The instant she uttered Multi-Strike, Kaguya's eyes widened and an invisible slash came from the left.

She lifted her blade to intercept, the steel meeting nothing but air and the impact sent her skidding right with her boots carving trenches in the ground.

Her teeth gritted from the force then her eyes widened further as another slash came from the right.

It was about to bisect her when the uniform's protective barrier flared to life with the translucent blue energy coating her body.

The slash collided with the barrier, deflecting with a sharp crack of breaking magic but that wasn't the end.

Several more slashes erupted around her, converging on that singular spot from every direction.

It was not left or right anymore… from above, below, diagonal angles, all around her. The assault threw caution to the wind with each invisible blade carving through space with devastating precision.

The shockwaves blew Itsuki's hair backward even from where he stood at the arena's edge however the whole ordeal ended in seconds.

Dust kicked up everywhere, obscuring the battlefield in a thick cloud of debris.

When it settled, Kaguya lay on her back in the center of a massive crater.

The translucent blue barrier had shattered completely with broken shards of protective magic dissolving into motes of light around her motionless form.

Itsuki paused, looking at Mio.

The girl had returned to normal with bobbed hair and her regular stance except for the fact that her eyes were still bleeding with twin streams of crimson ran down her cheeks like tears.

He brought his hand down.

"The winner of this match is Mio Kamemori from Class 5!" Itsuki announced.

The stadium erupted.

Cheers exploded from every section… Class 5 loudest of all, screaming themselves hoarse. The noise was deafening as a wall of sound that shook the very foundations of the arena.

Medics rushed onto the field with stretchers and healing supplies.

Mio cocked her head to the right, toward the section where Class 5 stood.

Though she couldn't see his face, she could sense Koya's mana signature looking at her and it made her smile.

'The hell, Mio?' Pale's voice cut through her thoughts. 'Are you an idiot?'

'Sorry Pale… I wanted to win… and to prov–' Mio thought back then she fell over, hitting the ground hard.

The medics reached her seconds later, already pulling out diagnostic tools.

Soon she was packed onto a stretcher alongside Kaguya with both unconscious fighters being carried away to the medical bay. Up in the stands, the Principal looked down at Saki.

The woman was adjusting her hair with a satisfied smile on her face, clearly pleased with her student's performance.

"Were you aware…" the Principal asked slowly, "that Mio was related to the Tsukuyomi Clan?"

Saki's smile didn't shake. "I wasn't. I didn't use that kind of magic on her…"

The Principal sighed, turning his attention to the broken arena below. Earth-awakened maintenance workers were already on the field with her hands pressed to the ground as they channeled mana into repairing the massive crater and cracks Mio's Multi-Strike had carved into the stone.

'The daughter of the head of the Tsukuyomi Branch clan…' the Principal thought, watching the workers labor. 'And she's already at this level, she's worth the investment. I will be seeing her later.'

His eyes shifted to the holographic board updating in real-time above the arena and two names flickered onto the screen in gold lettering.

Wisteria Riu and Tachibana Misora.

The Principal closed his eyes and sighed deeply.

'What a troublesome woman,' he thought… not of Misora, but of Hakua who was the woman wearing Misora's face.

The White Princess herself had assumed the identity of the eldest daughter of the Tachibana clan and threatened him personally.

Her words had been clear: let her into ALI in the lowest class, or she would destroy this institution from the inside out so he'd had no choice but to comply.

'I can only pray for Riu's soul…' the Principal thought, opening his eyes to watch the arena being repaired. 'And hope that she doesn't beat him up too much.'

One would think that because Hakua wasn't using her royal mana, she would be weaker and yes, technically that was true… without access to her royal reserves, her raw power output was diminished but Hakua was not a force to be trifled with.

She had mastered all the movement techniques and attacking techniques of the Tachibana clan within two hours.

Two hours… Techniques that took normal practitioners years to learn, she'd absorbed in an afternoon like breathing.

If that wasn't being overpowered, the Principal of ALI didn't know what the term meant.

