Ranking Match (2)
Annex Building 11, Fifth Auditorium — the venue for Class B, Group Three's match. Inside a specially warded indoor arena, four young men and women stood at circular starting marks in each of the four cardinal directions, weapons at the ready.
Chayeon cut her eyes sideways, sizing up the three opponents she would be facing.
To her left was Stra — the younger of the two brothers who had been hanging around Ju Jihyo on her first day after skipping grades. He held a wooden axe in each hand, the blades blunted for practice. An unusual choice of weapon.
Directly ahead stood a woman in glasses. What caught the eye was the book she carried, a tome as thick as a dictionary. She wouldn't be swinging the thing around, so it was probably a condition for activating her ability.
To the right was Ext, the older of the two brothers. He was holding an axe as well, but unlike his brother's, this one was long and pointed at the tip. Chayeon had seen something like it in a medieval movie — a halberd, she thought it was called.
She didn't know any of their abilities. Then again, they didn't know hers either. The three of them might even know one another's, for all she could tell. It didn't matter. If she held out, she would win.
"Is everyone ready?"
The referee was Seohee, as scheduled. Every match for third-year Class B was being overseen by Seohee — or more precisely, by her clones.
"We'll begin in thirty seconds."
The clock ticked toward the exact hour. Chayeon tightened her grip on her wooden sword. This was an individual match, but it was her first time facing multiple opponents at once. She would have to read the room carefully.
"Three, two, one — begin."
The starting signal rang out, and Chayeon stayed put, watching for an opening. At the same instant—
"Whoa—!"
Flames erupted from the surface of the woman's book, split into three streams, and shot toward the rest of them. They looked almost like dragons sculpted from fire.
Chayeon rolled sideways. Fortunately, the overwhelming physical ability she had developed during the fight with Rubrum-Luna let her dodge incoming flames from that distance with ease, even while startled.
A sharp crack split the air. Ext, the older brother, brought his halberd down hard on the approaching fire-dragon, and a violent gust of wind scattered the flames completely. Sparks flew in every direction like volcanic ash, and Chayeon's feet barely had a moment's rest as she danced around the embers coming her way.
In the meantime, Stra — the younger brother, who had sunk into the earth and vanished — burst up from the ground right at the woman's feet.
"Brother, let's take this one out first."
"Good thinking! That firepower is getting on my nerves!"
Ext whirled his halberd in wide arcs to scatter the remaining flames, then charged the woman head-on like a battering ram.
"Two against one? That's cheap!"
The woman stumbled backward in a panic, flipping her book open. Pages fluttered past in a rush, and her eyes flashed with light — that telltale gleam. Something powerful was coming.
"Take this!"
She thrust her hand forward with a line that sounded like it belonged to an RPG character activating a skill, and an inferno erupted with a force incomparable to anything before, swallowing everything around her.
"Kh—!"
Ext swung his halberd, but unlike a moment ago, he couldn't hold it back so easily. He staggered, giving ground. Stra, equally overwhelmed, scrambled out of range.
"Not bad!"
"Then how about this!"
Trading lines that sounded ripped from a textbook, the two brothers raised their weapons again and charged the woman. And through it all, Chayeon stood well back from the chaos, watching in perfect stillness.
"...Huh. They're doing a great job beating the crap out of each other."
Indeed. In times like these, sitting back and reaping the spoils is the wisest course.
For once, Chayeon and the Black Fox were in complete agreement.
Sparks flew. Wind howled. Shadows rippled. Steel rang against steel in a furious exchange of blades. It had the vividness of a fantasy action movie playing out right in front of her. She could go for some popcorn right about now.
The three of them clashed like that for some time — until they suddenly put distance between themselves and stopped fighting. They looked at one another, then all three turned their heads in the same direction.
At the end of that gaze stood Chayeon.
"...But brother, there's someone over there comfortably spectating."
"So there is. It would appear the new student has yet to learn her manners."
"...Insolent brat."
All three of them glared at Chayeon, eyes burning.
"Shit. I think I'm fucked."
Indeed.
"No — fuck, don't just agree with me. Actually do something. Can't you bring out that black energy from last time?"
It is still too wasteful to expend my power. Handle it yourself.
"You son of a bitch."
Chayeon raised her wooden sword vertically just as all three of them charged her at once.
Stra vanished into the ground first and erupted right in front of her. Chayeon's drastically heightened dynamic vision locked onto the spot where he appeared. Shadows. That was his ability.
Right on his heels, Ext came barreling in like a wild boar. Compressed air, released all at once to generate a violent wind pressure. She could see it now.
Every ability unraveled itself in her mind the instant she laid eyes on it.
