The rest of the dinner passed relatively uneventfully as Hayakawa and Lord Noguchi discussed some vaguely political sounding things that Jia didn’t pay much attention to. With the exhibition agreed upon, Jia and Eui’s exoticism faded into the background—their hosts' curiosity deferred for later. Jia hardly had to do more than address the occasional comment about her prodigious appetite as she made a point of sampling every single dish on the table—and surreptitiously storing some of the better dishes away in her ring for later. Some habits died hard. When Jia tried to explain it away on the basis that she’d been subsisting mainly on magical beasts for the better part of two years, that prompted Lord Noguchi to have some ‘properly prepared’ ki-infused dishes brought out. To Jia’s surprise, they were actually quite good, and she regretted not having the opportunity to steal extras. Eui asked about the preparation methods, and Lord Noguchi magnanimously offered to introduce her to the chef.

Overall, it was a surprisingly pleasant evening that didn’t have any of the stiff formality that Jia had expected from such an event. Admittedly, it was an informal dinner rather than something like a diplomatic negotiation, but the whole thing left Jia feeling cautiously optimistic that she wouldn’t make a complete ass of herself in the real thing. Thus, pleasantly full and with a storage ring restocked with enough delicious food to last her for a little while, Jia was in a good mood when Lord Noguchi and his squad of bodyguards led them into an enormous, high-ceilinged room with a large floor made of semi-soft mats laid out in an artistic arrangement. Lord Noguchi spread his arms out excitedly as he strode into the room and spun to address them.

“Welcome to the castle dojo! We’ve been rather informal so far, and I see no reason to do away with that! It would be terribly boring to skip right to the main event, so why don’t we have a few warm up rounds?”

Jia glanced around, suffering a minor spike of stage fright as she saw a small crowd of maids, servants, and some of the guests from the dinner that she hadn’t bothered to acquaint herself with gathering along the periphery of the huge room.

“Um, sure...what did you have in mind?”

Noguchi grinned at her excitedly as he responded.

“A baseline to start with—something simple to whet our appetites!”

He singled out one of his bodyguards and beckoned the man forth. By Jia’s estimate, he would be in the late second stage—perhaps even peak—and his muscular build on an already huge frame cut a figure that would have been imposing to Jia three years ago. Now it just seemed a bit wasteful. Had Lord Noguchi picked out his largest bodyguard specifically to contrast Jia’s diminutive build? Why had she been feeling so self-conscious about that recently? She snapped her attention back to the present just in time for Lord Noguchi to explain himself.

“Iida here is one of my better retainers. While I’m sure he’s no match for elites like Lady Hayakawa or her half-spirit friends, perhaps Miss Takeda would like to demonstrate her abilities? Just to give our audience context for the exhibitions to come.”

Jia glanced sidelong at Rika who was predictably scowling at the implication that she would be an even match for Iida. It was an easy mistake to make—to Jia’s senses, Rika and Iida both had similar levels of cultivation, around the peak of the second stage. However, like most practitioners in Yamato, Iida was purely a body cultivator while Rika had trained her mind and soul to match. Not only that, but Takeda Rika’s cultivation method unified body, mind, and soul in the same way that Jia and Eui’s did, which further empowered her. Like Jia—and by extension Eui and Yoshika—Rika had half a foot in the realm of xiantian cultivators, including her own domain, which granted her near-total control over the essence within it.

In other words, Iida wasn’t anywhere close to a match for Rika, who was in fact probably more suitably matched against Hayakawa, despite the full stage gap between them. Rika bared her teeth in an expression that only the most charitable observer would call a ‘grin’ and held out a hand, with three fingers extended.

“Three. I’ll take three of your bodyguards at once, and I’ll do it without moving from this spot.”

Lord Noguchi blinked in surprise, but rallied quickly and clapped his hands.

“Fantastic! I knew this would be entertaining! Ogawa, Sada, join Iida against Miss Takeda.”

Two more retainers stepped forward, looking a bit uncertain as they took positions on either side of their larger compatriot. Iida himself scratched a cheek awkwardly.

“Erm, not to put too fine a point on it, little miss, but how exactly are you going to fight us from over there?”

Jia cringed—Rika was the tallest girl she’d ever met at six feet tall, and she had a competitive streak that did not tolerate patronization. Calling her ‘little miss’ was asking for trouble. Rika’s teeth ground together as Jia felt Rika’s domain expanding outward to encompass the dojo. She politely withdrew her own in order to allow her friend control over the room. Three identical duplicates of Rika coalesced out of thin air, each one standing opposite one of the bodyguards. They spoke in unison, and Jia couldn’t help but chuckle at Rika copying one of Yoshika’s favorite tricks.

