Chapter 107: 106 Fair Points

"Two lances?" Donovan watched the two combatants prepare from a safe distance. "Don't you need two hands to wield them?"

Trebar laughed, though it sounded a bit insecure. "Those are spears, not lances, but yes, you usually use two hands. Zhoie is just a bit, well, she's a bit special in all the right places. You'll see what I'm talking about when they start, but please don't make her your standard for lance wielders."

"She's weird as hell, that's what she is." Cholst had finally broken himself out of his mood, though he was still very hostile towards no one in particular. "If she couldn't give me a hard time when we fight, I'd smack her on the head and call her an idiot."

"I HEARD THAT DIPSHIT!!!" A rock came flying at Cholst's face at a very flat angle, being caught at the last moment by it's intended target.

"DON'T GO FLINGIN' ROCKS AT THE AUDIENCE MORON! WHAT IF YOU HIT SOMEBODY!?!"

"I DON'T MISS!!!"

"THAT'S BULLSHIT AND YOU KNOW IT!"

"FUCK YOU MANSLUT!!!"

"FUCK YOU RETARD!!!"

"SHUT THE HELL UP, BOTH OF YOU." The technique Trebar used to raise his voice must have been incredibly similar to the one the Scholar had used to wake his men up on their first day of training. Obviously Trebar had more control over his ability to use split given he could actually form words, the Scholar was evidently not lying when he said that split arts were not his strong suit.

"...yes boss."

"He called me a retard..."

Their group dynamic was very clearly established to Donovan through this interaction. Trebar may not have nearly the same control over his subordinate's actions, but he could certainly keep them in line if he needed. Meanwhile, Cholst and Zhoie always seemed to be at each other's throats in one way or another.

"My apologies if that hurt your eardrums, Lady Diana."

"Oh, don't worry about it." Diana waved him off, she was far enough away from him to where it wasn't an issue.

Donovan, on the other hand, had to shake his head a bit to stop the ringing. "A little bit of a warning would be nice."

"In hindsight, that most certainly would have been a better idea." Trebar silently expressed his apologies before addressing the three people out in the field. "To put us all on the same page, I'm going to establish the ground rules for scoring points. Stepping out of the arena will award your opponent one point and the match will be reset, intentional fleeing from combat will be punished. Disarming your opponent will award you two points and the match will be reset. Landing a vital but not immediately fatal strike will award you two points and the match will continue for twenty seconds, after which a second point will be awarded and the match will reset. The 'dying' party may land blows during this time, scoring points and potentially denying the enemy that second point should the match end before that time. Landing an immediately fatal strike will award three points and reset the match immediately. Landing a blow on the hands, wrists, or hips will award one point and the match will continue. Is this much understood?"

"Yes boss."

"Yes sir."

"Good. In the interests of safety, I ask that you avoid intentionally striking the head and neck. So long as we can clearly see your weapon making a pass at those areas and defense is impossible, we will award the points. Myself and that, no, Nemo, will be the judges for this duel. We will go until one side reaches fifteen points or concedes. That means that there will be a minimum of five rounds. Are you two ready?"

"Yes sir."

"Ready to go boss."

Trebar nodded, taking his position on the opposite side of the square drawn in the dirt from Nemo. "Then we will start on the count of three, when I say go."

"Three." Both of them dropped into stances, preparing to burst out towards their opponent. Titanyana kept her body low to the ground, hand firmly grasped around the handle of he still sheathed sword. Zhoie held her spears behind her, crossed into an 'X'. 

"Two." Their eyes danced across each other's stances. This was the first time that they had fought, never even having seen each other fight, and neither subscribed to a method of combat that the other was familiar with.

"One." Both of them made last second adjustments to their balance and posture on the minute level, seeking to cover up potential weak spots and put themselves in a position that would exploit perceived deficiencies in their opponent's stance as quickly as possible.

