You raise one hand to the official, doing your best to signal that you have received the message and will be along shortly - but only after you've checked on your defeated opponent.
"You alright, there?" you ask, offering a hand.
"Nrrgh," Ichigo retorts. "Anyone ever tell you that you hit like a wrecking ball?"
"That would be a first," you admit. "Come on, tough guy. It looks like the last round of prelims are up; they need the ring."
"Yeah, yeah. Don't mind the guy who's seeing double..."
Despite his complaints, Ichigo takes your hand. You haul him to his feet, being careful not to pull too fast, and lead him towards his family.
"Look," you say as you go, "I meant what I said earlier, about showing you how the flashy stuff works. Are you okay with waiting a few minutes? Because I have one more bout to fight" - you pause and glance towards the waiting ring - "and the official is starting to look a little impatient."
"Huh? Oh, yeah. Sure, man."
His tone is not the most reassuring, but you don't really have the time to spare for anything more. Handing Ichigo off to his family - taking note in passing that the smallest girls are shying away from you, while the older one looks like she wants to fight you right now - excuse yourself as quickly and politely as you can, and head for the waiting ring.
For what you hope will be the final time today, you dip into your diminishing mana reserves and cast your divination spell as you approach the ring.
"You are running behind, young man," the official notes sternly.
"I had a conversation to finish, and a promise to tend to," you reply, not apologetic in the slightest. The man frowns, obviously not well-pleased, but says nothing more on the subject. You turn your attention to your fourth opponent.
This is the strangest one yet. Her features are decidedly Western and quite possibly the prettiest you've ever seen, emphasized by a striking combination of skin about as tan as yours and long blonde hair. She's wearing a long-skirted white dress, matching long-sleeved gloves, a gold tiara - what the hell? - and two large, cross-shaped earrings. All in all, she looks like a child beauty queen who's turned up at the wrong event - but her eyes, for all that they reflect the childish innocence of her bright smile, are as red as blood, and her aura is even less human than the jotunn-spawn's. Not only that, it's larger than Ranma's was, has the stability that denotes training in its use, and reeks of blood, violence, and tears.
"Hi!" the inhumanly beautiful little girl chirps cheerfully. "My name's Kahlua. I hope you'll give up quickly, so I don't have to hurt you!"
VAMPIRE PRINCESS: SHUZEN KAHLUA
You get the sinking feeling that this bout is really going to suck.
"FIGHT!"
The word is barely out of the ref's mouth when the pretty girl rushes at you with alarming speed, her aura compressing to match and reinforce her movements in a way that suggests physical enhancement.
You are not happy.
You've fought three opponents already this morning, each one a heavy hitter of some kind: Ranma with his excellent skill; Othrym with his brutal strength; and Ichigo with his absurd spiritual potential. You've defeated them all, but not without cost: Ranma gave you a good working-over; Othrym forced you to burn a lot of energy; and Ichigo scored an aura-enhanced kick that still stings. That last one wouldn't be a problem if you'd had a chance to rest, but you've been rushed almost directly from your third fight into the fourth, with barely enough time in between to catch your breath - and man, you are going to raise hell with somebody for that when this is all said and done, because there is no way that it's been an hour since the first fight of the third round. Rather more urgent than your displeasure with the accelerated schedule is the fact that, tired, drained, and sore as you are, you're being put up against yet another pint-sized powerhouse, one who gives you the distinct impression that she is your most dangerous opponent yet. And that includes Arrogante and the Hawaiian-print sorcerer, because you were at least able to face the first at full power, and Lu-sensei had more or less handled the latter before you even knew he was there.
Speaking as the guy with the memories of the King of Evil, you know a set-up when you see one. Somebody with influence - possibly several somebodies - has been rigging your matches, trying to get you knocked out of the tournament. The potential reasons why - because you're a foreigner, because you're a no-name, because you're Lu-sensei's student, because they don't like the cut of your jib - don't concern you nearly as much as the fact that this shit is being pulled at all, and that nobody seems to have done anything to stop it, including the officials who are supposed to be enforcing the damn rules!
It's fair to say that you are upset. One might even describe your current mental state as pissed off. And while Kahlua is certainly an opponent who merits a significant response, it's as much your anger at this entire situation as it is your threat assessment of the girl that leads you to choose your next course of action.
Someone wants to mess with you? Fine.
You'll mess with them right back.
