I barely managed to catch my breath before the saber was thrusted at me once again, and immediately I felt myself so overcome with fear I flinched and almost fell backwards, but luckily I managed to gain my balance and slam the butt of my blade into Isaac's. The resulting pain that jolted through my arm was insane and I just barely managed to hold onto my saber, strangely, Isaac showed no signs of even feeling the withdraw, and save for the reddening of a single of his knuckle, it would appear that he did not feel anything.

Isaac quickly moved his blade around and pretended to attack my leg but when I went to block he smoothly moved his blade up to my shoulder. It was too late to block or parry so I jumped back and was immediately asaualted by gusts of wind as Isaac's saber touched nothing but air. I couldn't resist the wind as it was too harsh and blinked. And the very moment my eyes cracked open Isaac lunged at me. And somehow, I managed to kick my reflexes into overdrive, and managed to bat his blade downwards and send it almost to the floor, unfortunately, since my saber was sticky, it stuck to Isaac's who immediately tried to push farther and price my abdomen, judging from the look of his face.

Unfortunately for him. I managed to keep him back. Barely. Holding onto that sword as he was pushing against it felt like pushing against an unlocked door with a tornado on the other side; completely and utterly pointless. if I were to guess I the only reason I was able to hold him off was from pure luck. Even though he was on the losing side of this duel, Isaac gave me a look that unironically put the fear of God in a magical child, because nothing other than the devil could have possibly created the human form in such a way that it would be capable to deliver a look so disgusting, I literally forgot to breathe until the end of the fight.

Then I saw it. On the middle of my blade where our swords interlocked whatever sticky object was on my sword was dripping to the ground, and picking up more and more speed over time. Isaac did not seem to notice, his eyes locking onto me in a way, that I felt like a bed of needles were being constantly thrown into my eyelids just by looking at him. Suddenly I got an idea. I counted down from 5 waiting to make my move, with each passing second Isaac's blade went closer and closer, like a timer to the most deadly bomb in the world.

And not a moment sooner than when I reached zero and my blade was now clean as soap, Isaac blitzed forward, and immediately I sidestepped him, aimed my blade at his torso, and plunged it at him like a mighty piston. And with a mighty crack, my blade slammed into him with such raw forced that it bore into him like a spear into a mammoth, sending Isaac smashing to the ground with a crunch as his elbow appeared to melt into the ground for a moment when he fell, and his sword was rammed into the ground with such raw force it shattered, and snapped Isaac's wrist, making me the Victor, standing on the dueling mat in the stance of how a person might envision a holy knight.

Unfortunately, that was not what happened. In fact what happened was far worse. While I did jerk to the the side and lunge right at Isaac, he was just so wirey it was pointless, as the moment I attacked, Isaac realized what I was doing, and while still keeping his momentum, raised his sword to meet my own and the sparks created combined with the illusionmdo his sword, was enough to blind me and render me to a flailing mess of fear and swing my blade with no real thought behind my strikes and once again, time slowed.

And once again it made no real difference save for lengthening the battle, as somehow, Isaac was able to match my reflexes. One of my strikes must have nearly nabbed him as he lunged back and my sight cleared and no longer saw a bunch of dancing orange spirals. My bones began to ache and then, pure rage filled me, and the duel stopped becoming one of many trials to get some good food, for me, and warped into a battle of life and death, and I was willing to win. My pain faded temporarily and I just launched right at Isaac in what would have been the most amazing second wind ever recorded if it were caught on camera, with furious strikes specifically at where his lungs and heart would be.

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The battle resumed again, but now Isaac was on the losing side. With every 2 or 3 strikes, he would be forced to step back. Now this was just a war of attrition. Something happened however. Then, Isaac changed his expression from a disgusting snarl, to a look of indifference. That was all the confidence I needed to push forward and end him, and as disgusting as it is to say, I genuinely wanted to skewer him like a pig, despite him being innocent, and I charged, feeling like a hawk charging a rat. Unfortunately what occured next could be described better as a hawk charging a Buffalo, since out of nowhere, Isaac began deflecting my attacks instead of just blocking them.

Both of us stopped moving and the battle a slugging match, since he would just keep deflecting my attacks with such easinesss, I would try to stab him even harder. And what was worse, was that for each of my attacks, my blade just got duller and duller, since somehow Isaac was blocking in such a way that the hilt of his sword would always only meet the point of my blade, sending waves of pain jolting through my body. I looked back at Isaac's face and immediately knew I was going to lose. For what was plastered on his face was not a sad face or the neutral expression from earlier.

Instead, what I saw on his face was a smile. Not a sadistic smile. Not an angry smile. He wore an expression of pure happiness, like a burglar would after lockpicking a door on his first try. It seemed inhuman. What he did next cught me even more off guard. First, he sliced off the point of my saber with a brutal parry. He did it with such force, it glided through the air and stabbed into the floor. Then, Isaac pushed his sword onto mine with presumably all of his weight, and sliced right through my saber like a laser through paper, causing both end to peel like a metal banana! the sound didn't even reach my ears when the blade slammed into my hilt and sent pain rippling through my body, I was forced into a kneeling position to not sprawl over and fall on the severed point of my weapon, as Isaac's blade ripped through my helmet and had he used the smallest push afterwards, would have no doubt drilled into my eye.

"Woah!" I heard a female voice say from my side. it sounded almost exactly like the voice I heard earlier after getting trickshot by that spoon. Isaac tore off my helmet with an upward swing, and now appeared more calm and docile, like he was when we first met. I turned my head to see the cause of the voice and it was in fact Eleanor Steyr. She was standing over Tyler like an imposing tornado, and was slack jawed. In fact everyone watching me and Isaac duel also were shocked, save for Tyler , who was holding the phone atlat us showing that time had run out.

And judging from his look it had been for longer than expected. Snidely appeared. shocked and kept looking from me to my Splintered sword, to Isaac and back to me again. Suddenly. The helmet fell back to the ground and was about to smack me right in the groin when Isaac jammed his blade into the exact same cut he made earlier, and gently placed it back on my head. Then, he took out his hand to me, clearly wanting me to shake it. I did, even though my entire body was sore, not out of kindness since I was still in kill-mode, but more put of fear so great it briefly encompassed my rage.

I glanced over at Snidely and through the damaged helmet, could see him grab a pencil and write in perfect cursive the word "Check mark" in one of the little checkboxes, from the giant glass window behind him. Then, I realized I had not breathed for quite a while and did so immediately, and as I exhaled not only did my soreness lessen a bit, I was relaxeded to see something in front of the shop. Laying on the road was a police car. And Inside of the car, was officer Dawson, good as new. His eye locked onto Rexid and then Snidely. He grinned, and I suddenly felt like I went from one challenge to an impossible task, evading Officer Dawson.