Chapter 237 - The Finals [P3]

Golden light met sakura petals in a swift, explosive flurry of testing strikes.

"Just dipping my toes in!"

"Careful, Amber!" Ayako grinned, deflecting the strike effortlessly. "The water runs deep!"

They shoved apart, sliding backward across the cracked stone to lock eyes.

Amber eyes had ignited into twin miniature suns, her iris’s gone. Her skin began to glow from within, radiating a blinding aura of pure Light Magic.

Beneath her boots, the ruined bedrock didn’t just crack—it warped inward, sagging as if a mountain had been dropped onto a three-foot circle.

As she hovered half an inch off the ground, held aloft by an inversion of gravity, the dirt and ruined bedrock warped inward, sagging as if a mountain had been dropped onto a three-foot circle.

"You know, Ayako..." Amber purred.

Her voice carried a strange, reverberating resonance that shook the pebbles on the ground. "...my family doctor told me I shouldn’t go past eighty percent capacity in exhibition matches. They said my muscles would tear themselves off the bone."

"Doctors are far too sensible, Strongwill!" Ayako called back. "If we listened to doctors, we wouldn’t be standing on top of a ruined arena, would we?"

"Haha! Not a chance!"

"Good!"

Ayako then drove the tip of her sakura swirling katana into the ground.

RUMBLE—CRASH!!!

Green shoots burst from the scorched soil and multiplied at a terrifying speed. From the depths of the earth, ancient roots erupted upward, twisting together to form towering trunks. And within seconds, a colossal forest of ancient sakura trees came into existence across the half of the arena.

Their pale brown bark pulsed with veins of elemental power. Where the branches split, pink blossoms materialised, shedding thousands of shimmering petals into the wind.

"Wow... A whole forest? Oh, you really are amazing! Come on then, Ayako! Show me what your trees can do!"

"With pleasure!"

Ayako swung her katana in a rising diagonal arc. From the base of the tallest central tree, a thick wooden branch surged forward like a striking viper.

As it flew toward Amber, Ayako shifted her elemental mana – the giant branch caught fire, turning into a blazing pillar of white-hot plasma that set off scorching heat waves in its wake.

Dropping into a horse stance, Amber raised both her glowing hands. As the flaming timber reached her, she crushed her fingers together, conjuring a gravitational pull directly in front of her palms that slammed the giant flaming trunk into an invisible wall.

The wood splintered under the dense pressure, compressing the fire into a superheated ball. Amber then threw her hips around and struck the compressed mass with a light-imbued heel kick as if it were a football.

KABOOOOOM!

The compressed flaming ball detonated across the trees into a shower of molten ash. Amber burst straight through the fiery curtain, moving so fast that her body left behind afterimages.

She was in front of Ayako in less than a heartbeat with her right shining fist aimed straight at her temple

From her fist, a light beam scorched through the air so close to her that it set the bottom half of Ayako’s hair ablaze as she narrowly leaned back to dodge.

Without breaking her stance, Ayako swept her blade upward for a piercing thrust. And although Amber narrowly dodged an attack as well, a second wooden trunk erupted from the earth directly beneath her feet.

This one encased in glacial ice and jagged branches that snapped outward like freezing spears.

Amber felt the sub-zero chill instantly attempt to lock her joints in ice and freeze her to the bone.

"Brrr! Too cold!"

Flexing her core, she unleashed an explosive pulse of radial gravity from her sternum.

BANG!

The ice tree shattered into glittering frost-shards. Amber spun in mid-air, dropping her leg out in a devastating axe kick directed straight down at Ayako’s collarbone, who met the kick with the flat of her steel.

CLANG!

The shockwave from the impact drove Ayako’s boots deeper into the dirt as she held back the sheer weight of Amber’s light-boosted gravity pressing down on her shoulders.

Her arms trembled and her muscles screamed under the strain, but the manic smirk on her face only widened.

"Is that all you’ve got, President?!"

"Not even close!"

Amber intensified her output.

A blinding flash erupted from her boots, dazzling Ayako’s eyes. Taking advantage of the sudden blindness, Amber shifted her center of mass, flexibly spinning mid-air to drive her fist driving straight into Ayako’s side.

THWACK—BOOM!!!

Ayako felt her ribs crack as the clean blow launched her sideways across the arena floor. As she rolled through the dirt, her katana carved three rapid circles into the earth.

Where her blade touched, three giant Sakura trunks burst from the ground in a protective arc, interlinking their branches to form a thick, wooden dome over her.

Amber landed lightly on her feet and bounded forward, leaping high into the air above the wooden dome with her hands clasped together above her head like an executioner’s axe.

"Open up cause here I come!"

She swung her hands down. A pillar of concentrated, solid light fifty feet wide crashed out of the clouds, slamming directly onto the top of the dome.

BOOM!

The light burned through the thick timber like a hot knife through wax.

The wood turned to charcoal, and the petals turned to ash as the blinding column of magic incinerated the structure down to its roots.

As the dome collapsed into a crater of smoking embers and the beam faded, Amber noticed that Ayako wasn’t crushed inside.

She was already floating twenty feet above the crater, standing on a suspended branch of a second, even larger tree.

"Hmm? Where did that come from?"

Her dark uniform was practically torn off her upper torso, leaving only her sarashi wrapped around her chest. She cut off the cinders of her burnt hair and pointed her blade down at Amber.

Around her, the entire forest of giant Sakura trees responded.

Dozens of massive wooden limbs, each as thick as a tower, rose into the air simultaneously. Ayako lensed her elemental affinities through every branch; blazing fire, torrential water, cutting wind, jagged rock, swallowing darkness, and her own version of blinding light.