Reaching deeping within your being, you seize the core of your ki with one metaphorical hand and the wellspring of your magic with the other, and then bring them both together. Your aura surges in response, and you make no attempt to rein it in, letting a burnt golden radiance explode from your body. From all around you come startled yells, more than a few cries of fear, and at least one voice raised in a protesting shriek of, "Damn it, Alex!" - but you do not hear them. Your attention is fixed on the obstacle target opponent before you.
For her part Kahlua's ruby eyes go wide with shock as the leading edge of your aura reaches her, and her form falters - but she doesn't cease her charge, and the time it took you to unleash your full power has left you with too little room to dodge. With no other acceptable options, you move to block, channeling the bulk of your unleashed aura to your arms as you cross them before your chest.
In the split-second before impact, you feel your aura collide with Kahlua's, and in that instant - perhaps due to your divination spell overloading, perhaps because of something else - you find that you're no longer facing a little girl. Above her, around her, and within her is someone else, a person who radiates dark crimson energy like a star of blood, someone who looks exactly like Kahlua and yet is in no way a child. Her skin is bronze in truth, her fingers are deadly talons, and from each of her arms sprout half a dozen bat-like wings, their edges glinting like the finest swords; above her shoulders rise full pinioned wings, more draconic than mammalian, and beneath her feet is a pile of broken bodies. The Other's mouth is open in a snarl that bares prominent fangs, her hair is in disarray, and her fine clothes have been reduced to bloodstained tatters - and from her eyes pour tiny rivers of tears, each drop sparkling like the most perfect and precious diamond. Beyond the Other are half a dozen silhouettes. Three of them are small and female, and radiate a confused tangle of warm feelings and competitive urges. The sole male shadow is tall and proud, and gives off a sense of affection, pride, and slightly-ominous expectation, while one of the adult female presences is kind and caring, yet unapproachable. And then there is the other woman, someone whose presence is Authority, Blood, and Terror... and faintly, hidden, something that might be love.
Even as your eyes behold this strange reflection of who and what Kahlua is, your remaining senses register other impressions - feelings not about the girl before you, but about yourself. You feel the comforting weight of armor on your shoulders, and sense a great and terrible sword at your hip, silently asking to be drawn. To your right, you hear the taunting, triumphant war-whoops of a raiding party of fearless warrior-women, each one mounted on a horse as black as midnight, as swift as the desert winds, and as tireless as the mountain stones. Three of their voices have the familiar weight of family, whether kin-by-blood and kin-by-choice, and the air before them is filled with streaking arrows and blazing spells. To your left, you hear the bellowing, bloodthirsty battle-cries of a legion of nightmares. Among their ranks are a dog - immense, glorious, and terrifying like something out of the darkest Norse legends - and a warrior clad in impenetrable darkness, wielding a weapon that shatters armies and tastes even the blood of gods. A hand lies on your shoulder, heavy with the weight of a black steel gauntlet, its grip as unyielding as steel, and you sense the man to whom it belongs standing just behind you. Behind him, above him, and within him just as Other-Kahlua is to the girl, you know the presence of the Beast. And there, in your right hand...
The vision cuts out as Kahlua's small fist impacts against your raised guard with a sound more akin to a hammer striking stone than the meeting of flesh and bone.
It is... remarkably painless. You were definitely hit, and your arm stings fiercely at the point of impact, but it's nowhere near the bone-breaking force you were expecting. From the expression on Kahlua's face, she's at least as surprised by this outcome as you are, and the two of you stand there, sharing a mutual moment of, "Huh?"
Then her lips quirk into a small, tentative smile, and she tries to punch you again. You block, and the result is much the same as before - Kahlua is hitting harder than a girl her size has any right to, but not so hard that someone of your size can't handle it.
Kahlua's smile grows, and she launches a flurry of strikes. Some you block, others you dodge - and at one point, spotting an opening, you strike back, almost connecting with her shoulder before she manages to slide out of the way. She answers your attack with a rising kick that almost catches you under the chin before you're able to jerk your head back, taking a glancing, stinging blow to the tip of your nose instead. Since it's right there, you grab the leg - and Kahlua kicks off the mat, coming up with her free leg swinging at your head, forcing you to release her and shield before she knocks your block off.
By now, Kahlua's smile is broad enough for you to confirm that she does indeed have fangs, though they're much smaller - and dare you say it? Cuter - than what you glimpsed in that bizarre vision. She's also giggling in a way that makes you nervous as hell for no reason you can adequately explain. You deal with this edginess by taking the offensive, forcing the small girl to start dodging and blocking in earnest as your - glowing dark gold? - fists flash towards her body. You quickly confirm that Kahlua is not quite as skilled or as fast as Ranma, but still better than you in either category, and the two of you are roughly even in strength. Your added mass tips the balance slightly in your favor, but the girl's recovery rate is very fast. What punches you manage to connect with don't appear to trouble her after a few seconds.
