In the back of Avalon's hall was a courtyard with a large dirt platform used for training, sports, and outdoor events– mainly concerts and monster part markets. Disputes would also be settled here on occasion as part of a duel of magistry and might. The battle between Xinyu and Avalon's master was one such duel.
The old man's first formal fight in years was enough to pack the surrounding area with hundreds of exhilarated spectators itself, but the word of mouth was that it was against an Eastlander, a rare individual from a group of people said to live east of the impassable mountain walls. Few westerners had ever met one, and many believed they were just a fabled civilization confined to storybooks and plays. Naturally, rumors began to spread like wildfire, and people flocked in, hoping to catch a glimpse of the girl far from home.
Brax was surprised that the elderly master even heard out Xinyu's ridiculous proposition in the first place, especially given who he was. Though Brax had kept his mouth shut out of respect during the initial encounter, he recognized his face the instant he walked into the building. The master was no ordinary old man. He was Lancelot, a renowned member of Arthur's Round Table, and a living Westland legend. Tales told him a beast who lost a fight but once in his life, to King Arthur himself during their youth, and was credited with building the greatest guild from the ashes of a hundred fallen kingdoms. This glorious group helped Arthur lead the Westlands from a crumbling mess of warring states to a single, unified division, and made Wunderdum the most prosperous city amongst all three nations.
Lancelot, known far and wide as the Warrior of the Lake, was one of the land's greatest warriors to ever exist, and a personal hero from Brax's youth.
The Warrior of the Lake and the Merchant of Joy stood on opposing sides, both bringing in an overwhelming presence. Their sly smirks emerged as enchanted auras irradiated their bodies with a visible intensity. Xinyu, burning with the fiery red glow of fortune, bowed respectfully with her fist in her hand. Lancelot, flowing with a fierce ocean blue smoke, spat sticky spit and cracked his knuckles. If their colored energies could clash, it would have created an amethyst-stained fire and blown the arena away in one fiery explosion.
Fortunately, both parties had the courtesy not to incinerate all the cheering folks in the immediate vicinity.
A finely dressed man walked out on the field to referee the battle that was about to ensue. At least, a mediator was what Brax and everyone else in the crowd had assumed when the tall young man first walked out, but they were surprised when he sauntered up to the guild master and got down on his knee.
"Lance, my friend," he said. "I know not why you've taken this skirmish, but if it is okay with you, will you allow me to battle in your stead? Our radars had noticed irregular energy coming into and out of existence around the kingdom, and it seems I've been able to trace it back to the young lady before you. With your agreement, I'd like to confirm and study this oddity with my own hands."
The gentleman who openly waltzed upon the grounds was suave, perfectly proportionate, and nested clean, yet messy brown hair atop his lovingly crafted skull. His tired eyes, a deep indigo, reflected the sun dashingly, whilst his cheeks bled a rosy pink blush from the heat. The sleeves on his greyish shirt were rolled to his elbows, and the tightly strung vest on his thin waist garnished his stylish outfit with a deep black. He smiled at Xinyu, but she stood aloof, simply waiting for whoever was to fight her.
"Please, allow me this duel," the man said once more, tilting his head down.
"Bah! Very well," Lancelot muttered. "If it were anyone else, I would've beaten them to hell, but you surely must have a reason for stepping in, considering you've never fought willingly before. I'd win too fast to have any fun anyway. This duel is yours."
"Thank you, sir," he said.
"Eheh? So do I have to fight this pretty-looking boy?" Xinyu asked, disappointed.
"Pretty, am I?" the man teased. "Sorry, but I've no interest in romance."
"I do not care," Xinyu said, curling her lip back. Then, she smiled. "Women make much better lovers!"
Brax watched the appealing man pick some fuzz off his pants and throw it to the side. He looked fatigued with his slightly baggy eyes, but this somehow came off as attractive. Brax kind of hated him for that. As he wondered who the insufferable cliche was, a name began to echo throughout the crowd: Cygnus. It was another name he knew well, though he hadn't ever seen his face before. It seemed the man who had taken the duel from Lancelot was the greatest scholar and scientist in the Westlands, Cygnus Rift.
"Sososo, what kind of magic do you use?" Xinyu asked excitedly.
"Oh? Why would I tell you that before we even begin?" asked Cygnus. "If that's the case, then would you tell me what kind you use, young lady?"
"Of course!" Xinyu said. "I use the most wondrous spells of all! Ones that are limitless in power, and as beautiful as the starry night sky. From lightning to arrows of light, my magic manifests anyway I see necessary."
"How peculiar," Cygnus said. "You've exposited many words, yet you've explained nothing."
