Catherine dodged between two swords, bending her body unnaturally to squeeze through he space. After recollecting herself she split herself in half to avoid a downward slash from Alexander, the force from his large body crushing the ground beneath the sword. Catherine reformed again, raising her hand to slash at his open shoulder but jumped back as one of the six translucent swords flew by where she once stood.

“Fucking bullshit skill.” She cursed. She couldn’t take advantage of when Alexander left himself open with a big attack like that, his swords simply covered for him. Normally, cutting weapons like swords, especially none enhanced by magic, held no threat to her. She could just allow them to passively cut through her body and reform the slashes with ease, like they never happened.

But magic swords were different. They destroyed what they cut, causing wounds that would be unthinkable with regular swords. As evidenced by the earlier stab, and the constant ringing in her head, those swords were some type of magic and she wanted them no where near the inside of her body.

She squished herself towards the ground as a sword flew overhead, then leaped towards alexander with her claws extended. Her eyes went wide when 4 swords came crashing down to form a shield infront of Alex, and her body extended to the ground, stopping her forward momentum.

Alexander yawned “How long are you going to fight like that?” He asked, waving his hand. The four swords that previously formed a shield pointed their tips towards her and sped rapidly in her direction.

She shrunk her body again, allowing them to pass above her harmlessly before leaping into the air to avoid a fifth slashing from the side “Fight like what?” she asked.

He motioned to her “That form, we have seen you fight in it all day. I know you are a slime, start fighting more like one, you are already forming some pretty grotesque shapes there, why do you revert to that cat?” Alexander asked, shoving his sword into the ground and leaning up against it, bored.

Catherine smirked “What’s the matter? Using your bullshit swords isn’t fun?” she asked as she dodged, morphing between blades and warping her body. Noticing that the crowd was also starting to lose interest with the constant dodge fest. The amusement of seeing her stretch and morph having wore off.

He raised an eyebrow “I’m sure constantly dodging isn’t fun either? Why not go on the offensive?” He raised his hands and shook his head “Shoot some magic? Show us some tentacles?”

Despite what he said about doing the same thing, Alexander was still controlling his swords in a constant assault, and would even block her with the swords as she approached to get a hit in. she did notice the swords were slowing down, but with the alarm in her head going off she was sure that was just Alexander becoming bored. “Well not my problem, if you are bored why don’t you surrender? Or perhaps use that fancy move you used on me ea-“

“you mean like this?”

As one of the swords passed Catherine by, Alexander appeared next to it. His giant body gripping the sword and forcing the momentum to halt, where he then swung it down.

“Fucker!” Catherine screamed, twisting her body but was unable to react in time, her arm flying clean off and landing on the ground besides him as she leaped away, clutching the dripping stump where her arm used to be.

Alexander smirked “ask and you shall receive!” he gloated “Really, I do not know why you are limiting yourself.”

Catherine growled, reforming her arm “Maybe I just don’t think you are worth the effort.” She grinned.

He raised his brow “not worth the effort huh?” The six swords flew behind his back, the one stuck in the ground dislodging itself to join the others “well then, if that’s how you feel.” He raised his arms, the swords raising up into the air before all of them pointed towards her, their tips began to glow.

Catherine paled, guessing it was the same skill or at least something similar to what Xioh used, and with her current luck these were also homing. The imagine of dodging multiple projectiles at once did not seem like a good time.

Alexander laughed seeing her expression “So, still think I’m not worth your time?! Let’s just see how much you ca- WOAH NELLY!” Alexander leaped to the side upon noticing several white spikes extended from Catherine’s severed arm, one of the spikes managing to cut into his right leg. “Ah you bitch finally did it at my best moment huh?” Alexander said as he landed

Catherine smirked, opening her mouth to say something she was interrupted by Alexander screaming before cleanly cutting off his right leg. Catherine was speechless, as was the rest of the arena.

Alexander picked up his severed right leg, tossing it several meters away he dropped down to the ground, his swords surrounding him in a circle. He then raised both his arms “I Surrender, Kathy get over here and run a cleanse ASAP.” There was no reply, the arena was quite. Alex looked over to the stunned spectators before slamming his fist to the ground “Kathy! I fucking surrendered, Catherine won, Freaking announce that already and get over here and run a cleanse!”

