messy and… well, disgusting.
Sent back, Saria dropped to her knees, unable to breathe in, both of her arms clenched to her chest, her whole body convulsing…
…all of that meant only that she was an easier target for the normally much shorter girl, and this time Blanid was taking advantage of it…!
The future hero rushed in and jumped, about to end the duel in her signature way, with an overhead downwards slash!
"...!"
The teacher should have stopped the duel four hits earlier. She was about to be late again, the panicked realization of which finally started showing on her face when…
*CRACK*
*tap*
"???"
The air in front of Saria froze over, creating a circular pane of cloudy ice that gained a bluish-white outline and then shattered, turning into a portal from which a massive arm reached out, meeting Blanid's sword and stopping all of the momentum with merely its index finger…!
The whole training ground turned even more silent than it already was, causing Blanid's soft landing sound like an explosion.
The arm was humanoid, no doubt about it, muscular and with pale skin… only that its size was ridiculous. The arm was almost longer than Blanid was tall, and the disguised girl could swear that its wrist was about the width of her thigh and that its forearm alone was wider than her waist!
If one would assume that if it belonged to a being of humanoid proportions, the whole creature would have to be around nine feet tall at minimum…!
The mere appearance of the arm caused the temperature to drop below freezing, frosting the ground and causing the humans gathered there to shiver.
"..."
Blanid bit her lips. She was raising her sword in a defensive stance, the seven ephemeral swords lowered from above her head, now circling around her body, ready to protect her at any moment…
…and then the disguised girl started backing off, using the advice she gave to Saria before, retreating from a disadvantageous situation while she still could.
Not even a single molecule in her body had the intention of engaging the arm and whatever it belonged to.
"Nrao~!"
"No, no, no! Do not engage it!"
The golden bear at the sidelines let out a lighthearted growl, clearly not realizing the danger because of its innocence, but its master remained clearheaded and called out, stopping it from taking any action.
"...?"
The funniest part of it all was that Saria did not realize what was happening.
Her head was already dizzy, her nose hurt and was completely overrun by blood. If Blanid didn't call sharply to her contracted fae, Saria would never raise her head and simply faint within the next few seconds, none the wiser…
"...eh…?"
Instead, she did look up, her golden eyes widening again, but this time from awe and not fright, and she let out a soft gasp.
Gazing upon the arm with an overwhelming ice aura reaching out of the portal, she forgot her surroundings…
"G-Grand White Wolf F-Fae…?"
"!!!"
Saria swallowed her saliva mixed with blood and bile and asked, even her weak voice clearly audible to everyone present, causing the audience to stir up in disbelief.
"...!"
The next moment, instead of the actual creature widening the portal and stepping through, the arm moved, not to attack, though.
Saria felt the pleasant coolness on her head as the hand of a giant patted her softly…
...and then retracted into the portal that closed the moment it went through, not giving anyone a chance to peek through…!
"..."
No one knew how to react anymore.
Blanid was staring at Saria with her mouth open. Teacher Hervolst and everyone in the audience were looking between the two of them, too.
Finally…
"I… I give up…"
*thump*
Saria took a short, haphazard breath, and said weakly before fainting and plopping limply to the side.