“I wonder why everybody is so scared of Blue.” Micro said to Tae while Blue made her debut as a cultivator.

“To one so great, pixies may seem as harmless as a butterfly, but they are a dangerous existence on our world.” Tae replied.

“And given that she is a rare colour, it may be assumed that she is capable of bringing at least a city this size to ruin. I must admit I still have some reservations about spending so much time with a creature of chaos…”

“Blue is a disciple of our sect, Tae.” Kel added sternly.

“I understand your feelings very well, but honour is not determined by one’s race in any world I know.”

“Of course, young master!” Tae replied quickly, bowing her head.

“The Fire Mountain Turtle Sect has a pixie for a disciple…?” Yin asked quietly.

“And an otherworlder…?”

“Stranger things have happened.” Lena interjected while watching the pixie intently.

“Like what?!” Teran asked with a gasp.

“That…” Lena thought for a moment.

“I don’t recall it at the moment… But calm yourselves. As confusing as this all may be, it is a matter of honour for all those involved. These words may be wasted on the disciples of little jade sects, but cultivation requires facing an unknown future with resolve, regardless of whatever sick joke fate may put in your way…”

“Yes, honoured Imperial Guard.” Teran replied, humbled once again by Lena’s intimidating aura.

“Huh…” Micro said with a short laugh as he looked around. With a better understanding of his new peers’ feelings on the matter, he returned his attention to Blue and Ki.

“The match… is sanctioned…” The announcer said after discussing the matter with several of his colleagues nearby. He lifted his hand awkwardly and continued with none of his usual enthusiasm, sounding more confused than afraid at this point.

“You may begin.”

~

“It really is amazing how much your face bothers me.” Blue shook her head while assuming a fighting stance.

“My what?” Ki timidly replied, taking a defensive stance of her own.

“Your face! It’s annoyingly familiar.” Blue continued.

“Have we met?”

“No-” Ki sputtered, biting her tongue as she tried to reply despite her shaking mouth.

“I haven’t seen you…”

“Hmm…” Blue squinted as she leaned in slightly to look at Ki.

“Oh well.”

“Wha-”

Before Ki could continue, Blue suddenly coated herself in the signature armour of the Turtle Art. The crowd gasped, but their silent shock gave way to mumbles. The sight of the pixie clad in what could only be the armour of a cultivator’s making shook their understanding of reality. Some continued to stare in horror, and others were still struggling not to flee the arena, but many men and women began to speculate.

“What would the capacity of a pixie’s core be?” One woman was heard wondering.

“Could other creatures be capable of cultivating to that extent?” Another man murmured.

“What if more pixies gained our power…?” A man muttered in fear.

“What is her goal?” A woman asked.

“A cultivator’s goal is only power. It would be the same for anyone, or anything…” Another woman replied.

There was one man among the crowd whose steady and familiar laugh drew Micro’s attention. There in his usual place, Tohan was busy tending to the betters in the audience who came to him, giving and taking gold as the pile in his lap grew larger by the moment. He caught Micro’s eye and gave him a wink, then returned to discussing odds and wagers.

“Her technique has improved quickly…” Kel said, ignoring the increasingly energetic chatter of the crowd.

“Come on!” Blue shouted at Ki.

“I’m waiting!”

“You…” Ki mumbled.

“Attack me!” Blue shouted, releasing a flash of light as her aura swelled.

“Eek!” Ki could only scream as she summoned two daggers to throw at Blue, both of which bounced off feebly, shattering into particles of energy.

“Pfft!” The armour-clad pixie taunted Ki and began walking slowly toward her.

“Try a little harder!”

Panicking at the sight of the pixie in glowing green armour walking toward her, Ki began throwing dagger after dagger while backing away. Each dagger found its target, but not a single mark was left on the armour Blue wore.

“That tickles!” Blue laughed, then began to run toward Ki with her hands in the air.

Ki immediately turned and started running in the other direction, turning only at the very edge of the stone platform as Blue chased her. Several gasps from the audience could be heard, while some of the spectators cheered Ki on as she ran away. However, as the chase continued, several spectators began to laugh.

“This tournament will go down in the history of our alliance…” Yin said with half a smile on his own face.

“The Fire Mountain Turtle Sect seems to be reaching higher than my own sect thought possible…”

“I did plan to steer the sect toward a brighter future, but this isn't exactly what I had in mind.” Kel replied, shaking his head with a shrug, but when he looked back at Micro and saw him laughing along with the audience, he was relieved.

“But this seems to be the right path.”

“Whatever you say…” Thea added.

“Stop it!” Ki shouted as she ran from Blue, whose pace seemed to quicken the more she ran.

“Don’t! Get away! Stop!”

“Bahaha!” Blue laughed maniacally.

“I’ll take that arm back after all!”

