Arnys not only saw it happen, she physically felt the pressurized deluge of mnemonically imprinted aether flood through her opponent’s body and blade.

Not one to suffer defeat by merely being outranged, Arnys repeated the trick she’d used earlier, flowing Fulgur along the edge of her own weapon and forming a blade of condensed lightning around it.

It took shape nearly instantaneously, and it was still just barely in time.

The two collided. A flash of white and yellow light could be seen amidst a rising, swirling cloud of dust, only for the cloud to be scattered by a powerful shockwave that swept over the stands, followed by a deafening CRACK. Cables and even larger system modules could be seen straining and bursting under strain, spraying strange liquids and pinkish Fog as arcanists around the oval jumped into action, plugging structural failures and swearing in Kargarian.

The ringing of cold-iron. The band and crowd both fell silent.

Two great geysers of what appeared to be blood sprayed upwards, forming a cross and staining everything below red as Zelsys and Arnys stood frozen, paralyzed, as both their metamorphoses faded. For Arnys, this entailed the simple shedding of everything that had grown upon her, her heretofore sizeable scales disintegrating save for tiny, iridescent cores. Zel’s reversion was much more of an energetic loss, her seething aura fading, her muscles returning to their chiseled, but still humanly plausible definition, her breathing and heartbeat both visibly slowing, even though she continued that strange left-lung right-lung rhythm.

As a mixture of fake and real blood rained down around them, as the Lightning Butcher reverted into its natural shape, its additional mass falling away as metallic dust, Zelsys realized two things.

First, half of Arnys’s top was gone and a chunk of surface flesh had been ripped out where her stamp had previously been, leaving bruised, stabbed musculature exposed.

Second, she, too, had been stabbed, as the still-crackling point of the Matriarch’s blade - still inches away from her skin- directed her attention towards the spot, and the searing pain of a cauterized wound beneath her own collarbone reminded her.

Arnys looked down at her own injury, then back at Zelsys as their gazes met.

Zel felt the Primordial Self dialing things back, the cocktail of hormones and her alertness both fading as overwhelming fatigue set it, and though she fully intended to soldier on, she knew better than to forcefully shut it out. She just withstood the all-consuming exhaustion for the moment, holding onto the reins of awareness with white knuckles as Arnys said something to her.

“There are… There are people like you and I in every generation,” she said, effortlessly spinning and sheathing her blade. “We who impose ourselves on the world without regard for its natural course. Do not let those who walk in your footsteps fall to the wayside, and… I don’t need to give you this speech. You already know. We can speak on cultivation later, once the meat is mended.”

Arnys had noticed that something was off well before she had finished speaking, and this was the other reason for cutting herself short. She straightened her back and exclaimed: “But, where are my manners? I’ve been bested to the fullest degree within the limitations I had originally placed upon myself for this exhibition match and then some. Why, even in this final clash, I can with absolute certainty say that it was I who was struck first. I concede! ”

Several of those who had held vigil around the oval’s perimeter now laid on the ground, seizing and struggling for breath, while the oval’s barrier flickered and faded. Banging and rumbling was heard from inside the armored transport, the tankmen seen ushering an arcanist inside carrying a cage with several chickens inside.

Meanwhile, as the musicians on-stage began playing a triumphant melody incorporating elements from a local folk song that Willowdale’s own anthem was based on, after the spectators had already broken into raucous celebration, Zelsys dug deep and took a deep breath.

She allowed the swelling self-satisfaction in her chest to present itself as a beaming and uncharacteristically earnest grin, flexing and showboating for the audience for a good short while, only stopping when Arnys approached her with her hand held out. As they shook hands before the Matriarch would walk off, Arnys whispered, “I’ll have my people find you inside. Get yourself fixed up.”

Nodding, Zel, too, decided that it was high time for her to exit stage left; or rather, exit stage right, in this case. And so she walked, the roar of the crowd sharp and clear in her ears as she carried the Butcher, resting it on her shoulders.

An intrusive thought pushed itself into her mind, as if the smothering fatigue and clamorous hunger wasn’t a clear enough message.

“I need rest. Now.”

“When we get inside,” dismissed the Thinking Self, whose other name so aptly described its care for appearances. Ego. “I need to get to the mess hall either way.”

Zef joined her along the way, but… She didn’t speak. The concerned expression on her face made it clear that she could tell Zel wasn’t in as good a state as she made it seem for the audience’s sake. Smiling, she reassured the blonde, “All good. Just need a breather and something to eat.”

Step by step, Zel swaggered towards the sect doors. Walking up the steps, passing through the barrier, fighting to stay awake and appear tireless the entire way. The chanting of the spectators rang in her ears, from vague, generic cheers, to variations of her own name, to one particular chant that not only stood out, but seemed to quickly spread through the crowd like a wildfire.

The end chant took shape from the intermingling of those who shouted of the engine-like appearance of her breathing method, to those who had been captivated by the feat of a strike so fast as to produce a thunderclap, and her previously mentioned title as a beast-slayer.

“ENGINE BEAST! ENGINE BEAST! THUNDERING ENGINE BEAST!!!”