Kathy blinked, readjusting her glasses and clearing her throat she spoke “Yes sir! Uhm, Catherine wins!” She yelled into the silent hall before running over to Alexander. She knelt down next to him and reached her hand out, a small black hole appearing infront of her hand. She reached inside and pulled out a small syringe and stabbed into Alexanders body, injecting the liquid.

Alexander sighed in relief “Thanks Kathy.”

She nodded, then looked over to the severed leg “Should I…reattach the leg sir?”

“Hell no, Its bad now.” He said, fixing his gaze onto the confused Catherine “Aint that right?” he yelled towards her.

Catherine blinked a few times, then slowly glanced over to the severed leg, then turning her gaze to Alex. “…tch” She clicked her tongue, Alexanders severed leg starting to dissolve. The slime she had managed to inject inside of his leg disposing of it.

Murmurs started to fill the hall, some of the guards who throughout the night started to draw their weapons, mainly the ones with the magical guns. Another loud slam resounded in the hall.

“Did I fucking say to ready your weapons?! Go back to your bet’s you bastards. I’m sure someone just made bank.” Alexander said, nodding to himself once he noticed they listened to him. He then turned his gaze towards Catherine “well, despite the mixed reaction I’m sure a lot of these folks would love to have you on their side, and you still haven’t met a lot of our stronger members what do you say?”

Catherine narrowed her eyes “what do you think? I have enough people throwing me around already.”

“Figured.” He gave a heavy sigh. One of the swords flew to his side, and he used it to prop himself up. “well, we will get you set up, won’t stop you from leaving. Your, companion, will be up by tomorrow.” He then glanced towards Kathy “Have a pod transport her to some available quarters, see what she needs, we wont be able to offer everything for free but if you have anything to do trade…” he eyed her, looking at the clean rags she wore “Heh, Yeah you have some sort of storage, share some of that junk with us y’here?”

Catherine sighed, for a moment she thought about just taking what she wanted and leaving but, even if Alex was acting right now, those swords of his still set off the alarms in her head. And she doubted he was actually serious when fighting her. She was just going to take her cheap win and run. “fine, I do have some stuff you might be interested in. better armor then what you guys have.” She said, glancing at the guards shabby armor.

The secretary, Kathy, stepped forward. “Any gear provided will be properly compensated best to our abilities. This will also greatly cover the cost of us assisting you.”

Alexander waved his hand in the air, signaling everyone to leave. And after a few minutes the room was empty, minus Alexander, Catherine, and Kathy. “Lets see what you got.”

Catherine’s body expanded, doubling in size before her stomach opened up, hundreds of empty armor, swords, empty tech rifles and a few bows poured out from her storage, along with a few small magic crystals.

Alexander brought a palm to his face, rubbing his temples “Yeah, of course it was you…” he said

Catherine tilted her head to the side “what now?” she asked.

Kathy stepped up, tapping on her glasses and the holographic screen appeared in front of her “Few days ago our spies reported a ship filled with fresh off planet soldiers got attacked in transport, the entire crew and a few high ranking individuals were among the casualties. This, of course, never made it to the public and was swiftly and easily swept under the rug. Other spies stationed near the ports also reported information the shared similarities, particularly via the gossiping cleanup crew who were more talkative then they should have been.”

Kathy moved away from them, staring at the pile of armor and weapons “most notebly they told a tale of how a ship just came in that got completely wiped out by a dungeon monster, and that monster was integrated into the organization.”

Alexander laughed “With this grade of armor, turns out it wasn’t just drunken tales, not that we doubted it. The organization picking up unique monsters is nothing new, happens all the time and even under more extreme circumstances. Hell, If Delvin or Monolith ever surrendered, I’m sure they would just be forgiven and integrated with a fresh leash around their necks. Speaking of.” Alexander eyed Catherine’s neck “If it was you, I don’t see a leash. How’d you get rid of it?”

