Thunderously powerful fist met shield with a resounding gong-like noise that reverberated him down to his very bones as Arslan punched.
It felt like he'd just blocked a tank shell.
It had been so blindingly fast that he hadn't managed to do anything but brace for impact.
Naruto knew his team could handle what was happening, though. They'd trained for this for months, always with Goodwitch practically breathing down their necks.
It was a style of fighting they were used to by now. Blake broke free of the ranks, taking ABRN's most mobile fighter, Reese, with her, the hoverboard-wielding girl speeding off towards where Blake had retreated amongst the rubble.
Pyrrha was quick to take his place in combating Arslan, the two seeming to focus solely on each other after Arslan's initial attack, which Naruto surmised was entirely just to rile Pyrrha up.
Weiss appeared to be narrowly avoiding bullets fired from a bladed-rifle held by Nadir, glyphs pushing her around as she maneuvered around his line of fire, before using a glyph to shoot forwards and deal a painful blow.
Naruto had no more time to look around as a staff almost clocked him in the head, narrowly missing as it struck the top of his shield instead.
This was Bolin, or so the process of elimination dictated.
The boy ducked backwards, spinning his staff. "You just gonna stand there and take the hits, or are you gonna fight?"
Naruto wordlessly obliged, taking a deliberately heavy step forward, followed by another.
It was much slower than he usually moved, a deliberate feint to throw the staff-wielder off.
It worked. A dismissive laugh was rapidly followed by three precise jabs from the end of the staff in three different locations, only one managing to be pushed away as Naruto flicked it aside with his shield, attempting to return a stab at the teen.
It missed, Bolin sidestepping it with a combined side-strike that struck metal, clanging off of Naruto's shield once more.
"So, you're the 'impenetrable defense' kind of guy. I can understand that," Bolin remarked, five rapid strikes hitting Naruto in different places, an attempt at wearing him down. "Shame you can't move fast enough to do anything. I'll just whittle you down until the rest of my team can help speed up the process."
This guy was cocky. It wasn't that big a surprise, to be fair, especially after the 'conversation', if you could really call it that, that Arslan had shared with Pyrrha.
Naruto continued advancing forwards.
Blows kept coming, and Naruto blocked or deflected as many as he could, occasionally trying to deliver a strike, which failed every time.
And still, Naruto kept advancing forwards. Which kept Bolin moving backwards.
Bolin was quite quick on his feet, to be fair, but quick with his mind the boy was not.
To his credit, he noticed that Naruto was driving him towards a geyser, and quickly decided he didn't want to play Naruto's game any longer, darting sideways.
Naruto moved. Faster than Bolin had been expecting. Faster than wide majority of the audience had expected.
Naruto's shield bashed against Bolin with enough power to send him stumbling backwards in a daze, staff hanging loosely in one hand.
His follow-up strike with Crocea Mors turned Bolin's ninety percent Aura into a twenty-two percent.
It also drove the boy to the floor so fast he lost track of where he was. One moment he was standing, disoriented, the next he was on the floor, even more disoriented.
The crowd ooh-ed as the stone cracked around where Bolin had landed, and internally, Naruto did the same. He hadn't quite meant for the Power boosted attack to be quite so… devastating. At least it kept up his appearance as a, well, heavier Pyrrha-like combatant.
Bolin was about to stand up, one hand wobbling as it applied weight on his staff, and Naruto had to admit, for someone as cocky as he had been, he was still quite capable.
Regardless, it was time to end this fight, or at least one of the four. Crocea Mors glinted in the stadium light as it carved through the air, intent of turning Bolin's Aura to shrapnel.
It never made it, a bullet ricocheting off of the blade with enough force to drive it off course, barely scraping Bolin's hastily raised staff.
Nadir had approached, and Weiss was nowhere to be seen. She hadn't been eliminated, at least. He would've heard the announcement.
Naruto raised his shield and attempted to attack Bolin again, only to have another bullet drive the blade out of the way.
Naruto sighed. It couldn't just be so simple. Then again, he did enjoy a good challenge. Bolin flicked his staff out, an attempt to deal at least a little bit more damage to the 'distracted' Naruto, only to have Crocea Mors hit the ground, the end of Bolin's staff firmly in Naruto's grip.
