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Satoru smirked as he looked at Naoya eyeing him cautiously.
His gaze was fixed on Naoya, and a moment later, he appeared in front of him and tried to land a kick on him.
Naoya raised his hand in defence, and although a bit late, he still managed to stop the attack from landing clearly on him.
The moment it connected, Naoya activated his technique and stuck Satoru in a frame.
He then proceeded to fly away and then rush back towards Satoru to strike the frozen frame with the increased momentum.
As the frame shattered, Satoru was blasted out of it, taking all the damage without cursed energy reinforcement.
His entire body screamed in pain from the defence-negating strike, and he tried to lock onto Naoya and heal himself at the same time.
Though before he could even move his gaze, a foot was planted in his gut that sent him flying further.
Naoya had already [Frame Dropped] at the expected location and struck him again, though this time there was no defence negating, so the damage was not as immense as his earlier blow.
Naoya was looking at Satoru with wariness.
The new trick that Satoru was using made him fast. Immensely fast, to the point where he too had to focus a bit to lock onto him.
If he gave him too much time, Satoru could gain the momentum that would make things difficult.
So, without hesitation, he started to strike him without giving him a chance to regain his balance.
[Frame Drop]
A punch landed on Satoru.
[Frame Drop]
A kick landed.
[Frame Drop]
The Flying Grayson Double Knee Drop Spectacular, boosted by [Projection Sorcery] and bypassed [Infinity] by [Frame Drop].
Needless to say, Satoru was already weezing out, though he was continuously using RCT to heal himself.
"You give up, Satoru?" asked Naoya, dusting his clothes off. The flying knee drop dirtied him a bit.
Satoru looked at Naoya and gave him the meanest glare possible.
"Who the f*ck double knee drops their best friend?!" asked Satoru, already mostly healed.
"Me," replied Naoya, and got ready to [Frame Drop] spam him once again.
Satoru was about to get back in action once again, but suddenly an army of cursed spirits surrounded and pounced on him.
"Let me join in too!" exclaimed Suguru.
Naoya, though, just gave him one side glance and made some hand signs.
[Zankyo][Rainbow Dragon]
"Zankyo, Shenron, play with him."
*Roar!!!*
Shenron roared at the cursed spirits, making all of them flinch from his presence.
Zankyo was one step ahead as he slammed his fist into the ground and activated his cursed technique.
[Murder Reliquary]
Cursed energy flowed in the ground, and a moment later, sharpened blades emerged from it and impaled the surrounding cursed spirits, exorcising most of them in an instant.
The blades then flew out of the ground and surrounded the air, all of them pointed at Suguru and the cursed spirits and Suguru.
"..."
Suguru was speechless. Almost all of his semi-grade 1 spirits that he brought to attack and distract Naoya were dead in an instant.
"Shall we play?" asked Zankyo, standing on top of Shenron's head while eyeing Suguru with a menacing smirk.
Satoru and Naoya saw the shikigami aura farming in front of Suguru and, for a while, decided to see how it turned out. It was looking interesting.
"Special Grade shikigami.....I have some Special Grades of my own," muttered Suguru and summoned a cursed spirit.
The cursed spirit looked like a woman with long dark hair, wearing a long trench coat.
The shikigami looked at their fellow Special Grade and waited to see what it was all about.
"H-Hey....Am I pretty?" asked the spirit.
A simple domain expanded around them.
Satoru and Naoya were caught in that as well, but the two set up their own simple domains, negating its effect.
"You want to save your shikigami?" asked Satoru.
"It's that ugly lady who should be worried," replied Naoya without any worry at all.
Zankyo looked momentarily surprised by that question and asked back.
"Where do you even get the confidence to ask that question. Have you never seen your own face?"
Shenron looked at his fellow shikigami and wondered if he even knew what tact is.
Geto was equally surprised by Zankyo's response.
Even Kuchisake Onna was momentarily shocked by Zankyo's answer.
