Vol 1 Skill 1

At this unsurprising outcome, a cold mood fell over the spectators. But―

What… is this?

Stella Vermillion felt something painfully off about this situation. Her sword dealt strikes that could produce earthquakes, could crush an enemy in one hit without fail. Overpowering an opponent without crushing him should be impossible, because her attacks couldn't be blocked so casually. But what was happening in this duel? Stella should be one-sidedly battering her opponent, but she was the one sweating.

Turn out like this? Running away? Just a matter of time? Those impressions were dead wrong. Stella herself had realized that.

I'm being… set up!

"Haaa!"

Stella brought her Lævateinn down on the enemy before her. Ikki received that strike with his Intetsu―but without stopping there, he rode the force of the strike and swiftly leaped backward, widening the distance between them once again.

…Again!

From afar it certainly seemed like Stella's strikes were pushing Ikki back, but the reality was different. Against his tactics, her strikes were being completely negated. Using a soft defense that slowly drained away power―that might sound easy, but doing it was quite difficult. If the strength in blocking was even a little bit too high then his arm would be pulverized, and if it was even a tiny bit too low then he'd be cut down. The calculations of power, angle, timing―missing even one of these factors meant immediate failure, yet Stella's opponent handled all that without so much as breaking a sweat. At this realization, Stella felt an indescribable anxiety. It was an alarm bell, her sixth sense warning that the enemy before her was very dangerous!