It worked, Llorona’s scream deflected Asherah’s blow and the light from it’s back seemed to dim a stage. Quickly Elijah shifted two of the mines from his back to his other shoulder as Asherah briefly spun on one heel before vanishing again.

“Impressive.” Lydia said from the stands as the girls around her cheered. Chloe and Holly were shocked when they noticed the new student’s opponent, More so when the new student blocked the first strike. The group that had come with them apparently hadn’t noticed the significance or recognized Asherah at all. A pity, if they were her students she would need to properly educate them later.

Something seemed off to Elijah though he didn’t know exactly what. The strike to his right was once more deflected as the aural mines went off. Wasting no time Elijah summoned the hip mounted laser canons and burned his thrusters to preform a hard 180° spin. The mines previously on his shoulders dropped to his feet and as he turned Asherah was once more stopped just shy of cutting into him by the shrieking mines. He fired without hesitation and was sure the hit connected before Asherah vanished again.

Third hit in the sequence Elijah thought to himself. Only a handful of opponents made it further than this in the footage he saw. There was no time to banish the weapons at his waist so he didn’t bother to, he fired them both at full blast.

“Misstep.” Lydia said as the lasers struck true.

“Really, how?” Holly asked.

“No stopping power.” Chloe quickly responded.

“Look!” Sunny shouted. “The mines he dropped are slowing it down.”

“Not enough.” Lumi said unable to tear her eyes away from Asherah’s shimmering form.

Everyone in the stands collectively held their breath as the chest of Llorona bloomed like a flower. Is he going to fire his coffin again? Bianca wondered to herself. No, apparently he was not. As the chest of Elijah’s unit opened to reveal a cluster of speakers Llorona once again screamed.

As Elijah’s world began to quake he noticed an alert on the screen in front of him. Just as he expected the shock of Llorona’s attack had vibrated his weapons into uselessness. He took in the form of Yukiko’s Vain Glory and noticed that the blades on the forearms and two on the waist were gone. Were the weapons meant to be one offs or had the sound from his Vain Glory done something to them? There was no time to ponder it as Asherah vanished again.

Had he been flying he knew the next strike would have been from below to shear off a leg, having kept firmly to the ground he knew the sequence would be more limited. A flash of light to his left confirmed the truth of Lydia’s video once again but Elijah couldn’t maneuver away in time and the canon on his waist was cleaved through. He tried to dodge the next blow but once again Asherah had been a step ahead and the second canon was now gone as well.

The pressure began to mount as Elijah tried to remember what step he was in, had Asherah struck six times now? Seven? Ten? Sweep. Upper right. Head. The screens screamed warnings and flashed red as the damaged mounted. This was either ten incoming or a shift in the pattern he couldn’t predict. Elijah flared his power to silence the alarms. The next strike would be a thrust through the chest, usually with more than enough room for the coffin to deploy if Yukiko’s opponents had the good sense to have one equipped. He summoned the shoulder cannons, shifted the last two mines on his back to just under the guns and fired, then had Llorona scream once more.

Asherah was blasted back as the lasers struck true followed by a wall of almost solid sound. Beneath her helmet Yukiko’s smile stretched her face. It had been a long time since she’d had to put any effort into a fight and she relished the opportunity to stretch her legs a bit. Asherah’s glow had faded almost completely, the blades at her sides and arms spent, and the amount of energy that flooded into her Vain Glory from it’s core threatened to drown itself in fire. She requested a comms line with her opponent forgetting the unit she was facing and was greeted with an ungodly screech of feedback for her troubles. She laughed hard at the fact that the trick Gloria had been so proud of implementing had actually hit her and mentally flipped a switch.

The heat from the core spiked as Asherah summoned a dozen floating blades. The ring behind her began to glow once more then spun to force cooler air into her core, her armor split at the arms legs and chest as more air was taken in though not enough to stop the cherry red glow that began to suffuse Asherah. Heat shimmered around her and the light seemed to bend as she exploded upwards.

Elijah had not remained idle, attempting to drag the beams that his weapons emitted upwards after Asherah. Unlike the weapons previously at his waist the aural mines he positioned under the guns had been working to counter the destructive sound that rang out from Llorona. Unfortunately with all of his focus on the skies he failed to notice the blade that skewered through his left shoulder, Ripping through his arm but leaving the cannon intact. Elijah oh a hunch dove hard to the left and narrowly avoided a second blade. Unfortunately the third pierced through Llorona’s back. A well timed scream blasted the one angling for his chest away, and he was able to shoot down the two that came for the legs.

Elijah was furious when he realized that the blades were just attacking the same points that Asherah had. Thinking back to his incredulity when Lydia revealed the pattern to him frustrated him further. It really didn’t matter that he knew where the strikes would happen. Llorona just couldn’t keep up. He had maybe one trick left before he considered throwing in the towel. The aural mines on the ground were spent of their charges but still mobile and Elijah

readily sacrificed them to physically block the next few blows.

He detached the mines below the shoulder guns and positioned them near the arena’s shielded walls, then dashed forward. The last three blades rocketed towards him and he fired but only caught one in the blast. He twisted to avoid a crippling blow and to his surprise the blades sailed past him. Instincts screaming Elijah Fired once more in a sustained blast towards the aural mines ahead of him.