“Like this. Any other questions?”

The three men exchanged looks with each other before simply shrugging and taking up stances. Both sides bowed politely to their opponents as Lord Noguchi went over the rules of the bout.

“These are just friendly sparring matches. Try not to cause any real damage to either each other or my floors. The fight ends either when one side admits defeat, or when I say so, agreed?”

Rika nodded her assent.

“Then you may begin at your leisure.”

All three of Rika’s doubles rushed forward at once, and Yoshika merged her thoughts in order to better follow multiple threads of action. She soon realized that she needn’t have bothered when Rika’s copies all ganged up on Iida, completely ignoring the other two fighters. One Rika went high, striking at the large man with a flurry of punches and kicks that were more numerous than they appeared, judging from Iida’s struggle to parry various invisible strikes. Another went low, harassing Iida with disruptive shin-kicks and invisible telekinetic projections that threw off his balance and completely ruined his footing. The third stayed back and began casting spell talismans with effects that weren’t immediately obvious.

Yoshika leaned forward with interest as she watched the two other fighters try to come to their companion’s aid, only to be blocked by invisible walls of force. In moments, Iida was brought down to the ground and pinned in place by some kind of invisible restraints. Yoshika was impressed on a number of levels. First, Rika had vastly improved her control of multiple bodies over the last two years, to the point that they now worked together nearly as smoothly as Yoshika did. Second, Yoshika had no idea how Rika had gotten the spell talismans to the copy that was playing the role of support. Her copies were very realistic, but they were still constructs of essence—any talismans they carried should be illusionary copies.

Within the span of a minute, Rika isolated and took down each of the bodyguards without even allowing a single one of them to show off their own techniques. The three bodyguards shamefully admitted their defeat, and the gathered crowd applauded Rika’s demonstration. Lord Noguchi himself didn’t seem perturbed that his personal guard had been so thoroughly dismantled, laughing goodnaturedly as he applauded.

“Hahaha, wonderful! I should have known that there would be more than meets the eye to someone in Lady Hayakawa’s retinue! Very impressive! Well then, is there anyone willing to challenge our one-woman army here?”

It was impossible to miss the way four copies of the same pair of dark brown eyes fell on Yoshika at once. Rika’s competitive streak was as long as she was tall.

“What do you say, shorties? You’re not the only ones who’ve been training.”

Yoshika chuckled a bit at the theatrics of it. Well, if she was being challenged directly, then there was nothing for it. She stepped forward to accept Rika’s challenge, to the applause of Lord Noguchi and the rest of the growing crowd—this was becoming something of an event. Yoshika spoke in Jia’s voice as she addressed one of her oldest friends.

“Are you sure about this, Rika? You know you stand about as much of a chance as Iida did against you, right?”

Rika shrugged, rolling her shoulders as her real body stepped into the dojo.

“Maybe not, but I want to see it for myself. I know how crazy you two are, but I still remember the cocky little brat getting slammed into the dirt when she got overconfident, and the girl so skittish that she pulled a knife on me in a friendly spar. At the end of the day, I’m still your senior, aren’t I?”

Yoshika covered her mouths as she giggled. Rika was really putting it on.

“Alright, fine. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

Yoshika expanded her domain, encompassing Rika’s and crushing it in an instant. To her surprise, Rika’s copies remained, each one acting as a source of Rika’s domain. However, Rika’s face immediately betrayed her nerves—she hadn’t expected Yoshika to be able to suppress her domain so easily. It was easy enough to understand why—Rika hadn’t had anyone to practice the control of her domain against, while on the rare occasions that Yoshika did, it was against Jianmo.

Ignorant of the metaphysical battle already happening before his very eyes, Lord Noguchi cluelessly gave the signal to begin the match. Yoshika didn’t move, considering her options as Rika advanced with two copies, leaving two behind to cast spells in an attempt to split the fight into two one-on-one battles. Time seemed to grind to a halt as Yoshika accelerated her mind with Absolute Awareness.

Yoshika had a wide variety of techniques at her disposal. Mental techniques were her weakest aspect—there hadn’t been much opportunity to study while lost in the wilderness, and she’d been forced to make do with sub-par talisman materials after running out of ink and paper. She’d been able to scrounge up a few valuable materials with which to make some extremely powerful talismans, but they would be inappropriate for a spar like this—they were trump cards for when she was in real danger.

