MIZURI

A boy? Angels have always been female, so Mizuri’s first impression of the boy was that he must have been some extra-strong Master. After all, very few Angels and Masters existed who were skilled enough with magic to do what he’d just done to her.

Though one look at his uniform had refuted that instantly. He was wearing the Higashi Academy uniform, though with a black pair of pants for his lower half instead of a short black skirt.

Mizuri’s fastest punch hadn’t hit him earlier. Plus, he had known exactly where she was all the time. She knew because she’d seen his eyes follow her movements around, even stopping when she’d used branches to change her direction.

His tracking had a slight delay to it, but that didn’t change the fact that he’d been able to follow her speed completely. That meant that when she’d been sealed, she hadn’t been as fast as she’d thought she’d been.

Or it could mean that he was just faster than her. She hoped not.

Mizuri had brought him to a nearby concrete-floored flat area the size of two football fields placed side by side and started the duel.

And she had struck first, hurling her kusarigama in a straight line at his neck, but he’d stopped it with his sheathed katana.

Mizuri jumped back and realized that he’d actually managed to place the sun behind him. Which meant she had to fight the light as well. It was a basic tactic, but the fact that he’d been able to pull it on Mizuri annoyed her.

She did her best to glare at him through squinted eyes.

She couldn’t help but feel annoyed whenever she looked at him. His uncut white hair was unkempt, and he wore head phones, as if to say he didn’t need to hear anything other than his music.

Mizuri knew there was probably a reason for it, but it came across as an insult to her, and she couldn’t ignore it even if she wanted to.

His speed was unfair as well. Mizuri remembered just how fast Owari-sensei had seemed to her, and this guy was as fast as that. And Owari-sensei had teleported. Speed like that was basically cheating.

Mizuri let her flame burn hotter. When her kusarigama was idle, she kept the sickle-like blade on the ground, and that didn’t do the concrete floor any good. The ground she was standing on had long been reduced to a bubbling mess of molten concrete, but she barely felt it. Heat didn’t get to her, anyway. She was an Angel of Fire, after all.

And she was fast. She knew exactly why she was fast, as well. The secret was doubt. Or the lack of doubt, to be more precise. Most people couldn’t be fast at something because of doubt. Her body didn’t afford for doubt. She was always moving before she even decided on what to do.

Maybe she wasn’t as fast as Owari-sensei had been, or as this guy was, but she had her own speed. And she was confident he didn’t know teleportation magic, because if he did, he’d have used it by now. He seemed to be a tactician, trying to win a battle before it even started.

But he didn’t know her. He didn’t know her reaction speed. That meant she could win.

Actually, Mizuri didn’t want to win, since winning would mean she’d have to return to the clearing. But she didn’t want to hold back. She’d never wanted to hold back since her first duel.

Think, Mizuri. Her opponent was faster than she was, and had an item that could literally freeze her body in place.

‘Tuning fork,’ my ass. If he thought that was enough of an explanation...

What made it easier for Mizuri to think was the fact that he seemed equally stumped on what to do. But he looked so much cooler about it that Mizuri probably did.

Not that it changed anything about the fight, but...

For starters, he was standing perfectly still, the point of his katana just barely touching the ground. Just barely, as if he were using just enough force so it looked like it was hovering on the ground instead of resting on it. She figured even that was calculated. Of course he’d hold his weapon in a way that he’d be able to move it with as little force as possible if he needed to.

His jacket was also the same as hers, but the black color and electric blue lines suited him a lot better than Mizuri’s black and purple jacket suited her. Growling in exasperation, Mizuri quickly slipped off her jacket, crumpled it into a ball, and hurled it away as far into the forest behind her as she could.

And, oh gods, his eye. His left eye was a pale white color, but somehow Mizuri saw something else there. Something she felt she probably wanted to see. The whiteness of his eye offset his looks a bit, and Mizuri was thankful for that. She probably wouldn’t have survived if his eyes had been the same color. Yet the eye did nothing to dampen the intensity of cool he radiated.

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His right eye was an all-too-familiar shade of purple. It was the same shade as her hair.

Wind. She knew that he had some form of control over wind, meaning he was an Angel of Wind, but he didn’t seem too scared to get close to Mizuri’s fire. Fire was the perfect counter against wind, after all. Mizuri had the elemental advantage here.

But then again, there was that monstrous speed. He was always getting close, for just an instant, really, so the fire never touched him.

Mizuri once again flicked her chain at him, and this time the chain only missed his ankle by an inch.

An inch.

So why did Mizuri feel like that inch was a foot, a meter?

She exhaled and unleashed a string of arcing attacks, this time aiming to disarm him, but he nimbly ducked and dodged away from every single move.

There it was. The monstrous speed. Mizuri couldn’t track his movements. All she knew was that he was dodging everything she threw at him with no expression on his face.

But then slowly, slowly, as she kept catching glimpses of his face as she attacked and he dodged, she noticed that his expression was slowly changing.

No expression. Boredom.

Then...

Entertainment. Realizing that made Mizuri frown.

Fine. You’re entertained? How about this for a change? She dug her feet into the molten concrete and bent her knees.

She knew how fast Owari-sensei had been, reflexes and teleportation considered. And she was sure that he wouldn’t have been able to move fast enough for this.

Her gaze locked on the guy’s wrist, just above where he was holding his katana on the ground.

She closed her eyes.

Then she pushed off with all her strength.

The ground broke further under the pressure she created, and she burst forward like a bullet.

Are you faster than a Teleporter?

The answer came as a shock of deja vu, washing over Mizuri. She knew this feeling. She knew the feeling of having a powerful shattered with brute speed.

He wasn’t where he was supposed to be. He’d made a full movement around her, ending up at the other side. Her side.

He floated above the mess she’d made, with a smirk on his face.

Mizuri flinched as she realized that she hadn’t even seen him move this time. Of course, she’d had her eyes closed, but it wasn’t that. She hadn’t even felt him move. Her body hadn’t even reacted to his movement.

All she could see was a pink semicircle going from where he’d started to where he’d ended up. And in the pink, in the aura probably made by his katana, was a faint trace of something, like the name of the move he’d just used.

Kamikaze, it said.

How do I beat someone like that?

Mizuri had always just followed one simple rule when she fought in duels, and it had never failed her. At least, not until Owari-sensei. And not until now.

Strike hard and fast, was the rule.

She knew for sure that this guy was a faster Angel than she was. Which meant that her three years of stagnation had to end.

She locked eyes with him, and she finally felt an unfamiliar feeling again after years, since her first duel.

Fun. Fighting this guy was fun.

She relaxed, and once again dug her feet into the ground.

If she hadn’t been able to touch him before, she’d just have to make sure she did now.

His left eye somehow didn’t look quite so white anymore. It had a bluish tinge to it. Mizuri took that to mean that from here on out, he was about to get serious.

Bring it! she shouted in her mind.

She knew she was a prodigy, but not anymore. She was a fifteen year old, probably the same as the guy, and he was probably every bit faster than her.

But she wasn’t a prodigy for nothing. Speed wasn’t all she had going on for her. She had reserves of magic equivalent to those of adults. And she had knowledge that far surpassed any other fifteen year old.

And she also knew that no victory was a victory unless she grew, and that no victory would come to her by itself.

So she would grow.

Bring it!