There was nothing Bolin could do aside from relinquish his weapon or maintain his grip, and considering he was a Hunter, he decided to maintain his grip, only to be pulled closer and have his face meet Naruto's shield once more.
He could feel the crowd's wince from where he stood, as he released his grip and, still under the cover of his raised shield, retrieved Crocea Mors from the ground, turning to face Nadir, even as rounds pelted off the metal of his shield.
"And with that devastating blow that was sure to knock some sense into poor Bolin, he finds himself eliminated by way of Aura loss! Tough luck, Bolin, better luck next time!" Port announced.
Naruto allowed himself a small smile behind his shield, which rapidly disappeared as a bullet nicked the Aura on his shin.
He almost made the crucial mistake of lowering his shield, instead making the conscious effort last second to not get shot in the head, instead lowering his stance so that his shield almost covered him completely, presenting the smallest target he could as he drew Nadir's fire.
He could barely move like this, however, but he had a plan. Well, he hoped he had a plan. It was more or less dependant on keeping Nadir's attention on him until-
Weiss did as he was hoping, hitting Nadir hard enough that it drove the rifle-toting boy to his knees, only to have two glyphs, one above and one below, begin to crush him, slowly pressing down on him.
"Easy, Weiss. We're not trying to kill the guy," Naruto remarked, standing once again.
"Speak for yourself. He shot me out of the air with a Lightning Dust round. I couldn't move for at least a few seconds."
Despite her outrage, she did halt the pressure, instead keeping him pinned in between the glyphs.
"With that, Nadir is unable to continue fighting! What a ruthless display of teamwork and aggression from Weiss and Naruto!" Oobleck remarked.
"How do you think Blake is-" Naruto was barely halfway through his question when Port interrupted him.
"And with that well-thought-out plan from Blake, Reese finds herself out of the match by way of a double knock-out!"
Naruto, now with his question answered, moved onto his next one. "So, should we go help Pyrrha? Seems like she's got a grudge to settle."
Weiss allowed herself a small shrug. "That depends. Do we value the grudge-match or avoiding Professor Goodwitch's wrath more?"
Naruto paled. "I don't think I should be the one to make that decision."
"Truer words were never spoken. We shall watch, and if we believe Pyrrha does not have it handled, we shall intervene."
Naruto nodded.
Pyrrha and Arslan were not that hard to find. Partly because all that was required was to go where the shouting and loud sounds of fist smacking against metal was coming from.
"That's right, Invincible Girl. Keep waiting for your team to show up and pull your ass out of the fire!" Arslan shouted.
Pyrrha would have laughed if she wasn't in public. Blake was already watching, staying out of sight like usual. Naruto and Weiss would be here momentarily.
She didn't want them to help, though. Not just because this was her hard-fought reputation on the line, either.
She had a score to settle. One nearly as old as she was.
"I don't need my team to help me finish this, Arslan. It's just you and me. Isn't that how you always wanted it?"
Pyrrha circled Arslan, the two stalking around the center of the arena.
"I've gotten stronger, Pyrrha. Strongest in Mistral, ever since you left. Stronger than you."
Pyrrha stopped circling, bracing herself against her shield. "Prove it."
Arslan's face was not like normal. She was normally a calm, collected individual, her team could attest to that.
Pyrrha could say otherwise. It was almost like her own competitive spirit brought out the worst in the dark-skinned girl.
Arslan's fist struck Akouo with a resounding echo, like a gong being struck by a flying Ursa, and Pyrrha gritted her teeth.
She only knew one person who had that kind of power behind a strike.
It was a good thing that Pyrrha had spent most of her time at Beacon outside of class sparring with her.
Pyrrha pushed through the pain, using the latent momentum that Arslan had to force her in close as the other girl's arm slid off the side of Akouo, arm fitting perfectly into the rounded divot in the shield.
Arslan tried to pull away, only to find Pyrrha locking Milo behind her neck, Akouo being pushed harder and harder.
Arslan couldn't move her arms, so she kicked up, kneeing Pyrrha in the inner thigh, trying to dislodge the taller girl's footing, only to find her head suddenly throbbing as Pyrrha executed a move that not a single person, Arslan included, had expected.
Pyrrha headbutted Arslan, the brunt of her forehead meeting the bridge of Arslan's nose.