“No!” Ki screamed as Blue cornered her. Moments away from jumping off the platform and fleeing from the pixie, Ki desperately activated the Tidal Force technique she’d used to defeat Kel not long before.

“Woah!” Blue shouted as she was pulled off of her feet into the air toward Ki, who ducked underneath the flailing pixie and rolled away as quickly as she could.

Ki looked back with a sigh of relief as Blue flew toward the edge of the ring like a glowing ball of green energy. However, Blue’s momentum didn’t carry her out of the ring. With a single flap of her thin wings, Blue stopped in the air and flung herself back toward Ki.

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“I said get away!” Ki shouted more with anger as she prepared to use the same technique again, this time intending to push Blue away before she could land on the ground. Once again, Blue’s momentum was altered, and she was flung away, but again a single flap of her wings was all she needed to reverse her trajectory and continue her pursuit.

Ki turned around to run once again, but she finally noticed the sound of the crowd. Laughter filled the stadium while she alone screamed in terror. Her face reddened as she caught a glimpse of her older brother among the contestants with a bitter look of shame on his face, and for the first time since the battle began, she turned to face the pixie with the will to fight. She took a deep breath as the pixie flew straight toward her, then activated the strongest Tidal Force she’d attempted that day.

Sensing the force coming, Blue flapped her wings fiercely to counter the effects of Ki’s attack, but still she was pushed back. However, just before being pushed out of bounds, Blue suddenly dove to the ground. While still being pushed back she dug her feet into the stone platforms and began to concentrate. Ki pushed harder and harder, but Blue appeared to have become stuck to the ground beneath her.

“The Mycelial Art?!” Kel shouted.

“Again?”

“Nothing to it!” Blue shouted back over her shoulder with a smirk. She shot a sideways glance at Micro and giggled.

“I’m catching up!”

“Do your best!” Micro cheered back.

“Be careful!”

“People will mistake our sect for the Fire Mushroom Mountain Turtle Sect…” Tae sighed.

“Then again…”

“That actually has a nice ring to it.” Yin whispered.

Ki finally had to stop her assault and step back to catch her breath, confused and disheartened that the armoured pixie in front of her had just used a mysterious art to root itself to the ground.

“Wait just a moment…” Blue turned to face Ki, who was scrambling to restore her energy as quickly as possible.

“What sect are you from again?”

“The Air Moon Sect.” Ki growled back.

“But if you’re at a match for jade level kids…” Blue took off her ethereal helmet and scratched her head while taking a long look at her opponent.

“You guys weren’t an amber sect?”

“What?!” Ki blurted out in a combination of surprise and rage.

“What do you know of that?!”

“I knew you looked familiar!” Blue shouted, pointing at Ki excitedly.

“What’s this about an amber sect?” Thea asked Tsurum curiously, but Tsurum immediately bowed his head in silent shame, so she and the others turned their attention back to Ki.

“That was a dozen generations ago!” Ki shouted.

“How dare you speak of such a shameful part of our history so lightly!?”

“History, huh?” Blue shrugged.

“Seems like yesterday somebody with a face just like yours cut down the tree I was sleeping in!”

“What?!” Ki shouted again.

“It was her own fault for leaving Core Cards in an unlocked box.” Blue said with a nostalgic laugh.

“Oh, the look on her face. I wonder how she found me. Was that your sister?”

“You speak of my ancestor… You rotten little-” Ki fumed.

“You cultivators come and go so fast.” Blue interrupted her.

“I can’t keep up. How’s the old lady doing?”

“She died in disgrace…!” Ki whispered through her teeth as the last of her fear was replaced by rage.

“The sect never recovered… the stolen cards… it was you…!?”

“Cutting down someone’s tree over some cards…” Blue rolled her eyes.

“Humans are so petty!”

The audience watched unblinkingly as the drama unfolded before them on the stone platform. Blue started laughing once again, but Ki’s aura became a chaotic storm that chilled the air. Her eyes began to glow like the light of a full moon and space around her shimmered and warped. She lowered her stance and held her hands together, all while looking fiercely at Blue.

“Bear the weight of your sins, you failed fairy!” Ki growled as she delivered Tidal Force in Blue’s direction which caused the weaker of the spectators behind her in the stands to be painfully pressed back into their seats, much to the amusement of the other spectators around.

“What did you just call me?” Blue asked with a sharp tone as her aura suddenly changed from a chaotic flicker to a steadily burning flame of energy. She rooted herself deeper into the ground and used the increased energy influx to bolster her armour to the point that it was difficult to discern her shape. Even her wings were encompassed by her ethereal armour.

“Can a fairy do this?”

