"What happened to you? You used to look so cute before. Why did you turn into... a delinquent?"
"..." Mira remained silent. She didn't know how to reply to that. She is wearing what she likes.
"Ahem. I mean, your current outfit is not bad. It does fit the vibe of your magic. Can you fully transform now?"
'Right. It might make her insecure if I say bad things about her outfit. Though I was expecting a rebuttal or something. Not silence.'
Mira slowly nodded. For some reason, she didn't want to show Kazu her full takeover form. 'I...Why do I feel this way?' She was pretty confused about herself. Kazu had just called her cute before. So, why does that make her embarrassed? Was this because nobody referred to her like that?
"Weren't you going to fight Erza now? I will see it then. I will act as a referee." Kazu nodded to himself.
"Sure. With you, at least there would be no damage." Erza quickly agreed.
"I..." Mira instinctively wanted to protest, but stopped herself.
Kazu raised a brow. "You don't want to fight?"
Mira took a deep breath. Her face went blank as she turned to Kazu.
"How about I fight you?" Her words shocked everyone in the tavern, including her.
Wasn't she supposedly embarrassed towards Kazu? Why does she want to fight him?
'I will just end this without needing to use my full Takeover form.' She moved Ethernano towards her legs.
'He does give me an experienced person vibe, but his magic power doesn't seem much higher. It's on the same level as Gray or Natsu. So, it should be fine.' Though Mira won't admit it out loud, other than Erza, nobody has been able to defeat her. So, she was pretty confident.
'Though he said that Erza has grown complacent... Does that mean...?' Despite her confidence, she was still cautious towards Kazu. So, she didn't bother saying anything and attacked him without a word.
Her right palm transformed—changing colour, becoming something else. Nails sharpened as she swung it at Kazu, who was within arm's reach.
This all happened in less than a second.
Her nails stopped inches away from Kazu's neck.
Mira frowned. "Why didn't you dodge?" For a second, she thought that Kazu wasn't able to react. However, seeing how he didn't even move instinctively made her believe that it was intentional.
Kazu shrugged. "I would have moved if you were serious about your attack. One advice I would give you is to go with the intention to seriously harm me. I could understand if you can't go for the fatal hits, but there are still several ways to make a spar be taken seriously."
Suddenly, Mira felt a touch on her exposed stomach.
Before she could even register what happened, she found her world rotating as she saw the tavern's ceiling.
'Pain.' She realised that her back was hurting. However, it was nothing serious, so she quickly got up and realised what had happened.
She was at the other end of the tavern, opposite Kazu.
The latter had pushed her.
Mira's expression went serious. 'I didn't even see him move. Is his magic related to influencing other people's perception?' She didn't think that what Kazu did was a demonstration of physical prowess.
It just didn't cross her mind as she didn't think he could express physical prowess stronger than Erza's.
"Erza, what about you joining the Spar too? I haven't seen your progress in a while. Don't worry about the tavern and go all out. I will make sure it remains fine."
"Fine." The redhead sighed. She wasn't expecting that she would be sparring with Kazu in a 2v1 fashion today.
Mira carefully heard Kazu's words. 'He will make sure nothing happens? How?' Without even thinking about it, she punched the wall behind her.
THUD.
"Wow, I didn't expect you to check my words immediately. Guess, you aren't as innocent as I thought you were." Kazu teasingly said.
"...What do you mean innocent?" Mira didn't meet his gaze and continued looking at the wall.
'It's a barrier. So, what he did was some application of a barrier? It must be pretty versatile like Levy's or Cana's magic.'
"Aren't cute people supposed to be innocent?" Kazu took a step back and dodged Erza's sword.
"They are? I don't see any of the people you supposedly call 'cute' to be innocent." A purple sphere appeared on Mira's as she glanced at the table where Gray and others were sitting.
Kazu made a pondering expression for a few seconds as he dodged the onslaught of 5 of Erza's swords.
He then nodded. "Fair. None of them is 'innocent'."
Mira hurled the sphere towards the ceiling.
"The hell! You are supposed to fight me, not the tavern." Kazu made an exasperated noise as he lightly jumped up before making a barrier beneath his foot and kicking it with more force.
Next instant, he appeared on the ceiling, moments before the sphere made contact.
A green barrier appeared around Kazu's hands as he brought his hands together and held the sphere with his barrier.
"This packs some high punch." He glanced to his right and found Mira's claws, gleaming in purple, a few inches away from his stomach.
He then glanced to his left and found a few swords closing up on him, blocking all the escape routes.
"That's some good cooperation."
'Destructive interference.'
The magic coating on Mira's hands disappeared as claws reverted to her palm. Erza lost control of those swords.
