Chapter 107
The appointed day had arrived.
Three years had passed since we returned to the Yosogi dojo, and my match with Win was about to begin.
We faced one another in the center of the dojo, wooden swords in hand.
Kaeha stood behind me, while Shizuki stood behind Win, both watching the match from a short distance away.
The disciples gathered around us were, naturally enough, cheering for Win, since they had trained alongside him.
Now that it had come to this, words were no longer necessary.
Win had truly grown.
It was obvious enough just from looking at his bearing.
He was almost as tall as me now, and he might even have edged me out by a little.
That was precisely why I would give it my all.
If I held back now, even if I didn't do so consciously, I would no longer be able to face Win properly.
Since we had spent so long together, we knew each other's habits.
Our strengths and our weaknesses.
Our habits with a sword, and all our other habits as well.
But those were things from three years ago.
How much had Win developed his strengths over those three years?
Or how much had he corrected his weaknesses?
We both took up our wooden swords.
I took a side stance, while Win held his wooden sword in a high guard.
The side stance was the one the Yosogi style—or rather, Kaeha—excelled at, the stance for delivering the sharpest sword strokes.
In other words, it was my best stance as well.
It was also well suited to intercepting an opponent's attack.
Win's high guard was a stance built around leaping in and bringing the sword down, with tremendous reach and power in a single step.
A middle guard would be suitable for gauging an opponent's range, but our physiques were similar.
Besides, we held training swords of the same size, and we both understood that our ranges were almost identical.
There was no need for a cautious, probing exchange.
If Win judged from my stance that I still hadn't corrected my bad habit, this would be an easy fight, but...
I chose to trust him not to let things unfold so anticlimactically.
"Begin!"
As the senior disciple acting as referee called out, Win leaped in to close the distance.
Of course, I had predicted that from his stance, but... his movements were far faster than I had imagined.
Had he spent these three years honing his strengths?
At this rate, his sword speed must have improved greatly as well, and even if I waited for him and delivered a perfect horizontal slash, whether I would prevail would be a gamble.
But if I retreated, he would catch up with me in the blink of an eye.
So I instinctively leaped sideways to escape.
As I leaped sideways, I spun my body around like a top and slammed my wooden sword into Win, even as I nearly lost my balance.
Our wooden swords collided with a hard clack.
Win barely managed to block my blow.
But my attack wasn't over yet.
I continued sending my wooden sword at him without pause, all the while recovering my broken stance.
With blow after blow, Win blocked my oncoming strikes, and his complexion grew pale.
The attacks were forceful, almost reckless, yet the slashes remained sharp; perhaps being unable to understand how was making him uneasy.
Yes, I had felt terribly unsettled too, the first time Kaeha did this to me during a bout.
But the slashes I launched from my broken stance while recovering were still only barely up to a passing grade; if he dealt with them calmly, they were by no means impossible to block.
In the end, I couldn't press my attack through, while Win somehow defended against it, and we both leaped backward to reset.
We had now both realized how much the other had changed from three years ago.
For now, we were evenly matched, or perhaps I had a slight advantage, but things wouldn't proceed as they had before.
Before the match began, Kaeha had given me one piece of advice.
'Eisa, if you truly care about Win, you must win. And remain the goal that child should strive toward, just as I am for you.'
That was how she put it.
Those words weren't a concrete strategy for winning this match, but they set my heart alight.
They were surprisingly persuasive, too.
That was why I couldn't lose—and why I absolutely wouldn't.
That was true no matter how badly Win wanted to beat me.
With my heart still ablaze, I leaped into range and swung my wooden sword.
Win didn't meet me head-on. He retreated once, darted sideways, and tried to circle around me, throwing me off with his quick movements.
Apparently, he had truly devoted himself to training his speed and his footwork.
His movements were incomparably faster than before.
Even so, I wouldn't let him escape.
I twisted my body slightly and swept my wooden sword toward the spot Win had circled around to.
Just as he had honed his movement speed, my ability to respond had expanded greatly, so unless he got completely behind me, my sword could reach him.
Therefore, no matter how fast he moved, as long as he didn't get completely behind me, keeping up with him wasn't particularly difficult.
Kaeha could send her sword behind her with minimal movement, but I still needed much more time before I could imitate that technique.
Realizing that his attempts to throw me off were having little effect, Win gave up on circling to either side.
But that did not mean he had given up on winning.
If he couldn't disrupt me with lateral movement, he must have decided to overpower me with vertical movement, converting speed into force.
In other words, it was the same as his first attack: a charge followed by a single strike.
In the end, this really was the thing I feared most right now.
Facing Win's high guard, I once again took a side stance.
This would decide the match.
I had evaded his first attack, but I had no intention of running anymore.
I had etched his movements thoroughly into my mind.
His next strike would surely be faster than any before it, but in my current state, I should be able to catch it.
Like a bowstring being drawn taut, weight and power gradually gathered in Win's legs.
...Come to think of it, I never did teach Win how to use a bow.
Like an arrow loosed from a bow, Win flew straight in and brought his wooden sword down, while I, waiting for him, swung mine in a horizontal slash.