Crazy. Ridiculous. Impossible.

These are the thoughts than run through Kay's head as she repeatedly swings her axe at the opponent in front of her, each swing effortlessly ducked beneath, leapt over or sidestepped by the smiling woman. Were she more naive, she could have convinced herself that since all of the attacks are near misses, that if she swung with just a little more precision she could hit, but she knows better. Helena barely dodges the attacks because that's all that is necessary. Every one of her evasions are flawlessly precise, making no unnecessary movements whatsoever. Meanwhile, Kay is largely just swinging wildly.

The naked mouse has little concern for losing herself again. She had already willed herself to stop holding back the curse mark, feeling the numbness flow through her legs, and in turn, her whole body feel quicker, lighter and stronger. But still, it is nowhere close to enough. She completely holds on to her senses, because it's virtually impossible to be drunk with power while simultaneously feeling completely powerless. Even as her own speed and reflexes improve far beyond a level that most mice would imagine possible,, the movements of her opponent scale up exactly as much as needed. Even now, with Kay putting every bit of strength into her strikes, it's quite clear that the mistress of the adventurers guild is hardly even trying.

Without warning, Helena finally attacks, an open palmed strike to Kay's chest. Even with her unnaturally reinforced body and resistance to pain, the sensation is excruciating as she hears the telltale sounds of cracking bone. Were it not for the curse mark sustaining her, it's unlikely she'd still be able to still stand upright.

"How can you be so strong?" Kay pants, backpedaling several steps, trying to regain her composure. She is hardly an expert on the experience level system, but even she knows that there is something wrong here. She and her allies had leveled up quite quickly, both due to the curse mark and the fact they constantly encountered new and greater challenges, but for a normal mouse, even raising to the level of Mia of Frederich would be incredibly difficult. Here, there was no comparison, which made the situation feel all the more hopeless. It is abundantly clear that Helena isn't simply stronger than herself, she's exponentially stronger, a level one couldn't hope to match through sheer guts and training over an entire lifetime.

The well dressed woman, her ornate garb not the least bit damaged or out of place from the battle chuckles. "Remember the experience tax?" she asks. In truth, Kay doesn't. "Where do you think that 10% of experience earned goes?"

Kay blinks. "Wait, so you get 10% of our experience points... you still shouldn't be stronger than us!"

"It may come as a shock to you..." Helena sighs, shaking her head. "...but you are not the center of the universe. It isn't just you and your little friends. Every single quest done by every single mouse, from the smallest errand to the grandest crusade, I get a piece of it."

"I get it. So you didn't earn any of this power yourself." Kay scoffs. "You simply stole it from others."

The calm, collected expression of the guild mistress changes at once, twisting in rage. "How dare you? Who are you to talk? I'll have you know, I work damn hard, and I'm entitled to my due compensation! Long hours, working out endless mathematical formulas, dealing with the dumbest customers you could ever imagine, and answering the same asinine questions over and over again..."

"Well, it is kind of an unintuitive system..." Kay replies, admittedly feeling just a little bit embarrassed about her accusation.

"It's not at all! The experience system is a flawless one, but nobody even tries to understand it!" she growls, before pausing and collecting herself. "Ahem. Anyways, as you can see, you're no match for me. It's not even close. You should just give up now. I understand your reluctance to part with the artifacts after coming all this way, and frankly, I detest needing to rely on such brutish methods, but there are too many questions involved in the reward. There's no telling whether the wishes of many can be granted, or it's diluted by the number of participants, and I can't afford to take that chance. There's far too much at stake."

Kay raises her axe with a shaky hand. "You're not the only one who has a lot at stake."

"Oh, please." Helena scoffs. "What are you even fighting for? To extend your own worthless existence? You have no principles or ideals, you're only here because the curse pushed you in this direction. You have no real stake in this or anything else. I swear, I cannot begin to comprehend why such gifts were squandered on someone like you. You were given access to incredible power, and for what? Why you?"

"Heh." Kay chuckles, even if the gesture causes a flesh ache in her ribs. "What can I tell you? I guess it's because I'm a protagonist. It must mean I'm special." she pauses and grins. "...which, I guess, must mean that you're not. That must really hurt."

Helena smiles back. "It does. But don't worry, I fully intend to return the favor."

In the blink of an eye, the several paces between them is made up. Kay tries to lower her axe to guard herself, but comes up just a bit short, a swinging kick shattering her thigh. The follow-up attack she does manage to sort-of deflect, but it goes no better. Even catching it on the side of the axe, her arm cannot endure the force. Kay had doubts about whether she would be able to stand earlier, were it not for the curse mark. By now it's pretty much verified. One can endure injuries through strength of will, at least to some extent, but the legs are the pillars of the body, and a broken pillar can't support weight, no matter how determined they are. Right now, it feels like the curse energy is the only thing keeping her bones from crumbling to pieces. Still, she continues to strike as best she can, even though it accomplishes nothing.

