The rain grew heavy between them.
The ground yielded.
With every blow.
Ghatotkacha's fist came down like a living sledgehammer.
The impact struck the mud before anything else — the surface sank, opened in dense waves, stone and water compressed together in a low crack that did not echo.
It was absorbed by the field itself.
Rynne was no longer where the fist fell.
She held her breath.
The world funneled.
Her right foot touched the mud — light, precise — just enough to find her axis.
In the same instant, her body disappeared from his line of attack.
She slid past the creature's shoulder, rapier low, blade parallel to the forearm.
The second strike came across.
Not wide.
Compact.
Arm closed, shoulder rotating with it, the torso entering as if it wanted to pass through the entire space and not merely hit her.
Rynne leaned her torso into the attack itself.
The fist passed close to her wet hair, displacing air and rain.
Water cut diagonally across her face.
The rapier rose.
Not to pierce deep.
To mark.
The tip scraped the side of the creature's triceps, a short, dry line.
Darkened flesh opened a thin furrow.
Steam rose thick.
Ghatotkacha did not roar.
He turned.
The elbow came from behind, heavy, horizontal, seeking to crush the space she would inevitably occupy.
Rynne had already changed level.
Knees flexed.
Body low.
She rolled inside the elbow's arc, shoulder nearly touching the mud, and used the creature's own leg as momentary support to emerge on the other side.
No high jump.
No ornament.
Only transition.
The ground sank again when Ghatotkacha's foot advanced.
This time there was no punch.
There was body.
He entered fully, shoulder forward, hips aligned, displacing air and rain like a moving wall.
If she stayed, she would be crushed against the field itself.
Rynne held her breath again.
The sound of the rain retreated.
She did not move backward.
She shifted in a short diagonal, crossing the front of the advance, her foot finding firm mud for a fraction before pushing again.
The rapier traced a minimal arc.
Low thrust.
Straight to the knee joint.
The blade entered one centimeter.
No more.
Enough to interrupt the transfer of weight.
The colossal body wavered half a degree.
Half a degree was already too much.
Ghatotkacha corrected with brutality.
The foot drove into the ground and exploded mud in a short radius.
Stone shattered under the pressure.
The environmental impact pushed Rynne back before the fist came again.
She absorbed the push by rolling over her right shoulder, the rapier protected along her forearm, back scraping mud and cold water.
She finished the turn already standing.
Breath held.
Wrist loose.
The creature gave her no interval.
The arm descended in an inverted diagonal, seeking to cut the space she would need to cross to maintain angle.
Rynne did not leave the line.
She entered it.
Her torso inclined into the blow.
The fist passed a hand's breadth from her chest.
Heat displaced the air.
The rapier rose along the fold of the elbow.
Short.
Controlled.
The blade met denser resistance this time.
The flesh did not yield easily.
The steam rose thicker, almost organized.
Ghatotkacha closed his arm.
Not to protect.
To trap.
The forearm crushed against the space where she had been a second earlier.
Rynne had already turned her hips.
Her right foot touched the mud — reference — and her body slid outside his axis, now behind him, blade low, ready for another interruption.
The creature's heel came back without warning.
Not a high kick.
A brutal step back, trying to crush anything there.
Rynne withdrew her leg at the last instant.
His sole crushed mud and stone where her ankle had been.
She counterattacked in the same movement.
High thrust, seeking the side of the ribs.
The blade entered shallow.
Ghatotkacha turned fully.
The rotation brought the other fist in a straight line, compact, cutting through rain and steam on a direct path to her face.
Rynne held her breath.
The world narrowed.
She yielded within her own attack line, shoulder dropping, hip releasing half a degree.
The fist brushed the fabric of her left shoulder.
The cloth opened.
Clean.
No immediate blood.
The pressure came an instant later, burning the skin beneath the cut.
She was already outside again.
Both stopped for less than a second.
Not from fatigue.
From calculation.
The rain fell heavier between them.
The ground sank under his weight.
Under her feet, the mud did not sink.
It slid.
The rain thickened.
Rynne did not relax her base.
But her chest rose a fraction more than necessary.
Air entered too fast.
She held it again — half a second before the body was completely aligned.
Her right foot sought reference in the mud.
It found it.
But took an instant longer to leave.
Ghatotkacha entered.
There was no preparation.
His foot sank deep.
The ground split before the impact.
The advance came whole — not arm, not shoulder.
Body.
Hips aligned, torso low for his own size, displacing rain in a single block of pressure.
He did not seek where she was.
He sought the point where she would step to accelerate.
Rynne felt it late.
The world was still too narrow.
She turned her hips to exit laterally — but the colossal shoulder was already crossing the space.
The impact did not hit her fully.
It grazed.
Enough.
Her body was displaced two steps back, the sole losing adhesion for half a second before finding firm mud again.
She did not fall.
But the rhythm did not return intact.
