There was little to no technique or consideration in his assault, his strikes had long wind-ups that she had no issue reading and countering.

She managed to dodge the first two strikes, but he slipped past her guard with a low gut-punch. A full-force elbow strike to his forearm forced the boy back, his arm bending under the force like a branch in the wind. Three consecutive punches, she blocked with her forearms. Halxian swiped at her, which she answered with a light uppercut to his wrist. He wound back, grunting in pain as he unleashed a right jab. A slight movement of the head to avoid the strike, whilst cross-countering with a right-handed jab of her own, exhaling as she did. He ducked under the jab long before it would have struck, well before she had committed. She turned it to a slightly downward right hook.

Her fist, his temple.

The young man spun around and fell to the ground trailing a spiral of Fog, having lost consciousness. Still riding the body high of combat Zelsys stepped towards him, oblivious to how this all must’ve looked to the bystanders.

To the bystanders, the fight was more of a violent light-show than a duel, a dance whose lows were higher than any mundane fistfight’s highs, and whose highs were visual overload to the vast majority of those watching.

Makhus caught pieces of it all and managed to even recognize individual moves, but his eyes were confused by the ribbons of Fog that obscured everything. Even with her Homunculus Eye Zefaris had to pay close attention, lest she lose track of what was happening. And Sigmund… He didn’t even try to keep track of the fight, entirely content to be just like the other bystanders. Even still, he had a good idea of the general course of the duel from beginning to end.

It was obvious the audience that had gathered expected some sort of flashy technique to end off the fight, much like it often happened in choreographed martial arts shows during festivals. Perhaps that subversion of their expectations was part of what made the simple right hook knockout so impactful, a sudden wave of silence spreading through the crowd as the young beast-hunter spun in place and fell to the ground.

The silence grew into a discordant choir when the bronze-skinned amazon took a step towards her unconscious opponent, her eyes gleaming like those of a predatory beast and her face contorted into the snarl of one. A few even called out to her to stop when she ducked down and reached for his face whilst Fog slowly poured from her half-open mouth, but none dared intervene, waiting with bated breath for what she would do.

Surely, she had been consumed by bloodlust over the boy’s insult of her honor.

Her body still coursing with adrenaline and who-knew-what else as she began the descent from the peak of that exhilarated battle-trance, Zelsys thought it would only be a good idea to make sure she hadn’t done something worse than knock Halxian out.