As the platform extended and the slim yet tall figure stepped onto it to be brought onto the arena Mana continued to try and pick up any details about her next opponent. The only detail that stuck out like a sore thumb was the decision of this woman to extremely overdress. She wore a white simple desert cloak together with a black coat on top and a black headdress that appeared almost like a shroud, her face was also covered with a crimson red cloth making the woman appear even more mysterious than usual.
It may have from the first glance seemed very rude or not quite proper for a woman to dress scantily in these conditions but it was actually quite the other way around. During the day the heat would've made it unbearable to stay under these clothes, these suggestively dressed women in Sheikh's quarters made few if any sexual or implied sexual hints towards their master and they very well may have been just protecting from the desert heat with their lack of clothing covering them up. The entire time Sheikh's eyes were absorbed by the fighting and he appeared to have little to no interest in the female forms unless there was nothing else to see.
For that reason, the way in which this Apheiya, the Woman that Changed History, overdressed appeared odd to Mana and the magician tried to see what could've been made out of it. Was it some sort of suggestion towards personal insecurities? Was it somehow reflective of her personality, could it have been used to devise a more precise dodging style or maybe somehow helped her define a valid prediction of to how exactly this lady would fight? Apheiya stepped very gracefully and her head was held up high, almost like that of a noble.
"Apheiya, this young woman..." The announcer began his attempt to rile the champion up for this fight but the older woman lifted her hand up silencing the announcer with a single gesture.
"I know who this girl is, I've been observing her for a while," Apheiya spoke in a very deep Land of Wind accent to her speech. The Ninja World had only one universal language but different time periods and different locations placed different spins on that language and sometimes it was quite easy to determine where the person was from by their language alone, sometimes these accents and dialects were faked for various purposes, such tricks were handy for a ninja to learn.
Mana did not speak to the woman, while the magician had a great deal of respect towards any woman who managed to break through the prejudice and hatred that women inevitably received when arriving at Agbarah, that didn't in any way change the girl's goal. This woman was just a nimble and strong rooted tree that bloomed right in the magician's way to her goals, that tree needed to be stepped around or trimmed if needed.
The announcer appeared to be too unnerved to speak any more words so he just announced the beginning of the battle. Instantly the woman's body blurred, she moved at least fifty times faster than Mana thought was humanly possible. The woman's knee thrust towards Mana's lower abdomen, attempting to instantly incapacitate the young one, no doubt. Instead, it hit Mana's palm which also used the force of Apheiya's forceful knee strike to propel herself and flip over the woman.
Mana didn't even look behind herself, she did not speak.
"Heh, I must admit I expected you to get hit at least with this first strike, that's how it usually goes with you. I observed your battles, you never expect the burst of speed that martial artists are capable of. How can you respond to such inhuman speeds? Do you use budojutsu as well perhaps?" The woman inquired. Mana turned around partly, turning to the side to face both directions and keep herself able to defend from both frontal and back assaults.
"Not at the moment, I merely always expect the top speed I can respond to from everyone. I usually need a hint as to what kind of an attack is coming so I begin my response well before you even begin your attack, by the time you realize I am countering your attack you're too invested into your speedy attack to change it." Mana replied casually.
It was an advice given to her by the old man. There was always a limit to how much a human could perceive, part of that limit was how much they were expecting to see. Mana not only stretched those expectations to the max every time but she also cut the brief response time in half by using her opponent's speed against them by giving them less time to counter her response because of how fast they themselves went for her.
"I expected this to be an easy fight, I expected to give you a lesson to how far beyond yours our level is, just like Damij has done but... It appears I shall have to work for it a little." Apheiya's facial rag twisted suggesting that the woman may have been smiling under it. She removed the facial rag and the black shroud that covered her face and tossed them aside letting them land beyond the arena's bounds.
"Your attires are severely hindering your speed," Mana mumbled somewhat coldly, "They not only move in the wind alerting me of your location, even when my eyes cannot clearly perceive you but they also slow you down, it's like wearing a parachute on you".
Apheiya's body flashed black once more, she charged at Mana with long reaching kicks but the magician could've evaded them with her eyes closed. For a moment the girl was hesitant to counter but then she realized that she didn't care if Apheiya fought at her best or if the fight was in any way fair, Mana only cared that she beat this Gauntlet. With a swift pirouette and a backward kick, the magician sent her opponent face down onto the stone, gracefully giving it a couple more leaps to get some distance which would've given Mana more time to react.
"It appears I may need to surrender..." Apheiya stood up and dusted her clothes.
"Go ahead," Mana replied.
"Since I cannot remove my clothes, I must protect the honor of Wind Patriarch's granddaughter," Apheiya explained.
"You're the granddaughter of the Land of Wind's temple leader?" Mana wondered, a history lover inside of Mana wished to talk with the woman after the fight to find out a bit more about the religious culture of the Land of Wind but currently there was little time.
"Yes, I am in the middle of my pilgrimage, training here in the Sun Disc fighting arena to return once I become strong enough to escape its grasp. I must suffer true hardship to be accepted back in the temple," the woman explained.
