Limitless Path

"It was a very good effort," Beth started with, though that didn't seem to brighten the mood at all.

"It was not," Bai said with a sigh. "We were stronger, faster, and better in almost every way. The handicap you were under was, quite frankly, ridiculous. How you were able to even fight at all with no skills and such low stats is a mystery, but how you could still do so even when you couldn't use your Presence and we could is just…I don't know. I don't even understand what happened out there. How did you do it?"

"I cheated," Beth said, shrugging her shoulders.

"What do you mean?" Bai asked, clearly surprised.

"I tricked you in much the same way I did last time," Beth said, a wicked grin curling just the corners of her mouth. "I was restricted, sure, that's not hard to verify. There is, however, one thing I forgot to mention, something which tilts the balance back in my favor."

"I knew there was something," Ming hissed. "You were too strong, too fast. I've fought so many people the last five years; I know exactly how someone with those stats should fight. You didn't fight like someone with four or five hundred stats. How'd you do it? How could you break the rules?"

"My skills were restricted, yes, and I couldn't summon my Presence, sure, but I have something the arena can't restrict," Beth said, grinning wider. "Well, that's not a hundred percent true, but it's much harder to restrict, so it's basically never done. I built my Mana Physique."

Everybody but Sera and Blood just gaped at her, mouths open in quite surprised expressions, and Beth couldn't help laughing. Their reactions were exactly what she had expected and exactly how she had expected them to be, and they were funny. Her laughter seemed to snap them out of it, though most of them were still in shock. Bai recovered quicker, likely one of the reasons why she was the leader of the group, and glared at Beth.

"I can't believe you tricked us twice, and almost in the same way! Have you no shame?" Bai demanded.

"Haven't you learned to fucking be careful?" Beth immediately scoffed back, giving the girl a raised eyebrow and just a bit of a glare.

"Point taken," Bai said, backing down immediately.

"You…you really have a Mana Physique?" asked Fang tremulously, not able to get over the shock of her surprise reveal.

"Yep," Beth said, shrugging again.

"Don't shrug like it's nothing!" Li exclaimed. "You didn't tell us you were Enlightened! How is that even possible?"

"It's not," Beth said. "Well, maybe it would be, honestly, but I'm not an Enlightened. I am an Empowered, however."

"But, you just said you had a Mana Physique!" Li cried in exasperation.

"I do," Beth said, giving him a puzzle look.

"But how?! How can you have one and not be Enlightened?" he asked desperately.

Beth exchanged a look with Sera, who had been observing the conversation before turning back to the group, saying, "You don't need to be Enlightened to have a Mana Physique. You only need to have a Mana Physique to become Enlightened. It's like the whole square and rectangle thing, right?"

"I don't know what that means," Li said in frustration. He continued, "But that doesn't explain it, either. What do you mean, you don't need to be Enlightened to have a Mana Physique?!"

Beth exchanged another look with Sera, both of them clearly seeing the surprise in the others' eyes before she turned back to Li and answered, "You have to form a Mana Physique to become Enlightened. Most people know that, yes. But you don't have to form it at exactly the peak of rebirth nine or anything. You can build a Mana Physique any time, or I should really say, any time before that, as long as you understand what to do. I built my Mana Physique when I did my fifth rebirth; you're presented an opportunity then and I took it, successfully making a Mana Physique."

"And that's why you're so strong?" Bai cut in, interrupting whatever Li had been about to say in response. She asked, "You're able to use your Mana Physique even under restrictions?"

"Yeah, it's not a skill," Beth said. "And Presences can be suppressed in a limited duel if you put that in the rules. It's not that hard for the level of enchantments the arenas have to do that, as it's stopping something that you're not using from manifesting into reality. Stopping somebody's Mana Physique, which is an intrinsic part of their physical body and mana pool, is way harder. You have to very specifically request Mana Physique be restricted and you have to follow certain rules for it. I didn't tell you I had one, so you didn't make the request, and I certainly wasn't going to be requesting to be made far weaker for no reason. I still think it was a mostly fair fight, and the six of you hurt me pretty badly, I just still had a trump card you didn't realize was there. Just reinforcing the lesson that you always have to stay on your toes."

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"How…how difficult was it?" Li asked. "I mean, to make your Mana Physique."

"It was really hard," Beth answered. "I studied mana and runes for a very long time before I made the attempt and even then, I didn't really have a great understanding of them. The construction itself was also super difficult, with it taking me hours to build it all while undergoing immense pain and agony. And that was all under ideal conditions; I can't imagine just trying to randomly wing it."

"This is all fine and everything, but when are we going to fight again?" asked Ming.

"How about a match against Sera?" Beth asked with a grin.

"She doesn't also have a Mana Physique, does she?" Bai asked suspiciously.

"No, no. I'm not that crazy," Sera said, holding up her hands in protest. "I am pretty tough, however, though without any skills, that won't be nearly as noticeable."

"We could adjust the rules just a bit," Bai said, craning her neck to look up at the dragon girl.

"Well, that would be better. I would do the same fight if I could have just one skill. I think that would be fair, though I wouldn't be as strong as Beth with her Mana Physique, even with her skills restricted," Sera said.

"Let's do it!" Ming cried before anybody else could give any other input.

"I'll set it up," Bai said with a sigh, moving off to get the match set up.

When the match was queued, the team got ready at one end while Sera waited with Beth and Blood at the other. Beth just watched without saying anything, knowing that Sera was going to have a tough time, but she suspected Bai and her team would still be surprised. She expected she knew exactly what skill Sera was going to keep, as with this duel she would be able to select the skill when she stepped into the starting circle. That skill, combined with another surprise she knew Sera had in store for Bai's team, was going to turn this into a very exciting match. She just hoped that Bai's team wouldn't be too mad at them for pulling yet another little trick on them.

