(The day of the final fight.)
So, I don't know how to proceed. I want to lose here, but at the same time, I also want to fight, and not say "I surrender", or "I yield" or anything like that. But the thing is, I know I can beat him, but I need to make it look like I'm struggling or losing. I need to make it look convincing. I'm going to have to go pro wrestling with this one. It shouldn't be too hard, his skill should help him out here to make it look like he's actually good.
I'll see what I can do.
/\\//\\//\
'So, Raphael, do you think Masayuki can beat Nero?' Rimuru was looking forward to this. Despite how Masayuki seemed to reach the final, he was here for a reason.
[It's hard to say. So far, he's been mostly lucky.]
'I know. Can luck really be a skill though?'
[In the right scenario, it can. Just remember what happened to you recently.]
'Oh come on, that was something which should've never happened! That was some kind of probability anomaly or something!'
[And yet, I warned you about it. And this is something I'll keep reminding you about it.]
'Why do you sound so smug about it?'
[It's your imagination.]
Rimuru sighed. "I'll just go ask Artoria. She seems to know a lot anyway."
Rimuru made his way to Artoria's booth and knocked on the door. A few moments later, Artoria opened it up.
"Rimuru. What brings you here?"
"I just want to know who you think will win?"
"Masayuki." Artoria responded immediately, her tone not showing any doubt.
"That was fast." Rimuru was taken aback by her fast reply.
"Yeah, well, he's a hero for a reason. By the way, I want you to meet him later. And try to make good friends with him and make him an ally of ours. He will be very important in the future. Especially with the Eastern Empire. Look, I'm not going to explain it, 'cause it's kind of hard to, and there's a whole bunch of time nonsense going on."
"What? This sounds like something you should explain."
"Not really. It's not…time yet." Artoria chuckled a little. "But don't worry, a certain person/spirit will show up soon that will explain everything. I think. I'm not too sure."
"What's with all the cryptic stuff you're saying?" Rimuru was confused. What was she saying? Time nonsense? What, was she talking about time travel or something?
"Don't worry about it. You just go on and live your life. Everything will fall into place eventually. One of our biggest problems later on will be a certain marshall, I think it's the marshall, of the Eastern Empire's army. Look, just enjoy the fight, Rimuru, it's going to be fun."
/\\//\\//\
'I'm gonna have to thank Shuna a lot for her illusion abilities.' I thought to myself as I got the information from my other self. Well, I can worry about that later. I need to put on a show.
Which was going to happen right now. I stood in front of Masayuki and the poor guy looked a little scared. I have no doubt that even he himself is wondering how he ended up here. If I were him, I'd probably be thinking that everything so far has been a series of very fortunate events. Which isn't completely wrong, that's just how his skill works.
But it makes me wonder though. I know his skill isn't affecting me, but from the start, before he even showed up, I planned to lose on purpose. But then he showed up, and I was given the perfect person to lose to. I can't explain it, but I know there's some kind of paradox or something here.
Whatever, not like it matters.
"Fight!" Once again, Gabiru flew up into the air as he gave the signal to start. I'm going to start this simple, but with a bang.
I dashed toward him, opening up with a simple swing. Simple, but very powerful. He reacted a bit late, and I could see him get a bit spooked by the speed, and no doubt, the power behind it. He raised his sword as fast as he could just to block it, his were closed as he braced for impact. And of course, his body, scared and just twitching, raised his sword in such a way that it would deflect or parry any other person. I could just overpower it with brute force, but that's not what I'm here for.
I played along and went with the flow as he "parried" my attack. Now, normally, anyone would just counterattack at this chance, but he didn't.
"Huh? I'm still here? Did I actually do that?" Yup, he stood there in surprise that he was able to "parry" my attack.
"Finally, someone who's actually good! You're not like those other people I've fought! You have some skill!" I said out loud as I pointed my sword at him. This is definitely adding fuel to the fire. I could hear gasps of awe at his "parry" and the praise from me is making it better, or worse from his view, as I'm seen as the best fighter in this competition.
"I just got lucky." He looked uncomfortable from all the praise benign given to him. He even seemed a bit guilty.
"You seem to be modest as well!" But I'm not going to let up. I once again dashed him. I clashed swords with him and looked him in the eye. I made sure to have a smirk on my face as if I was enjoying this. I could see he looked worried, and also a bit surprised that he somehow held up.
I backed up a little and swung again and again. Normally, this would overwhelm anyone else, but with his skill masking up any mistakes on his part and with my strikes leading him like a dance, it looked like a fast clash of swords with sparks flying around. However, this had to end eventually, so, taking advantage of an opportunity, which was easy, I deflected one of his swings and went for a heavy downward slash. I made sure to load it with magic so it would cause a large dust cloud that would obscure everyone's vision.
As I swung, I narrowly "missed" him and hit the ground. Now that there was a smokescreen of sorts, I rushed toward him and lightly kicked and punched certain parts of his body to make him get into a specific pose. I grabbed his arm with a sword and made him reach with it, and then I stood in the path of it so he could feel that he made a hit.