Last of all, the woman at the rear flipped her book open, and a massive pillar of flame surged up and came crashing down toward Chayeon. That one needed no interpretation at all.
All of it happened in a fraction of a second. In that sliver of time, Chayeon's mind automatically parsed every ability, and her hand — already drawn back, already finished preparing the swing — was waiting.
Compared to Rubrum-Luna, that psychotic demon bitch, they were all ridiculously slow.
A deep, heavy whoosh tore through the air.
She had swung a wooden practice sword, but the sound it made was that of a giant club being brought around with full force. Pressure erupted from the tip of a blade that hadn't even made contact, blasting the two men away from her and scattering the fire-dragon into nothing.
A colossal boom followed a beat later, rolling through the entire auditorium. Unable to withstand the pressure, the two men were hurled in opposite directions and slammed into the far walls.
"Ghk—!"
"Hhk—!"
"Th-that's impossible!"
The woman went white as she watched her attack rendered meaningless and her allies taken out in a single stroke. She flipped frantically through her book — but Chayeon was hardly going to stand there and watch her do it.
The girl who had been on the opposite side of the arena was suddenly crouched right in front of her.
Chayeon flicked her wooden sword upward in a light, almost casual uppercut.
The effect was anything but light. A shockwave of wind pressure bloomed outward in concentric rings with Chayeon at its center, and the woman was caught in the current and thrown. She tumbled across the floor, her head striking the wall with a sharp clang, and her chin dropped to her chest.
"Th-that's enough!"
Seohee, who had been staring blankly, having forgotten her own role in the face of what had just unfolded, hastily called the match. She had already known how strong Chayeon was — but seeing it in person for the first time had left her stunned.
And Seohee was not the only one standing there with her mouth open. A handful of students who had finished their own Ranking Match preliminaries and come by to get a look at the rumored skip-grade freshman were equally dumbstruck.
Doctors and healers who had been standing by for emergencies rushed in to examine the three who had gone down.
"All three have simple bruises. Aside from being unconscious, there don't appear to be any serious issues."
Once the three of them had been carried out on stretchers, Seohee declared the match over.
"Class B, Group Three — Jeon Chayeon wins."
"Wh-what was that just now?"
"No idea. What kind of ability was that? Physical enhancement?"
"That's ridiculous. You think just being strong would produce a phenomenon like that?"
Paying no mind to the stir among the surrounding students, Chayeon let out an inward breath of relief and approached Seohee.
"Um, so can I head out now?"
"Mm-hmm. There's nothing else on the schedule, so you're free to do as you like. Still, though — I knew you were strong, Chayeon, but... that was something else."
"Yeah, I guess so. I'll see you tomorrow."
That was all she said before heading for the door.
The truth was, Seohee and the other students weren't the only ones stunned by Chayeon's power. Chayeon herself was stunned. She was still stunned, in real time.
What the hell...? It was that easy? Or am I just that strong?
Neither. I am the one who is strong.
Yeah, of course you'd say that.
Chayeon replayed the fight in her head. The strange abilities had caught her off guard, sure — but compared to Rubrum-Luna, both the power and the speed had been absurdly low. If anything...
If we're talking pure skill, Arena might've actually been above them.
The witch's blade is indeed extraordinarily sharp. Sharp enough to sever that red demon's claws — something even I could not cut.
Arena's ability was Absolute Severance. They said that as long as she held her broom-sword, she could cut through any substance in the world. And though Chayeon hadn't known it at the time, Arena's pure swordsmanship was also on an extremely high level.
Come to think of it...
A remark of her own from not so long ago suddenly surfaced. After winning their first spar, she had called Arena a beginner, among other things. And then Arena had gone and said she'd never even learned swordsmanship.
Yeah. She'd have every right to be pissed.
Only now did Chayeon understand why Arena had been so furious — why she had clung to her like that.
Are we heading back?
"No. I need to get fully prepared. You can read my mind, so why even ask?"
I was merely opening a conversation. For the sake of natural communication.
The place Chayeon was heading was Auditorium Nine of Building 11 — where Ju Jihyo's Class B, Group Six match was being held. Her own match had ended unusually fast, so she was on her way over in the hope that his might still be going.
"Auditorium Nine, Auditorium Nine... ah, here it is."
Chayeon found the Ninth Auditorium and pushed the door open. The interior layout was similar to the Fifth, where she had just been. And then—
"Ghk! Kh—! Stop—!"
"...That's too much."
"I'd heard the stories, but seeing it in person, he's strong, all right. His personality, though..."
"That bastard — who the hell does he think his seniors are!?"