It was too much, and Arslan lifted both her legs, placing them on Pyrrha's chest and pushing, ignoring the searing pain of Milo scraping against her back, Aura flaring as she managed to finally build up some distance.
It was the strangest way of fighting, and it confused Arslan. Was Pyrrha doing it on purpose?
It didn't matter. Tricks weren't exclusive to Pyrrha, though the redhead using them was somewhat unexpected.
Arslan let out a roar, flipping as she flung her rope-dart out, watching as it barely missed her opponent, who instead slid underneath it, already running close.
But Arslan wasn't finished. Bringing her arms up in guard, she swayed sideways, narrowly missing the slash that would have cut straight through as she sidestepped another, completely on the defensive.
Then her dart rushed back to her hand, hooking around Akouo and pulling it free from Pyrrha's grip, all in a single movement.
It was fast, blindingly so, and not even Arslan could track its movements. It was a risky maneuver, so much so that she risked hitting herself with the shield, but it worked, sending the circular metal plate soaring into the arena, far enough away that Pyrrha wouldn't be able to retrieve it.
Unless, of course, her blond team leader caught it out of the air in a display of dexterity that she definitely hadn't been expecting from someone like him.
Pyrrha didn't waste time focusing on that, though, and Arslan's distraction costed her dearly, Milo biting into the Aura that covered her stomach, punching through her temporarily lowered guard and sending the blonde girl backwards a few feet simply from the force behind it.
Arslan let out a cough, sucking in air, and struck back, Aura covered fist meeting blade as she struck it on its side, other hand snaking towards Pyrrha, who, now without a shield, had no way of blocking it.
Caught in a grab, Pyrrha found herself flung overhead, arcing over Arslan's head and landing with a grunt and a plume of dust.
Arslan wasn't going to let this be the end of it, though, and was already capitulating on the landing, pouncing atop the bronze-armored girl, fists pounding a rhythm into Milo as Pyrrha used it to block the strikes, one hand on the grip and the other on the blade.
Not content to lay there and take it, Pyrrha attempted to buck her hips, to throw Arslan off, pulling one leg in fast enough that when Arslan landed once more, she was now precariously balanced, with Pyrrha's foot on her chest.
She had all of a single moment to widen her eyes before the foot pushed hard, flinging the blonde off and sending her into the wall of a ruined building, at the cost of some of Pyrrha's Aura.
Back to where they started. It was almost funny.
Arslan was about to make another move when Akouo hit her in the back, and Pyrrha looked as equally surprised.
A glyph froze Arslan's feet to the ground, coating them in a thick layer of ice.
Arslan, in a last ditch effort, flung her rope-dart out at Pyrrha once more.
The sound of a gun discharging ended that attack, the dart meeting the bullet in midair and being forced into the ground, cord falling slack behind it.
"That's enough. Look at you."
Arslan turned with a vicious glare at Naruto, who was approaching slowly, weapons sheathed.
"Naruto, why interrupt now?" Pyrrha asked, panting.
Naruto didn't answer Pyrrha, instead closing the distance between himself and the leader of ABRN.
"You sacrificed your entire team just to get a chance to fight Pyrrha. For a grudge. It didn't matter to you, because you'd get a chance to, what, prove that you're stronger?"
Arslan's glare didn't falter, but neither did Naruto.
"You know, even if you'd won, you'd still have lost. I wonder how your team feels about that, or did you even bother to ask them?"
This time, her glare did falter.
Naruto spared a glance up to the projection, noting that her Aura was sitting at about thirty percent.
"You can either surrender, or take the hit. Which would you prefer?"
"I'll take the hit. Coward."
That riled Naruto up, and he couldn't explain why. "What, you think that because we all got into your little grudge match that we're cowards? Because we're not willing to watch a teammate die?"
Arslan rolled her eyes. "It's a tournament."
Naruto didn't relent. "And when it isn't? We're cowards for taking our jobs, our lives, seriously?"
Arslan refused to meet his eyes at that.
"Fine then. Just do it."
Naruto did.
"So… that was a thing."
Naruto had to agree with Yang's assessment.
"Yeah. I, uh, I think Pyrrha's a little mad at me, to be honest."
The two were currently fetching a new round of popcorn, before the next match was to be announced.