All natural affinities, alongside a dozen smaller wooden limbs, converged on Amber from every single angle. It was a terrifyingly beautiful display of absolute elemental mastery.

In the center of the convergence where Amber stood completely surrounded, she didn’t show fear, nor did she look for a way out.

She threw her arms out to her sides and burst into a reverberating scream.

A sphere of radiant light expanded outward from her body, combined with a violent, outward-pushing gravitational anomaly that inverted the spatial field around her.

The collision was monumental.

Zwoosh—KABOOM!!!

The giant elemental branches – that were all slammed into the expanding sphere of dense gravity and light – all got crushed and vaporised immediately. The explosion even shook the entire stadium to its core.

The secondary barriers guarding the spectator stands shattered easily, sending a howling gale of wind, pulverized wood, and light washing over the front rows. Banners were ripped from their poles and stone railings cracked.

Inside the collision, both combatants were thrown backward by the recoil of their own magic.

Ayako was hurled high through the air, crashing hard against the far edge of the arena wall. She slammed into the stone, spitting up a mouthful of blood as her katana slipped from her numb fingers, clattering onto the ground beside her.

She slid down the wall, sitting in a dazed, bloodied heap, her left arm hanging limply at her side.

On the opposite side, Amber was blasted backward, crashing on the other side. The shining light surrounding her body flickered away.

Her white uniform was completely ruined, covered in soot, mud, and her own blood. Her hair came loose as she forced herself to stand upright. However, she stumbled as her knees buckled.

The forest was gone and the stone arena was gone. There was only a giant crater.

Somehow, someway, at opposite ends of the ruined crater, the two young women stood.

Their bodies felt broken. Their mana reserves were bone-dry. Their muscles were torn, their skin was burned, and their limbs were trembling from total physical exhaustion. But they stood.

Amber lifted her head slowly and raised a finger trembling so badly she could barely form a fist. A faint flicker of light sparked on her knuckles before dying out.

A weak, raspy laugh escaped her lips as she looked across the crater at Ayako.

"Hey... Ayako... That... that was really something... wasn’t it?"

Across the crater, Ayako pushed herself off the wall.

She used her right hand to agonizingly pick up her katana from the dirt. She rested the blade against her hip, using it almost like a cane to keep herself upright.

Yet, she forced her mouth into a weak, bloody smirk.

"It... it was the greatest fight... of my life, Amber... But... we need... a winner..."

"Y-Yeah..." Amber grinned with her eyes half-lidded and her body swaying where she stood. "Come on then... let’s finish it..."

One painful foot after the other, Ayako took a step. Then another. And another.

She gathered every single remaining atom of stamina left in her soul, pushing past the pain in her ribs, the burning agony in her lungs, and the numbness in her legs until she finally made it to the edge of the crater.

With a final, desperate burst of willpower, she kicked off the ground.

BOOM!

Her body blurring into a weary charge across the crater, her katana drawn back for one last, horizontal quick-draw slash aiming for Amber’s midsection.

Across the clearing, Amber stood her ground.

As always, she didn’t try to dodge. She didn’t back away.

She just raised both bruised arms into a simple, high guard, her face breaking into her signature smile.

She shifted her weight onto her back foot, seemingly ready to absorb the strike and counter with everything she had left.

Ayako closed the distance in a second.

Ten feet.

Five feet.

Three feet.

As her eyes locked onto Amber’s ready smile, her sword slashed in a final arc when suddenly–

Amber’s guard dropped.

The bright smile remained frozen on her face, but the light behind her eyes vanished.

Her knees unlocked, her head lolled, and her body pitched forward like a felled tree.

Thud.

Amber crashed face-first into the dirt, sliding down the crater, utterly unconscious.

Ayako’s katana stopped mid-swing, stopping less than two inches from her opponent’s body.

She just stood there, frozen in her mid-strike posture with her chest heaving hard and her eyes wide with speechless shock.

She stared down at the unconscious girl lying below, then looked at her own blade, then back down at Amber.

"Wait... Wait... what...?"

She blinked in utter disbelief, waiting for Amber to pop back up with another manic giggle, or throw a sudden gravity counter.

But none of it came. Amber simply laid peacefully in the dirt, completely out cold.

Then, an exhausted chuckle escaped Ayako’s lips. She lowered her katana and slid the blade back into its scabbard with a faint click. A look of profound, affectionate respect graced her tired face

"And here I thought I was a monster... You pushed yourself... to the absolute limit..."

Ayako’s own legs finally gave out. She sat down on the edge of the crater and closed her eyes, tilting her face up toward the warm, clear blue sky.

High above the ruined arena, Ken stared at the scene in speechless awe before finding his voice.

"L-LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!"] his voice echoed across the breathless coliseum, trembling with emotion.

["ELDORIA’S REPRESENTATIVE, AMBER STRONGWILL... HAS PASSED OUT! WHICH MEANS... THE VICTOR OF THE FINAL MATCH... AND THE UNDISPUTED MVP OF THE CONTINENTAL TOURNAMENT... IS MYRIA’S, IZUMI AYAKO!"]

"""""YEEEAAAAHHHHH!!!!!"""""

The entire stadium exploded into a roar. Myrian banners waved frantically in the wind, tens of thousands of people stomped their feet, and the entire continent celebrated the glorious, breathtaking clash of giants that had just unfolded before their eyes.

Down on the crater, Ayako smiled faintly, letting out a long, quiet sigh of fulfillment.