The murmurs of spectators who had arrived ahead of her drifted over. Just as they had for Chayeon's match, the stands were packed with people who had come to see the rumored freshman's skill for themselves.
And beyond them, inside the arena—
"Kh— hah, s-stop it!"
"Hmm, I don't think so. She's not incapacitated yet, is she? Right, teacher?"
Ju Jihyo stood there with a woman's face clenched in an enormous hand.
Seohee said nothing. But that silence was as good as permission.
Two other men already lay collapsed around Jihyo. They appeared to have been rendered unable to fight some time ago; healers were crouched over them, administering treatment.
"Senior, they say demons enjoy torture — it's how they break an ability user's mind. You learned that in first-year class, didn't you?"
The woman's face was shoved away from his hand. And then, immediately—
It was yanked right back. Her face collided with his palm. A wet smack, and blood sprayed.
"Senior, your hands and feet are perfectly fine, aren't they? No serious internal injuries, either. You really ought to put up more of a fight."
"S-stop. I-I already lost.... Please..."
"That's not how this works, though."
Her face was shoved away again.
"Ah— s-stop...!"
Yanked back. Another wet, crushing impact. A choked gasp.
Jihyo's control over the force was exquisite. If he had applied even a little more pressure — if her nose had broken, if a couple of teeth had been knocked out, if her orbital bone had fractured — Seohee would have been obligated to stop the match on the spot. Conversely, so long as the opponent was not deemed unable to continue fighting, the referee was not permitted to halt the match on a whim.
And the force Jihyo applied was strong without quite being strong enough. Measured, repetitive pressure. Under that pressure, the woman had to drive her face into his palm dozens of times, hundreds of times, blood pouring from her nose. Blood sprayed into her eyes and stung; tears and saliva ran freely down a face that was soaked through.
And still, she was not incapacitated. If she wanted to, she could have used her ability at any moment. The only reason she wasn't was entirely psychological. Torture that delivered pain with surgical precision every time she tried to resist. Through that repetition, the woman had been reduced to a state where she could no longer even think of fighting back — only beg.
"...That's too much. That is."
"But I heard high-ranking demons use methods just like that. It might be good experience for her."
"This is just a Ranking Match!"
Opinion among the spectating students was split. Some argued that a bout with Ju Jihyo was a chance to accumulate more combat-oriented experience. Others called it unnecessary sadism. But every last one of them was operating from the same underlying premise: that what Ju Jihyo was doing right now was closer to a demon than a human being.
"...Ah, how boring. This is why I can't stand weak women."
The smile on Jihyo's face cooled by degrees. He had subdued the two men early and had spent the entire match since then tormenting this one woman. But even that seemed to have lost its charm. He put his full weight behind the toe of his dress shoe and drove it into her lower abdomen.
"Ghhk—!"
"Stop!"
An attack of an entirely different caliber from everything that had come before — more than powerful enough. The woman dropped to her knees, and Seohee halted the match. The healers who had been waiting rushed in to check her condition.
"...No issues."
The healer examining the woman said it through gritted teeth, brow furrowed. This cruel bastard had driven her mind to the brink through a method this agonizing, and yet he had left behind not a single serious injury.
"...All right. Ju Jihyo wins."
"Yeees, thank you for your hard work."
Jihyo wiped the blood from his right hand on his pants and headed for the auditorium door. On his way out, his eyes found Chayeon.
"Yeah. A woman ought to be at least this much."
His footsteps closed the distance. He stopped in front of her. The difference in their builds was overwhelming.
"Someone on Chayeon's level would suit me, don't you think? Even your blowjobs have some bite to them."
"...You crazy bastard."
The voice she spat the curse in trembled, just slightly. Residual emotion from that day, still clinging on.
Breathe. Calm down. Don't flinch in front of this asshole.
I was curious what manner of impressive creature could make my vessel tremble in such terror — but what is this?
The Black Fox's voice cut through at that moment.
This is nothing but a horny male pup. Pathetic. Do not be afraid.
The instant she heard those words, Chayeon felt her heart settle. A horny male pup. That was exactly it. This guy was nothing more and nothing less than a pervert who got off on tormenting women.
She could deal with him tomorrow. It was a shame she hadn't caught the full details of the match, but she didn't think she was going to lose.
She ignored him and turned on her heel. A slimy voice drifted after her from behind.
"Leaving already? Let's talk a little more. We should get to know each other."
"...Wipe your dick and get ready to get wrecked."
"Hahaha. So you've still got the guts to talk like that? I knew my eyes weren't wrong."
That smirk as he looked down at her. Somewhere in it, she was reminded of Rubrum-Luna.
"I'll be looking forward to that feisty side of you."
Chayeon left the auditorium without another word.