Still, the condition for the domain was completed, and many scisors surrounded Zankyo and Shenron, ready to shred them apart.
[Murder Reliquary: Weapon Destruction]
Zankyo used his cursed technique to destroy the scissors surrounding him.
The scissors that tried to cut into Shenron shattered from the defensive scales.
"..."
The slitted throat curse looked at the scene with shock.
Both the targets were unharmed.
Zankyo raised his hand, summoned a giant warhammer and sent it crashing into the lady curse, sending her crashing through the trees.
If he wanted, he could kill the ugly curse, but Naoya's orders were simply to play around with the ponytail boy and his curses.
"Any more curses you have, ponytail?" asked Zankyo as he readied two katanas, ready to pounce on Geto.
Without saying anything, Geto summoned another army of curses.
Seeing the army, Zankyo smirked.
"It's been a while since I saw this many dummies!" and jumped off Shenron and immediately tore apart the nearest cursed spirit.
Shenron got into action as well and pushed back any curse that tried to reach it with his devastating roar.
-----
Naoya and Satoru looked at the battle for a bit longer before they decided to focus back on each other.
"You want to save Suguru?"
"He can handle himself. For now, let's continue where we left off."
"What is this new technique of yours?" asked Naoya.
"Liked it? It's a technique I developed after taking inspiration from you," replied Satoru.
"Really, well, I am flattered to see that you took inspiration from me. It makes me tear up to see that my son is growing up by looking up to me," said Naoya and wiped a single tear.
"Haha. Funny. Now then, this new trick is the extension of my [Blue]. Just like how you split your movements into frames and do those movements, I set up fixed [Blue] points around me and pull myself towards them at great speeds. Previously, I used them to make instantaneous movements from one point to another, but now that my brain is refreshed 24/7 thanks to RCT, I can map them faster. Calculate the coordinates more efficiently and then gain acceleration to strike enemies far greater than yours," explained Satoru, completing the Binding Vow by showing his hand to Naoya.
Naoya took a moment to digest the information that Satoru just dropped.
He knew that Satoru could use short-range [Blue] for almost instantaneous movements, but to use them in succession like that....it really made his acceleration at a speed far higher than his.
Seeing Naoya in thought, Satoru decided to start his preparation to strike Naoya.
[Blue Rush]
Multiple possible [Blue] point locations appeared in his head, and without wasting a moment, Satoru's figure vanished from his spot, and he appeared in a different part of the forest before he changed his direction in an instant and repeated the same process, speeding up massively in the process.
As Satoru's body blurred past the surroundings, the trees got uprooted, and dust clouds rose.
Naoya's eyes continued to move, scanning the terrain, trying to catch Satoru's figure, who was getting faster and faster as the time progressed.
*CLICK*
A sound came from the shadows.
Seeing Naoya standing in his spot, trying to analyse him, Satoru smirked. To him, it looked like Naoya was too shocked to see him move like that. Even at these speeds, thanks to [Six Eyes], he could see everything around him clearly. He could see the CE in Naoya and around him, moving in certain ways, which meant that he was trying something out, but because of his speed, Naoya could not get a lock on his position.
'Let's see what he's doing?' thought Satoru and made a new point near Naoya.
As his body shifted towards Naoya, his eyes widened in shock.
Naoya noticed the incoming blur and activated a [Simple Domain].
Immediately, he stepped aside, barely dodging Satoru, who came to a stop at the [Blue] point he made.
He was about to make a new [Blue] point and move away, but because of [Simple Domain], Satoru was very hittable.
Naoya's punch landed clearly on Satoru's abdomen, making him spit out a bit.
Satoru's [Blue] point activated a moment later, and he moved away almost instantaneously, though the damage was still done, and he had to heal it.
"What the hell?!"
"Liked that? I told you I will always find a way to whoop your ass, son," said Naoya with a smirk.
"How the hell did you do that?!" asked Satoru.