/\\//\\//\
Much of the audience was waiting with anticipation to see what would happen. The large dust cloud covered up almost the entire arena, but their curiosity was soon settled as they saw a figure seemingly launched from the cloud. It was "Nero". "Nero" landed on her feet, but it was clear that Masayuki landed a heavy hit on her to make her fly like that.
As the dust cloud settled, there stood Masayuki, a strong stance from the aftermath of a thrust.
/\\//\\//\
"Umu! Magnificent! No wonder everyone calls you a hero! You would've made an extraordinary gladiator!" I was clearly enjoying this. Is this what pro wrestlers feel like? I looked at Masayuki, and I think he reached maximum confusion and surprise. His eyes were wide open at the fact that he seemed to "hit" me.
"What's going on? I don't think I'm this good." I heard him mutter to himself. Yeah, this guy was going through some kind of personal crisis or something.
"It seems I will have to get serious!" Ok, here we go. I'm not going to do something so drastic as to use something like a sword beam, but I'm going to use my magic to enhance everything. Just a normal kind of magic burst. With a…burst of magic, I blitzed toward him and thrust my sword, but I made sure to give a little delay so he could react.
But there was also something I needed to do. I was going to "share" my magic with him, so everyone could think that he was also getting "serious". As soon as I was close to him, I channeled my magic through his sword and throughout his body, so he could get the same buff. As long as I stood close to him, he would have it?
"What? How am I getting stronger?" Nope, I can't have him asking too many questions or thinking too much about it. I unleashed a flurry of strikes faster than before. Sparks flew and wisps of magic seemed to fly off as well. Our actions became a blur as we kept fighting. There's no doubt the audience was entranced by our fight. This was definitely a good final fight. It had flash and power. But it was time to end this.
Since we were moving so fast, almost nobody could see the little actions in between strikes and the small adjustments made. I knew what I was going to do. I waited for him to try to parry one of my hits, and when he did, I followed along, but while only one hand was only my sword, I quickly grabbed his hand with my free hand and guided him to make a counterattack on me. For this, I used magic to make it too fast for him to see. But I made sure there would be no cuts on my dress. Shuna put in work into making it and I don't want to damage it.
/\\//\\//\
'Woah, Artoria wasn't kidding. This is a cool fight! It reminds me of some kind of anime!'
[I wouldn't be so sure. There's something else going on here.]
'Oh come on, Raphael, what could be happening? This is clearly a fight between two good swordsmen! At least now we can see how good Masayuki is. I have to do what Artoria said and try to be friends with him. Maybe we can get him to settle down here.'
[Yes, you're right.]
'Why do you sound so exasperated? Like you're tried of talking to someone?'
[It's your imagination.]
/\\//\\//\
The crowd was in awe. Many of them wanted Masayuki to win, and their wish seemed to come true. In the midst of their onslaught, "Nero" was suddenly launched back with a monstrous force. Her body flew as she hit the wall of the arena, before falling back down. Her body left a small crater in the wall and various cracks on the wall as some small pieces of the wall crumbled.
"Nero" stood still on the floor, not getting up. Gabiru flew down and started examining her. He was about to call the match, but "Nero" started moving a little.
"Ten!" Gabiru started to count down. If "Nero" couldn't get up, she would lose by a count out.
"Nine!"
"Eight!"
"Seven!"
"Six!"
"Five!"
"Four!"
"Nero" was on all fours. She really seemed to be struggling. Her arms were shaking, her head was low as if she was only focused on trying to get up.
"Three!"
"Nero" used her sword as a support. She slammed the tip into the ground. At this point, she was on her knees.
"Two!"
"Nero" managed to get herself up on one knee. Slowly, but surely, she was getting up. But it might be too late as time was practically up.
"One!"
The audience held their breaths as they watched "Nero" seemingly almost up, but at the last moment, she fell back down.
"It's over! In a dramatic finish, the winner is Masayuki!" Gabiru announced out loud to the entire audience and they started cheering loudly. Their cheers were so loud, that everyone outside the arena could hear them.
Masayuki looked at his hands, still not believing what he had accomplished. 'Am I really that good? Did two days of training with Artoria turn me into this? Should I consider getting more lessons from her? But I might have to stay here for a while.'
/\\//\\//\
Oh yeah. This has to be my best performance. Putting up a last-second struggle only to falter at the end? Something you only see in a story. This would probably be the best memory of the people here.
As I laid on the ground, I discreetly moved my eyes to see what Masayuki was doing. I saw him look at me and then back at his hands as he seemed utterly astonished at what he had done.
Now I just need to wait a bit, and then disappear. This tournament will be the first and last appearance of "Nero", who is someone that looks a lot like me. This will probably spawn some conspiracy theories. Maybe I have some lost family member or a twin sister. Maybe even a daughter. A daughter? Yeah, right, my genetics would have to completely overpower anyone else's to get such a resemblance which I don't think is biologically possible.