A month had passed since the culling mission, and Ky was getting a physical by the school. It was supposed to be a quick examination for the one he missed due to his late arrival. But a week after, he was know sitting in the waiting room of the doctors office not knowing why he was there. For several minutes Ky sat there in silence, slightly irritated having been pulled out of class knowing full well that he wasn't planning on doing anything anyway.
Finally, the doctor that had done the physical walked into the room carrying a clipboard, a short green haired woman who looked more like a child than a grown woman.
"Sorry for the wait Mr. Kiske, there were a couple of things we had to check before we would be able to tell you." said the doctor.
"Not a problem." replied Ky as he stood up.
Following the doctor into a separate room, Ky took a seat on one of the two provided chairs while the doctor took the other. Flipping through the papers on her clipboard, the doctor spent several seconds looking at a sheet before saying,
"We have good news and... let's say confusing news for you. Which would you like first?"
"The good news."
"The results from the physical say that you are in incredible physical health, in fact, you have perhaps the highest physical scores of any Valkyrie that has ever attended St. Freya."
"I see, and the confusing news?"
"Well there are two things that we haven't been able to figure out yet. The first is when we inspected some of your DNA, we found a trait that isn't present in any of the Valkyries. We tried seeing if anyone else in Schicksal had these traits, but only three others had the trait"
"Asuka R. Kreuz, Frederick Bulsara and Aria Hale if I remember correctly." said Ky, cutting off the doctor.
"Yes," replied the doctor slowly, "when we looked through, we didn't discover any correlation between the four of you."
"I can answer that question for you."
"You can?"
"Of course, that trait you found would be are ability to use magic. We all share it, but the strength does vary between person to person. The reason you didn't find it in anyone else is because of the Stigmata's all your Valkyries have. My teacher said that Stigmata's suppress and eventually get rid of that trait. Unless the second thing you're telling me is that I have a Stigmata then in that case I have no idea."
"Well you're partially correct."
"Really."
"We did indeed find a Stigmata-like mark on your left eye." The doctor said talking a photo from the clipboard and giving it to Ky. Taking the picture, Ky looked at it
"Our first thought was it was an unidentified natural Stigmata, but there was no trace of Honkai energy in your body. There should be at least small amount of Honkai energy present if it was a Stigmata."
"Are you going to try to figure out what it is?"
"If you're alright with it then yes."
"Then I'll have to decline. I'd rather not have people poking around my eye with no idea what they're looking for or at."
"Are you sure? Whatever you have could potentially help further the fight against the Honkai."
"I'm certain. Whatever you want to find you're only going to disappoint yourself."
The doctor was silent, not saying anything that could possibly refute what Ky had said. Deciding that it was time to leave, Ky got up from the chair and left. Watching as Ky left the room, the doctor sat there emotionless, but when Ky was for sure gone, an eerie smile appeared on her face.
Outside
Walking in school's courtyard, Ky was heading back to the dorm seeing as the school day had just ended. Passing through the crowds of school girls, Ky had only managed to get around halfway to the dorm when he was impacted from behind.
Stumbling forward a couple feet, Ky managed to balance and get his feet planted, preventing himself from collapsing to the floor. Feeling the arms that were wrapped around his neck and back, Ky said,
"Kiana, could you stop doing that."
Kiana, the one on Ky's back responded with,
"Come on! It's fun to do and you know you're not going to fall down!"
"That's not the point Kiana."
"I think that is the point!"
Coming from behind the two of them, Mei said,
"Kiana, you should listen to Ky. Not everyone likes when you do that."
Kiana begrudgingly got off Ky, saying to Mei,
"Only because you told me to."
"And wasn't there something you wanted to tell Ky anyway?"
"Oh yeah! Two S-rank Valkyries are holding an exhibition match for everyone to see! And guess what they're doing after!"
"An open workshop?" responded Ky.
"Almost! Once they finish they're going to pick someone and they get to fight one of the Valkyrie's!"
"That is exciting, so when does that happened?"
"Right now!"
"Then why are you still here. If you keep talking me, and I'm quite confident that you would keep talking, end up missing the duel."
Kiana's brain blue screened as she registered what Ky had said. Only after several seconds of silence and Ky giving Kiana a 'I a told you so' look that Kiana snapped out of her stupor, yelling,
"Oh fuck! We gotta go!"