The crowd had not diminished at all; if anything, it had continued to gather, as an awful lot of people had noticed that neither Bai nor Beth's team had left after their first match. Clearly, there had been an expectation of more matches, though Beth wasn't sure people had exactly been expecting matches quite as good. Well, they were going to get as much or more than they bargained for, Beth giving Sera a firm slap on the ass when it was time for her to enter the ring, getting a laugh from the dragon in response. Bai's team across from them were rather serious, a stark contrast to their laughing and joking attitude.

The ref was the same ref as the last time, going through the same procedures just as the first time before urging them to start. In almost a direct mimicry of Beth, Sera waited for Bai's team to approach, her spear resting with the tip against the ground. Bai's team didn't like that at all, quite clearly, as they grew more cautious as they moved as a unit across the floor of the dueling field towards Sera. Unlike Beth, however, Sera didn't move to attack when Bai's team closed with her. She stood sturdy, instead, Beth grinning from the sidelines, the fight opening exactly how she thought it would. She knew exactly what Sera had chosen to keep as her one skill beyond her weapon skill, and she knew just what her girlfriend was going to do with it.

Bai's team leapt into the attack when they were within arm's reach, having hesitated when Sera had done nothing. Sera, for her part, responded with just her weapon, striking out as soon as Bai's team had attacked. Something that became immediately apparent was that Sera was an entirely different fight, her weapon making the experience vastly different for Bai's team. With Sera's weapon skill also being in Expert and well through the grade, her fighting was more powerful and individual than those at lower grades. Sera's weapon being a spear was also a vastly different experience than fighting against Beth's greatsword and fists. The dragon's insane reach and powerful thrusts were different than anything Bai's team had been against, and they had to adjust their strategy a lot compared to fighting Beth.

The other thing that was different was that Sera didn't seem eager to press her advantage, or what advantages she might have with everything of hers being so limited. That was clearly making Bai's team rather nervous; Beth could tell from the way they shifted their bodies, the way they hesitated a little before some attacks, and the way they quickly glanced at each other, likely a subconscious gesture. She knew exactly what was happening, but much of the audience didn't, and she could see and hear the discussions as people tried to figure out why Sera was playing so passive when she was both heavily outnumbered and outgunned. Beth just waited, her grin slowly growing as the time ticked by and Sera remained almost uninjured. The dragon girl also had her own trump card, which she hadn't used, and it was one that everyone else should have been able to figure out, but Beth was still expecting it to be a surprise when she pulled it out.

That surprise would come sooner than expected, as Sera got the absolute perfect opportunity to use her hidden card on two members of Bai's team at the same time. A slight error, something that wouldn't have been nearly so bad if Bai's team was fighting a weaker opponent, and definitely wouldn't have been a problem if they were fighting someone with less experience, became a massive mistake. A hasty attack at the wrong time by Bai's caster, Mei Mei, had put both her and Ming out of position and Sera was able to twist her body slightly and line them up perfectly. She executed the move so fluidly and flawlessly that Bai's team didn't even realize what was happening until it was far too late, Beth with a massive smile on her face as Sera let loose, leaning forward slightly after her twist and belching forth a gout of space-meltingly hot flames that hammered into Ming and Mei Mei like a freight train. The power and searing intensity of the flames was so great that both girls were knocked off their feet the moment the flames reached them, and they soon found out the terror of dragon fire, as they were unable to extinguish themselves and were quickly removed from the dueling field.

That left Sera, almost uninjured and still very fresh, against four moderately injured members of Bai's team, but it was clear that Bai's team members were getting a bit tired. Keeping up such a high level of combat for minutes on end was hard; fighting beasts was much more mindless and often required much less concentration. Even if their bodies had hardly tired, given their great Endurance and many helpful skills, their minds were already starting to fatigue a bit. On top of that, there was the factor that seeing two of their teammates knocked out in a single attack was greatly demoralizing. Oh, and the fact that Sera appeared totally fine and also fully fresh and fully focused was another hit to morale. Bai's team tried several other combinations of attacks and counters, but they were able to do very little to Sera, even given that they were able to land a hit at all. Fighting against someone with such a higher weapon skill was damned hard, and Bai's team didn't really have the stat and skill gap that was necessary to fully overwhelm someone like that. Sure, they were stronger and better than Sera, given the limits Sera had agreed to, but without any of them having their weapon skill at Expert, they had a lot of trouble dealing with the dragon.

The fight was a good bit different than the fight with Beth, even given the double elimination early, as Sera made no move to capitalize on it. She continued to hold her position on the floor, having not even left her starting circle, blocking and parrying all the attacks sent at her. She had an easier time because of her range, of course, as she was able to hold off the others with her spear a bit easier than Beth could, even given the size of Beth's sword. That and the fact that she had reduced Bai's team to four fairly early made the battle much more of an uphill slog for the team than it had been against Beth. Beth knew Sera's plan and watched over the next few minutes as she executed it; it wasn't flawless, and the dragon girl did take some wounds, including a serious hit to her leg that could have been a real problem, but she dealt as good as she got.

Eventually, the match had to end, and it was unfortunately another mistake that started the spiral to the finish. Bai's team once again made a small mistake, not teeny tiny, but not a very large error, one which left two of them open again. It wasn't a perfect counter by Sera this time, but she got Li out and hurt Fang, meaning it was basically two-and-a-half people against one, that one being crazy strong even given her limits. The spiral had truly started at that point, and the remaining members of Bai's team could only hold on for another minute until Sera knocked them out. Despite a handful of injuries and such a long time being so heavily outmatched, Sera looked calm and fresh as the ref announced her victory, showing she still had plenty in the tank and her injuries hadn't been particularly bad.