The attacks from Kay's opponent are not frequent, but each and every one is absolutely devastating, causing severe damage to her already broken body. She knows things can't continue like this. Bard songs are full of tales of underdogs defeating far superior opponents, heroes who are beaten and broken, rising up, mustering up all their strength and taking down the smug and arrogant villain. The reality rarely works out this way. In reality, getting hurt, hurts. The more tired and injured you become, the less effectively you can fight (well, unless you're a berserker, but that's another matter entirely). Usually, the saving grace of this is that it applies to the opponent as well, and ideally, even if you can't take them down with a single well-placed blow, you can outlast them, out-endure them. As a result, the stories aren't always wrong. Even if the enemy is stronger, a determined individual who doesn't get struck somewhere vital can endure, wear them down and find a window for victory. Then, there's also the obvious reality: Your opponent, usually, at least, is a flesh and blood creature.

People can accomplish impressive feats of athleticism, pushing their bodies, minds and spirits further than nature had ever intended, but in the end, bodies are still fragile things. No matter how hard you train, no matter how much you build your muscles up, you can still be killed with a single blow, especially from a weapon, but even unarmed, bodies are, again, relatively fragile things. That's the other way that the hero can defeat the demon lord: landing a single blow, through luck or skill, to a vital point. Still, far from an easy task, of course, and a strong opponent is very much capable of doing the same to you, and has considerably more resources at their disposal to make it happen. Still, it means that no one on one battle is ever completely hopeless. Maybe close to that, but never completely.

Kay is fully aware of this. Outlasting her enemy is a hopeless pursuit. Not only is her body slowly giving out on her, but the level system improves a lot of different aspects, including stamina. Helena could likely keep going like this all night. The naked mouse similarly can't overpower her or outmaneuver her. She's never been a highly skilled fighter, largely relying on brute strength. She can't even count on an intelligence advantage, quite the contrary, most likely. In this conflict, she has no advantages whatsoever over the guild mistress, so all she can do is go for broke: Try to finish this fight with a single blow.

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It's not an impossible idea. Second winds are a thing, and while she can't keep going like this for long, she can certainly muster her strength into a single exceptional strike. Then, of course, there's the one drawback to being overpowered: the tendency to underestimate your opponent, the downfall of countless would-be villains. Growing overly confident that you have the situation under control, and lowering your defenses as a result. Not enough to leave you wide open, necessarily, but enough for a single especially strong, especially quick, and especially risky strike to catch you off guard. Fighting defensively is a futile effort, and all it might accomplish is drawing out Kay's own inevitable defeat. No, she needs to ignore defense, and depend purely on strength, speed and more than a little bit of luck to end this.

Rather than try to guard or dodge the coming strike, a painful stomp down on the side of her good leg which results in an even louder crack than the earlier blows, she steps into it, while Helena's eyes are focused on her target, looking downwards. With both hands, Kay grips her axe, swinging it in a severe arc, just as the guild-mistress raises her head and catches the glint of metal. The blade slams against the side of her neck.

"Idiot." Helena says, shaking her head, the curved blade still resting between her head and shoulder. "If you couldn't cut my forearm earlier, why did you think you'd be able to cut my neck?"

That's when the battle abruptly ends. A hard spinning kick to the stomach, but more than that. Ribs, spine, vital organs, Kay isn't a doctor and similarly doesn't have time to make any sort of proper medical assessment, but it's clear the damage is incalculable. She's thrown back, landing roughly on her stomach, whole body screaming in pain. She tries to get back up onto her feet, but falls back to the floor. Even if her arms and legs were, at this point, capable of supporting her weight, she has no idea what she had hoped to accomplish anyways. Her weapon, Catherine is tossed well out of reach, not that it makes much difference. The naked mouse had swung as hard as she could against a vital area and landed, essentially, a perfect blow, yet it accomplished nothing.

Helena stands overtop her, before taking on a curious expression, rubbing her paw against the side of her neck. She looks in shock at the sight of red staining her ornate glove and glares down at Kay. The naked mouse can't help smile a little. It's not a mortal blow, not even close, but still, it's better than nothing. The guild mistress straightens out her paw, and Kay closes her eyes, already anticipating the next strike: A sweep straight through the back of her neck, the sort of thing an ordinary mouse would require a blade for, but it's quite clear that even bare-handed, Helena can strike more effectively than any sword. She had little doubt that it could cleave straight through her spine with no effort at all, and that would be the end of it. She squeezes her eyes shut as the inevitable blow comes.

She indeed feels the sweep of the air, but to her surprise, finds herself still very much alive. She opens her unnatural eyes, looking up at the woman standing above her, now holding the thin, black cord with three glowing keys hanging from it.

"While I do have some objections to your overall philosophy, I do hope you understand that this isn't personal." Helena says, her free paw still massaging the small cut on the side of her neck. "I similarly wish no ill upon you or your friends. I don't expect you to appreciate that fact, of course, but don't worry: Even aided by unnatural powers, I imagine you're still in quite terrible pain, but just close your eyes and relax. Things might look bad now, but I promise you, everything will look much better in the light of a new day, when you awake to a far better world."

