Chapter 208 - Doing Things Her Own Way

Of the countless memories she had, there were only a few of them that had not yet faded away into obscurity over the endless passage of time. 

One of these rare, special memories for her was the first time that she tasted the metallic flavor of iron in her mouth. The throbbing, sharp pain from having a tooth broken and the warm flow of fresh blood in her mouth — it was a memory not so easily forgotten...

It was the taste of her first failure and by extension, the first time she had been punished. 

She had failed the trial that she had been assigned to complete — to hunt a jasper-tailed hummingbird, reknown for its extraordinary speed and shyness.

More than anything, it was a tender, reserved creature that hid away from the world, only showing itself to feed and find a life-long partner during mating season when it entered a.d.u.l.thood. 

Finding a jasper-tailed hummingbird was not an easy feat even for experienced hunters, much less a budding amateur like Lu'um at the time. It had taken her four days to find a single nest, and another two to approach it without alarming the s.e.n.s.i.t.i.v.e hummingbird couple that called the nest their home. 

Her task had been deceptively simple, to steal an egg from the hummingbirds and bring it back home. But doing so would rob the hummingbirds of their child, a terrible thought that Lu'um felt deeply conflicted. 

She had still been a relatively normal child at the time and had not yet undergone the tribulations that would later shape her identity. 

In the end, she was unable to do it; she could not bear to tear that tiny family apart and returned home empty-handed... and failed her mother for the first time in her life. 

Words could not convey what Lu'um felt when she tasted her own warm blood as a result of Shaali's punishment. But Lu'um knew that although it was a painful and terrifying experience... 

She had not felt guilty about her decision. She felt happy that she had done the right thing. 

That she had done something she decided for herself, not something she had been ordered to do.

Only the ear-piercing roar of two blades colliding with one another filled the silent arena once the match began. The crisp sound of their blades striking each other was terrifying to behold both in terms of sight and sound. 

Though the obsidian blades they had been given did not have any Anima capabilities, they were artificially reinforced to be virtually unbreakable. The edges of the blades had been sharpened down to a hydrogen atom's width, making them sharp enough to cut through just about anything ever made. 

So, every time these two blades clashed, an explosive flash sometimes filled the arena — the unintentional fusion of lighter atomic nuclei and brief ignition of the surrounding air. 

Many were used to the usual grudge match that the mother and daughter would have once a decade or two, but they quickly realized once Lu'um and Shaali started fighting that something was wrong. 

There were no longer any loud, rambunctious cheers or playful jeering from the crowd once they witnessed their furious blows. No one had the guts to speak, much less utter a word of concern over the fact that the duel had very clear turned into a fight to the death. 

Most of the audience actually had a hard time following the fight, truth be told. Not that they did not understand the fight — they were all warriors — so following the trajectories of their strikes and parries was not difficult... 

But visually perceiving the fight was another story. Most could hardly see the blades themselves as they clashed against one another.

The apple did not fall far from the tree, as was to be expected from a sub-branch family reknown for its martial prowess and extreme physicality.

A millisecond was enough time to contemplate a dozen different potential actions, but it was still not enough time to deflect the lightspeed strike that was coming at Shaali's throat. In fact, the only reason Shaali barely parried the blow was because she had correctly predicted where the strike would land. 

Even amongst the greatest warrior families, the Shaali's lineage was cultivated and refined with the blood of inhuman berserkers, genius warriors, and the like from a thousand different alien races over the course of an uncomfortable number of generations. This refinement was naturally also compounded further through careful genetic editing for maximum effect. 

Thus, the amount of time, effort, and planning that had been put into Lu'um, by extension, was mind-boggling to contemplate. Creating the perfect warrior had not been a simple undertaking; it was an unprecedented project that spanned the cosmos in terms of time and scale.

In contrast, the work Dragoncrest family had done in Mulia seemed infantile compared to the work that had been put into Lu'um. They were separated by a hundred orders of complexity and effort. 

Another stroke of Lu'um's blade came at Shaali's throat again, even more heavy-handed than the previous strike. This time, even with a precisely timed block, it had not been enough — the sheer force of Lu'um's strike blew her away and she flew backward into the bedrock of the arena. 

The ground shook with fury as powerful shockwaves spread out from the epicenter, causing many in the audience to frown deeply. Not because of the damage caused by the collision, but because of the worrying display of strength Lu'um had demonstrated. 

They'd all known her for millennia and had never seen her seen display this level of strength before in their lives, which could only mean two things to them. 

Either she had been hiding her real strength for an unknown amount of time, biding for the right chance, or... she had undergone some kind of transformation to warrant the exponential growth she had just demonstrated.

In the eyes of the audience, they were both equally possible conjectures, but it quickly became obvious to Reed which one they felt was more likely to be the truth. 

When Reed felt the probing gaze of a few key members of the audience, he burst a small fit of laughter as he struggled to contain his mounting irritation. 

To be looking at me as an answer for this development... How audacious a thought it must truly be that the strength she dug out of herself was a product of her own effort.

That sort of condescending sentiment was not foreign to Reed, as someone who was well versed when it came to being treated as a lesser person and a sore thumb. Perhaps because of the same reasons, but the general sentiment was more or less the same... 

