Suijin stood, wiping the tears off of her eyes. Both mine and Homura's efforts managed to reach her. She had sincerely asked for help. For maybe the first time in who Know's how long.
In front of us, Aergia had been watching the situation. You couldn't call the expression on her face anything but boredom, however she was staring directly at us. As if the situation had managed to pique her interest. If only in the slightest.
Just as she opened her mouth to speak for what would be the second time, a screech could be heard.
Over the P.A. system, Shindo's voice spoke. He gave a speech about how he had managed to defeat one of the many enemies that had kept us boxed in here. He gave an update on the battlefield, before finally telling everyone to not stop fighting, and that our efforts would not be in vain.
As the speech ended, the smile that was on Suijin's face was so large it must have hurt. I knew because I had the exact same one on my face.
"He did it. And not only that...." She didn't finish that sentence; however, we were both so uplifted that I didn't even question it.
Pumping a fist into the air, Homura shouted out, "Hell yeah! That's one down!"
Aergia's expression did not change in the slightest. Not even the tiniest shift in her features could be seen. Like nearly everything else, she seemed completely and utterly bored with it.
She yawned once again, before stretching her arms.
"No matter how many times I see it......I'm still shocked.......At how much you try to struggle."
Suijin's smiled faltered slightly as Aergia began to speak once again. My own expression fell a bit as well. However, this time her expression did not fall into one of murderous rage. Instead, she kept her composure, and took a step forward, locking eyes with the girl in the blue hoodie.
"I'm also shocked. You said the same thing before. I wasn't in the right state of mind to answer that. And don't get me wrong, your question still makes me angry, unbelievably so. However, It won't make me so angry that I lose control. So, I'll ask you this."
Suijin summoned a bow made out of water. Notching three arrows unto it, she pointed it at Aergia. "What's so hard to understand about a will to fight and struggle on?"
There was a long moment of silence, and for a second I thought that Aergia would choose to not answer at all, but at the last moment, she spoke up.
"This struggles you put on. This act, this action of putting everything on the line in order to survive? What's its purpose? In the end, if you fail, it would all be meaningless."
"That's exactly why we fight." Suijin's answer came immediately. "We fight with everything we have in order to avoid that outcome. But even more so, because we don't want to go down easily. Even if we lose in the end, we fight to make sure that death was not an easy one. Ever heard, 'Do not go gentle into that good night?'"
Both Homura and I looked at each other, before simultaneously shrugging our shoulders. We had never heard of that line either.
Without even having once looked back to see our reactions, Suijin supplied an explanation. "It comes from a poem, written by a man urging his father to fight against death, and not die easily. A great read, even though its hundreds of years old at this point."
Aergia tilted her head to the side. "But you're only delaying the inevitable? Why not accept that dying light? Because at one point or another, it will claim you. It is inescapable."
Suijin simply shook her head. "Living like that means you reject everything life has to offer. There are many opportunities to take, things to do, something you want to achieve. If you even have one thing to look forward to, then you can't allow yourself to ever give up easily."
Another long moment of silence ensued. Aergia tilted her head back, before finally saying.
"I can't understand you."
Immediately after, a massive burst came flying out towards Suijin.
She fired her three arrows, which neutralized the blast mid-air.
Aergia flicked her fingers in multiple quick slices of air that came from all directions, however Suijin reacted just as quickly, firing arrows made of water to meet every last single slash that was launched.
Taking a closer look, I was able to realize that it was an in-genius application of her ability. Taking the zone of Absolute Zero and turning it into something that was small enough to encompass an arrow or any other creation she opted for; she could create water that neutralized techniques.
I wondered how the water that Absolute Zero was wrapped around managed to not also suffer from the effects. It should have dissipated immediately.
"Look closer Kami." Once again, like she had eyes on the back of her head AND was a mind reader, she issued an answer to an unanswered question.
Not only that, but she wasn't even telling me directly, rather turning it into a, "learning opportunity."
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She was deceptively like Raiden.
Focusing my vision, I took a closer look at the arrows she fired.
Now that I was looking closely, I could see that the arrows didn't actually dissipate until they made contact with the Aergia's own attacks. That detail could be lost as just a clash if you weren't looking closely enough.
The real reason behind it? Absolute Zero didn't activate until the water arrow made contact with Aergia's own attack.
It was even more genius and skillful than I had originally thought.
"Seriously impressive. Just how...."
Suijin giggled a bit. "Someday the two of you will be able to make use of sequences and spells, almost as skillfully as I do."
I raised my brow a bit at the emphasis she put on almost.
"Now, I want the two of you to be ready."
Both me and Homura stood up straighter, tension flowing through our bodies.
"I said ready, not tense." Suijin instructed. "Relax, let a deep breath out, but do not let your sense's dull."
Following Suijin's words, we let out a deep breath, and let out muscles relax, while doing the best we could to keep our eyes and mind constantly working.
Suijin smiled. She began to explain our plan, all the while firing arrows to neutralize all of Aergia's attacks.