…

Misora walked down to the stage that had been prepared. The arena floor had been fully repaired with no sign of the crater or cracks from Mio's devastating final attack leaving the fresh stone gleaming under the afternoon sun.

'I'm really surprised she managed to hide that from me…' Misora thought with her hands in her pockets as she walked.

She knew Kaguya personally and had been around members of the Tsukuyomi clan countless times during formal gatherings and political events but Mio had never acted like any of them so she didn't suspect it.

'That still means I have to let her sleep on the bed next to Koya.' Misora finished that thought with mild annoyance.

Mio had clearly tried extra hard to win and as an honorable class representative which Misora prided herself on being, despite everything, she would honor the promises she'd made.

However…

'Maybe I should kick Ichinose out and join her?' Misora thought with her expression remaining perfectly blank.

One would never guess from looking at her that the girl was actually very shy.

That beneath the calm exterior and devastating combat prowess, she got flustered at the thought of sleeping in the same room as Koya.

Misora reached the acceptable distance and stopped.

Her opponent stood waiting.

Wisteria Riu who was a handsome young man, though unlike other nobles, he was tall and thin. He was not muscular at all.

The ALI uniform hung on his frame like it was two sizes too big making the fabric look like it was practically swimming on him.

Itsuki raised his hand.

"Thirty seconds to prepare!" He announced though his thoughts were not so comforting.

'I only made this contest for Class 1 to gain points and spice up the day…' Itsuki thought, resisting the urge to grab his blue hair and yank it out in frustration. 'Why are we actually losing? Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck… If Riu didn't win this round, Class 1 could become the bottom class. The absolute bottom, below even the commoners they were supposed to be effortlessly superior to.'

They couldn't be expelled… nobles had protections against that and class expulsions only happened after Mid-terms anyway, so there were still three more days to claw back what they'd lost but that wouldn't change the fact that right now, in this moment, they were putting commoners at the top of the ladder.

The optics were terrible.

'As much as I wanted to add myself into the bracket, I couldn't…' Itsuki thought bitterly. 'That would make it sound unfair. What the fuck... this was a really bad idea.'

But he didn't lose hope yet. There was still a chance.

As long as Riu didn't get ticked off, there was a chance and as long as Misora agreed to let him take off his mana suppressor, there was a fighting chance they could salvage this disaster.

Itsuki clung to that hope like a drowning man to driftwood.

Misora looked at Riu.

"You're really thin…" she said flatly.

Riu raised an eyebrow with a trembling face. "W-w-why w-w-ould y-you say that?"

Misora let out a sigh of boredom. "You look thinner than a broomstick. You should try eating more."

Riu's face flushed. "What you said... what you said is not nice..."

Misora almost laughed.

Among all of the Great Clans, the Wisteria clan was the least fit for direct battle. If Class 1 was going to rig this whole tournament, they could have chosen literally anyone else… Anyone but they'd picked Riu.

The only things the man had going for him were high mana reserves and the ability to release poison from the pores of his body.

That was it and his other self properly…

'Though regular poison doesn't affect me, so I'll have to act the part.' Misora thought with her eye twitching slightly.

Sometimes she really hated acting like a weakling… pretending to struggle and pretending to be vulnerable but it was a small price to pay for a normal life.

This was infinitely better than spending time with her own father.

Not that she hated him… he was a good man, objectively but he was so boring compared to the outside world. That was what she'd realized the moment she'd first run away from home to explore Omni Supercity.

The world beyond the White Estate was vibrant and amazing.

"You should take off the mana band…" Misora said, pointing at the suppressor on Riu's wrist. "I don't want you to be restricted during our battle. I'd feel sorry for you otherwise."

Riu's face went from embarrassed to furious in an instant. He gritted his teeth and ripped the band off, throwing it back at Itsuki and the man caught it and looked at the ground.

'Wallahi…' Itsuki thought. 'We're finished.'

Itsuki brought his hand down.

"Begin!"

Immediately, Riu squeezed both hands together. His mana spiked with the air pressure around him increasing as power flooded his system. He extended both hands toward Misora, who stood perfectly still and watching him with mild interest.