There was also a floating notification he'd been meaning to get to since he'd finished the match, but he would get to that when he had a chance to sit down.
"I'd probably be pretty angry too, if you'd interrupted what looked like an age-old grudge match."
Naruto shrugged. "To be fair, it was a team match. If it was the singles rounds then it'd be a little more fitting, you know?"
Yang handed him half of the large buckets, precariously balancing her own half in her arms. "True. Considering how many times Goodwitch has drilled it into our heads, it does make sense. Still, I'd be grumpy. More so at myself than you, though, and I reckon it's the same with Pyrrha."
Naruto had to agree with that. Besides, he knew his partner pretty well by now, he liked to think. Pyrrha was more than likely frustrated that she hadn't been able to finish the fight as quickly as he imagined she would have liked.
Room for improvement, Pyrrha Nikos? Most would say otherwise, but he knew that Pyrrha would vehemently, but politely, decline that suggestion.
"I'll talk with her anyway, see if there's anything I can do to 'alleviate her stress'," Yang remarked.
Naruto decided he'd just ignore that.
Thankfully, the opportunity to do just that arrived, his saving grace for the first and last time being the voice of Peter Port over the speakers.
"Let's move onto our next match, ladies and gentlemen! For our first team, we have… Team FLIT, from Atlas, led by Flare Archid, with Lillith Wrath, Iren Roust and Tera Verdant, versus…"
Oobleck continued on. "Team CFVY, from Beacon, led by Coco Adel, with Fox Alistair, Velvet Scarlatina and Yatsuhashi Daichi. This is already shaping up to be an interesting match between second-years!"
If Naruto remembered correctly, this was to be the second last match of the team rounds. Which meant, it was also the second last match of the day, before they had to get ready for the next day's doubles rounds.
He and Pyrrha versus any of the day's winners. Well, he'd faced worse odds.
CFVY had won, albeit barely. It had been a close match, with a bunch of interesting semblances on the team from Atlas, but CFVY had scraped through with a down-to-the-wire clutch that had Yatsuhashi quite literally use his own body mass to slam one of the others into the ground.
Naruto enjoyed watching it, he realised. It was a good distraction, the eight of them sitting and cheering with varying amounts of enthusiasm, feasting away on the exorbitant amounts of popcorn they had available.
Seriously, it was a ridiculous amount of popcorn. He didn't quite know why they served popcorn in buckets this big. He'd seen entire dinners for twenty people with less food than a single one of these buckets.
If he ate anymore popcorn he would die. Nothing would be able to save him, his veins would pump liquid salt, and his heart would clog. He'd die, wishing for something to drink, all because he got carried away and continued to feast on the absurd popcorn bucket.
Naruto allowed his attention to wander for only a few more indescribably inexplicable moments before he returned to the land of the soon-to-be-not-living-thanks-to-popcorn-overdose.
"So, one last match today? Do we know who it is?" He asked, discreetly placing his bucket on the ground under his seat, for later. Meaning never, but he didn't need to say it outright.
Ruby, who was sat next to him, shook her head. "Nope. But I think Professor Port is going to announce it in a moment, so we should know soon!"
Somehow, she'd eaten two-and-a-half buckets of popcorn. Frankly, Naruto was amazed. Then again, considering her semblance, he had to imagine Ruby burned calories like Yang burned people when they got on her bad side. So, often, and in large quantities.
The notification, as of yet unchecked, still hovered in his periphery, existing and yet also not existing in the existential-crisis kind of way that they all seemed to inhabit. He'd ignored it up until now, simply because he wanted to watch the fight, and not become bogged down with new and/or dangerous semblance things.
But now, well, he'd noticed it once more, and there was nothing incredibly pressing that would make him put it off once more.
He brought it to the forefront of his mind, which also just happened to make it manifest in the air, visible only to him as it always was.
A quest reward?
He read it through. He hadn't even remembered getting a quest, let alone completing it, though considering there was a reward here, he had to imagine he had in fact received one. Maybe he'd been so absorbed in the fight that he hadn't noticed?
Food for thought, perhaps.
[Quest Complete!]
[40th Vytal Tournament: Round One]
[Win the first round of the 40th Vytal Tournament.]
[Rewards: Rare Skill Book, New Title Slot]
Wait. Wait just a single moment. A new title slot?