"Right now, Kami, we have the home court advantage. Our enemy is forced to fight in a terrain that you have complete control of. Use that to your advantage. Shift the terrain to catch her off guard. Use it to sell your feints. Use your terrain to give your allies the edge, while confusing your opponent."
Closing my eyes, I focused on controlling every single part of the ice palace. I used mana sense in order to pinpoint the location of everyone inside it, when I could sense an attack coming straight for my head at insane speed.
Reflexively, I snapped my eyes open and flinched backwards, however the attack never hit.
Homura had intercepted it with her blades, redirecting the force out of the hole in the wall.
"Don't break focus, we have your back!" Homura shouted, turning her focus back towards Aergia.
Nodding, and placing face in my own comrades to keep me safe, I closed my eyes once again.
Using Mana sense, I could see that Homura and Suijin were doing everything in their ability to intercept all of Aergia's many attacks. However, Aergia was attacking so quickly that they had no clear openings for offense.
They were relying on me to create those openings for them.
Think Kami Think! Pouring all of my focus into strategy, I tried to come up with a method that would be able to hold Aergia off long enough for either one of my allies to land a blow.
Her advantage lies in the number of ways that she can attack. With a swing of her hand, arm, finger, and even a blink. All of those actions can end up in devastating slashes. In an open environment, she can overwhelm opponents with just the sheer number of attacks she's capable of wielding.
So, in order to beat her, I'll have to restrict the options of attack that she has!
Turning focus back to the battle, I began to move parts of the ice castle.
Raising a wall there.
Dropping stalagmite out from the ceiling.
Summon chains from the ground to divert her attention, before summoning even more walls.
I set up an area of walls that did two things.
Blocked the brunt of Aergia's attacks, while also narrowing her field of vision and routes for open attacks. This hampered the speed and frequency of her blows.
Still, it wasn't enough. In order to circumvent the physical barriers, I had placed, Aergia just turned to her mana sense, using it to map out the environment, and easily launch her attacks while avoiding the barriers.
This quick adaptation led to the barriers I had set up to become more detrimental to my allies, as Aergia now used the mana signature they were giving off to mask her own attacks.
Damn!
I immediately returned to my train of thought, trying to figure out another way I could throw her off her game, even if it was only for a singular second.
"Kami!" Suijin shouted out to me once again. Her voice was strained, and I could tell that it was because of the number of things she had to keep up with at once.
Still, she found a second to lecture me and give me a lesson.
"Don't restrict your own mind. And ability like yours requires freedom of thought. Keep every move creative. Do anything to make your true goal hidden, even if it means not thinking too much about what you're doing! Fool yourself and your allies if you have to! Because if you can do that, then you can most definitely fool her enemy!"
Her voice cut off as she returned to dodging and blocking attacks, however she had gotten her message across.
Fool myself? Freedom? Creativity?
Still, although her advice was good, it was much easier said than done.
Let your mind be free? How could I-
Suddenly, Mina's voice came into my head. It was one of the many training sessions that we regularly had.
Sometimes during battle, you have to empty your mind in order to let yourself battle more efficiently?
"But how does that make any sense?" I asked. "Emptying your mind? How would you be able to come up with effective strategies?"
Mina nodded. "Good point. However, in a high paced battle, with many different factors, your margin for error is zero. You need to be reactive. If your constantly stuck in your brain, then you're going to end up making a mistake, or miss something. The stress of the battle will also impede your ability to think. So, what you need to do is let all of it go. Just battle. Get into the flow. Before you know it, the strategy will come to you."
Zero margin for area. Just allow yourself to enter the flow.
Letting out another deep breath, I cleared my own mind.
With that, I returned to manipulating the Ice castle. This time I didn't have any other goal beyond, Impede Aergia.
So, I resorted to whatever means.
Rocking the entire palace, half-summoning a wall before letting it go, shifting the palace 90, to 180 degrees, summoning multiple ice dragons and other constructs as well as ice clones of myself. I cluttered up the battlefield.
Soon, there was so much clutter, that no matter how you looked at the situation, with your physical eyes, or with your mana sense, it was pure chaos.
Yet even in that Chaos, I was still able to locate Suijin and Homura.
They had closed in close enough.
Suddenly, I dropped all of the distraction on Aergia's left side, giving Suijin the prefect view.
She rained down arrow at her opponent.
Aergia snapped her head around, reacting as quickly as she could to neutralize the attacks.
Suijin maintained the pressure though, attacking Aergia with water dragons and blasts of fire and wind.
Waving both her arms in a massive blast, she knocked back all of the attacks at once.
I used my ice to pull Suijin out of the way, as a massive gaping hole the size of a room was left in the ceiling and the wall of the palace.
However, both of our diversion had worked.
On Aergia's left, I had left the distractions, pouring a majority of my aura into them. The chaos on that side, along with Suijin's distraction, was just enough to mask all of Homura's movements.
Allowing her to get behind Aergia.
Our opponent turned, and fired a blast, but too late.
The blast forced Homura to divert her angle, so she couldn't land any sort of fatal blow.
Yet, her blade still carved a deep gash from Aergia's left shoulder to her right hip.