Catherine recognized the first name, but Monolith was a new one “…monolith?” She asked

Alexander clicked his tongue “Way to show your age. You know Delvin right? Just a dungeon master. contained by the organization. Monolith is sorta the same. A dungeon master, but unlike Delvin isn’t contained for shit. back when they captured Delvin, whose dungeon originally orbited a planet just outside the organization’s control, Monolith, who resided on the planet, threw a fit. “

“The organization did not detect Monolith’s presence on the planet, otherwise protocol would have been to contain them first. “Kathy chimed in “Monolith’s fit, as Alexander put it. Is one of the biggest disasters The organization has ever suffered. The biggest loss was an entire city ship being destroyed in Monolith’s retaliation. The dungeon now is in a somewhat, dormant state compared to when Monolith was rampaging, but only small ships are allowed near it out of fear Monolith would become active.”

“This has lead to a sort of, anarchy planet, being formed.” Alex said “The organization does have a base near the planet, but its not enough to control the planet. I think only one settlement controlled by the organization remains. “

Kathy nodded “one station in orbit, one medium sized town hosting a few thousand, and dozens of small villages with multitudes of different factions.”

Alexander laughed “If you ever sign up for the organizations scouting party of uncharted worlds, they have a 3 hour long training video of protocols they use. Monolith and Delvin are the reason a lot of them exist, and some argue that Delvin, who they have captured, should be destroyed.”

“While more smart members argue that doing so would further provoke Monolith, who appears dormant.”

And I’m supposed to just fly there and deliver a briefcase of unknown crap to them… “right, so the organization is just full of dumbasses, got it. So what can this stuff get me?”

“more then what we could provide with just the armor.” Kathy said, still going through the inventory “we can set you up significantly better.”

“wiiiith?” Catherine asked

“First of all we can set you up with some Fake ID and rank, reminds me, Catherine.”

“yeah?” she looked towards him.

“You are not spacer rank C. at best you are planet based upper A.”

Catherine blinked “wait, you said Carlos was A rank!”

Alexander chuckled “I lied, Carlos is Rank D PB”

Catherines eye twitched “But wait, Nyoka, the other cat beastman, said she was rank C.”

“PB or spacer?”

Catherine paused, she never said “But I’ve been into Delvin’s dungeon! Even the lower levels!”

Alexander did a fake gasp “oh you were! Oh do tell me how many monsters you killed on those levels!” when Catherine didn’t answer, and instead glared at him he smirked “people in the organization have a weird quirk of saying their highest rank and withholding what class it is. Delvin’s dungeon’s power spike is a good example of how stupid it is. Early floors are based on pb, more you get down the more it encroaches on being classified as spacer as if its some kind of sick joke.”

Catherine frowned “What about on that ship I killed, one girl said she was S rank.”

Alexander rolled his eyes “everyone on that ship you were on had a planet based rank, to give you an idea of the difference My rank is Spacer D, lower end at that. And if you think you seriously won that match” the size swords previously rotating around Alex protectively vanished, appearing around Catherine in an encirclement, their tips starting to glow. Alex himself loudly screamed, his body shining lightly and with a wet squishing sound his severed leg rapidly grew back.

Now standing on his fresh new leg he smirked “ a few of the guys probably were not even going to point their weapons at you, but at me for cheating them, how much money did we make Kathy?”

Kathy adjusted her glasses “not nearly enough after the last time”

The swords around Catherine vanished “figured…”

“Yeah could tell you were not into it, next time do me a favor and at least put up more of a show yeah? I will give you credit, that infection shit could kill a lot of higher up people, trouble is getting it inside them. Just a heads up to, a lot of us have skills to strengthen our bodies against penetration.”

“Phrasing, sir.” Kathy said then approached Catherine “We will set you up with your ID and rank later, as will any needed explanations.”

“So what now?” Catherine asked

“For now, a pod will be waiting outside that will take you to some quest housing.” Kathy said, tapping on her glasses, the screen closing “tomorrow morning another will come to pick you up, and we will discuss things from there.” She said

Catherine glanced at Alexander “So upper A huh.”

Alex crooked his head to the side ‘Your rank? From what you showed me yeah. What? Want to go again for a better score against this old man?”

Catherine shook her head “…nah, pod’s outside right?” seeing Kathy nod she turned to leave. Still lower ranked then Rose… she found herself thinking as she left the building.