"You told me that you make [Blue] points to pull yourself and accelerate yourself. But knowing how your technique works, you cannot simply place all your [Blue] points all at once, or you won't be able to control where your body gets pulled towards. You need to do that step by step. You make a point, accelerate towards it, and then make a new point and repeat to speed up more and more. However, all that speed is useless if you cannot hit me," said Naoya.
Satoru was already looking annoyed at Naoya's description of his new trick. His self-proclaimed daddy knew him too well.
"To hit me, you will need to move towards me, but that too has a huge issue. You need not make physical contact by using [Blue]'s spatial crush and pressure. But you still need to keep in mind that if I get the chance to use [Frame Drop], you will get hurt as well. To avoid that, rather than moving with me, you will need to immediately change your position and move away from me and keep changing your position so that I don't get a lock on you. For that, the [Blue] point should be near me; you will move with me after you collide with me." Naoya continued.
Satour facepalmed.
"...You read when I move towards you and then use the [Simple Domain] to find the location of [Blue] point and step out of the way and use the Domain's sure hit effect to strike me..."
"Wow! So smart, Satoru. That's it," said Naoya and gave a thumbs up.
"Agh! Damnit! Why are you using your brains?! Stop that and fight me with brawns!!!" yelled Satoru.
"I don't want to hear that from Mr. Magic eyes that makes the brain a million times more efficient for sorcery and casually do things most sorcerers wouldn't even dream of doing."
"It's fine as long as I use my brain. You doing it is cheating!!!"
"Whatever, you showed me a few new tricks. Let me use a few of mine, too," said Naoya and got ready to use his new trick.
"New trick? Show me!!!"
Already out of his complaining phase, Satoru's attention was caught by Naoya's words.
Both of them smirked at each other.
However, before they could continue further, a voice echoed throughout the forest.
[Tokyo 2nd year Unit defeated]
As the voice rang out, Satoru and Naoya looked at the sky with annoyance.
Was someone out there trying to stop their fight?
{A/N: It's not me....Must have been the wind.}
A certain distance away, Suguru and Zankyo had the same thoughts; the fight was just getting good.
Kuchisaki Onna was biting onto Zankyo's blade, trying to kill this ugly shikigami who dared to call her ugly.
Another cursed spirit was pinning down Zankyo and was almost sliced in half by Zankyo's other blade, but stopped because of the announcement.
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In a different part of the forest, Kuroko was standing, looking at the unconscious Shoko, with a bit of guilt.
It's not like he was targeting her; she just came in the way all of a sudden when he was hunting the curses scattered across the forest and knocked her out in one punch.
"Sorry," muttered Kuroko, picking up the fallen Shoko and dragging her to safety.
-----
Since they were eliminated, the Tokyo 2nd years were watching the fight between the 1st years. Naoya and Kuroko joined them as well, and now all the 2nd years were seeing the 1st years duke it out.
Though it was a battle between 1st years and all of them were Grade-2, the match was very much in favour of Kyoto.
Though it was an expected outcome, Kamo and Inumaki were well-reputed clans who taught their members well, while Nanami and Haibara didn't have that kind of backing.
Shion Inumaki had the clan's inherited technique, the [Cursed Speech], whatever he says within reason and opponent scaling follows. Simple, yet deadly.
Hideaki Kamo had a fundamentally fun technique, [Threefold Gamble: Rock-Paper-Scissors]. Just like the name suggests, he could bring the Rock, Paper, Scissors game into reality. Quite a versatile technique.
What techniques Kento Nanami and Yu Haibara had, Naoya had no idea. Still, it didn't matter much.
From the looks of it, both were melee fighters, with Nanami relying on a cursed tool hatchet, and Haibara could move around by stepping on air, but still required to be hit by coming closer. Great for manoeuvrability, but not that effective when your opponent could literally order you to come back to ground and stay still while their partner knocks you out.
[Tokyo 1st year Unit defeated]
[Winner Kyoto!]