Grabbing both Ky and Mei, Kiana dragged them with her at a full run. Getting to the training hall within a minute, the three of them headed into arena where the duel had already started. Spotting Bronya in the crowd, they made their way to her and took the seats that she had saved for them. Now with a clear sight of the two fighters, one of the fighters identity were was now clear to Ky. The one he recognized was Rita Rossewiesse, who was still dressed in her maid outfit and wielding a flashy and decorative scythe. The other fighter, a young woman with long blond hair dressed in a black military coat with gold accents and buttons, with a matching military hat as well. Her weapon of chance being a large lance.
Currently, the two of them were locked in a fierce back and forth were none of them seemed to have the upper hand. The agility that Rita possessed seemed to be able to match the raw power that the other Valkyrie possessed as every strike that she did left a mark on the surroundings around her. But Rita wasn't lacking on offense herself, for every strike she could redirect, she'd have an attack ready.
And to say Ky was enthralled by this duel would be selling it short. Ky was loving every second of this fight he had seen, to him, seeing to warriors of equal skill battling out for even a tiny advantage would never fail to draw him in. Completely focused, almost every detail was noticed by Ky as the fight continued to rage on, not losing intensity for a single second.
Suddenly, after Rita had blocked a thrust from the lance-wielding Valkyrie, in a quick full body spin, the Valkyrie brought the lance around, smashing into the shaft of the scythe that Rita barely managed to get around in time. The result of this clash was Rita being knocked off balance as the other Valkyrie was now in a perfect position for a full on assault. Not failing to capitalize on the situation, with a flurry of powerful thrusts and swift stabs, the Valkyrie easily had had Rita on her back foot as the only thing she could do was defend.
With the occasional strike that broke through her defense that hit with a glancing blow, Rita was doing her best to make sure the situation didn't snowball to hard, and was actually succeeding in doing so. Rita's constant dodges, sidesteps and overall constant movement made it so she was never forced to be under constant pressure. This seemingly never ending cycle continued as the two Valkyries moved across the arena in this ferocious dance.
And just like how this dance started, with a single unpredicted decision, that it ended. Reaching the center of the arena, Rita suddenly stopped moving as the other Valkyrie, who was already mid lunge, strike moved past Rita leaving her wide open. Quickly capitalizing on the opportunity, Rita used the head of her scythe to rip the lance from the hands of the Valkyrie and sent flying toward the back of the arena.
Ky's eyes widened in shock as he watched what would've normally been the end of most fights, completely turned around as the Valkyrie pivoted her body around and absolutely blasted Rita with a punch to the stomach. The force of the punch sent Rita flying backward, bouncing off the ground several times before managing to stop herself at the edge of the arena.
But by that had happened, the Valkyrie had regained possession of weapon and was already speeding towards Rita. And this time, Rita didn't have the luxury of movement and the other Valkyrie began her beatdown. Without giving Rita a second to get proper footing, the Valkyrie already had a strike lined up, which followed by another, and then another again. Whatever happened, the Valkyrie was not going to let Rita get even a second of rest. Slowly chipping away at her defense, till eventually, after slowly wearing Rita down, with a single well placed strike, broke through Rita's defenses and landed a strike with the very tip of lance into Rita's chest, sending her flying back and slamming into the wall.
Slow to get up from the place she landed, Rita was greeted by the tip of a lance. Smiling, Rita said,
"It appears I've lost this one."
"It appears so." Responded the Valkyrie, before switching the lance she held to her outstretched hand. Taking the outstretched hand, Rita was pulled up quite easily by the Valkyrie. And just like any good fictional sporting event, Rita took the hand that had helped her up, and thrust it in the air, shouting to the crowd,
"The winner of this match, Bianka Ataegina!"
And with that, a thunderous cheer came from the crowd. Many different things were thrown out during this cry, such as,
"We love you Bianka!", "We knew you could do it!", "Your the greatest!" and a myriad of compliments and things that couldn't be considered compliments but really just meant the same thing.
Waiting for the crowd to die down, Rita called,
"Seeing all your reactions, I assume any of you love would love to have a duel with Bianka here!"
With crowd roaring in agreement, Rita began to scan the audience. Going row by row, column by column, till her eyes eventually got to the seats near the front of the arena. Seeing this, Kiana was practically ready to jump out of her seat and fight Bianka right then and there. However, Rita passed over Kiana and landed on the person next her.
"Ky Kiske! Why don't you come down and challenge Bianka to a duel!"
Authors Notes: In the amount of time since the last time I've updated this book, almost two months, the official one year anniversary of this book passed, February 12 to be exact. And because I'm lazy and a dumbass, didn't do a chapter or even announce that, we're doing that here. And the offer for the Q&A still stands, only got a couple of questions so far. But knowing my update schedule you honestly have like two months before I even make any story progress that can answer your questions.