The heavy doors closed with a loud bang, sealing the chamber again.
For a long moment, silence filled the air.
Naya stood perfectly still, her katana angled towards the ground, her gaze fixed on the intruder.
The masked girl didn't move either and her breathing was steady and her stance deliberate. Her light magic was shining from her hands.
"You again," Naya said. "You survived."
The masked girl tilted her head. "Barely."
So she could speak. The voice was lighter than expected: calm, defiant, carrying none of the panic most humans wore when seeing her.
Naya's gaze sharpened. "Let's correct that."
And then she moved.
The sound that followed wasn't a step; it was displacement, air collapsing in her wake. One instant she was a few paces away, the next her blade flashed before the girl's mask.
Steel met light.
The girl's barrier flared, pure white radiance clashing against polished metal. Sparks burst outward, painting the walls with glittering motes.
Naya's strikes were measured, almost lazy at first, testing angles, gauging reaction time.
The girl parried each one with a glowing dagger of light, conjured and dissolved in rhythm with her movements.
"You're fast," Naya admitted as she slid backward, letting momentum carry her into another attack. "But still fragile."
She feinted left, then pivoted low, sweeping a kick that sent the girl stumbling. The mask caught a glint of molten light before she recovered, boots sliding across the black floor.
A thin laugh escaped the human. "You're holding back."
"So are you."
They clashed again. The ring of steel and light echoed through the chamber, a rhythm of violence too precise to be chaos.
Each strike pushed the human backward, each dodge cost her another heartbeat of stamina. Yet she kept coming, gritting her teeth, eyes blazing through the mask's slits.
Her light magic burned purer now, threads of silver weaving around her body. Every movement left trails of radiance that flickered like wings.
Naya drove her backward toward the pillar line, blade a blur of silver arcs.
The human dropped low, rolling under a swing that would have taken her head, then flung a pulse of light straight at Naya's chest.
The impact forced the general two steps back. The glow seared through the fabric of her coat, leaving a faint scorch mark.
Interesting.
She straightened, lips curving. "That's quite impressive you're keeping up ."
The masked girl's voice came tight between breaths. "You didn't kill me last time. I took that personally."
Naya laughed. "So this is revenge."
"No," the girl said, summoning another blade of light. "This is proof."
"Of what?"
"That I can reach you."
The statement hit harder than the attacks had. Naya's smile faded. Reach me?
Her answer came as motion.
She blurred forward again, faster now, testing the limits of both patience and endurance.
The girl blocked three blows in rapid succession, deflected a fourth, then gasped as Naya caught her wrist mid-swing.
"Predictable," Naya said softly.
The girl twisted, light flaring from her palm. A burst of brilliance forced Naya to release her grip and step back, vision whitening for a split second. When it cleared, the human was gone.
No above.
She dropped from the ceiling, light-woven daggers in both hands, slamming down with a force that cracked the stone beneath them.
Naya met her mid-fall, sword arcing upward. The clash erupted in a flare of heat and brightness, a miniature sun between them.
When the glow faded, both stood apart again, chests rising and falling, neither giving ground.
"Good," Naya murmured, rotating her wrist. "At least you can make me move."
Her voice was almost approving but the dungeon's air trembled at the undercurrent of lethal intent.
The girl steadied her breathing, golden light dripping from her fingertips like liquid dawn.
"I've been practicing."
"I can see that. Your footing still lacks discipline."
She dashed forward again. Their weapons met mid-swing. This time, Naya didn't test anymore she pressed.
The rhythm of her strikes became relentless, each one heavier, cleaner, more decisive. The floor split under their feet.
The girl's defenses wavered, then solidified again, fueled by sheer stubbornness.
She turned aside one blow that would have carved her mask in half, then answered with a flash of light aimed straight at Naya's unguarded flank.
Naya caught it with her bare hand. The holy energy hissed against her skin, searing faint black lines across her palm.She didn't even flinch.
The girl froze for half a second, enough for Naya to pivot and knock her weapon aside. The light dagger shattered on impact.
Naya raised her sword, its edge resting inches from the girl's neck.
"That was careless," she said quietly.
Through the mask, a smile. "I'm still standing."
Something inside Naya tightened, half irritation, half reluctant admiration.
Her soldiers would have been unconscious by now. Most captains would have fled. But this human refused to fall, every breath laced with defiance.
Enough, she thought. Let's see how far you can truly go.
She stepped back and lowered her weapon.
The girl blinked, confused. "What—"
Naya spread her hand. Heat coiled around her palm, crimson and gold.
The air thickened; the chamber's temperature surged instantly. The dormant magma veins along the walls brightened, responding to her call.
"I wanted to see your limits without magic," she said. "Now I'll see if you can survive mine."
The floor trembled. A vortex of red fire swirled above her hand, growing, feeding on the dungeon's core.
The glow painted the walls with dancing shadows, turning the black stone into molten mirror.
The masked girl stepped back, light gathering around her like armor. Her breathing slowed, eyes narrowing behind the mask.
Naya lifted her hand higher. The flame condensed, shrieking with contained energy until it formed a sphere of blazing power , larger than last time, dense enough to distort the air.
"Run," she said.
The girl didn't.
Of course she didn't.
Naya hurled the fireball.
The blast filled the chamber with roaring heat. The shockwave hurled dust and shards of stone across the floor.
A column of flame surged upward, devouring everything in its radius. The light was blinding, absolute.
For a moment, even Naya couldn't see.
When the smoke began to clear, she expected the familiar silence that followed obliteration,the quiet of victory, of nothing left to burn.
But the silence never came.
Instead, she heard breathing.
Slow, ragged… human.
The light that had been swallowed by her flames began to return thin at first, then brightening, forming a circle of radiance within the inferno.
Her eyes widened slightly.
The masked girl was still there.
Kneeling, one hand pressed to the floor, the other raised before her.
The pendant at her neck burned a vivid blue, runes glowing across its surface. Around her shimmered a translucent barrier, fractured but unbroken, holding back the fire that should have consumed her.
Steam curled from her shoulders, her cloak half-charred, but she lived.
Naya lowered her arm, disbelief flickering across her face for the first time in years.
She took one step forward, studying the human through the veil of heat.
"How—" she began, but stopped herself. The word tasted foreign.