"We would be here all day if I explained it all," Xinyu said. "Come! I will show you!"
Lancelot, who resigned to adjudication, struck his hand downward to signify the beginning of the match.
Cygnus moved first, sprinting up to Xinyu and throwing a hefty fist at her. Xinyu's eyes widened as she sidestepped his punch, but the agile guy spun and delivered a swift kick to her chest, causing her to go flying into the dirt. She quickly jumped back to her feet and brushed herself off, grinning. It turned out the blow hadn't actually landed, because she had thrown herself back before his foot even touched her chest. She knew well that falls were better controlled when self-induced.
"Was this not a battle of magic?" she asked, looking despondently at the stain in her garments. "If you wish to trade fists, then say so!"
"No one in their right mind would reveal their cards without assessing their opponent," Cygnus said. "Besides, physical enhancement magic is a type of magic. I'm surprised you can keep up with mine with only your innate physical prowess. How strange… I am intrigued!"
"You should always train your body to be in good health," Xinyu laughed. "But let us get serious now. I do not wish to disappoint this spectacular audience!"
"I couldn't care less about that," Cygnus said. "But I'm going to need you to use your magic. There are a few things I'd like to confirm."
"Did you not say only a fool would reveal his cards without assessing his opponent?" Xinyu asked.
"Indeed… I did," Cygnus said, as he began to unveil his power.
From the palm of his hand, Cygnus formed a small, furious sun, swirling like a blazing orb of magma. Though it started at the size of a flea, the spell grew hastily and soon floated overhead in the arena, morphing to a massive flash of brightness that could blind anyone who attempted to gaze directly at its radiance.
As the spherical mass increased, so did its scorching heat. Within seconds, everyone in the crowd was sweating and removing their extra garments, trying to appease the sun's wrath. If it had not been for the guildmaster's attendant's protective barrier around the area, all the spectators would have been burnt to brittle charcoal.
Floating above the dirt arena, radiating noble Valencia fire, was the power of a star.
"As bright as the sky, my sun burns," Cygnus said, the flicking lights dancing upon his shining face and in his gaping eyes. "Allow me to tell you about the limitless and beautiful power of a star. It is the frightening result of hydrogen fusion, a wonderful phenomenon that science can hardly explain. The mere presence of my sun's plasma is enough to melt steel."
The flames crackled, and the attendant began to struggle to contain the star's power. Cygnus had faith in him to keep everyone safe, though. Otherwise, he wouldn't have unleashed such a vicious spell near so many people.
Actually, he preferred not to use his magic at all, because Cygnus's signature cosmic powers consumed energy faster than any other magic. All magic had a cost. Magic energy. Mental stamina. Bodily risks. The form of magic was only bound to the caster's imagination, but the actual strength of it relied on the user's ability to pay the price. The law that dictated nature was that the greater one's power, the greater the price they had to pay.
Still, with a pool of internal magic that could only be rivaled by a few figures such as Arthur, Lancelot, and Princess Sako, Cygnus was one of the only people capable of wielding such draining magic. He knew that he would have to expel a great extent of his power if he wished to tempt out the true colors of the anomaly before him.
"If you don't believe your magic can handle it, I would not think less of you should you falter now," Cygnus said.
"It is you who should falter!" Xinyu said as she smiled. She placed her hands on her knees and chanted the name of the hero Hou Yi, the great archer deity of her lands. Blue fire sputtered from around her back into a curved crescent shape and became conjoined by a sparkling gold thread knotted upon each tip. Summoning Yi's greatest weapon, she conjured a bow made of azul flames and golden strings. This enormous weapon held by Xinyu dwarfed her by two times, but was light enough for her to carry easily, and feeble enough for her to sling back a pure white arrow of light.
"Legend says that there used to be nine suns around this world, but Hou Yi shot nine of them down," Xinyu said, aiming the bow towards the bright light that burnt the sky. "I loved reading about him, for he is so cool! The coolest of all!"
Her aim moved up and steadied. Readied with golden light arrows, the dazzling bow string creaked as it was pulled past her back.
"But the most incredible thing about Hou Yi… is that he never misses!" Xinyu said. "Though I am not sure how you could miss such a big target."
Xinyu released the string, and the arrow flung forth, piercing the air faster than the eye could see. It flew right into the center of the fiery red ball and disappeared into its inferno. In that instant, the sun reacted, becoming a supernova of glimmering brilliance, and collapsed into itself, folding inward like a crumpling piece of molten paper. Before the sound hit anyone's ears, it exploded in a disk of sunny dust and spread its sparks into the dissipating wind. All that was left behind was a ball of iron and a slightly out-of-breath celestial mage.