Ghatotkacha did not stop.
The arm came right after, compact, closed, descending in a short arc to crush the point where she would need to stabilize her base.
Rynne tried to recover her axis.
Her right foot touched the mud.
Late.
The sole slipped half a centimeter before setting.
Not enough.
The fist was already descending.
She released the air.
All at once.
Held it again.
"Suspension."
The world expanded for an instant — not slower.
Clearer.
Her chest contracted.
The air returned compressed, trapped below the throat.
Her heart beat twice in the space of one.
There was no glow.
No aura.
Only adjustment.
The fist passed where her face would have been a second before.
She did not leave the line.
She shifted within it.
Micromovement.
Her shoulder dropped half a degree.
Her hip released.
The sole found traction before the mud yielded.
But he was already ahead.
The other arm came across without interval, using the previous miss as leverage.
He no longer sought to crush.
He sought to close space.
Rynne turned inside the arc.
The rapier tried to mark the forearm.
The blade entered shallow.
More shallow than before.
The flesh closed almost at the same instant.
Steam rose.
Denser.
Ghatotkacha advanced a full step.
The ground yielded under the weight.
The pressure pushed the air against her.
Rynne retreated half a step.
The arm came again.
She did not try to leave early.
She waited.
The fist descended.
She released the air at the exact instant.
The world opened.
Not slower.
More detailed.
The contraction of his shoulder.
The rotation of the hips.
The displacement of rain cutting the impact itself.
She moved.
Late enough to almost not move.
The fist grazed her hair.
The wind of the impact pulled her body half a degree beyond calculation.
Her heart beat three times in the space of one.
Metabolism surging.
Pulse faster.
Vision clearer.
But the cost came with it.
The next blow came before the first had finished.
She reacted.
Faster.
But no longer dominant.
The rapier marked the biceps.
The flesh took a full second to close.
One second.
Before it was instant.
Now it was not.
Ghatotkacha advanced without changing expression.
He was beginning to adjust.
Not to the movement.
To the interval.
He did not attack where she was.
He attacked in the space the State required to exist.
Blow.
Blow.
Pressure.
She avoided two.
The third touched.
Her forearm absorbed part.
The impact passed through.
Air left without permission.
The world lost clarity for half a second.
The State demanded more.
Her heart raced.
A metallic taste rose in her mouth.
Still she moved.
Still she cut.
But now there was minimal delay between intention and execution.
Ghatotkacha saw.
Not with his eyes.
With his body.
He entered fully.
The fist came straight.
No curve.
No test.
Definitive.
Rynne tried to turn.
The world was too fast.
Her body was not.
The fist was a hand's breadth from her face when—
The water closed.
It did not appear.
It closed.
As if it had already been there waiting for the exact moment.
The fist collided against compressed liquid mass.
The explosion was muffled.
Water and steam burst open in a circular impact.
Ghatotkacha stepped back once.
The mud split beneath his heel.
A fissure opened in the field.
Not wide.
Deep.
And from it came Skyra.
No announcement.
Already attacking.
The spear described a direct arc to the side of the wounded knee.
Ghatotkacha retreated another half step.
The rhythm he had taken was interrupted.
Not lost.
Interrupted.
Rynne fell to her knees.
Not from defeat.
From limit.
The rapier driven into the mud beside her body.
Low posture.
Controlled.
Like someone choosing to kneel.
Blood ran from her nose in a thin line.
It dripped into the mud.
Kaelir emerged from the fissure beside her.
Not hurried.
Observing before speaking.
Neriah appeared behind, water still circling her fingers.
Rynne released the air.
Slowly.
Like someone returning something borrowed.
Her chest lowered.
The world lost its excessive sharpness.
She wiped the blood with the back of her hand.
Looked ahead.
Not to Kaelir.
To the field.
To the creature.
She spat the blood into the mud.
"I was starting to have fun."
Kaelir did not smile.
He did not look at her either.
He observed the creature.
"The time you gave us was… useful."
Rynne tilted her head slightly.
Half a smile.
"Useful is an understatement."
Short pause.
"Did you learn anything… or just watch?"
Kaelir then turned his gaze to her.
Calm.
"We learned he does not waste movement."
Silence.
"What you do once… will not work the same the second."
The rain grew heavy between them.
"The time was enough for us to recover part of our strength."
Another pause.
"But not enough to know how to kill him."
He turned his eyes back to the creature.
Neriah stepped forward.
Water still turning slowly around her fingers.
"He is no longer the same as when we began."
Her voice did not rise.
But hardened.
"When I faced him… he still reacted."
Her gaze fixed on Ghatotkacha.
"Now he anticipates."
A short beat of silence.
"Each exchange costs us more than it costs him."
Rain ran down her face without her blinking.
"The longer we prolong this… the more he will understand."
Another pause.
"And when he understands enough… we will no longer be the threat."
The field trembled.
The creature breathed.
Learning.