"Go!" Two clouds of dust just behind where they had been standing an instant ago denoted the fact that they had both launched at speeds nigh imperceptible to Donovan at his current level. He could only make out the instant they both made their first strikes.

Zhoie was the first to be in a position to attack, unsurprising given the longer reach of her spears, opening with a sweeping arc out in front of her with one of her spears. More than anything, this was a move that forced Titanyana to act, disrupting her projected path of motion and forcing her to give up some of her energy unless she wanted to get hit.

That would be the case for most people, at least. Titanyana simply ducked further underneath, almost on the floor, allowing the spear to whiz harmlessly over head. Zhoie, unfazed, followed this up with a thrust at her center of mass. Donovan would not have been able to deal with this attack. Hell, a good ninety nine percent of those attending the academy wouldn't have been able to handle the first strike, much fewer would be capable of mitigating the thrust.

Titanyana made it seem easy, moving her tiny body out of the path with a simple side-step as if she was weightless, ending up behind Zhoie's back before Donovan had even registered she was being stabbed at. Titanyana slowly stood up from that position and turned around.

"Slash, lower torso, instant kill. Three points Titanyana." Nemo very calmly reported what had happened to the less perceptive bystanders. 

"Damn, good hit Titanyananana. I'll get you next round." Zhoie sighed and returned to her position.

"Mhm." Titanyana followed suit.

"What?" Donovan looked on in shock. Forget the fact that he didn't see what had happened, Titanyana didn't even draw her sword. "What do you mean instant kill?"

"The moment she passed by the idiot's waist she sent a pulse of split down her sword arm. Had this been a real fight, she would have unsheathed her sword at full power and Zhoie would probably be in two pieces with her guts strewn out over the floor about ten feet away." Cholst filled Donovan in on what he saw. "Well, she never makes the same mistake twice, she just makes a different mistake. Let's see what she does next."

"Ready?" The two of them were in positions again, Zhoie adopting a slightly different stance than before, both of her spears out in front of her this time.

"Three."

"Two."

"One."

"Go!"

Once again they shot from their positions, meeting once again in the center. Once again Zhoie struck out first, this time her first blow coming towards Titanyana from the top, something which Titanyana easily dodged owing to how obviously the strike was telegraphed.

The second strike was not nearly as easy to deal with, coming down in a diagonal towards where Titanyana's current momentum was leading her. There was really only one way to escape.

As Titanyana sailed upside down past Zhoie's shoulder in a lazy arc, the tension leaving the spear wielding woman's body as she realized the match was over.

"Slash, jugular, instant kill. Three points Titanyana for a total of six."

"FUCK!"

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"Should be obvious this time. Little lady would have struck her mid-air from a position Zhoie couldn't block, though I'm certain that idiot would have been decapitated instead of just having her jugular severed." Cholst drew his thumb across his own neck, mimicking what would no doubt have happened if they were fighting for real.

Titanyana naturally landed on her feet, like some sort of master-class gymnast. The only notable difference being that she did so to kill. "Hmm. Tricky." Titanyana mumbled to herself as she approached her starting point once again. Zhoie only failed that time because she failed to take into account Titanyana's capacity for vertical motion. "What to do next."

"Ready?"

"Yah boss."

"Mhm."

"Three."

"Two."

"One."

"Go!"

This time around, Titanyana took a less direct route. She arced around to the side she believes was Zhoie's less dominant arm and unsheathed her sword properly for the first time and dropping almost to the floor, ready to pounce. She lashed out at Zhoie before she could adjust herself to properly face the incoming threat.

As Zhoie swung out a spear with her weak arm, sailing harmlessly over her head, Titanyana began to follow it. Just as she had done with Wall's axe, she was chasing the weapon to a position where it had no power, a position that was relatively safe regardless of the weapon her opponent used. Upon reaching the end of the arc, Zhoie pulled back her spear as she would normally, a hint of panic in her eyes. If she had been using two hands, this situation might have been recoverable, a simple repositioning of the pole portion to block the incoming blade would have sufficed.

