It was better to maintain the appearance of low stakes. A friendly spar of no consequence. Even if, in reality, Sae’s performance directly decided whether it was worth risking bringing her into the adaptive dungeon. We’d skated through the trial by the skin of our teeth, and the venture hadn’t ended well.

While it was true that, as individuals, we were both far stronger than we were during the trial thanks to her recent stat boost, our combined strength was still probably less of that than our original group. There was just no easy replacement for the powerhouses we’d lost. Nick and Jinny both.

There was no safety net. No Nick to bulldoze through monsters if either of us were overwhelmed or injured. If I was going to take Sae into the dungeon, she needed to be rock solid.

I took a spot towards the rear of the court. “Sure you don’t want to go over your abilities first?”

“I’m sure.” Sae’s expression was blank as she stared me down. Her demeanor had changed since I’d accepted the rematch, much of the anxiety suddenly absent. The shift in behavior was disquieting, but probably a good sign. “I’ve worked out what some of them do. You already know what I had before. Not really keen on giving advantages away.” She licked her lips in a manner that scared the hell out of me. “How hard do you want to go?”

I hefted a wooden practice saber in my hands. Though light, it was more than heavy enough to cause injuries if I wasn’t careful. “It’s just a spar.”

“Last time we sparred, you almost broke my nose, bashed my head against an armoire, and threw me into a pool.” Sae glared at me.

“That was an ambush. I reacted accordingly.” I shrugged. “However, point taken. No broken bones.” After reevaluating the claws on the end of her long fingers, I added, “Or deep lacerations. Nothing that would do permanent damage or risk causing an injury that would take more than a simple health potion to fix. Beyond that, we want this to be as real as possible.”

“You’re worried I’ll choke.” Sae frowned.

“It’s just as likely I may be the one to choke.” I said. She pursed her lips, and I explained. “Seriously, I’m counting on you here.”

“Don’t patronize me.”

I bit back an irritated reply. It was better to be honest, even if showing weakness was something that went against my nature. “Look… I’ve started experiencing certain issues ever since the event. Everyday noises startle me. And even though I’m probably far safer here than, well, anywhere else, it’s almost impossible to drop my guard.”

“Post traumatic stress.” Sae connected the dots, and her irritation seemed to melt away.

“Exactly. No idea how bad it is. So, this isn’t just about evaluation. It’s about accountability. I watch your back, you watch mine. If either of us sees anything out of the ordinary, or a glaring issue that wasn’t there before, we call each other out on it.”

Seemingly mollified, Sae rubbed the back of her neck. “You’re making it really hard to be competitive right now.”

“Just putting my cards on the table.” Some of them, at least.

Sae set her legs in a manner that looked more like a sprinter’s stance than anything combat related. “Ready?”

“Ready,” I confirmed, not entirely sure what Sae intended. Did she plan to use her superior strength and speed to plow me over before I could catch my stride? It was a viable strategy, considering the stats, but I couldn’t help but be slightly disappointed by the direct approach.

Without looking away, I evaluated and catalogued my surroundings. There were beams in the center of the room, platforms that formed oversized steps ascending the left and rear walls, where a railed catwalk led to an octagon supported by several beams in the center. I seeded on her legs, anchoring the spell to activate when I pressed my index, third, or fourth finger to my palm. Then an anchored a section of heavy looking pads on the rear wall to my thumb, one of the platforms to my pinky. The mana drain was significant compared to the dice, but far less so on the inanimate objects than Sae herself.

Thick crimson fog rose around us, obfuscating my view of her. I felt myself freeze up. This was some variation of the ability she’d had before. All at once, I was surrounded by red again. I could almost see the silhouettes of figures, shuffling—

screamed, pulling me out of my reverie just in time as Sae emerged like a comet through the mist, glowing blue fist cocked backward.

I threw myself out of the way with no time to think and landed hard on my side, barely managing to salvage the momentum and roll out of it. I sheathed my saber and immediately withdrew my practice bow with There was a meaty thump as Sae slammed into the pads on the back left wall.

