Chapter 35: Gambling on Honour.

Jade stretched in the (thankfully luxurious) spectator seat and rested her head against Adamant's shoulder, looking into the arena where Bulltrue was squaring off against Agil, the game's most imposing merchant. She should have been psyching herself up for her next battle, but the two most heavily muscled (statistically and physically) players present were in that arena. It was bound to last a while…

._.

With a roar, both players charged each other, broadsword and axe lit up with blue fire and red plasma respectively. Jade leaned forwards, curious… which turned out to be a bad idea. Agil swung his axe in a colossal uppercut, which was met by a dynamic downward smash from Bulltrue, which caused enough smoke to fill the entire arena and blind half of the spectators. When, coughing, Jade was able to wave the stuff away (getting some irritating flashbacks to 'the incident with the birthday hunt') she was able to see that, somehow, neither competitor had moved. The duo, weapons locked in between themselves, were engaged in an epic power struggle, waves of energy from either side blown upwards and to the sides as neither side were capable of overcoming the other. At that point, Bulltrue's method of thinking became apparent. Disengage? No. that would be like losing. Keep going? The entire floor would collapse before either gave an inch. Conclusion. Hit harder.

So, to the amazement of the crowd, he took one hand off of his sword hilt. His remaining arm shook under the pressure, not just from holding the blade, but from Agil's relentless assault. However, to the amazement of the Axe wielder, the arm held. Shaking under the effort, Bulltrue brought his other arm back and curled it into a fist. Instantly, yellow flames curled around the fingers.

Jade gaped. Unarmed? Surely he isn't going to- With a roar, Bulltrue brought his fist forward and smashed it into his blade. The metal shattered under the strike, but the combined force blasted the shards into Agil. The grape shot of projectiles bodily hurled him backwards into the side of the arena. The whole fight took around 10 seconds.

._.

Letting out a breath as the 'winner' icon appeared over Bulltrue's head; Jade shrugged, stood up, and walked towards the sands. Behind her, Adamant sent a private message to Kirito, sat a row in front of him, knowing that the text had an auto-translate. The black clad beater glanced at the pop up just in front of him, smiled, looked up at Adamant and nodded. Returning the smile, Adamant turned towards the sands.

._.

Jade walked forwards, paying no attention to the crowds, and locked eyes with her opponent. Asuna's face betrayed a slight smile, before she gave a low bow. Jade copied her, and drew her blade in one fluid movement. Then, in a blink, they were clashing swords.

Blink and you missed five attacks. The two fastest players in the game spun, slashed and countered faster than most of the spectators could comprehend, and those that could, maintained rapt attention for the entire fight. Jade herself could barely understand it, she was operating entirely on reflex. It was like reacting to touching something hot without thinking, but for a lot longer. Well. She thought, if I'm not using my mind for fighting, let's use it for strategy. Years ago, at the start of the game, Adamant had described Asuna as 'a blur half the time, lightning the other half.' Daily training of her skills had improved that further, it seemed, based on how easily she performed ridiculously acrobatic manoeuvres. But Jade was no slacker. She had been duelling since before she had heard of the nerve-gear, but she had learned how to fight people, not just some random monster with two or three attacking options. And she knew how to read someone. She had been analysing Asuna's technique in every single boss fight they had seen. And noticed something.

Jade struck again, her sword scraping off of Asuna's, the minute damage registering as a blocked attack, before swerving out of the way of a counterattack. Asuna's far too proud.

Simplifying her movements, Jade transformed the battle into a simple back-and-forth of strikes and counters, dodging or redirecting her opponent's attacks. She'd rather take every attack head on, and lose a little health each time, than dodge, because it feels like running away...

Suddenly, after blocking a particularly close strike, Asuna's eyes flickered up to the top right in alarm, just where her health bar would be, and Jade could imagine her surprise at the dramatic dip in her health bar. She did not let her imagination limit that opening though. Charging her blade with red light, she darted in and to Asuna's off hand, scoring a light scratch on her shoulder. She saw her opponent grimace as she darted in again, then again. She had to give it to Asuna, she didn't get flustered and lose her composure after the first hit. But she wasn't going to recover. Jade could see it in her eyes. Swiping upwards until she was above, Jade executed the final attack of thorn of the rose, knocking Asuna to the floor and stabbing into her back.

From the stands, Kirito grimaced as Jade flipped off of her felled opponent and gave a victory bow to the crowds. Sighing, he materialised a bag of gold from his inventory and chucked it behind him to where he knew Adamant sat, grinning. Then he stood up and walked away, hoping now that Jade wouldn't be defeated until he got the opportunity to fight her. He was very keen to avenge his 'wife's defeat, and vent his anger on the girl who lost him 100,000 col.

DONT KILL ME I CAN EXPLAIN- *kill +100 headshot+10 total=110 we ran out of medals, someone should probably do something about reviewer23*

Hey, i got a puppy, (look like whitepaw from my destiny fic? i wish...) getting these things housebroken takes time. Of course, you know who's going to duke it out next chapter. Review please, they're fun, and... hey... we haven't heard aboout dylan for a while...