"Poison Fall!" Riu shouted, striking a pose like he was in an anime but nothing happened as the arena fell completely silent.

Even the stands went quiet… and Misora chuckled.

There was one weakness of Riu that everyone exploited once they knew about it.

The guy had massive mana reserves but when he was pissed off, he couldn't use it. His emotional state directly interfered with his mana control so his spells simply wouldn't activate.

However… If you made the man cry, he would show his true power.

So the typical strategy was simple: anger him, mock him, get him furious enough that his magic stopped working, then knock him out while he was vexed and helpless but Misora didn't want to end the battle so soon, not after Mio had put on such a spectacular showing.

She wanted to impress Koya too so Misora blitzed forward.

The Tachibana Movement technique closed the distance in a heartbeat. Riu took a step back but it was already far too late as Misora was in front of him.

She slapped him across the face.

The slap generated a visible shockwave that rippled outward in a ring of displaced air. Riu was sent flying backward with his body tumbling through the air like a ragdoll and when he stopped… His hand was pressed to his cheek with a perfect red handprint already forming on his skin.

Tears trembled at the corners of his eyes then he began crying.

The moment the first tear fell, the ground beneath the arena trembled.

A massive pod erupted from the stone floor.

It wrapped around Riu's form, cocooning him completely before lifting him into the air like a chrysalis suspended from invisible threads.

At the same time, something began growing from the arena floor.

Trees burst from stone and roots cracked through barriers as branches spread like grasping fingers, all of them reaching toward Misora with clear hostile intent.

Itsuki created a pod of water around himself for protection, rising into the air to maintain his view of the battlefield.

Misora clicked her teeth in annoyance.

She slapped one of the approaching branches away and the limb disintegrated from the force. It was a mini forest that followed and every single branch seemed to hate her.

One tree decided to fall directly upon her with its trunk angled to crush her beneath its weight.

Misora leaped sideways and the massive timber crashed where she'd been standing a heartbeat before but the moment she landed, roots from another tree burst from the ground like serpents reaching for her ankles and wrists while branches from a third tree lashed out simultaneously, whipping toward her face.

Misora waved her hand and a shockwave of mana exploded outward, tearing through the roots and branches like they were paper.

The vegetation disintegrated into splinters and dust. She looked up at the glowing pod hovering above the battlefield.

"Come out of there!" she called.

The pod glowed brighter then holes began forming across its surface starting from first one, then several, then dozens until the entire structure resembled a massive green chrysalis splitting open.

A figure fell from within, landing gracefully on one of the trees.

Unlike the thin young man who had entered, a muscular young man emerged with long green hair cascading over his shoulders. His frame was broad and nothing like the fragile form from moments before.

His eyes found Misora.

"Was it you?" he asked with his voice dripping with hatred. "Were you the one who bullied me?"

Itsuki breathed a sigh of relief from his water pod perch.

'Thank the White King Misora didn't knock him out…' he thought. 'Riu is our ticket to victory.'

This was Riu Wisteria as well… all of the great nobles knew that.

He had been bullied by Ryouma and his siblings when he was younger, which caused him to develop an introverted attitude. He stopped eating and became afraid of other people but a part of him wanted to fight back.

So the man developed Dissociative Identity Disorder… a second personality that manifested when he retreated into that protective pod.

It would normally be manageable for a regular person, but for a noble born with high mana like him? Once he entered that pod, his body rebuilt itself and the second personality emerged. It was all Riu wanted to be, that perfect person who stood up for justice and this other part of him absolutely hated bullying.

"Bully is a strong word…" Misora said. "All I did was taunt you for being thin. I said you should eat more before fighting. Since this is a tournament, can that really be called bullying?"

Riu's expression hardened with righteous fury.

"People like you," he began with his voice rising in conviction. "who use words as weapons to tear down those weaker than themselves… who mock and belittle without understanding the pain they inflict… who hide behind the excuse of 'jokes' or 'friendly advice' when in truth you seek only to elevate yourself by crushing others beneath your heel. I despise people like you with every fiber of my being! You represent everything wrong with—"

"Shut up and fight." Misora interrupted.

