Ever since I first saw Yi Xiao, the mysterious foreign Chinese international student, I couldnt’t help but wonder abotu the type of life she lived. I could see it in the way that she talked, moved and lived that she clearly had a labored past. And if it were rude or something that I wouldn’t directly benefit from it, it was something that I needed to know.

It wasn’t out of curiosity or some naive Heroic yet bratty instinct to fix someone that I never knew because the answer was far simpler than a twisted agenda but simply that I wanted her to be my friend. That was it.

I wanted another friend that was my age. Someone who wasn’t a disingenous faker using me for social benefits such as the drama queen girls from middle school or a hopeless simp like Erin, or someone meek like Noah but someone that I could truly rely upon. Someone who had the strength to lead in life and teach me how to get ahead of the others.

I continued jogging along with my thoughts as I glanced at the scene between Yi Xiao and Noah. Despite the fact that she had been so strong, the fact that Noah could even keep up to some degree was shocking. Though it was clear that he was still on the backfoot.

Yi Xiao pointed her wooden sword towards Noah and asked him,

“Why do you continue to fight?”

Noah bitterly bit into his lower lip as he was asked such an uncomfortable question out of the blue. But even if his reply was something cringy like that said from an anime character, he still had to say it as it was for his own sake rather than that of his brother’s. As a man he has to live for himself and advocate for himself and the meek will never get ahead if they do not advocate for themselves.

“It’s just that I don’t want to return to becoming someone buried by regrets of not being strong enough or courageous enough because I’ve had it with those thoughts and my weakness which has enslaved me into a life that I don’t want to live!”

Yi Xiao smirked before her sword began to burn up with red sparks. My eyes widened in surprise.

‘Am I seeing things wrong? Was that a spark on her sword?'“

“Then I will test your determination…”

Yi Xiao swung her blade faster than ever with the trail of small red sparks following along the course of the blade’s trail…

“Noah! Watch out!”

I yelled out to him and he suddenly leapt to the ground all his fours.

…Before the trail of red sparks grew and exploded into flames.

“What the hell are you even doing Yi Xiao?”

I asked her with a look of obvious concern on my face as she chuckled and turned back to me.

“He’s a young man so I must test his resolve to live for himself and unless someone like him is unable to meet his standards for strength, he can never consider himself human.”

I bit into my lip as Yi Xiao jumped towards me and swung her blade vertically towards me. Seeing that fiery display from earlier, I didn’t even have to be told to dodge considering the fact that I didn’t want to be burnt a cinder. Rushing to her side, Yi Xiao began striking me again and again however it seemed that the pace of her strikes were slower than before.

Taking advantage of that fact, I would decide to make the best use of the current situation. I glanced to Erin who had gone unnoticed by the narrator for some time as she came behind Yi Xiao and winked at her. Yi Xiao’s mouth opened up confused before turning around and parrying the swift and sudden thrust of Erin.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“I thought she was flirting with me!?”

“Hey! Just because you are good looking and a foreigner that doesn’t mean that I want a piece of you especially considering the fact that the two of us are girls!”

I leapt towards Yi Xiao who had still had her back turned to face Erin and the distance steadily closed. Six, five, four, three, two. I lunged my hand out and slashed towards her back. The distance between her back and my sword gradually collapsed.

One meter, eighty centimeters, sixty centimeters, forty centimeters, thirty centimeters! I could just feel the lovely taste of victory with the nearing of twenty centimeters! And it grew even more as it came to fifteen centimeters and then onto ten centimeters of mere distance!

But through some sort of miracle or just some unholy skill of sorts, Yi Xiao had twisted her entire body to dodge my thrust towards her. It was like she had eyes on her back or something!? She turned back to me and Erin with her metaphorical back up against the border of the sword arena platform.

“How the hell did you even dodge that move!?”

I embarassingly asked as Yi Xiao began runnign to the edge of the battle stadium. At my left had also been Erin running alongside me in the Hunt for Yi Xiao. And far behind me had been Noah standing out in the open all alone while sprouting some cryptic nonsense.

"It was a good attack Nari but I could feel the air pressure of your attacks.”

“Air pressure? Then you really are crazy but what’s even crazier is that you managed to dodge that attack!”

“It’s just the training regiment of my brother nothing else!”

