Day Three
Mira went first.
She attacked like a storm—no feints, no hesitation. Her fists came in relentless chains, every strike backed by overwhelming physical strength and rapid footwork that kept her pressing the master's space. Her fighting style was pure aggression—drive him back, force mistakes, break through with momentum.
It didn't work.
The master flowed like water, never fully yielding, never colliding. He redirected, deflected, and guided her own force against her. By the end of the first hour, Mira was breathing hard, clothes singed from glancing cuts.
"No hits," she muttered, "but I got a few deflections. He moved. That's progress."
Aric was next.
His style was the opposite—precise, measured, tactical. He never got close unless it was safe. His water-based attacks bent physics itself, slicing and curving mid-air with unnerving control. Aric didn't fight to overpower.
He fought to manipulate.
He weaved illusions of pressure, shaping the battlefield into zones of control—coaxing reactions.
But the master didn't bite.
He slipped through the traps like wind through leaves. Aric barely kept pace and left the arena with a thin cut across his cheek and a faint smile.
"Intention's everything," he murmured. "Even slight flaws in sequencing, and he punishes you."
Then came Leo.
His movements were less refined. His footing wasn't as secure. His initial strikes didn't have Mira's brutal confidence or Aric's clinical clarity. But what Leo had—
Was flow.
He danced between instinct and intent, chasing not perfection, but rhythm. His spear wasn't there to win—it was there to listen. And with every failed clash, every narrowly dodged counter, Leo learned.
Not big lessons.
But hundreds of tiny ones.
Day Five
Mira had grown more patient. She no longer opened with haymakers. She'd learned to probe, to faint, to watch. And while her power still led the charge, she began thinking like Aric.
Aric, in turn, grew more assertive. He started closing the distance—stepping into melee, using water to reinforce his limbs and strike with sudden force. He borrowed from Mira's confidence.
And Leo?
He began merging both.
He adapted, absorbed, responded.
Where Mira was force and Aric was form, Leo became flow.
He didn't aim for an opening. He waited for the rhythm to falter.
And on that third day, his spear passed within a finger's breadth of the master's neck.
The blade didn't land—but it forced a step back.
Aric raised a brow as he watched from the edge. "He's getting closer."
Mira narrowed her eyes, watching Leo go through a final series of forms, his body moving smoother, sharper.
"He's catching up," she muttered.
Aric nodded slowly. "No… he's doing more than that."
The Final Day
The sky above the arena never changed. The light remained the same cold imitation of daylight, the glyphs along the arena's edge pulsing faintly like a heartbeat.
But everyone felt the pressure mounting.
Their time was nearly up.
Five days of solo attempts. Dozens of exchanges. Hours of sweat, bruises, and frustration. And still—not a single clean hit.
Not from Mira.
Not from Aric.
And not from Leo.
As the last hour approached, the master stood at the center as he always had—serene, unmoved, almost statuesque. An embodiment of control. Of perfected intent.
Leo stepped to the line again, spear in hand. Mira and Aric stood by the wall, arms crossed, faces tight with unspoken tension. This was it.
The final attempt.
He stepped into the arena.
The master's eyes opened.
Leo moved.
At first, it was the same dance. The same sharp angles, flowing transitions. He tested the master's defense with sweeping thrusts and pivoting jabs, reading the counters, watching paths open—and shut—within fractions of seconds.
Too slow.Too wide.Too expected.
The rhythm played out again. Just like every other time.
But then—
Something shifted.
Not in the opponent.
In Leo.
The paths—those silver threads of possibility he'd come to rely on—faded.
They didn't vanish.
They simply stopped mattering.
There was no thinking.
No reading.
No predicting.
Only movement.
Perfect movement.
Leo didn't see what to do. He knew.
Every muscle, every shift of weight, every angle of breath—each followed a rhythm deeper than the fight itself. It was like slipping into a current that had always been there, waiting for him to stop fighting and just flow.
He dipped beneath a sweeping slash.
Spun inward past a pivoting parry.
And in that breathless, silent moment—
The tip of his spear kissed the master's leg.
A shallow cut.
But real.
The master's blade came crashing down a heartbeat later, slamming Leo back with a punishing strike to the chest. He flew across the arena, hit the wall hard, and dropped to one knee, coughing.
Pain flared across his ribs.
But he didn't feel it.
Not really.
Because something else filled him.
Satisfaction.
He had touched it.
Just for a moment.
Mastery.
Not a trick. Not a fluke.
The real thing.
Mira ran over, helping him up, her expression flickering between pride and disbelief.
"You landed it," she said quietly. "You actually—"
Before she could finish, the master straightened and bowed once.
Then the world shifted.
A pulse of light swallowed the arena—and the three of them vanished.