Abnormal Moon

As her thoughts raced, Okita Souji rushed forward, sword in hand, and slashed at her side with a backhand strike.

Bazett narrowed his eyes.

Was the height miscalculated?

The girl's knife wasn't parallel to her line of sight; instead, the side of the knife was visible.

Keep your sword parallel to your line of sight, so that it appears as a line to your opponent. This makes it impossible for them to judge the length of the blade or the distance between you. In this way, a panicked opponent can only retreat to protect themselves.

If you accidentally miscalculate and expose the side of your blade, your opponent will not only be able to calculate the distance between you and block the attack, but you may also be caught off guard, cut into your arms, and be killed in one blow.

Is this a case of focusing too much on offense and forgetting to calculate the angle of attack?

Is it a genuine flaw, or a trap?

If it's a real weakness, then we might be able to win with a single blow!

"When facing Heroic Spirits as opponents, one must not act rashly!"

Bazett felt a surge of excitement, but ultimately abandoned his attack and retreated.

Okita Souji launched a series of powerful attacks, revealing a clear weakness every few moves. It seemed that as long as he seized this weakness and charged in, he could gain an overwhelming advantage.

But seeing that Bazett was only dodging and not attacking at all, Okita Souji frowned slightly.

I wasn't fooled at all.

She deliberately created several openings, and Bazett's reaction showed that she was somewhat tempted. But no matter how she tried to entice him, Bazett suppressed his impulses, stayed true to himself, and was not greedy or reckless. He was incredibly cautious.

Such a warrior, even in her own time, would undoubtedly have become a trendsetter.

"But as my Master's enemy, I will surely kill you!"

Okita Souji's heart tightened, and the murderous aura on his face intensified.

Suddenly, she covered a distance of more than ten meters and appeared in front of Bazett in the blink of an eye.

It was almost like a spatial teleportation. With one step, the distance in between seemed to be erased out of thin air, and he appeared more than ten meters away. The continuous action of running was forcibly transformed into two static states, and in an instant, he moved from one static state to the other.

"what?!"

Bazett stared in astonishment.

Tooth protrusion!

Okita Souji used his sword to strike with a blue eye, the tip of which was aimed directly at Bazette's left eye.

Bazett felt a sharp pain in his left eye, as if a bullet had hit him. Before his brain could react, his body moved first, his feet taking a series of steps backward. At the same time, his left arm, which had been tucked to his side, quickly rose up.

"clang--!"

With a melodious, bell-like clang, Bazett flew backward like a bullet, sliding more than ten meters on the ground before finally coming to a stop. He quickly rolled over and got back into his boxing stance.

A burning pain shot through his left arm. Bazett dared not look at the wound, his eyes fixed on the petite, blond swordsman not far away, not daring to relax for a moment, cold sweat dripping from his forehead.

"If I hadn't been in a defensive stance from the start, that punch would have pierced my brain!"

Bazett was horrified; his heart pounded and his chest heaved violently.

She almost died!

Having just returned from the brink of death, even the King of Hell was puzzled as to why someone had come to visit.

If she had even the slightest thought of being greedy or reckless, she definitely wouldn't have been able to withstand that move.

"That was definitely not spatial teleportation. If it were, I wouldn't have had a chance to dodge at all. That must have been some kind of footwork! It was the ultimate footwork technique that incorporated swordsmanship, breathing, blind spots, movement, and even human consciousness!"

Bazett tucked his hands under his chin, his arms in a defensive stance, his eyes fixed intently on Okita Souji.

"But I'm already prepared, and if I defend with all my might—"

Bazett calculated in her mind that she had roughly understood the young swordswoman's teleportation technique from that attack.

Chapter 10 The Demonic Eye Against the Moon

Okita Souji stood there, a hint of surprise on his cold face.

"I even used the Shrinking Earth technique, and it still managed to defend against this..."

She flicked the knife in her hand, and blood from the blade splattered onto the ground in an arc.

As soon as she finished speaking, she took another step forward, her figure disappearing into Bazett's blind spot. Almost like a dimensional jump, she appeared in front of Bazett in the blink of an eye, slashing at her abdomen with a knife.

Bazett was on guard against her attack. When she suddenly appeared in front of him, his expression changed, but he did not panic. His right arm sank.

Just a tearing sound was heard.

As the sound of tearing cloth rang out, Bazett took several steps back to create distance, and his right arm felt a burning pain, but his abdomen was unharmed.

"No problem, it can be defended against!"

Bazett was invigorated, and his fighting spirit rekindled in his eyes.

Okita Souji curled his lip, feeling utterly frustrated.

She really managed to defend against it!

Her Shrinking Step technique is her strongest trump card besides her Noble Phantasm. Apart from this, her only other trump card is her Noble Phantasm. To reveal this technique, she needs to at least cut off one of her opponent's arms to achieve a satisfactory result.

"This is my first battle since being summoned by my Master. I didn't even manage to defeat the enemy, let alone sustain a decent injury. And my opponent wasn't even a Servant, but a modern-day magus. What will my Master think of me now!"

Okita Souji's heart was pounding.

broken!

Master, you don't think I'm bad, do you?

“Saber.”

"Yes, Master!"

Okita Souji immediately straightened his back and puffed out his chest, looking like a well-behaved puppy listening to a lecture.

"You are permitted to use your Noble Phantasm."

Roy's voice, manipulated by magic, came through.

"……Yes!"

Okita Souji bit his lip and reluctantly agreed.

The Master who issued this order to use a Noble Phantasm against a modern magician must have been extremely helpless and disappointed in her!

Okita Souji turned his head to look at Bazett, only to find that she had returned to where she had been standing, picked up the metal cylinder on the ground, and poured out a black ball made of some kind of ore.

Does this mean "Ace Showdown"?

Okita Souji took a deep breath, re-adopted the flat blue-eyed stance, and took large strides with his feet apart.

The Hira-Seimei-ga is a common stance in Japanese Kendo. It is one of the starting stances of the middle stance, in which the blade is placed at eye level and the tip of the sword is pointed at the opponent's left eye.

This posture makes it easy to tell that she intends to use a thrusting attack.

Okita Souji was a master of the Taira no Seimei in history. His most famous move was the thrust, which he mastered and eventually made into his Noble Phantasm.

"Beat the flash of my secret sword! One step beyond sound, two steps without pause—"

Across from her, Bazett wore a confident smile.

"A showdown of ace players? Unfortunately, the moment I entered that state, I had already won!"

A black iron ball floated up from her hand, ancient runes appearing on it. The surface of the ball became ethereal, and a short sword only a foot long extended from its interior.

Lightning crackled across the sword, sending up wisps of smoke.

Bazet threw a punch, about to hit the ball.

"Ugh!"

Suddenly, a sharp, electric-like pain shot through my body unexpectedly.

Bazett groaned, his eyes widening in disbelief, before he collapsed to the ground uncontrollably.

The runes on the sphere then went out, fell to the ground, and became as dull and lifeless as ordinary ore.

"Enough, Saber, stop now."

"Three steps, oh?!"

Okita Souji stumbled and almost fell.

When she came to her senses, she saw that Bazett had fallen to the ground for some unknown reason.

"Royal Lord~~!"

The young swordswoman looked at her master with a resentful expression, drawing out the last syllable of her sentence.

"Ah, ahhh—!"

Bazett collapsed to the ground, clutching his chest tightly.

An unknown pain shot through my chest, my heart pounded wildly as if in rebellion, and my body was so overwhelmed by the intense pain that I could only manage a painful groan from my throat.

His disheveled appearance was a stark contrast to his earlier dashing demeanor.