So you step up the attack, and start firing off low-level analogues to the Power Ball in the middle of your flurrying blows. The first of those catches Kahlua by surprise and provokes a genuinely pained yelp, and thereafter she makes no attempt at all to block them. You seize on this at once, using the threat of the energy blasts to corral the girl, forcing her back towards a corner. Kahlua senses what you're doing, but for a few moments, there's not much she can do about it. Then she grits her teeth, deliberately takes a hit, and rushes forward to kick you in the stomach while your hand is still extending in the "throwing" position.
It hurts more than Ichigo's, and you can't stop your instinctive defensive curl. Instead, you use it, grabbing at Kahlua's billowy dress. In a moment of purely feminine pique, she forgets her defense to yell at you, demanding to know what you think you're doing, be careful with that dress, it's brand new and a designer label-
Then you pick her up, lift her - still griping; damn it, what did she expect to happen if she wore a fancy outfit like that to a martial arts tournament? - clear over your head while turning her upside-down, and finally allow yourself to fall backwards on the mat.
Kahlua comes down first, and she comes down hard.
As you roll to your feet and slightly away from the gasping girl, you realize that you've been burning through your reserves like crazy. It's not even been a full minute yet, but you've got barely a third of your power left. You need to end this.
Time is running out. With each breath you take, you feel a little more of your energy slip away. You know that if you try to make this into an endurance match, you will almost certainly lose - you started out drained, whereas Kahlua appears to have used very little energy in her three previous matches. You wonder briefly who or what she fought, then dismiss the speculation.
You consider attempting a pin, but recall how earlier, Ichigo managed to yank himself out of one. True, you weren't fighting entirely seriously then - never mind with your full power enhancement up and burning - but Kahlua is a much closer match for you in raw strength than Ichigo was. A pin - or for that matter, an attempt to put her in a sleeper hold or drag her out of the ring - most probably has only a fifty-fifty chance of working. Not good enough. Power Ball costs energy you can't afford to spend right now, and it isn't exactly fast; if it missed, you'd be screwed but good. As for the idea of casting a spell, dropping the enhancement that is the only thing letting you match Kahlua - no. Just no.
That leaves just one course of action. Stepping forward quickly, you bend down, grab the girl by one arm and one leg - to a "Hey!" of protest - and then spin towards the nearest end of the ring as fast as you can, releasing her mid-way. Kahlua lets out a single, high-pitched squeak as she tumbles through the air-
-and then she does something with her aura that appears to involve pushing off against empty air, what the hell-
-and comes down like a ballerina, landing toes first on the edge of the blue mats that make up the ring. Her legs bend to absorb the shock, the ball of her foot descends just within bounds, while the heel... does not come down, goddamnit, she's still in the ring.
"Bullshit," you protest, slipping back into your native tongue.
She blushes, shrugs, and in perfect English, says, "Sorry."
She's totally not sorry, but you have no time to call her on it, because she's back in your face, either trying to get out of the not-quite-corner you've pushed her into or simply to take you down directly.
Realizing that this is your last chance, you commit everything you have left to an all-out offensive blitz. You begin gathering more ki and mana to your hands, forming it into small masses that you do not release as projectiles, but rather wrap around your knuckles in a manner similar to the "fire fist" spell you employed against Othrym.
"Ow! Ouch!" Kahlua begins yelping. "That - ai! - really stings! Eeek! Stop it!"
"Make me," you tell her.
"Oh, you - yow!" She almost laughed there.
Caught between you and the edge of the mat, Kahlua does not have enough room to dodge your charged blows as she did the earlier batch of projectiles - and your fists have a shorter distance to cover anyway, which they do somewhat faster than the glowing half-spheres you were pitching around before. This has a dramatically detrimental effect on Kahlua's defense, which gets slower and less precise with every hit she sustains. Within twenty seconds, she's retreated into a full guard, half-crouching and hiding her head and upper body behind her raised arms.
As soon as you see that, you bring both hands back, and simply give her a hard shove. With a cry, Kahlua takes a step backwards to regain her balance-
"Ring out!" the official announces. "Winner, Number Three-Oh-Three!"
-and stops, blinking. "I... lost?" The girl stares at you, her expression blank. "You beat me?"