Days continued to pass, and the search for Kei turned up no answers. The school, the police and even Mai and Nao’s spynet failed to find any sign of her or her captors.
“It’s already December and we’ve barely done any preparation for the upcoming war. It sucks, but I think we’re gonna have to make the call to stop actively searching for Kei.”
Saki hid a grimace as she said that to us. Given how close she and Kei were, it must have been a difficult call to make, but we were running out of options. It was like Kei had completely vanished without a trace.
“As much as I hate it, I agree. If we rescue Kei but lose the war, there won’t be much of a home to bring her back to. Let’s focus on training for now.”
“I-I think that’s for the best. We don’t have much time after all.”
Nao and I both voiced our assent, but one party didn’t speak at all. Ever since the investigation, Mai had begun going quiet whenever Kei was brought up. At first I had assumed it was because of her conversation with Yokoshima, but it seemed like something more than that.
I was worried that there was something she wasn’t telling me, but I wasn’t prepared to push her on it. Whatever it was keeping her quiet, it seemed to be too much to talk about.
“I called Kyouma at lunch and asked her to meet us in the usual place. Me and Nao are gonna be helping Hana with planning and logistics, but there’s a doubles sparring tournament going on today. Could be a good chance for you guys to get some training in.”
“Yeah, that’s a good shout. You up for that, Mai?”
“Hmm? Ah- right. Sounds good.”
I hid my concern over Mai’s absentmindedness, knowing her well enough to know she’d talk to me when she was ready. She was often spacy and lost in thought, but it had gotten significantly worse recently, and I had found it was better to keep her distracted than keep pushing her on it.
Kyouma was actually on time for once, allowing Saki and Nao to get to their meeting with Hana on time, while Mai and I made our way to the training hall.
“Good to see you guys joining in with us today. Might be some real competition for us this time.” Hikari, who was joined by her sister, was apparently the one running the whole event. The twins had supposedly won every doubles tourney they had hosted (conflict of interest notwithstanding), so they generally became battles for second place.
“The road ahead of us is dangerous. Figured we better do everything we can to prepare.”
“A good mindset to have, Shin. And having seasoned fighters like the two of you on the field will be a good way to boost the motivation of the girls, too.” Suzume spoke with her usual cool tone, as opposed to her fiery sister who was barely able to keep her tone quieter than a shout.
Mai didn’t say a word.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
Hikari and Suzume added us as a last minute team to the bracket, making us the 16th pair to sign up. The twins were on the other side of the bracket, meaning we would only be facing them if both we and they made it to the finals.
As the final entrants, our fight was the last of the top 16, giving us plenty of time to watch the other teams fight and prepare ourselves mentally. The rule set seemed the same as last time, but the match area was much smaller, contained to a circle of radius no bigger than seven or eight metres.
We watched several unique powers we had yet to see before, from electromasters to weapon summoners to even gravity benders, though none had nearly as much of a mastery of their crafts as the twins, who dispatched their first opponents in mere moments.
“We’re up next, you coming?” I asked Mai, who had been so deep in thought she hadn’t noticed our match was next.
“Ah- right. Let’s get going.”
“Y’know, if you’re not feeling great we can call off the mat-“
“I’ll be fine. We don’t have time to waste, let’s just go.”
It was rare for Mai to snap at me. It was clear that, whatever was getting to her, it was troubling her more than she cared to admit. I became a tad frustrated - it was evident that she was seriously worried about something, but every time I offered her my ear she shut me out.
Still, it wasn’t my place to be annoyed. It was obvious that it had something to do with Kei, and I’d be lying if I said any of us were coping well with the continued absence of our friend. Saki had thrown herself into her work harder than usual, and Nao had spent every free moment checking the data from her spynet. I wasn’t doing too great either; I had been using anything I could to distract myself from my powerlessness in bringing Kei back.
All I could do for Mai in the meantime was keep her occupied.
We made our way over to our side’s weapon cache and took the same weapons as before, myself wielding dual one-handed axes, while Mai took a long rapier. We made our way over over to the match area, finding ourselves facing down two girls the same age as us, both adorned in black magical girl outfits. One took the form of a gentleman thief, a feathered chapeau upon her head and a tuxedo-like suit on her body. The other appeared like a ninja, a full black body suit and bandanna covering all but her eyes.
“Let’s try to conserve our magical power a little. We’re gonna need a lot of it if we end up fighting the twins.”
“R-right. Yeah, I agree.”
I frowned slightly at Mai’s response. It was clear that her heart wasn’t in it.
“Fighters ready! Top 16 match 8, begin!” Hikari’s voice was followed by the out-of-place sound of a starter pistol, and our opponents jumped into action immediately.
They must have been thinking the same as me in terms of magical power, as they approached us with physical attacks. With lightning speed, they ran around opposite directions of the circle to force Mai and I to engage separately instead of as a team.
The ninja ran directly towards me, leading her attack with a short hail of shuriken. With Mai behind me, dodging wasn’t an option, so I deflected each one with my twin axes. That bought the ninja time to approach with a flying kick aimed at the side of my head, one that carried such force that even blocking it was hardly effective. I found myself stumbling sideways, though I was able to avoid stepping out of the match area.
The ninja didn’t let up, now swiping at me with kunai in either hand, forcing me to dodge and block several fast attacks per second. With two fast moving opponents fighting one another with light single-hand weapons, each attack and defence was launched with such speed that one was forced to rely purely on instinct.
Luckily, my instincts were honed. I quickly picked up on a pattern in her attacks and made a bold prediction, ducking early to let a heavy attack sail over my head, leaving me to attack her blind spot around the abdomen. I slammed my left axe into her side, sending her reeling from the shock.
Rules dictated that she was out, and a fair ruling it was. Were it a real axe I was using, it would have sunk deep into her flesh.
Celebrating my victory, I turned my back just fast enough to watch Mai get sent flying out of the match area by a sloppy attack she had lazily tried to block.
Suddenly the scales tipped back to even.