Did that mean a new title, or…
Naruto quickly brought up his player menu, and noticed the second slot for another title. "Holy crap."
At this point, Ruby had very much noticed that Naruto had started staring at the air with jaw agape, and was patiently waiting, though his outburst was certainly unexpected. "What is it?"
"Did I ever tell you about my titles?" Naruto asked, looking to Ruby, who was currently bouncing up and down in her seat in anticipation.
"You might've briefly mentioned them, or I wasn't really listening, either or. Why?"
"Well, up until this point, I've been limited to using one at a time. Now, I just got a second slot. That's a game-changer."
Ruby 'ooh-ed', before frowning. "Did you seriously make a pun?"
Naruto opened his mouth, before also frowning. "Oh gods, I did. I'm so sorry. It was unintentional, I swear."
Once Naruto had promptly removed his foot from his mouth and Ruby had, albeit jokingly, accepted his apology, he resumed his investigation of his newfound title slot.
So many options. Some of them actually worked in conjunction with other titles, and he realised that if, and only if, he figured out some of the combos, he could become remarkably powerful through titles alone.
Another little facet of the System, he supposed. Maybe he was just a giant beta test for all the parts of the System to see where a player would invariably find themselves. The meta, so to speak, or at least that was what everyone on the forums he'd read through called it.
That was, of course, relying on the theory that he was living his life inside a literal video game, one of many theories he'd come up with over the past few months.
He could practically pluck an idea out of sci-fi and assign it to his life, though, so it wasn't that hard.
Running Huntsman and Banker at the same time was a great way to build up a surplus of XP and Lien from fighting Grimm, which he imagined he'd be doing a lot of in the future. Likewise, running Soul Tamer and Armsmaster would make him able to take on threats with ease, like, for example, whoever he'd be up against in the doubles rounds.
With some deft movement from his fingers, Naruto swapped his titles around to Soul Tamer and Armsmaster.
He didn't feel any different, though it wasn't like he'd been expecting to, so it came as no surprise to him.
But, he knew that Alcmena, Cadejo, Callisto and Electrus would be stronger. How much stronger would remain to be seen, but he imagined it would be enough that even if he had to fight against two Pyrrha-level fighters he'd be capable of going toe-to-toe with them.
Then there was the new skill book, which was apparently rare. He brought up his inventory and quickly scanned through, looking for it.
Stasis, or so the skill was called. He didn't even have to take it out of his inventory to read it, which was nice.
[Skill Learned!]
[Stasis (Active): Thanks to the System, you can seal a target in stasis, preventing the target from doing anything, but making it immune to damage. Stasis lasts for a short time. Costs 80 MP to cast. Level 1; XP 0/12.]
It was an interesting skill, too. One of the skills that required a little more thought behind its usage rather than being something he could just fire out ad nauseum.
Now, though, wasn't time for deep reminiscing, or future planning. The last match was about to begin.
"Our last match for the day, one that bears the mark of being a good one! First up we have Team ENVY, from Beacon, led by Nabala Emeraude, with Nero Vince Green, Veema Lotion and Ymil Dosza, versus…"
"Haven Academy's Team EMBR! Led by Emerald Sustrai, with Marseille Noir, Mercury Black and Romana Torch! I do so look forward to this match, Peter."
Naruto settled in to watch. If Oobleck thought it would be interesting, it might very well be just that.
"He knew nothing."
Qrow scoffed. "Course he didn't. He was a two-bit terrorist amongst more two-bit terrorists. I'm surprised he didn't try to resist. More a coward than a revolutionary."
"For once, I can't help but agree with you. We're getting nowhere, Branwen. This is the third raid we've conducted, and we've learned nothing. It's beginning to get frustrating," Winter replied, nursing a glass, a frown gracing her otherwise flawless face.
Qrow downed his own glass, refilling it from the bottle on the bartop. "Yeah, I know. Maybe we're going about it wrong?"
Winter took the proffered bottle, refilling her own glass. "You have a better suggestion?"
"Maybe we go talk to a couple people who seem to have a little more experience with the Fang. Personal experience. Maybe even recruit a few of 'em."
"Who're you talking about, Qrow?"
Qrow smirked. "Why, I think we met them just the other day."