Ki roared as she gradually increased the strength of her attack, but Blue’s armoured hand suddenly held an object unfamiliar to her. Ki disregarded the tiny, unknown weapon while dedicating her entire being to her Tidal Force attack, but when Blue pulled back a tiny string and took aim, a shiver crept down Ki’s back.

Kel and Tae looked dissatisfied as the pixie consistently found new ways of misrepresenting the teachings of their sect, but they were surprised again to hear a happy shout.

“She’s like a little tank!” Micro laughed.

“A what?” Kel asked.

“A tank.” Micro repeated.

“A weapon from your world, master?” Tae asked curiously.

“It is!” Micro replied.

“They’re at least ten times bigger than trucks like me. There were a few parked outside a museum for a while. I wonder if any of them ever got sent here…”

“I don’t think this world is ready for a being ten times greater than you, master.” Kel said quietly with wide eyes, imaging the sort of being Micro was describing.

“A being like a fortress…”

“See? There she goes.” Micro said, point at Blue.

As Micro laughed, Blue began to fire tiny energy projectiles at Ki from her safely rooted position. Ki deflected some of them with an energy dagger, but she dodged others which varied in size and power. The little balls of energy looked unthreatening at first, similar to what Blue had pelted Micro with recently in the Fire Mountain Art dungeon, but while rooted to the ground and absorbing more and more energy, her armour was not the only thing to gradually increase in strength.

The energy balls she fired at Ki grew more difficult to deflect as their density grew. Ki summoned another dagger with which to protect herself from the growing danger the balls of energy posed, but soon she was dancing all around the platform in an effort to avoid being struck by the stationary armoured pixie whose power only rose with each shot she fired.

“She’s combining Core Cards well, isn’t she!” Micro said to Kel with a proud smile.

“I almost feel bad for Ki!”

“You don’t pity the victim of that mad pixie’s ridiculous power…?” Teran asked with a bitter tone.

“She may be young, but she was very rude to that old man.” Micro replied.

“It was such an avoidable accident.”

“It’s honestly impressive that you’re able to keep track of such weak presences.” Teran said with a frown.

“Like counting ants on a leaf…”

“Hmm…” Micro frowned back, not sure exactly what she meant, but not somehow put off by her tone.

He turned back to see Blue’s assault on Ki had started to resemble a fireworks display. Blue’s projectiles were flying from her slingshot so quickly that it was hard to spot the space between them. Ki managed to avoid most of them by using her Tidal Force technique to push and pull herself out of their path, deflecting many of them with her spirit daggers, but the energy balls that did hit her landed with a heavy sound. Her clothes were tattered and she was covered in bruises before long, and Micro began to notice a change in the audience.

“Oh, that’s not good.” Micro sighed as he looked around at the spectators who were forced to shield themselves from Blue’s chaotic display of energy projectiles. Some spectators hid behind strong cultivators, while others ducked down on the floor. Several had no problem deflecting them with their own auras, but the stadium itself, constructed mostly of carved rock and wood, was beginning to show signs of wear and tear. Splinters exploded from wooden beams and dust burst from rocks as countless balls of energy pelted every exposed surface. Several screams could be heard beyond the walls of the open-roof arena as the night sky was filled with Blue's bursting lights.

At the centre of the chaos, no longer aiming at anything in particular, Blue laughed louder and louder at the scene of her own creation. Long after the laughter of the audience had given way to confusion and cries of pain, nothing was visible through the clouds of dust and smoke but the flashing light of Blue’s projectiles and the fading glow of Ki’s daggers, until only Blue’s lights remained.

“Is it over…?” The announcer asked cautiously as he peered over the wall of his booth.

“Please tell me it’s over…”

The sound of Blue’s laughter echoed through the smoke as the audience waited impatiently for something to end the chaos, until Azar let out a deep sigh that resonated throughout the smoky arena. A shockwave caused by his frustrated aura cleared away the smoke like a gust of wind, revealing the extent of the damage. Every corner of the arena was dented and scratched, and several cultivators lay bruised or unconscious in their seats. Those of higher power observed only the stage though, and what they saw was nothing but a small, blue pixie yawning in the middle of it. The only people in the building who seemed to be enjoying the spectacle were the mundane workers.

“Impressive…” Yin was the first among the contestants to acknowledge the result of the battle.

“The winner…” The announcer said between coughs.

“Is the pixie…”

Not every cultivator in the audience still had the will to laugh or cheer, but as Ki poked her head up over the side of the platform, having hidden herself out of bounds at some point during the explosive assault, a fresh wave of excitement swept through the crowd.

Ki ran straight to the recovery room with a red face, mostly uninjured but too ashamed to face her brother or any of the other contestants.

“I don’t think anyone will fault her for that…” Kel reassured Tsurum, whose own face bore a complicated expression.

“Thanks…” Tsurum mumbled.

“We’ll continue the tournament…” The announcer continued.

“After a short break…”