Riu didn't hesitate anymore.

The tree beneath him bent down, lowering him to the arena floor. The other trees retracted their branches and roots, sinking back into the ground until the field was clear again.

Riu stood tall, placing one hand behind his back in a formal stance.

"It doesn't matter if you are a woman," he declared. "I will not forgive you fo—"

Misora blitzed him. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

Her movement technique closed the distance in a blink and then she slapped him across the face on the same cheek she'd hit before.

The impact generated a shockwave.

Riu staggered backward, holding his cheek just like the scared version of himself had done except this time no tears came.

He was shocked that she'd actually struck him mid-sentence and without waiting for her to go again, he extended his arm outward.

"Feel the poison!" Riu roared.

Purple gas erupted from every pore of his body. It flooded the arena in seconds… a thick noxious cloud that obscured everything. The barriers held, containing the toxin within the fighting space.

Itsuki pulled a gas mask from his storage ring and slipped it on, peering forward through the purple haze with growing hope.

'Riu's Poison Fall…' Itsuki thought. 'Seventy percent hydrogen cyanide, fifteen percent arsenic vapor, ten percent ricin aerosol, and five percent concentrated neurotoxin derived from Wisteria clan bloodline techniques. One breath of this mixture would paralyze a Blue Crest fighter's nervous system… There's no way she'll be able to move within this cloud so we might actually win this.'

Roots popped up beneath Riu's feet like coiled springs, launching him forward through the purple fog.

He shot toward where Misora had been standing with his fist drawn back for what should be a finishing blow.

"This is what happens to bullies like you!" he shouted, his voice ringing with righteous conviction.

In the next instant, a shockwave erupted from the center of the arena. The force was immense… a wall of compressed air that hit like a physical blow.

It blew away the poison cloud entirely, dispersing the toxic gas in a single devastating pulse making purple mist scatter harmlessly against the barriers, dissipating into nothing.

Itsuki raised a hand to shield his face as wind pressure threatened to knock him out of his water pod entirely.

When his vision finally cleared, he saw them.

Misora stood with one hand casually tucked in her pocket and her other hand was pressed flat against Riu's stomach with the palm centered just below his solar plexus.

Riu hovered above her with his feet off the ground and his body suspended in mid-attack as a flicker of mana that had been shot into the air above them dissipated into nothing.

Whatever follow-up technique he'd been preparing was gone…

Misora dropped him and Riu hit the ground behind her with a heavy thud.

His back slammed into stone and he immediately curled into himself, gasping desperately for breath.

His lungs burned and his diaphragm felt paralyzed. That single palm strike had disrupted his entire respiratory system shattered his breathing rhythm and left him unable to draw air properly.

He looked up through tear-blurred vision at the girl who'd mocked him… struck him twice and now humiliated him in front of millions of viewers.

What he saw made even his confident, transformed body tremble uncontrollably.

That glare… that cold… absolute… overwhelming glare… that was empty of anything resembling mercy or compassion.

It looked as if the White Princess herself was staring down at him through Misora's eyes with that same crushing presence.

"Be serious…" Misora said, closing her eyes as she sighed with obvious disappointment. "Fight better."

She sighed as roots emerged from the ground beneath Riu's prone form which was an unconscious defensive reaction from his panicking subconscious.

They pushed him several meters away from Misora, creating distance his body instinctively knew he needed.

'Koya-kun is watching me…' Misora thought with frustration building in her like pressure behind a dam. 'Mio already impressed him with that spectacular finish...'

She glanced at Riu struggling to stand, supported by his own defensive vegetation and still gasping for air.

'And they give me this? Such a mediocre opponent?'

Originally she wanted to hold back and win easily but she had to outdo Mio and maintain her position in the top spot… so… she wanted to win and she needed a strong opponent to at least pretend to struggle, instead, she was beating up someone who couldn't even land a single hit.

This was making her look bad.

[Author's Note]

Tch… Give Golden Ticketssss 😭😭😭