Our standoff felt like it lasted hours, thought it was likely little more than a few seconds. The eight of us stood there, staring each other down, daring the other side to make the first move.

No one dared to move an inch, not willing to leave an opening for attack.

No one but Kagami.

In a moment so quick I barely caught it, Kagami seemed to disappear completely into thin air. At first I thought her completely invisible, but the heightened senses of a magical girl saved me just in time, as the fly approaching me rapid speed morphed back into the shape shifting girl just as suddenly as she had disappeared.

Still slightly airborne, she tried to catch me with a flying punch, one that I narrowly dodged. I was unable to dodge the rest of her body as it barrelled towards me, however, giving her the opportunity to flying-tackle me to the ground.

“Shin!” Mai called out and tried to approach to help me, but was stopped by the sudden approach of Yokoshima who landed a surprise sucker punch, forcing Mai onto the defensive.

Nao hurriedly took to the skies, only to be followed by Shiko who engaged her in an aerial fist fight.

The two leaders also engaged one another head on, Saki being forced to fight with a defensive mind to avoid the sting of Nakama’s kunai.

As Kagami sat atop me and hounded my face with punches, I realised we had played right into their hands. As a team, our cohesion was our greatest strength. They had forced us to separate right off the bat, neutralising that team cohesion completely.

I held my arms in front of my face to reduce the damage from the barrage of attacks, but I could hardly find a way out of the situation. Despite having superhuman strength, it was still difficult to move with a person’s body weight pressed down on my core.

Running out of options, I tried kicking my legs up and hitting the back of her head. It was sloppy, but I managed to instead strike her back with enough force to knock her forwards. With her temporarily knocked off guard, I used all my core strength to slam her with a headbutt that dazed her enough for me to scramble to my feet.

Instead of attacking the assailant who had been beating me down just moments ago, I turned my focus to Yokoshima. Mai and I would be better off in a 2v2 than two separate 1v1s.

Mai was completely on the back foot, using her 「Clairvoyant」powers to dodge but being unable to find a chance to counter. I cloaked myself and silenced my steps, patiently watching for an opportunity. The moment I saw a telegraphed strike, I took my chance and delivered a scissor kick to Yokoshima’s head, knocking her to the ground.

“You okay?”

“Thanks to you.”

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Luckily Mai had yet to sustain any serious injuries. Unluckily, neither had Yokoshima or Kagami.

“That kick didn’t even rattle her?”

“Apparently not. We’ll have to hit ‘em harder next time.”

Mai and I stood side by side, Yokoshima and Kagami opposite to us. This time, I wasn’t willing to wait for the first strike to come.

I projected a momentary illusion into Kagami’s mind of me attacking her abdomen, causing her to lower her guard from her face. I took the opportunity to deliver a superman punch that broke her nose, blood spurting from her face as she was stumbled backwards.

Yokoshima tried to avenge her friend by way of low kicking my calf, but was interrupted by Mai’s own kick throwing off her balance. I swept at Yokoshima’s leg and almost succeeded in sending her to the ground, but my follow up strike was deflect away by Kagami’s hand, immediately followed by a back fist across my face and a hook with the same hand.

Mai saved me once again with a snack kick at Kagami’s jaw, opening an opportunity for the two of us to attack in tandem. I, on Kagami’s right, launched a low kick into a straight left at her already bleeding face, while Mai struck with a double left body hook at her liver.

In a desperate bid to save her friend, Yokoshima dive tackled Mai, knocking me out of the way in the process and slamming my partner into the ground.

My balance lost, I was unable to dodge the powerful left hook that the blood-soaked Kagami threw at my face. After several shots the head each, both of us were partially dazed, causing us to fight scrappy and with clumsy movements. After desperately dodging a few more punches, I took Kagami by surprise by wrapping her head and neck in a clinch. I held as tightly as I could, delivery knee after knee to her gut while she desperately punched away at my sides.

She found my liver and started desperately wailing on it, which was more effective than she had likely anticipated. With the pain too much, I threw her to the ground and made to follow her, only for her to recover beautifully with a kick-jump up from her back, slamming her body weight into my chest.

We were back to basics, both on our feet and hurt bad. We approached each other again, both opting to grapple instead of strike. I attempted to wrap my arms around her shoulder and neck to force a triangle choke, but she predicted as such and reversed it, wrapping me in her own grab and body slamming me into the ground.

Once again, she positioned herself on top of me and slammed my face with punches, my blocks and dodges barely mitigating the pain coursing through my head. With much of my strength spent, I could no longer fight back in such a position.

I had been completely defeated one-on-one, and could no longer hope to bring this fight back on my own. I would need a saving grace if I wanted to get out of this okay.

Luckily, a saving grace came.

Descending from the heavens like an eagle, Nao kicked Kagami off of me at such tremendous speed that the shapeshifter girl was sent flying into a nearby tree.

I took the opportunity I was presented with to boot Yokoshima in the abdomen, launching her off of Mai who was just barely clinging to consciousness.

“You guys holding up okay?”

Behind me came the voice of Saki, who had retreated to rejoin the rest of us, while Nao whipped up wind nearby as she came to a gentle landing next to us.

“Heal!”

Holding her hand above her head, Nao used her ability to fix the wounds sustained by the four of us. Though incredibly useful, such an action was extremely taxing for her, likely meaning she would be unable to use it again during the fight.

Not to mention it healed only wounds, not fatigue.

Mai got to her feet, while Yokoshima and Kagami emerged from the trees they had been kicked into. They were bloodied and battered, but their fighting spirit wasn’t diminished.

From the other side came Nakama and Shiko, both having sustained some damage but appearing mostly fine otherwise, outside of Shiko being wracked with fatigue from prolonged magical flight.

All eight of us were exhausted, but the fight was yet over.

None of us were willing to give up yet.