The fog was dissipating quickly, but if I played this too passive, she’d be able to regroup and try that insanely quick charge again. I nocked an arrow and released it. It fwipped into the evaporating mist and hit the floor with the clatter of wood on wood. I pressed a finger into my palm and listened for her to fall, then took another shot, and another.

“Time out.” Sae said.

“Unless you’re conceding, we didn’t establish time-outs when we went over the rules.” I answered, taking another shot in the direction of her voice. There was a loud crack, the feathered tail of the arrowing spiraled out of the mist and landed next to me, sliced in half.

Did she just deflect that arrow with her claws?

“Seriously, wait. I might not be able to control it. It’s like I’m constantly peaking. Hard to dial it down.”

I considered that, my heart pounding in my chest. The safest option would be to call this off, let Sae drill for a few days until she was fully comfortable with her abilities. But I wasn’t sure we had time for that.

“It’s fine.”

“What?”

“I have the level advantage, as well as more practical experience. And realistically speaking, you won’t be holding back in a dungeon. It’s better that we get a sense of what you can do.”

“What if I hurt you?” She sounded small, some anxiety returning to her voice.

“I mean, don’t try to hurt me, if it’s avoidable. But let’s play this out.”

There was a moment of hesitation. I watched the mist for movement. It stirred back and to the left, and I drew another arrow, loosing it in the direction of the disturbance. There was no sound of the arrow bouncing off anything, as if the mist itself absorbed it.

“You dropped this.” Sae leapt from the mist holding the arrow I’d just shot out towards me, intent on jabbing the rubber-tip into my neck. I let the bow fall and braced. took over, and I used my body as a pivot, deflecting her momentum away from myself.

But she wasn’t as light as before, just like all that strength wasn’t for nothing. Sae kept her grip on my arm and fell to the ground, pulling me forward and planting a foot on my chest.

Then, with a movement as casual as a kid kicking a soccer ball, Sae launched me. I flew backwards, hit the floor and eventually slid to a stop, trying to shake off the disorientation before it cost me.

She’d knocked me over by one of the platforms that led up to the octagon.

I baited her, waiting until the last possible moment to throw myself forward as she aimed a brutal kick towards my mid-section, her leg hitting the platform behind me instead. It splintered even as she grimaced in pain, and I spun on my back, kicking a leg out from under her and withdrawing my saber in the same motion.

But I’d underestimated how many new tools Sae had to play with. Long black blades formed of chitin emerged from her elbows and she swiveled, driving a blunted edge into my saber, knocking it away. When the follow-up strike came, I was already leaping upwards and back, helping me clear the chest high platform and land on top of it.

There was less than a second to appraise the blades. They were around a foot and a half long, and didn’t seem to carry much of an edge. More bludgeons than swords. It wasn’t a bad set up for her—she could use the elbow extensions to soften and disorient a target, then move in with her claws for the kill.

Problem was, I had no idea how to defend against it. If I was going to win, I needed to figure out a solution. Quickly. I retreated up the platforms, Sae chasing behind me. When she reached the seeded platform, I pressed my pinky to my palm and the platform collapsed, dumping her off, following it up with my third finger, making certain she fell.

Without hesitating, I used and pulled my crossbow, firing from the hip as Sae plummeted towards the ground, momentum still carrying her towards me. A feeling of victory rose in my chest. Sae fought well to this point, but there was no way she could avoid a shot at this range.

The arrow struck her and bounced off—but did nothing to counter stop her heel from obliterating the platform beneath my feet.

She landed hard on her side, and I fell right beside her. My head banged against the wall as I landed and stars exploded behind my eyes. I stabbed the saber towards her blindly, and she knocked it away with an elbow blade, slamming the dull side into my gut before I could so much as blink.

There was a momentary reprieve as we both scrambled to our feet and put distance between us.

I panted. “You’re… a lot better…”

“So are you.” Sae flexed her wrist suddenly, and two thorn-sized black projectiles shot towards me. The double-tap. I delayed my reaction just long enough to insure I didn’t dodge into the second. They embedded themselves into the ground a foot away from me. The range wasn’t long—probably shorter than my crossbow. But if she intended to use them in conjunction with her poison buff, they didn’t need much in the way of range.