The metallic mass crashed to the ground, indenting the dirt, and Cygnus looked curiously at how easily she had swatted one of his strongest abilities away.
"Your sun might be strong in the face of others, but it is a mistake in mine!" Xinyu gloated.
"Those who don't make mistakes are those who don't try anything new," Cygnus said, taking off his vest and throwing it to the side. He clenched his fist, and the iron ball began to levitate. The hunk of metal wobbled in the air and then started to shrink. Screeching and creaking, Cygnus crushed it with immense magic pressure until it was compressed down into an infinitesimally small nothingness; a microscopic object which no one could see, but all could sense as it seemed to pull in the spirits of all the watching spectators. The obnoxiously loud crowd grew silent as an eerie chill came upon the air. The iron ball itself disappeared, but the area where it had been began to distort, blur, and swirl as if color itself were being sucked in.
Though no one was aware of what the scholarly mage had done, his magic had released a miniature imitation of the universe's most dangerous and ravenous entity, an object from beyond the skies which Cygnus referred to as a black hole. Not a single mind in the crowd could understand the magnitude of the magic before them, yet inherently, they knew it was something sinisterly tearing at the fabric of existence. Something that should not have been used so casually. Still, Xinyu did not feel threatened in the face of such a destructive beast, and even smirked at its fearful aura. Instead of wavering, she released Hou Yi's bow from her grasp, dissolving its flame, and chanted another name.
"Of the four fiends, I request Chaos, the harbinger of Entropy. Disperse this wild magic as it is of your realm," Xinyu said, humming her words. A black light appeared first around her heart, then dimmed her skin until she was a shining entity of pure darkness. Her eyes and features disappeared into this blinding black stain, but her radiance remained. She raised her arm towards the distorting light and began to pull it in.
Cygnus was intrigued, but did not let his focus break. Veins began to show amongst his gripping hands as he struggled to hold it together and keep control over his ravenous power. He did not wish to unveil the magic he'd been working on before he'd perfected it, but he was also never one with stagnation. He also felt at ease knowing that no matter what happened, Lancelot was there to stop him should he lose control.
The constellation sorcerer was at the peak of unleashing the black hole, drenched in sweat and battling waning muscles. For him and the crowd, it felt like an eternity had passed while he charged this power, but in reality, only a fraction of a second went by. He struggled to maintain its destructive intake, and then, something peculiar occurred.
Though no object nor entity physically came into being, the black hole reacted to Xinyu's motions and consumed itself into oblivion. It swirled faster and spun like a bamboo leaf caught in the most ravaging tornado, but not for long. Fwipping into rippling waves, the wind became gentle again, and the once-twirling air steadied into stillness. It all happened in an instant, like nothing happened at all, but Cygnus's distortion was no more. The world existed as though he hadn't cast anything in the first place.
Cygnus was puzzled, yet he was curious. So curious, he had to know. Two of his most potent attacks were thrown away as if they were simple elemental spurts of water and fire. In the end, they were bluffs, as he would never have unleashed them, but they should have been nigh unstoppable nonetheless. At least, so he thought.
Why? he wondered. Why, why, why, why! I must…
He paused.
"It's funny," Cygnus said.
"What is?" Xinyu asked, tilting her head to the side.
"Your magic is irregular, but you are not the dark anomaly we're looking for," Cygnus said. "Our radars showed an intense magical concentration of the black energy we'd been tracking for so many days before your arrival, so I thought you might be the cause. Now I see that's not true. Back to square one, it seems."
"So does that mean we are finished here?" Xinyu asked.
"No," Cygnus said. "You've gained my interest, and thus, I cannot let you go without knowing more. I want to see the full extent of your power– and mine too!"
"I am very interested in you, too! Let us continue our fight then!" Xinyu said.
Cygnus's body shone brightly, like a star in himself. His heart, a lionizing furnace that could broil hell itself, became so furious that it stained the ground with stagnant magma, and so hot that it might even melt thought itself. The attendant was overwhelmed by the pressure and would've failed to contain the overwhelming gravity of Cygnus's light had Lancelot not stepped in and lent his energy to create a magic field to protect the spectators.
"Shouldn't we stop them?" the attendant huffed, on the verge of fainting.
"And give up this damn good show? Not a chance!" Lancelot said. "You may rest now, Galahad, for I shall protect everyone from here on out."
Cygnus, creator of stars, became a constellation of energy. His body shone blindingly to the point where none in the audience, save for the guildmaster, could see what was going on. But Xinyu did not need her human sight, for she could see with a particular third eye. Erlang at her side, she witnessed each star that made his body and readied herself. One that shone brightly in his head, his heart, his legs, his arms, and his all-encompassing soul. He was mightier than most mortals, and thus Xinyu decided that if he wanted to use the might of the cosmos against her, so should she.