However, both Mira's arm and Erza's swords have gathered enough momentum to be problematic for Kazu.
'She's going to break her arm at this rate.' Kazu thought as he kicked Mira in the right direction while creating barriers to slow Erza's swords. Without any reinforcement, Mira would break her arm due to the reaction force.
This problem won't happen to individuals like Erza or Gray, who don't have much difference between their original physical attributes and their Ethernano-enhanced attributes.
However, for people like Mira or even Kazu, the difference is pretty significant. If Kazu punches with all his might and then removes the enhancement of his hand just before contact, then breaking the arm would be the least of his worries.
Mira was launched towards the floor. However, just before she could crash, she regained control of her magic as she instinctively transformed her entire body.
"That's some aura." Kazu dodged Erza's swords before compressing the barrier holding Mira's purple sphere, which was still in his hand.
THUD
He blocked most of the sound and light from escaping as the sphere exploded against the barrier, becoming useless.
"You might want to be careful using that form. The aura you are releasing would certainly scare the civilians." Kazu chuckled.
"I will keep that in mind." Mira sent another energy sphere towards him, but this time almost instantly.
Clap.
Kazu clapped. A barrier almost materialised around the sphere and caused it to burst, containing all the damage.
Suddenly, multiple purple spheres appeared around Mira before hurling towards Kazu.
Clap
Kazu clapped again. Barriers appeared around each sphere, effectively neutralising them.
"Pretty good. But, I wonder how long your magic consumption can hold." Mira stared with a blank face, unlike her usual arrogant demeanour with everyone else.
At the current rate, Kazu would run long before she would.
"You are correct. I would lose at the current rate."
He glanced to his left and saw Erza herself appearing from his side, her sword flashing at a blinding speed which even Kazu found hard to track with his eye.
"So, how about we change things up?" Kazu kicked the ceiling he was standing on before twisting his body.
Erza's sword hit the air as she turned her eye towards Mira.
Kazu appeared in front of Mira, and all the spheres she had tried to form dispersed before they could condense.
"How about we check the physical strength of that form? I won't cancel your magic." Kazu punched her.
Mira instinctively blocked with her other hand.
Her eyes widened when she felt a large force shaking her hand.
'His physical strength. What the fuck?' Mira skidded a few meters back.
Kazu ducked as Erza's sword passed over his head.
'First Barrier magic, then his weird closed form cancelling spell and now this ridiculous degree of enhancement... No wonder he called Erza complacent.'
She watched Erza swinging her sword, always inches away from hitting Kazu.
'He also seems to be able to predict how she's moving, as if he's reading her like a book.' Mira frowned.
She didn't want to lose without giving her best.
Mira kicked the ground. In the next instant, she appeared above Kazu, doing an axe kick on him.
Kazu grinned and did a kick from the ground while sending magic bullets to hold off Erza.
BOOOM
"Wow! You are even stronger than Erza in the physical department. It's a shame that you don't know how to fight properly." Despite being in the air, Mira was the one to get pushed back.
'He is above me in strength... I still need to confirm with my best attack.' Mira frowned. Her competitive streak flared when she was compared to Erza.
"Is that so? How about this?" Purple streaks of Ethernano flared out of Mira's right fist. She disappeared from the air and appeared from Kazu's right, punching at him.
Kazu grinned. His fist gleamed green as he punched at her punch.
BOOOOM
Both Kazu and Mira got thrown back by a few meters.
Mira then turned to Kazu, who had gotten back to dodging Erza.
'I can't beat him like this. Though I don't know if that punch was his upper limit, I would run out of stamina first due to this form...'
"Erza! Hold him off at one place. I just need one shot." Mira stretched out her right arm, concentrating energy. This would be the strongest spell to date. She poured all of her Ethernano in it.
Erza wanted to retort by saying how she could hold Kazu in place when she can't even touch him.
However, Kazu beat him to it. "You should have directly asked me. Here, I won't move."
He suddenly stopped and deflected Erza's sword, catching the latter off guard.
Mira didn't like that, but she wasn't in a position to complain. 'If it were a real fight, he would have already taken us out. Well, I guess, this also makes it a high chance for me to take him out by element of surprise.'
A concentrated sphere formed in front of Mira. Unlike before, she was going to release it in the form of a beam.
"Soul Extinctor!" This was the first time she was using the move in front of everyone, so she didn't mind shouting the name.
However, just before she could release it, she suddenly felt a killing intent.
A killing intent so intense that it felt like somebody had directly placed her at the bottom of the ocean.
Mira had never felt anything like this before in her life.
Everything became blurred apart from the source of the killing intent.
Kazu
He was staring at her.
Black tendrils of Ethernano flickered on his body.
***
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