She rushed me before I could comment further. I barely fended her off, working on overdrive to redirect and deflect her attacks as we clashed over and over again. Her strength and speed were oppressive as she threw herself at me, every blocked hit landing like a battering ram.

She’d clearly spent a lot of time thinking about how to use her abilities, and managed to put them into execution almost flawlessly. It wasn’t just that she was better, though she was. The tentativeness to her movements was gone. As if she’d overcome a mental barrier that’d been holding her back before.

The system had taken something precious from her. Her identity and to some extent, her humanity. And in return, it had made her a force to be reckoned with.

If I was being honest, I wasn’t confident I could take her in a straight fight. Maybe if I was playing dirty, screwing with her head and using both summons, it might be doable. But it was hardly a certain outcome.

That felt like an important reality check. Because Sae was just one User among a sea of hundreds of thousands. And after the transposition, every single person in that sea—the vast majority of them, at least, would be searching for an edge. An advantage. They’d be leveling and growing as quickly as they could manage, gathering items and artifacts to solidify their power.

And every one of them was a potential threat.

We were both fatiguing now, though I was fading faster than her. I wasn’t built for long, drawn out battles. Even if it was just a spar.

I stabbed out suddenly with my saber, using the final instance of probability cascade, hoping to catch her by surprise.

Sae recovered from the stumble, swiping my saber away and sending it tumbling to the ground. I reached for my inventory just as she grabbed me by the throat. The sharpened tips of her claws pressed lightly into my neck.

“Tap out.” Sae growled.

With a smirk, I glanced down. “Draw?”

She followed my gaze downward and groaned. I’d managed to pull out and press it against her abdomen just as her hand had closed around my throat.

“Ugh. Fine.” She released my throat and collapsed to the ground. “Really thought that was a win.”

“Almost was.”

Sae peered at me suspiciously. In truth, I’d intended to sandbag. Throw the match if it meant building her confidence back up. But that intention hadn’t lasted longer than five seconds. She was packing too much power for me to do anything half-assedly. A single lapse in focus would have been my undoing.

I snorted, poking at my bruised ribs. “Let's never do that for real.”

Sae raised an eyebrow. “Because we’ll both end up in the hospital?”

“Or bleed out in the ambulance.”

Silence held as we regained our breath. After we’d taken an adequate amount of time to rest, we started discussing strategy. Sae hadn’t used her buffs nearly as much as she could have, the influx of strength and speed distracting her from what were previously her core abilities.

Conversely, Sae gave me shit for my continued lack of creativity.

“We just talked about how you need more variety than tripping people.” She glared.

“One, it was a spar and there’s not that much to work with in here. Two, defending against your onslaught took the entirety of my attention. But yes, you’re not wrong.” I had been using the power in a more effective way—casting it beforehand and triggering those actions after. Now, I needed to test its limits.

“So…” Sae said. “We’re really doing it then. Finding a dungeon tomorrow and getting back to the grind.”

That posed an interesting quandary. If it lined up with the trial, the dungeon would probably reset any floor we entered as a party. If my theory held, I’d originally intended to redo the first and second floors as a softball, intending to save most of my mana and strength for the lithid. The lithid itself was still off-limits. But now that I thought about everything up to that point, the dungeon seemed to primarily adapt to level first, class and individual second. Which meant Sae would be bringing our average level down, while punching far above her weight-class.

“Our priority should be getting you to level ten as quickly as possible.”

“That’s a big jump.” Sae opened one eye and looked at me. “Sounds like you figured out what Nick’s friend was being all cryptic about.”

“The system augments stats at level ten, buffing the two highest you have. From what I can tell so far, it’s not necessarily a direct buff—more like getting several feats based around the skill, giving it more utility. Your Strength and Agility are already a force to be reckoned with, even as they are now. After? You’d be terrifying.” I said.

“Good.” Sae stared up at the ceiling. “It’s better than being weak.”

“The plan I have in mind makes sense. It’ll help me expand my repertoire with the ability, and hopefully boost your level. However, it will require some, uh, flexibility on your part.” I admitted.

She shifted, and I felt her eyes on me. “Why do I get the feeling I’m not going to like this?”