“Ah!” Tooth Tiger hadn’t expected Medith to erupt like a spring thunder. He swung his spiked club on reflex, a dark comet arcing to block.

Clang—! Her sword-lunge crashed against the club, steel singing like a struck bell. Their leverage wasn’t equal; inch by inch, her blade slid past his guard.

Hiss— The long sword punched through his left collarbone. “Aaah—!” Tooth Tiger howled, then slammed her away with a savage right-hand swing.

Medith landed in a single light step, a crane touching water. She smoothed her dreamlike garb, pale fingers locking the clasp, sealing that tempting stretch. In a breath, the siren was gone; an iron-blooded general stood there, ice-still.

“You damned woman! You tried to seduce me?!” Tooth Tiger clutched his ruined shoulder, rage and pain snarling together like storm and surf.

Medith tossed her chin, hair rippling like a dark banner. “Hmph. If you were a sage, you’d scorn the dust of desire. But you aren’t. You don’t just crave it—you worship it.”

She eyed him, a fox’s smile under moonlight. “From the look of you, it’s been ages since you tasted fish-and-water joy, hm? No girlfriend either. Like some hack author called something ‘Memorial’—abject and useless.”

“How about this… we let ten thousand watch us join like fish in water right here on the battlefield? Life’s short. Why not chase pleasure?” She eased her trousers down a fraction, then drew out a strip of white lace-trimmed cloth.

She lifted the cloth and—snap!—smacked it against her pale skin, a flash of snow against rose.

“You… you shameless… don’t you… don’t—” Tooth Tiger’s eyes turned greedy, winter ice melting into swamp.

“Quick March: Horn!” Medith’s body shot out like an arrow off the string, her sword-light stretching into a horizontal stroke that tore the air toward Tooth Tiger.

He was tempted, but not blind. He’d prepared. The spiked club roared up, and he hammered back. Steel and spikes met with a crack; neither yielded. Medith skated backward and tugged her trousers up, locking the dreamland away.

“They say you don’t step into the same river twice,” she teased, mischief dancing in her eyes. “Depends on the river, doesn’t it?”

“Roaaar—!” Tooth Tiger’s bellow hit like a tiger in a canyon, sound slamming stone. Medith’s ears rang; even her iron will flickered for a heartbeat. He exploded forward in that blink, body a fired catapult, right arm high to cleave.

By the time she moved, his spiked club—like a sky pillar flashing white—was already falling. Her reflex bit like frost. She ripped her sword up. “Quick March: Halt!”

From the line her blade drew, a white sword-qi geysered upward, an irregular plume—flat here, curved there—like a broken moon. It slammed into the descending club.

Thoom— The impact rattled the entire wall. The already crumbling edge shattered; stones avalanched with a rattle and a roar. The stone under them spiderwebbed with cracks, and even the air crackled—snap, snap—as pressure split it.

…

“Captain?!” Melia and Milia, still mid-heal, stared at the distant duel, shivering like leaves in a night wind.

…

“That’s the girl Sprite?” Nessos eyed the white silhouette on the wall, his voice edged with wariness. He knew Tooth Tiger’s strength best. Among the four captains, his overall power stood highest. Barring certain… special reasons, he was not beneath Nessos. The other three together might not take one of his full blows. And yet Medith…

“Little brother, you’re forgetting us old bones?” A dry elder’s voice drifted in, like wind through dead pines. A flat, horizontal slash screamed over. Nessos bent low, a reed in floodwater; the killing stroke hissed past and sheared a few strands of his fine hair.

“Old thing…” Nessos clenched his fists. Murder rose off him like a winter blizzard.

…

“Aaaah—!” Tooth Tiger’s muscles swelled, ropes of iron under skin. Midair, he wrung out more force, like thunder striking twice. Medith’s sword-qi began to fracture, light flaking like ice.

“Tiger Maul—!” he roared. The spiked club warped in the eye—tiger jaws yawning, a roar coiling in steel. It tore straight through her slash.

Medith’s eyes flashed with shock. She flipped back fast, a swallow cutting the wind. Rumble—clatterclatterclatter— The spiked club drove into the stone, blasting out a ring of force. The wall around them heaved and swayed, ready to die.

The shockwave licked her. A chunk of torn stone slammed into her chest. She had her blade up, but the force was a breaking tide. Something in her ribs snapped like dry twigs.

Pfft— Medith skidded back over ten meters, sword gouging a line. Blood sprayed in brief red arcs, beading the path behind her.

Tooth Tiger gripped his club and stared, eyes like winter iron, breath like a furnace.

“Hah… hah…” Medith dropped to one knee. Both hands on her sword. Eyes hazed. Blood on her lips. A woman half in the shadow of death.

“Hahaha… you’re done… Me—Medith…” Seeing her state, Tooth Tiger’s body loosened, like ropes cut. His club hand shook hard; his legs jittered, fighting to stand. He looked one breath from kneeling.

“Let me… let me get a little strength back. I’ll pin you down, and I’ll—” A sting bit his neck. He grabbed it. His fingers came away wet, crimson.

Seconds later, he felt his head slide. The world tilted. The ground rushed up, bigger, closer. Thud. The lights went out.

Medith held a silver sword in her right hand. Not a fleck of blood stained it. She sheathed it with a swan’s grace and listened to the heavy fall behind her. “War-Song Movement: Dirge.”

“Don’t you know? Until the enemy’s truly dead, you never lower your guard. Mmn… pfft…” Her wound flared; she pressed her chest and spat a small mouthful of blood. She was badly hurt, yes, but not crippled. The half-dead act was bait, a well-used snare to catch an opening.

She hadn’t expected Tooth Tiger to bare his flank so completely, or to show he’d spent himself. That part wasn’t on her.

“Captain!” The two women sprinted in. Together they poured healing into her like twin streams. Medith didn’t resist; she flowed with them, turning her own power to speed the knit of bone and flesh.

“You two… have grown up…” She smiled, warmth in battle-smoke, seeing their bodies cut and bruised, their tasks complete.

The two didn’t forget to “get back” at her. “Grown up? Captain, you’ve always been younger than us.”

“Heh… this time… I won’t pursue your disrespect to a superior…”

“With you like this, even if you wanted to, you couldn’t.”

“Oh? Then later—”

“Ah—”

“No— don’t—”

While the three were still teasing, two miserable screams tore from the main gate of the wall. They looked over—two men were hurled tens of meters into the sky, bodies carved by a thousand blades, unrecognizable. Even their masks were shredded with chilling gouges. The masks were the Yellow Tiger and the Red Tiger.

Their ruin was bone and rags. Then came the shapes of hundreds of Mountain Bandits, flung up like dead leaves in a gale. They looked no better.

“What is… that?” For the first time, shock shattered Medith’s composure.

…

“Are the captains… wiped out?” Inside his mask, Nessos’s eyes widened with the same shock, even a thread of fear. He threw back his head and roared, “Rooaar-rooaar— roaar-rooaar— roaar-rooaar—” The sound was so savage that Sprites and Euticles alike clapped hands over their ears.