Her most useful mental technique was Absolute Awareness, the very skill that was enabling this review of her skills. It would accelerate her thoughts enormously, and allow her to recall with perfect precision everything that she experienced while using it. That said, after years of practice, she’d gotten good enough with her standard lightning spells to cast them without talismans—with a little help from her personal artifact.

The Claws of Heaven and the Fist of Earth—which she somewhat regretted giving such a grandiose name—were a pair of mismatched gloves. They were artifacts of her own creation that helped her channel the essences of lightning and destruction, particularly with the bodies that lacked the normal affinity to those elements. Eui wore the Claws of Heaven to enhance her ability to wield lightning, while Jia wore the Fist of Earth, giving her more control over the rather volatile element of destruction. Primarily, this allowed Yoshika to use her signature martial arts interchangeably between bodies—albeit with some limitations.

Eui’s Six Arms of Asura technique allowed her to empower weapons or her own body with the element of destruction—a powerful but volatile element that was anathema to all others. Thrown weapons like her favorite knives would explode violently, while empowered strikes would cut through anything effortlessly. In the wilderness, Eui had long since run out of her preferred throwing knives and learned to take up the sword instead. When Jia used the technique, she could imbue the claws of her gloved hand with the same power of destruction.

Jia’s Lightning God Transformation technique was a quick, mobile style that favored erratic movements and pressure-point strikes. Her lightning steps would partially transform her body into bursts of lightning that zipped unpredictably from place to place, while her sharp-clawed spear hand strikes would deliver paralyzing jolts of lightning essence into the meridians of an enemy combatant through their pressure points. In its ultimate form, Jia could use the Lightning God Transformation to flood her entire body with lightning essence, dramatically increasing her speed and strength, and allowing her to turn herself into a human lightning bolt for a single, overwhelming strike. In Eui’s body, the technique mostly let her use lightning steps to move much faster than her stiff, blocky Six Arms style would normally allow.

Lasty, Yoshika had an entire arsenal of spiritual techniques that she had once looted from Yan Zhihao, the late scion of the Great Awakening Dragon Sect—one of the Qin Empire’s most powerful ruling bodies. Her signature techniques were The Tranquility of the Verdant Marsh, and Corruption of the Fetid Bog. The same technique, but with reversed aspects. One was a wood element technique that used the power of life and growth to heal herself and others, while the other allowed her to focus the powers of corrosion and decay into a powerful sickening aura that would rot foes' bodies from the inside out. Other abilities granted by her spiritual arts included projecting qi attacks from weapons, limited flight, reducing the weight of her bodies to almost nothing, creating simple illusions, and controlling gravity within her domain.

The signature technique of the Awakening Dragon Sect was the Awakening of the Dragon’s Heart, normally a fire element technique, which Jia had adapted to what Yan Yue had called the ‘true’ form of the technique—a strange fire which would burn only essence, leaving the physical completely unharmed. Supposedly a technique which originated from legendary dragons.

That wasn’t the full breadth of Yoshika’s abilities, but most of her other techniques wouldn’t be useful in combat. As such, she left it at that and began to devise a strategy to most efficiently dispatch one of her best friends without causing any undue harm. When she was satisfied with her plan, Yoshika prepared herself and allowed her thoughts to return to normal speed.

Several things happened at once as time appeared to resume. First Yoshika carefully identified which Rika was the real one—it was a bit hard to tell, but she had no intention of destroying Rika’s constructs and setting her friend’s cultivation back, so it was important that she concentrate her efforts where they would matter most. Second, Jia and Eui’s bodies simultaneously traced a jagged arcing path of lightning steps between Rika’s duplicates to arrive next to Rika’s real body with a loud thunderclap. Third, Jia erupted in a rainbow-hued nova of plasma essence, utterly dismantling the shield of force protecting Rika without causing her any real harm. Finally, both of Yoshika’s bodies delivered a sharp flurry of pressure point strikes that quickly rendered Rika insensate as she fell to the floor convulsing from the lightning essence flooding her meridians.

Without Rika’s concentration, the essence constructs dissipated, and Yoshika withdrew her domain to allow Rika’s to naturally recover her projected power. From start to finish, the entire fight had taken just over a second. Yoshika wasted no time in healing her downed friend, bringing her back to consciousness and helping her up. The room was silent as Rika looked around sheepishly, climbing to her feet and swallowing nervously as she met Yoshika’s eyes.

“Holy shit, Yoshika.”