A Saga of Tanya the Evil/The Irregular at Magic High School crossover.
I do not in any way, shape, or form lay claim to either of these works.
This is just a work of admiration from one fan, to those others that share the same interest.
The only characters or places I lay claim to are those solely of my own creation
Chapter 43, Time flies: A moment in time.
Tuesday, August 10th 2094. 2:03 AM
Point Two.
Tanya had the odd urge to laugh, an unfortunate side effect of using the Type 95's power. It always seemed to bring on strange moods in her, when she used the full power of the cursed device. She assumed it was more of Being X's meddling in her affairs and mind, but in this case it was unavoidable. She needed far more power than the CAD she carried as a backup could manage. She couldn't even activate the small, modern device if she wanted to make use of the Type 95's power.
The Chinese agent she fought against was good, a very talented fighter who was able to keep up with her. It had been ages since she felt so challenged, since she had faced such a foe.
It was almost a shame she had to kill her.
Tanya closed in once again, the sound of their clash like a truckload of cymbals hitting the ground as their weapons rang out against each other at speeds that should never have been possible. The two clashed and disengaged rapidly, neither having an obvious advantage.
Xian Lao took the momentary reprieve to gulp a few more lungfuls of air before her opponent was on her again. The fanatical gleam in her eyes, the rictus grin that changed the other girl's pretty face into some horrible monstrous mask. It was becoming more and more evident that this girl had to die for the sake of her homeland.
Someone with power like hers was too much of a threat.
Xian Lao narrowed her eyes as the two circled each other. There was no way that either of them could keep this up for very much longer, especially since each of them just pushed themselves faster over and over again. She knew that she was near the limit of what she could do, and she had to hope that her opponent was as well.
Tanya eyed her opponent and slung her gun. It wouldn't be useful in the fight ahead, and she needed to concentrate on the melee that was about to come. Her skills in hand to hand combat had gotten her far over the years, it would be a good thing to test them against someone who focused on hand to hand combat.
Tanya grinned that as her golden eyes narrowed for a moment before she lunged in once more. She came in low, as she made the most of the height difference to lessen the size of target she presented to her opponent.
Xian Lao shifted her stance slightly, then turned to the side as she struck down at the back of her opponent. She didn't expect to land the blow, but sometimes it paid off to go along with your opponent to an extent to figure out not just what they had planned, but what they were capable of.
Tanya rolled to the side and attempted to sweep her opponent's legs out from under her. Without surprise, Xian Lao avoided the sweep and delivered a kick to the small mage. Tanya rolled with the impact and ended up kneeling on one knee with her knife ready if Xian Lao attempted to close.
Xian Lao Had originally thought of closing with her smaller opponent, until she saw the controlled roll and decided to back off once more. Her years of training, and the last two years with the Old Master had taught her much, and she trusted those ingrained instincts here.
Tanya stood up, her guard never dropped as she started to circle Xian Lao. The Chinese agent was every bit as talented as she had expected her to be. She dipped her hand towards her gun and fired a burst at her opposite, and noted how she didn't even flinch as the bullets deflected away. In fact she started to close. She clearly intended to use the moment when Tanya transitioned from her gun to her advantage. It was clearly a tactic she had used before.
Xian Lao had moved to close the distance even as Tanya had started to dip her hand. She had done this often, and had trained until she didn't even flinch anymore when bullets struck the barrier she surrounded herself with. It was proof against bullets and other small projectiles, but it had to let blades through, or her own weapons of choice would have been useless.
As the fight once again became a close range melee, Xian Lao delivered a series of quick slashes with her paired blades. Tanya parried one, then slid out of the way of another with fluid grace before she lashed out with a kick aimed at her opponent's midsection, and used the block to reverse her momentum and deliver a backhanded blow of her own. Xian Lao barely blocked the strike and pushed the smaller mage off of her and watched as Tanya landed lightly on her shoulder and rolled back to a ready position as she flipped her knife back. Xian Lao shivered at the look of murderous glee on Tanya's face, the look of eager anticipation.
Tanya grinned as she bounced on her toes, the thrill of a good fight lighting a fire in her chest. She launched herself back into the fray as she led with a lunge. She came in fast and exchanged blows with Xian Lao quickly, as she kept up the pace and rhythm. She had started to get a feel for her talented dance partner, and had decided to see if she could end their little party with one of her little tricks.
Tanya's face became serious once more as she exchanged blows, their blades flickering in the light. Tanya steps it up, as she lashes out with a series of kicks and slashes, the cold and focused look on her face even more disturbing in many ways to Xian Lao than the maniac look of moments before.