"Chang'e," Xinyu chanted. "Graceful starlight, under thy radiant moonlight, let white glory never yield. Goddess of the moon, give me your grace and love!"
Xinyu was illuminated in equal bright light, parallel to her opponent. Celestial bodies - one of mythic legend, the other observed by man - prepared their ionizing bodies to engage in one final clash.
Xinyu and Cygnus sprang at each other like geysers of lava, spiraling into a collision of clenched hands that detonated between the sun and moon. Like comets of pure power, their fists met once, twice, then several dozen in a barrage of perfectly swung and deflected hits. Xinyu swung left, but Cygnus dodged right. Cygnus flung his right up, but Xinyu redirected it with her knee. Cygnus tried the kick he'd initiated the battle with, but it was met with Xinyu's punch. Xinyu countered with another punch, but Cygnus countered that. This vicious cycle continued on and on and on and on.
With each punch that cometted through the nothingness between reality, the atoms of oxygen and other fundamentals were chased away by the propulsing vacuum created from the savagery of man. One dozen, two dozen, three; the speed which drove wall-destroying balls was unseen to eyes, rapidly increasing in temperature until the souls of the fighters could bear it no longer.
How incredible this man is, Xinyu thought. It is people like him who remind me that this world is so pretty!
Before anyone could even blink, Cygnus and Xinyu both coiled their knuckles back with all their strength and might. They threw them forward, knowing this was the final strike, and met at the center between their hearts.
Unexpected to both of them, the impact of their fists released a sparkle of whiteness that expanded rapidly and threw both of them back.
As they landed on their feet, the two were left standing in a strange world of only a bright, eternal whiteness. It seemed to be a room that expanded forever in warm light created by the energy of Xinyu's god magic and Cygnus's star magic colliding, though Cygnus could only theorize upon that notion.
In the strange dimension undiscovered by anyone else, it was just the two of them in a sea of whiteness. The atmosphere was sultry and washed away worries, and neither of them questioned where they had been whisked away to or why, simply because of the tranquility the emptiness brought. Perhaps they would learn of the significance of the white dimension one day, but in the present, they could only connect their souls in a way no one else could.
"Young lady, forgive me. I've forgotten to properly introduce myself," Cygnus spoke. "My name is Cygnus Rift. I am a scholar and head researcher of the Westland kingdom. How might I know you?"
"Hailing from a nameless village in the east, I am the daughter of poor but happy merchants!" Xinyu said. "The name that I carry with me is Xinyu Ma! Fortune to have found you!"
She clasped her fist with her hand and bowed.
"What an odd gesture," Cygnus said. "Still, I'd like to know… what do you think about the world?"
"I think it is beautiful!" Xinyu said.
"And it's people?" Cygnus asked.
"They are so pretty! Especially when they smile!" Xinyu said.
"Such unwavering optimism. You remind me of a certain old king," Cygnus said, happily reminiscing in his thoughts. "Say, Xinyu! Do you know what science is?"
"I fear I do not," Xinyu said. "But please tell me!"
"Science is…" Cygnus said, pausing for a moment. He closed his eyes and thought about his father and the village he grew up in. "Science is a legacy! It represents thousands of years of learning, and thousands more of discovery. It creates new things that help people live better and bring joy to the world! And the best thing about science is that, as long as just a single human remains, it will never die out!
"Owow! Science sounds incredible!" Xinyu exclaimed.
"Indeed, it is," Cygnus said. "But I fear the world will soon end. I do not want everything we've worked so hard to build to come crashing down. With that, I ask you, with your mighty magic, will you help me save it?"
"Only if you help me destroy it first!" Xinyu said. "There is no future in the world we live in now, so if we want to move forward, we must gather our hearts and burn down the heavens and the earth. If fate has destined our end, then we must destroy it all, fate and all, and create something new. Only then can we pave the path to a new place."
"If only it were that simple," Cygnus chuckled.
"It is that simple!" Xinyu said with that radiantly bright smile.
The most excellent scholar of the West and the merchant of joy walked towards the center and took each other's hands. When they shook, the white room vanished, and they were suddenly back in the center of roaring crowds. Nobody understood what had happened the instant they disappeared, and quite honestly, it left something to be desired for the heaps of people who were expecting a more protracted fight. But alas, Cygnus had gotten his answers and was finished with the matter.
"This battle is over, for I concede!" Cygnus announced as he fell to his back. He couldn't move a single muscle, except for one. The one that was his grin, which stayed upon his face even after he had collapsed from exhaustion.