The nail that sticks out gets hammered down. 

The traditions, laws, social norms, and cultural beliefs all spoke of a rigid society built upon a clearly defined hierarchy and a deliberate, brutal adherence to order above all else. 

"...Is it really such a difficult thing to accept? That this would eventually happen? You would go so far as to entertain the thought that some trickery is afoot rather than accept the truth!" said Reed, as he rose up from his seat, furious. 

His contentious attitude generated a low murmur of hushed talks and visible disapproval from the elders and the guests. Itotia immediately pulled on Reed's arm, as she whispered for him to sit down, but her pleas once again fell on deaf ears. 

An impetuous sneer formed his lips and he said, "Do my words offend you? Good. Besmirch her honor again and I will face the lot of you myself after this duel, mark my words...!" 

If Reed was going to make amends with these people, then he would do it on his own terms. He was not an Ancient Mulian, nor would he ever be. Any pretense of kinship with them was impossible for Reed, even if he was capable of forgiveness. 

"If not, then hold your tongues and keep your dishonorable thoughts to yourselves... 

There was no better time to make his stance clear than now, even if it was a little flashier than he intended. Still, he had no guilty feelings about what he said.

...Well, he did feel a little bit guilty considering he stole a bit of Lu'um's spotlight, but thought it better to support her now before anyone got any funny ideas.

He wasn't about to let the old fogeys invalidate Lu'um's moment of glory with some bullshit argument later on. Reed was determined to force them to accept whatever the outcome of the duel would be, even if it cost him some of their good-will in the near future...

For the briefest of moments, Ulbo felt his soul leave his body as he observed the spectacle unfold before him. It was as if he had been transported back in time to a certain night, much like this one. 

Many, many lifetimes ago a royal princess had once proclaimed a similar threat, to many of the very same people present tonight. Hence, Ulbo was not alone in feeling a powerful sense of... nostalgia. 

He really is so much like his mother it's positively uncanny, thought Ulbo as he observed Reed's imperious figure. 

In any other situation, Lu'um would've probably melted into a puddle of happiness, but she did not have even the slightest amount of spare time to spend; only a single distraction was enough to doom her against her mother.

And though it felt good having landed a solid hit on her, Lu'um knew better than to let herself get comfortable in this fight. She was up against a woman who had not only mastered the art of combat but had also written most of the books on the subject. 

She had gotten a freebie by revealing her real strength, but the same trick wouldn't work again on Shaali. Lu'um knew that her mother would her strength take into account and mitigate the power behind her strikes with her terrifying skills. 

If only, if only... How delightful would it be if I could just club her within an inch of death? Alas... 

Hell, the only reason Lu'um had lasted this long in the fight was because of her freakish physicality. To be sure, she was no slouch when it came to her sword techniques, but beating the old hag in a battle of pure technique was too big a hurdle, even for her. 

In fact, she had nearly died a couple of times during the fight. Some of the movements her mother had used were downright fiendish.

Feints within feints within feints, constant mind games by purposefully incorporating flaws in her techniques, and a hyper-aggressive fighting style devised to not give Lu'um even a single second of respite in the fight. 

Shaali's combat doctrine was to break her Lu'um — physically taxing her through never-ending attacks and burdening her with a fighting style meant to break her mind. 

Were it not for Lu'um's absurdly fast reflexes and her beast-like intuition when it came to her mother, she would've had her head lopped off a dozen times over ten minutes ago. 

And as if in response to her thoughts, the tip of a pitch-black sword danced across the surface of her forehead, a thumb's length away from piercing the spot between her eyebrows.

Though Shaali did not possess the same extraordinary endurance, strength, or reflexes as her daughter, she was by no means a pushover either. They both came from the same family, after all. Expecting anything less of her would be a grievous mistake. 

Unfortunately, a battle of attrition would be impossible against her mother. She had the same c.o.c.kroach-like vitality, so it'd be several days before she'd tire her to the point of exhaustion. And she was not likely to make any slips-ups again after getting humiliated. 

Every gear in Lu'um's mind was screaming at her, telling her that she was going to switch the blade over to her right hand,  to create a momentary distraction — either to disarm her or to give her a chance to perform an overhand palm strike to bash her skull into tiny little pieces.

But then, the answer to her problems struck her like a lightning bolt, and she made an attempt at cleaving off Shaali's left arm with all the strength she could muster. A furious black streak almost connected with her shoulder, but Shaali hurriedly moved to intercept. 

The Lu'um's blade lightly kissed her mother's skin, drawing the first blood of the duel, but it went no further than a millimeter into her shoulder. It was a failed attempt, but it also created an... interesting situation. 

They had entered a complete deadlock — Shaali had one of her hands occupied in stopping the blade digging into her shoulder, and the other hand was preoccupied with stopping Lu'um from stealing her own blade. 

It wasn't a particularly honorable thing to do in a sword fight, but then again... Lu'um wasn't interested in following the rules anymore. Besides, it stopped being an honorable duel the moment they decided to seriously kill one another. 

So she was going to do as she pleased from now on...

And kill her mother the old-fashioned way, just as nature itself intended from the beginning.