As she stood with only one hand on her spear, she lacked the leverage to do that. Worse still was the fact that her other spear was too far away to intercept. Zhoie had been baited into opening herself to attack and she knew it.

"Not again!"

Titanyana's head was practically up against Zhoie's belly, her sword angled up in a position that threatened to stab up under the ribs, through the diaphragm, and into the lungs and heart.

"Stab, chest, instant kill. Three points to Titanyana for a total of nine."

Titanyana only relaxed from her position once her points had been confirmed. Neatly turning around and sheathing her sword, her tail twitched a few times in frustration. She was running out of ideas to approach.

"That's the first time I've seen somebody use that trick." Even Cholst was shocked at this turn of events.

"What did she do?"

"She baited Zhoie into a defenseless position, usually Zhoie is the one to pull that sort of thing. I've never seen her do it like that though."

"Ready?"

"Yeah."

"Mm."

"Three."

"Two."

"One."

"Go."

Once more Titanyana threw herself into the range of Zhoie's spears, this time faced with a diagonally rising strike that Zhoie pulled across her body. Titanyana immediately realized that this was a set up for a downward strike, that arm having a powerful position. The troublesome part was that the other spear was in a prime position to block most strikes she could make from this position.

Zhoie was learning how to fight her, and Titanyana was not in a very good position. That didn't mean it was unsalvageable though.

As fast as she could, Titanyana stabbed her sword out towards the only place that couldn't be guarded effectively, Zhoie's groin, and landing a blow on the inside portion of her right leg with her artificially blunted blade before desperately rolling out of the path of a vicious downward strike.

"Femoral artery. Twenty seconds." Trebar coldly mentioned both the time and the reason for the countdown. He would say nothing further until time was up.

Zhoie did not say anything either, instead focusing on finishing Titanyana as fast as she could.

Titanyana found herself on the receiving end of a ferocious series of stabs swings the instant she got off of the ground. This was the sort of environment Zhoie was most suited to. Her weapons, possessing both a moderate range and precision, were very good at keeping an opponent on the back foot once they found themselves there. Strikes could come more often, if a little less powerful, and they could be used to disallow her victim to recover their stance.

That only really worked against slower and less nimble individuals, though, and Zhoie soon found Titanyana capable of fending off her blows. Even if Titanyana couldn't strike back, she didn't need to. Zhoie needed to do something desperate.

"RAAGH."

With all the power she could muster, Zhoie threw one of her spears at Titanyana. This was dodged, of course, it was far too easy to see coming, but it left a small opening to be taken advantage of. 

SMACK.

"Twenty seconds are up. Three points Titanyana for a kill, twelve points total. One point to Zhoie for landing a blow to the hand." Nemo summed up the score for the round, finishing just as Titanyana fell to the floor.

"Can't keep going."

"I'm sorry? I didn't catch that."

"Nothing left, can't continue." Titanyana started taking a few deep breaths. "Went all out."

"Ah, I get it. My condolences for your misfortune. Do you concede the match?" Trebar caught on to the fact that she did not possess a large reserve of split from the start, such was evident in her meager usage of it, but he didn't realize it was that bad. The only possible explanation for someone of her caliber was that she was born and raised on a planet in a system with a low quality star, probably an orange one.

"No, I'll concede." Zhoie seemed disappointed with the way the situation had developed. Naturally she had been feeling like she was getting closer to a win with every round, but the fact remained that she didn't win even once. "I can't take a win like this, not when I didn't even take a fair point."

Zhoie was convinced that her spear only landed on Titanyana's sword hand because she ran out of split at the last instant. Should she have had just a little bit more, she would have gotten her sword up in the blocking position. She was competitive, but she wanted a fair fight.

Points scored against an unfairly disadvantaged opponent weren't points at all.

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