Chapter 251 Thea Vs Josinia [II]

The first exchange between the two beauties forced the crowd to stop cheering, and suddenly paid attention to what was going on.

Thea opened with a water skill, a hard lateral lash meant to force Josinia off her line.

Josinia stomped and brought earth up in a short ridge that took the hit, then stepped around it and closed distance.

They met clean in the middle of the cage, no wild swinging, both of them already reading the other.

The crowd liked that at once.

People had come in half-ready to laugh at costumes and fake titles. Or, they had expected Thea to swiftly dispose of this woman in purple makeuo.

But that first exchange was enough to tell them that this fight was at least somewhat serious. They still made jokes about anime costumes, but still, they couldn’t deny their strengths.

Every time Thea’s water shot from her hands, or Josinia’s used her skills to create walls of earth to defend herself, the crowd cheered loudly in awe.

Kalon watched from just outside the primary line of the cage wall.

The pair were evenly matched. That was the first thing he noticed about the exchange.

Thea had the smoother transitions and better range control. Josinia was aggressive despite being more suited towards a defensive style, and also had incredible reaction timing when it came to altering the battlefield.

Neither of them was wasting a single movement, nor being distracted by the crowd.

Good. He needed the first League fight to look serious if he wanted to impress the masses and make a name for himself.

Thea slid left and snapped a burst of pressurized water at Josinia’s lead knee. Josinia took part of it on a raised slab of earth and still had to hop back, violet armour plates clicking as she reset her positioning.

She answered with a low spike of earth that forced Thea to jump, then tried to catch her on the landing with another one.

Thea twisted in the air to land around it, threw a thin water whip into Josinia’s shoulder, and created a small laceration into her skin.

"Bluegale!" someone shouted from the rails.

Other voices cut over it with Josinia’s invented title, half mockery and half investment.

Phones stayed up all around the bowl as they recorded the entire thing to post on social medias.

Kalon paid close attention to the fighters, trying to guess who was going to win. He could easily guess Josinia, since she was the higher ranked fighter, however he knew that combat IQ and skills were actually what made the difference.

Thea was fractionally ahead in decision speed.

Every time Josinia committed to earth for defence, Thea changed height or angle and made her have to rebuild.

That would matter if the fight stretched, since Josinia’s mana reserve was slowly depleting.

Josinia’s advantage was blunt pressure. If she got Thea onto the fence or into a bad corner of the floor, she would advance with martial arts and try to strike the woman down with fists and kicks.

However, in terms of martial arts, she was still beneath Thea. This was because Thea had spent years being trained by her mother, and also had a proper conventional academy upbringing.

Josinia seemed to reach the same conclusion on her own.

She stopped trying to fight conventionally and drove straight in through a spray of water, tanking a cut across the armour to get hands on Thea’s waist.

The clinch landed. The crowd jumped. For a second it looked like Josinia would lift her opponent up and slam her into the ground.

Then Thea’s palm hit Josinia’s ribs in a short concentrated blast of water that broke the hold and shoved them apart again, both breathing harder, both still upright.

Kalon nodded once to himself.

That was the level he wanted. It was short exchanges like that that made him glad that he had selected these two fighters first.

They began circling each other.

Thea’s fake wings were already marked with blood and dirt. Josinia’s white hair stuck damp to one side of her face where water had caught her.

Neither looked finished.

The next sequence of attacks lasted longer.

Thea chained three water attacks into one line, high then low then wide, trying to overload Josinia’s earth timing. Josinia blocked the first, ate a glancing hit from the second, and answered the third by lifting a thicker wall and punching a short stone spear through it.

Thea had to dodge immediately. The spear clipped the edge of her boot and drew a sound from the nearest seats as a bit of blood flew.

The pair were even again.

Then Thea started taking the better end of the exchanges.

Not by much. Just enough that Kalon saw the pattern before the crowd could.

Her footwork stayed smootber as the minutes went on.

Josinia’s heavier commitments left wider openings. Thea began filling those openings with water hits that looked small, but when built up were actually deadly.

A shot to the thigh. One to the forearm. One across the side of the armour that forced Josinia to reset her breathing.

The hall sensed the lean towards Thea’s side.

Bluegale fan chants thickened on the west side. People who had been shouting for the mystery girl started arguing with each other about whether the debutant was fading.

Josinia still answered every major probe and still made Thea respect the centre of the cage, but the winner was starting to look clearer and clearer.

Kalon kept his face still and filed the details.

From the outside, for people who didn’t know the two women closely, it would look like this was all they had.

However, Kalon knew that this wasn’t the case.

Both women were hiding an affinity, or perhaps waiting for the right moment to use it.

Thea had the death Affinity.

Josinia had the lightning affinity.

No one could sense that both women were waiting for the opening to use these skills.

Except for Kalon.