She swung at me with a swift strike that I was unable to predict. The strike was swift and unpredictable but with Erin’s blade rushing against Yi Xiao’s and undermining it’s once monstrous momentum, I would have the opportunity to realize and dodge the attack.

“Nari we aren’t going to win if we are fighting all by ourselves.”

“That’s true but Yi Xiao’s ridicolously strong so even if we are stronger together, it’s going to be dififcult to even land a hit on her considering her flaming sword.'“

I stareed into Yi Xiao’s dark crimsone yes and her confident smirk.

“I like being praised. Your kindness reminds me much of my childhood friend. If the two of you could ever meet, you would certainly get along!”

“It’s just what I have to do in the face of someone as strong as you but for a friend it comes naturally.”

“Wait. On second hand, I don’t think she would like you since you sound too nerdy.”

“Why not?”

Yi Xiao rushed towards me and clashed swords against me and Erin who jointly parried back at her sword before she ran past us. The two of us looked at her confused as we expected a flaming attack of hers to go our way.

“What’s with the lack of fire? You can’t do it anymore?”

Yi Xiao turned back with only her eyes glacning back to me as she chuckled humoring my idea.

“You will have to think because I’m not an idiot who is going to give you an answer to my actions.”

Yi Xiao was an actual thinking human being rather than some comical villain who told their trump card to their enemies, which made her all the more troubling. But judging based on the fact that she could have easily finished us off if she had resorted to the flaming sword, it was more than likely that she had some sort of resitrction regarding that ability. Perhaps it was a cooldown or just the fact that attacking with those powerful flaming moves would require a lot of her aura supply.

I glanced to Erin and we nodded in joint thoguth as we began chasing after Yi Xiao who had in turn ran towards Noah. With a bolting smile across her face, she ran up to the exposed boy without any hesitation in her mind or body.

“Hey. What have you been doing alone all by yourself?”

Noah woke from his trance as Yi Xiao’s sword thrusted straight towards him and landed right before his eyes. Suddenly and quickly otu of desperation he ducked as if he had been the main character of a movie dodgin flying bullets at a point blank range.

“You are far quicker than I gave you credit for but you will have to do a lot more than if you are going to win against me.”

“Yeah. I know. In order to defeat someone as strong as you or my brother, I can’t just win based off of hardwork because I will have to fight tactically and take advtantages of your weaknesses!”

“And what are my weaknesses?”

“Hey. I’m not going to tell you.”

“Fair enough.”

Yi Xiao slashed towards Noah wiht a mad fury of blows with flamed attacks mixed into them every few or so blows. Despite the fact that Noah had been so outscaled by Yi Xiao earlier, now he was capable of standing up to her formidable strength for whatever reason. Perhaps it was because she was expending much of her strength or rather…

With a swift and deceisive slash, Yi Xiao broek the top of Noah’s sword leaving him standing up blankly. With the breaking of his sword, he was eliminated from the battle.

“One down. Two more to go.”

Erin patted me on the back as I stared at Yi Xiao’s swift and merciless vicoty against Noah.

“Let’s do our best. Even if we won’t win, we should still give it our all.”

“You are only so cheery right now because you want to show off to me. Is that right?”

“Well perhaps?’

Erin chuckled as we rushed Yi Xiao and with a single decisive slash she broke our swords.

“Well congrats. You broke our swords so you are going to have to pay a fee to the hunters who run this place.”

Yi Xiao stared at me in shock and confusion as she dropped her wooden sword and began checking her pockets. She stared at me with a blank face of dread.

“Uh…”

I said as I watched Yi Xiao suddenly transform from a viscious fighter capable of easily defeating all of us in battle to a pitiful creature.

“I left my wallet back in China so I can’t pay.”

“Come…”

She came towards me with a dejected look as I pressed my hand on her face. Erin immediately began crying out in shock and confusion while Yi Xiao stared at me confused with Noah chuckling in the background.

“We had two minutes left remaining and I’ve touched you. Even though you considered the breaking of our swords as a knock out stipulation, you never introduced the idea to us before we began fighting so even if it is on a cheeky technicality…”

Yi Xiao chuckled.

“Well I’m kind so it’s your win. So what do you guys want from me?”

End of chapter 8