Mana wanted to just let this female monk surrender but something inside of her wished to help Apheiya. After all, even if Mana saved this place and changed the Sheikh's mind about his lethal ways and using literal slaves for combat, Apheiya would still not change. She'd keep on fighting here wearing a mass of clothes on her, sweating out of her mind and getting heat strokes in the middle of a battle or being too slow to properly fight any of the higher tier martial artists. The woman's pilgrimage would literally never end.
"Would losing your honor in front of these people not count as "true hardship"? Being beaten by me as well as losing your honor, I've lost both battles and honor, often at the same time. There are few things that are more painful for one to lose than these two." Mana replied grinding through her teeth. The last thing she needed was to make this woman stronger but... The magician wished to help Apheiya with her pilgrimage, she also wanted deep inside of her heart for the woman to complete it within the reaches of this century.
"I am already twice faster than Fajal was when you fought him, are you not afraid of me once I remove my cloaks?" Apheiya asked curiously as her feeble feminine hand reached up to her collar and yanked hard enough to tear layers upon layers of cloth apart.
"I am not afraid of death, I just do whatever seems right at the time," Mana replied quickly, hating herself for not letting this woman surrender.
"Then you still have much room for growth, then again, you are still a child." Apheiya smiled friendly, almost like a mother would smile for a child.
Apheiya finally hatched from her cocoon of clothes and cloaks, appearing with a simple green dress that didn't appear much different from those simple clothes one could buy at a bazaar around the Land of Wind. The dress that Apheiya wore was torn at the end, leaving just four straps that didn't restrict the woman's legs. That suggested Mana that the Woman that Changed History must've favored kicks, that and how well defined Apheiya's legs were, they were as thick as the arms of a strong man.
Apheiya's body blinked in and out for a couple of seconds, she was just testing her new limits, the public roared in excitement and awe of the woman's rising speed and power just from the simple act of removing her clothes.
"Do not be surprised if you find yourself dead in a blink of an eye, girl, like this I could dash 20 000 meters in just a second, I feel light as a feather." Apheiya giggled with a blush. She was quite ashamed visibly of standing in front of an audience in only a dress but while the embarrassment was clear the woman also felt certain liberation first time in a while.
The woman's body blinked out, Mana leaped forward and for a brief moment, both of the two disappeared. The two just blinked in and out, in and out, however, neither was able to touch the other. The two were locked down in an eternal chain of Mana evading Apheiya's attack only to attempt a counter that was evaded and attempted to be countered only for Mana to start the chain all over again. In the end, neither landed a single blow.
"That's it... You are using budojutsu." Apheiya smiled after the two leaped away from each other laughing. Neither of them managed to even touch the other offensively.
"I pretty much have to..." Mana closed her eyes, "Your speed is inhuman, no human being could stand up to it or react to it, even when using my style of combat".
"So the old fart did teach it to you." Apheiya wondered with an observation more than a question.
"Actually, I sort of discovered what it was by myself. He probably doesn't even know I can do it. It's the physical portion of chakra. Chakra as a concept is divided into two parts: the spiritual and the physical. There are other conceptual energies in this world: the samurai use kenki which is essentially just another name for chakra, you martial artists appear to use what the old man calls "chi", but it's actually just the physical part of chakra we ninja use. It's a far cry from the real deal but the good thing is that it was always the spiritual part of me that blocked chakra, there appeared to be no problems in accessing the physical. I initially had my doubts about being able to use it but there were no problems really once I willed myself to it." The magician explained without as much as a huff.
Mana glanced briefly at the Sheikh's quarters, her ego was stricken with a great deal of pampering when she witnessed the excitement in the old man's face and how he leaned over the balcony and clapped like a little child. At the very least she wouldn't be executed specifically for disappointing him...
"You don't appear to be tired at all..." Apheiya observed with a sigh that was supposed to hide that she was a bit short of breath.
"Because I'm not fighting at the peak of my abilities, I can kick it up at least four times this much before getting winded." Mana shyly shrugged. Her chakra pool was always far beyond that of her peers because she specifically used to focus on that, it'd take days of fighting on end to tire her out when fighting at such an insignificant portion of her abilities.
"Hmph... I shall have to bring out my strongest moves in that case!" Apheiya declared as she flipped back landing on her arms. The woman's body burst with overflowing purplish shroud of the purely physical aspect of chakra as she pushed her body forward.
The woman then landed her feet firmly at the arena and kicked off of it destroying the arena and crumbling the whole thing down from the brief tap of her feet alone. Once Apheiya was at the peak of her jump, so far in the air that she couldn't even be seen from the ground with an intimidating battle cry she dove right at Mana. The debris around the woman was reduced into dusty stone powder in an instant right as the woman touched it or even passed within a short distance to it from the immense pressure of the chakra.