Kay plans to say something back. She's not exactly sure what, but it hardly matters, as she can hardly breathe let alone speak. All she can do is watch the elaborately dressed, silver furred mouse walk towards the corner of the room where she raises all three keys. The swirling black void no longer blends in with the shadows, now a bright white. The instant the guild mistress steps through, she vanishes without a trace. Kay makes one more useless effort to get up, but can hardly move a muscle, completely exhausted, without even the strength to be angry. As much as she hates the idea of taking the advice of an enemy, she has to admit, closing her eyes does sound pretty nice. It's been so long since she's slept, after all.

Things go hazy for a little while. It feels like a long time, but in reality only a few seconds had passed as a flood of warmth flows through her body. She opens her eyes to the harsh world once again, looking up to see Mia, looking far from her best, one paw clutching her throat, the other open and engulfed in green, flickering healing energy which flows through Kay's broken body. Frederich kneels beside her, also looking down at the naked mouse, clearly even more beaten up, one arm dangling uselessly at his side, but wearing an expression of obvious satisfaction.

"Glad to see you're still with us." he smiles, extending his good hand towards her. "Want some help?"

"I don't need help...." she grumbles, looking away from the armored mouse. She's not even she why she said it, as even with the healing, her entire body hurts, and she honestly doesn't know how she'll return to her feet on her own. Typical, she thinks to herself, feeling a flash of self loathing. Even when people around her try to do good, she can't help but spoil it. She closes her eyes and sighs, takes a deep breath and looks up, surprised to see the paw still outstretched, the grey furred face, despite his obvious pain, still smiling.

"I didn't ask if you need it," Frederich says, "I asked if you wanted it."

His smile falls away at her expression, as he looks down at her quivering lip and tear rimmed unnatural eyes. In truth she isn't sad or upset. She isn't even angry, despite what had just happened to her. She isn't quite happy either, even if not so far from it. She's mostly just feeling foolish, but not feeling too badly about that, either. With a moments hesitation, she nods her head, taking his paw in her own rough and discolored one.

"Thank you." she sniffles, having no idea why she's crying. Sure, she has plenty of reason to cry, but in this moment, none of those reasons really seem to matter all that much.

"Hey, come on..." Frederich says, sounding a little embarrassed as he helps her to her feet, but even once she's standing, he offers his shoulder, suspecting she's still unable to stand upright. He isn't entirely correct, but close enough to not matter.

Kay had little faith in the power of the healing magic, but that's only because, in the past, it was mostly used to ease the symptoms of the curse mark, which isn't a proper wound. Against actual injuries, it's really quite effective, even as it rapidly flickers on an off as Mia struggles to maintain the spell. Her whole body still hurts terribly, but no longer feels like a bundle of broken sticks that's barely being held together by twine.

"I'm sorry I can't do more." Mia murmurs, her voice coarse from the blow to her throat, fur which had never quite regained its earlier luster beginning to gray once again. She looks to Frederich. "How's your arm?"

"It's..." he replies, looking down at it, moving the upper arm a little, making the lower portion swing like a pendulum. "Stable, I guess? Anyways, don't worry about me. Kay's hurt a lot more badly than I am."

"It feels like I got off pretty easily." Mia says, feeling a little embarrassed. It's a little hard to deny. While she did take a few hard hits, the fact that she has no broken bones is clearly more of a sign of Helena's meager mercies, than her own resilience.

"Maybe she thought severely beating a young girl would look bad?" Frederich says, smiling, an expression which fades as he turns to the annoyed look of Kay. "I mean, not to say that..." he sputters.

"I'm not that old." Kay grumbles.

"Heh." Fred grins once again. "I've missed your catch-phrase. You haven't said it in a while."

"I don't know what you..." Kay begins before she sighs. "Ugh, nevermind." as she tries to step forward, nearly falling back down before Fred catches her with his good arm.

"So... what now?" Mia asks.

"Do you have to ask?" Fred replies.

"I've got to finish this." Kay pants, wiping her eyes with the back of her paw. "You two... you don't need to come... you know, if you don't want to..." she looks down, shyly.

"I don't have anywhere better to be." Fred says, grinning a little wider. "How about you Mia?"

"My neither. In fact, at this moment, there's nowhere I'd rather be." she says, smiling back. "Um... do we have any sort of plan here?"

"Nope." Kay shakes her head.

"Not even a little bit of one..." Fred replies, looking towards the swirling white void. "...and I don't think we have time to make one."

Mia smiles and sighs. "Whew, that's a relief."

Her two comrades look to her with confused expressions. "How is the fact that we don't have a plan here in any way a relief?"

The young sorceress bites her lip. "Oh, um, I suppose it isn't. I was just a little bit worried about being willing to continue forward without having a proper plan of action." she shrugs, smiling shyly to the. "For a moment there, I was afraid that t I was the only stupid person here."

"I don't think you'll ever need to worry about that so long as we're around." Fred chuckles.

The naked mouse can't help but give a little chuckle right back, as much as it hurts her damaged ribs. "Thank you. Both of you."

The three slowly step towards the magical gateway, both helping to support Kay. She finds herself tempted to insist that she can walk fine on her own, but she doesn't for two reasons. One, it's not entirely true, and for another, for once in her life, she finds herself genuinely glad to have the support.