Contrary to everyone's expectations, after the start of the fight was announced, nothing major happened. Xyenna was standing still with her mischevious smile, waiting for her opponent to come at her. Using the advantage that she was in the very middle of the fighting area, all she had to do to follow his slow movements was to turn around!

On the far end of the field, her opponent was slowly moving in circles, as if trying to heat up his muscles. Neither one of them had any chance to do so beforehand, so flexing now, even if only for a bit, might give them an advantage later.

It appeared that the girl took Mike's warnings to her heart. Instead of outright provoking her opponent, she carefully observed his moves, the way he could bend his joints, his field of view from behind his full-on helmet or how far he could reach.

It was obvious that so-called Marcus prepared himself for the fight. Or to tell it honestly, he was prepared by the faction supporting him in this duel. His set of heavy armour was aimed against her sword, making it very hard to reach any vitals with it! There were some techniques like dace smash, but her sword wasn't sturdy enough to try them on. Her grip-cover made this specific movement even harder!

After a few moments of just observing each other, Marcus finally charged at the girl. While his attack was slow at first, the weight of the armour considerably slowing him down, with every step the momentum he attained made it harder and harder to dodge or break his rush.

The audience watched with held breath as the man rushed at a seemingly powerless girl. Her sword lying on her foot made her look even more useless against this metal can charge at her. Only when her opponent got close enough, she did act.

Twitching her leading foot up, she kicked the sword away! Lowering her centre of weight, she swiftly grabbed her sturdy knife and seemingly trusted it at the man while rushing with her right leg forward.

While the man got distracted by the main weapon flying away, he didn't bother much with it. Realising what the girl was aiming for, he turned his body sideways to avoid the hit on the joint between the breastplate and the fauld covering his crotch. This was one of the few places where his body wasn't protected by the chainmail. If she managed to strike a lucky hit, he would bleed to death in just a manner of moments!

Just from this slight movement, it became apparent that the current Marcus had nothing to do with the guard that was initially challenged. One had to possess great skill and experience to perform this minuscule movement, not to speak about even maintaining his mind calm and analytic enough to figure out a correct way to counter Xyenna attack.

To his surprise, Xyenna didn't plan anything that simple!

Just when he appeared at the distance of an arms reach, swordmistress extended her left, gloved hand while retracing her right one! With a slight 'clang', she locked the knife's blade on the metal glove and rested the backside of it on her armlet. Falling on one knee, she judged the correct distance and squeezed herself in.

Unable to change his position at such close distance, 'Marcus' could only endure the blade of the knife suddenly piercing through the chainmail on his armpit!

While the sudden, sharp pain startled him, the angle at which Xyenna could turn the knife's blade was too low to actually do much harm! This elaborate and extremely dangerous move served only as a form of the greeting!

Carried away by his momentum, Marcus had to extend a fair amount of strength to stop! Stunned by his opponent, he moaned when he felt the small pain from the shallow wound. As if struck by a realisation, he slowly turned around.

Someone capable of executing this kind of attack, would not hit him in the back! Not in such an early phase of the fight! His eyes instantly confirmed his thoughts! Not even trying to follow up with any attack, swordmistress calmly straightened herself and flailed her gloved hand around for a moment. The metallic sound of her glove clanging around made both of them realise that the audience was absolutely silent!

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Those people that couldn't keep their mouth shut even when the announcer was introducing them, were currently stunned at the turn of the event. This small and actually pointless exchange made them realise that this wasn't a onesided fight that they expected.

Both of the challengers shrugged when the same realisation struck them at the same time. Realising that she wasn't fighting with the same guy that she initially challenged, Xyenna didn't hold any animosity towards her opponent. While smiling sympathetically at him, she strode to where her sword lied and picked it up.

Finally uncovering the thin blade, she gazed at her reflection for a short while. She closed her eyes for a second as if experiencing some mythical bond with her weapon. After she was done, she stood up in proper fencing stance and saluted Marcus with her beloved sword.

Figuring out the processes that took place in the girl's head, the man clad in armour didn't interfere with her actions. Seeing the gesture of respect, he struck his breast with the blade of his axe, producing a reverberating, metallic sound.

With the proper greeting exchanged, now the real fight was about to start!

While those first hits were exchanged, Mike didn't sit on his spot doing anything. While he paid a certain amount of his attention to Xyenna's situation, he was also diligently observing the crowd and the arena itself. What made his confused a bit was the fact, that during his charge, Marcus didn't leave deeper footprints on the ground. They were all around the same depth as if something was allievating his weight.

Compared to him, Xyenna seemed to just slide through the grass. While the light armour wasn't heavy, it still had its own mass. It took him a while to realise that her swiftness was augmented by her proficiency blessing slowly firing up!

Since the real greeting was done, warriors started closing on each other. In just a few steps, they reached their attacking distance. The man swung his axe sideways, at the torso height, trying to force Xyenna into a worse position. Accelerating forward, she didn't have much choice but to lean forward with her sword held along the centerline of her body. While the man's attack got dodged, the girls sneaky cut from below didn't manage to put even a crack on Marcus armour. Flying past him, she still managed to turn herself around on the move and execute yet another slash, this time aimed at her opponent neck. Unsurprisingly, this light hit didn't cut through the chainwest either.

Turning around his body, Marcus took a wide swing while holding the longer end of his axe. This kind of attack might make him wide open, but the range at which it forced Xyenna to escape compensated for this flaw. Left with no other choice, the swordmistress had to jump back a bit, allowing the man to use this attack yet again.

With this short exchange, the audience finally understood that the bout was slowly heating up. While they had no idea about the depth behind each move, the show itself was really enjoyable!

While looking at this exchange, Mike couldn't help but feel that something wasn't right. With how massive Marcus's battle-axe was, there should be no way he could swing it that easily with all the iron armour weighing him down!

It was plainly obvious that he wasn't the original guard. It was clear for all to see that his fighting skill was supported by loads of actual experience. This kind of people didn't bother themselves with the gifts, but relied on their proficiency alone! It looked like the City Hall trick were already in place, working in Marcus favour!

As Mike was desperately looking for either the culprit or the solution, the duelling pair stopped their fight and distanced themselves from each other. In this kind of intense battle, they had to take short breaks to take a breath! If they allowed their blessing to take over their minds, this place would instantly turn into a bloodbath!

While Mike was still looking around with a panic slowly growing in his heart, Xyenna's disposition suddenly changed as if she resolved herself to something. Pulling the knife yet again, she held it in back grip, looking for any lapses in Marcus movement. Seeing that he was still gathering his breath, she instantly jumped at him!

And it was exactly what he was aiming for!

Instead of continuing with wide swings, he held the axe by the blade and swung it upwards, trying the split woman in half in her approach!

Using the fact that both of her hands were on the right side of her torso, she swung her knife-holding arm and struck the side of the axe with a palm of her hand!

Unable to deal any damage while in front of the panzer wall, she placed the blade of her sword at the side of her enemy ankle, jumped to the side and pulled her weapon along, severing the belts that held his greaves on his right leg! Judging from the amount of blood left on the blade after the slash, his tendons should be cut as well!

Contrary to Mike and Xyenna expectation, Marcus didn't seem to be hindered by it at all! Replying with a wide hand smash, he managed to land a hit on the girl's shoulder!

Thrown out of the balance, the girl strode forward a few paces, while grabbing her arm. Looking at the Xyenna's pained expression, merchant froze. It was obvious that just from that single hit, her shoulder got dislocated!

But that was an impossible hit! With his tendons severed, there was no way he could turn around so fast, that even agile swordmistress couldn't react to it at all!