Tales of a Ninja Magician: Of Where We Come From

The Gauntlet

"This... Budojutsu, do you think you can fight that?" Bult asked looking right Mana into eyes with a hopeful expression, the magician closed her eyes and shrugged.

"It's no chakra augmentation, if it was, I'd have been crushed instantly, at no moment fighting Almash did I feel completely overwhelmed but it was tougher than I thought. Let's just say I'm happy to have this moment to breathe." Mana replied as truthfully as she could, her answer didn't seem to calm Bult, however, the girl's honesty was appreciated, that much she could see in his busted face.

"Now, ladies and gentlemen, without further delay we shall start the spontaneously planned event of the day – the Descent Gauntlet of this young girl who has invaded a match and requested a match with our champion Damij!" The announcer declared as the bridge structure once again connected the arena to the living quarters on the other side with the announcer being ported right up to the arena since he stood on top of it once it got moving.

"For those who are unfortunate enough not to know the rules, there are few: the challenger fights until the Sheikh thinks they've had enough or are liberated by death! We've already met our challenger, she surprisingly lost a match against Gaffu today however she finished off Almash, the Bare-Chested Berserker! Ladies and gentlemen, I introduce the first contestant, the man who shakes the world beneath his feet and crumbles the ground – Sadar!" For the second time that day Mana had the honor to see the announcer engaging in his craft, for the girl the man appeared far overly excited by his introduction but at least he was devoted to his thing.

"Darn, he's not in Damij's crew but it ain't good... Whenever Sadar fights he ruins the arena, one time he knocked a person down and bashed their face to the ground until the whole arena crumbled down. He's a big and strong guy, don't try to overpower him, don't engage in standoffs with him, he's also deceitfully fast so don't get caught out." Bult started coaching Mana who carefully observed her opponent making his way down to the arena.

"I've faced large men before, I'll hit him low and make his legs give in, hit him in the joints and behind the knees, that usually worked. Fast or not no human can get his hands on me unless I want to, I've trained myself that way. I shall not allow him to ruin the arena, that'd mean us falling to the spikes below and I won't let that happen." Mana firmly declared quietly revealing her strategy to her friend.

"That should do it, be careful though, don't take chances, you've still got other guys to worry about," Bult suggested. Mana nodded and slowly started walking forward.

"Begin!" The announcer yelled out declaring the beginning of the fight. That very same instant Sadar went onto the offensive, his stance was strangely open, implying dominating presence and with countless openings, Mana quickly pranced forward avoiding the first chop, ducked under the first elbow counter and backflipped over the man's tripping sweep. The girl kicked the man right in the face a couple of times but he didn't appear to get overly fazed by it – a troubling sign.

Suddenly, the air around Sadar started to vibrate and glow barely intelligible golden glow, the man's blows intensified, they became faster and much more ferocious, with each blow they caused almost a small explosion wherever they hit making entire chunks of the arena fall down below. The ground shook and Mana almost fell down due to loss of balance from the man's relentless offensive effort. He didn't appear to tire which also felt really intimidating for the magician.

He wasn't yet too bad to avoid. Mana's training with Meiko with attack redirection and the ability to make her own openings allowed her to get countless cheap shots in and her training with Kouta with perfect evasion techniques allowed her to quickly identify the telltale signs of upcoming attacks and quickly make up perfect evasion tactics on the fly. She was going to pull it through. If that was all that her opponent had.