As they crossed blades once more, Tanya dropped her blade and caught it in her other hand in preparation for an off-handed blow. In the moment that Xian Lao's attention shifted, she darted her hand forward as entropic energy surged on her fingertips. A single touch to end the fight.
Xian Lao had followed the weapon as it shifted for just a moment. She wasn't sure what prompted her to dive backwards, but she followed her instincts like the Master had taught her. She saw Tanya pulling her extended hand back, and wondered for a moment if her opponent might possess magic like the Masters. Often, the most dangerous effects either required time, concentration or, as was the case with her Master, proximity.
If that was the case, then this fight became much more dangerous, since she did not know the nature of the effect. If she had achieved these speeds through neural control, then perhaps she could disrupt a person's nervous system? Or perhaps it was the metabolic processes themselves she had altered? Xian Lao shook her head as she disengaged once again. Now was not the time to speculate. She had to avoid contact if possible, and defeat her target as quickly as she could. At least the spell seemed to require contact with the fingers, as did the Master's. That was something to work with.
Tanya quirked an eyebrow as they separated once more and locked gazes. She hadn't expected her opponent to throw herself backwards like that. She had obviously had experience with a magician who used touch-based magic. Perhaps that old mage that she had killed earlier.
She knew that the amount of time she could spend in combat at this acceleration was drawing closer and closer to the limit. She had to end this soon, or she might pass the soft limit she had set for herself. She had a few ideas on how her opponent's barrier worked, and if she was correct, then she might have an opening she could exploit.
And Tanya was never one to let an opportunity pass her by.
Xian Lao flexed her fingers around the hilts of her blades as she watched Tanya warrily. The spirits that hse commanded were what let her move this fast, but she paid a price for it. The human body just was not designed to sustain this kind of speed for long, and even if the spell enabled her to react at this speed, it was becoming a closer and closer margin by the minute.
She had to end this, and end it soon before her spell was no longer sustainable.
She was sure that the Master would lecture her again.
Tanya knew that the next engagement would likely determine this fight. Neither of them could keep this up for much longer, not without draining themselves totally, of that she was fairly sure. She was hesitant to rely too heavily on the Type 95 if she could avoid it, she never knew when that maniacal Being X would decide that she needed more… Motivation… in her descent into fanatical adulation of that pompous wannabe deity.
She'd had an idea, a thought. A conjecture, if she was going to be honest with herself. It was risky, and would likely only work once but hopefully she would only need to resort to such tricks once. She dipped her hand once more and fired off a quick burst that emptied her gun. When she reached for the replacement magazine, her finger lingered on the exposed round for just a moment longer than normal before she slammed it home and charged it.
Xian Lao had kept a watchful eye on Tanya the entire time, certain that it had to be some sort of trick. Surely the blond mage was aware that no matter how many times she tried, her bullets would never make it through the barrier that protected her. It had to be some sort of trick, but she wouldn't fall for it, not this time. She would conserve her energy and make the other mage take the first move.
Tanya squared her narrow shoulders, glad that her opponent seemed to be taking a more cautious approach. It would actually make what she had planned easier, if her hypothesis was correct. It was time to test it, to end this fight so that she could help Visha if she needed it.
Not that she thought that Visha would.
Tanya charged at Xian Lao, and her hand dipped down to raise her submarine gun. As she expected, Xian Lao braced herself, ready to let the rounds deflect and deal with Tanya in close combat. But something was going to be different this time.
Tanya fired off a burst aimed at her opponent's face, and the rounds slapped into the barrier that surrounded Xian Lao, but instead of being deflected, this time they turned to dust. The rounds, decayed by Tanya's entropic field and no longer held together by her stasis turned into a fine metallic powder on impact with the wall of wind. The sudden, shocked inhalation had been what Tanya had counted on as Xian Lao started to choke and cough, and during that vulnerable moment Tanya struck.
Tanya swung her blade, reinforced with an entropic sheathing, into and through the blade in her opponent's left hand, and carried the strike through to nearly sever her right hand. As the blood sprayed through the air in an arc, Tanya prepared to deliver the finishing blow. That was when she felt it, the surge of magical power that welled up from the broken remnants of Xian Lao's blade. At that moment, she realized that they were not simple weapons as she had thought, but talismans used in Ancient Magic. A talisman that she had just destroyed without a thought. She felt the spells that had sheathed her opponent start to fray and unravel as the air spirits that had been confined broke free of their constraints.
That was when she was slammed into the wall behind her as the other mage's spell unraveled.
The stunned and groggy Devil of the Rhine shook her head as she thought to herself "That was unexpected."