Yukiko had amused herself as the blade drones did their work by keeping behind Elijah’s position, though high above him. She realized that he’d lost track of her and frowned a bit. She’d be sure to train that out of him once classes started. Once Llorona’s arm had been taken she knew that the fight would be ending soon. At the tenth strike of the attack sequence she came screaming down behind Elijah. He had managed to dodge the lazy path of the blades so she caught them and rose her arms to plunge them into his back. He must have been expecting her she thought as she watched him fire. To her shock the aural mines he sent in front of him screamed and bent the beams back towards them. They struck Asherah’s hands cleanly and continued into the ring on her back. Yukiko couldn’t help but laugh hysterically as she melted through Llorona’s right arm with a swift thrust of Asherah’s remaining forearm then separated it’s legs with superheated a kick.

======================

A heavy silence fell in the stands at the end of the match, soon broken by Bianca and Nadia quietly talking to each other about checking up on Elijah’s condition immediately. Sunny and Lumi sat stunned for a moment as Penny patted them on their shoulders. Lydia Lazzaro smiled as she saw Yukiko break pattern. Every scrap of data she could gather was priceless and she decided that she had room for one more mentee after all.

“That new girl… She’s a fucking monster.” Chloe muttered.

“Agreed.” Holly said.

“I didn’t think anyone could last that long against Asherah…” Chloe continued. “I think I’m in love… Did you see what she did at the end there? Bending the beams like that? I’d be interested in seeing if Joyeux could pull off something similar.”

“Avalon has a few laser tricks that I’d be more than happy to show you.” Holly said.

Elizabeth Carter stared down at the battlefield. Didn’t Yukiko realize that they needed to pay for all the damage they’d caused? They could readily afford it but still. It was the principal of the thing. There were however more pressing issues to address. No one had noticed it yet but Asherah’s hands were scrapped. Training weapons were supposed to be all that was available to prospective students for the combat exam. Llorona’s sonic weaponry was meant to take down large swathes of soldiers and ruin conventional equipment as far as she could tell that had all worked as it should have, but the laser weaponry should have had it’s output capped to safe levels. Someone would be quickly fired for their carelessness. She could forgive her careful instructions being overlooked by the greedy and the stupid but she would not tolerate the safety of students and faculty being ignored.

“Excuse me ma’am.” Evona said to Lydia.

“Yes?”

“How exactly is the pilot to get out?”

“Oh, that’s an interesting point. The coffin certainly didn’t deploy.”

“Elizabeth?” Lydia began. “Is a crane or some such arriving?”

“Oh, We had been keeping this a more discreet affair. I suppose I could have someone from maintenance come down early.”

“Ah, I can go down and drag him back into the doors he came from if you want.” Penny volunteered.

“Bianca, is that fine with you?” Elizabeth asked.

“Sounds good.”

Elizabeth pulled a tablet from a pouch on the side of her wheelchair and entered a few quick commands. With a loud hum the shields in their section of the stands flashed white then dropped and a platform extended for Penelope to summon her GM safely. Penny quickly did so without much fanfare and gently flew over towards the fallen Llorona. A brief exchange was had with Yukiko and as the large entrance doors slid open the Great Machine hoisted what was left of the Llorona and began walking towards the hanger.

“Evona.” Chloe said.

“Yes Chloe?” Evona replied.

“Your friend is amazing. Make them be friends with me.”

“No. You are weird and irritating.” Saif replied.

“That is wonderful logic Saif. Are they not friends with you as well given how irritating you are?” Holly jabbed.

“No. We are not friends. They are madly in love with me.” Saif said in her usual lack of tone. “Sadly I can not return their clear lusts and affections.”

“What a pity. To think there’s someone out there who could love someone like you. Truly this is a more twisted and bleak world than I had first realized.” Holly said, dramatically clutching her hands to her chest. “Really though, I hope introductions would be in order?”

“Well certainly, you already met their sisters, Lumi and Sunny.” Evona replied.

At the mention of her name Sunny turned around and smiled at the group sitting behind them. “My ears are burning! Wow that looked tough, was it that big a fight for the rest of y’all?”

“Not at all, I picked a Tengu and my opponent picked a Zephyr. Out maneuvering them was simple.” Holly said.

“Yeah, it was pretty easy for me too. I picked an Oni and they picked a Proximo. I clubbed it to death.” Chloe chimed in.

“Looks like little J got a bum deal.” Lumi chimed in.

“As riveting as this conversation is perhaps we should move it inside.” Lydia said as she stood and moved towards Elizabeth.

“Yeah, let’s not keep Elijah waiting.” Sunny said, bounding down the arena steps and latching on to her mother’s arm.

“Who’s Elijah?” Chloe asked.

“Our brother. You just watched him get his teeth kicked in.” Lumi said as she followed after Sunny.

“I’m sorry, Did they just imply…?”

“Oh, yes. Elijah is the one enrolling.” Evona said as she passed by the gobsmacked Holly and Chloe.