With a gentle foot tap to Apheiya's heel, the girl sent the woman tumbling down completely repurposing her technique. Instead of blowing up the whole out of bounds grassland the shockwave formed an abyssal fissure that rumbled to the other end of the arena and cracked the building into two. For a moment, Mana looked in horror as the building split but there appeared to be no people caught into it and the structure was cut in half beautifully as a cake, didn't even collapse, only left a couple of hundreds of fighters looking through the gap in awe.
The Woman that Changed History grunted and writhed around on the ground before rolling backward and flipping back on her feet. Her dress and her flawless ebony skin were dirtied and bruised, some could say battle-worn. Mana crossed her hands over her chest and smiled, such slow attacks were the easiest to counter, it didn't quite matter how powerful they were.
"It was dangerous girl, you completely made me lose my balance..." Apheiya sighed with a smile.
"True, for a moment I almost cursed myself, if anyone in those buildings was injured I'd have hated myself greatly," Mana nodded in agreement.
"You mentioned being a ninja briefly, ninja of average rank are easily able to destroy this Earth if they do not control their strength. It might be wise, for our world's sake, to not trip them like that," the woman stood and cracked her knuckles. She leaped forward blinking out again, Mana's body blinked out as well.
The two clashed their elbows to each other, each using budojutsu augmentation to strengthen their endurance so that their flesh did not explode into particles and their bones weren't ground into dust. Mana knew quite well how exhausting budojutsu augmentation was, she, however, stood the most chance of controlling that tension since she was quite a prodigy at chakra control, something thousand times less refined shouldn't have posed much of a problem.
Apheiya gracefully and swiftly flipped, Mana leaned back avoiding both heels of her opponent and then witnessed a barrage of backflip kicks as the woman flipped so fast that the air pressure behind her heels allowed her to use them for leverage and backflip again. Doing so in rapid succession it appeared like a string of endless backflip kicks that quickly disappeared into the heavens splitting the nearest clouds and dispersing them. Had Mana gotten caught in that, she'd have quite likely strained herself too much trying to survive it.
Something brief mumbled from way above where Apheiya had risen. Then a blindingly fast double foot stomp crash drove into the ground. Mana took a gentle leap back and then kicked forward with a hop, right into the woman's chest as her stomp opened up her upper body for counterattacks. The woman screamed in pain and slid a great distance backward slamming into the protective wall. Despite the fact that both women stood on the grass below neither one was disqualified because the Gauntlet's battles were supposed to end in death, usually at least.
From the smoke and dust of the collapsing protective wall Apheiya's body appeared in a diving front kick position, she moved faster than lightning itself yet Mana, still using her augmentations leaned sideways and jumped up to kick Apheiya right in the back. Yet another wall got busted to pieces once the woman crashed into it. With a torn dress and messy hair, the granddaughter of the Wind Temple Patriarch appeared from the rubble wearing a smile.
Mana shared that sentiment, "You are attacking without thought, just showing off random moves," the magician noted.
"That is true, you said that you were able to fight four times faster and stronger, meanwhile this is my limit. When we fight like this we can't touch each other as both of us are fast enough to evade entire armies trying to kill us but... I must say that you are better than me. I just wished to have my fun before giving up." Apheiya laughed, despite being tossed around by blows that'd decimate any man or woman and grind their bodies to dust she barely even appeared to be injured by it.
"I may have been lying..." Mana tried to help the woman she was beginning to respect more and more but the monk had none of it.
"If you had I'd have noticed. You're barely even wearing yourself out while I'm fighting my best. You weren't bluffing... I wish you the best of luck against the others." Apheiya sighed crossing her hands over her chest.
"Wait, wait, you can't surrender during a Gauntlet fight! Young woman, kill your opponent if you have the chance!" The announcer screamed out but Mana turned around.
"I have no such intention, she may surrender for all I care," the magician sighed out.
The announcer looked at the Sheikh who just nodded and waved his arms around frantically like a child who wished to move past the boring rituals and pleasantries to move on to the other fight.
The announcer looked back at the staff behind him. "Find another champion that wishes to fight this one".
"Sir, the young woman beat Apheiya by making her surrender, they decimated the arena and almost tore this whole complex apart, who in their right mind will..."?
The announcer slapped the two around before the door in the barely functional living quarters opened up and the platform extended from it attempting to connect with the non-existent arena in the center.
"Someone has agreed to fight her!" The announcer yelled out in awe, apparently to the great surprise of his very self. The public roared in excitement as they have expected that after such a battle the Gauntlet would've pretty much been handed to this strange magician girl that rode in on a camel saving a local merchant's life. This whole heroic gimmick she was going for appeared to resonate greatly with the public which also resonated with the Sheikh above who was scratching his long grey beard and taking more and more curious sips of whatever fruity smelling drink he was having.
"Appear before us, the champion who has answered the insolent challenge of this young woman! We call you forth!" the announcer screamed out slobbering all over himself and the two staff members he was talking to. Despite a rather disgusting manner of speaking the man was quite energetic and had the ability to speak louder than Mana has ever heard a man speak. He was charismatic if anything, at the very least.
One more step closer to Damij and to her goal...