Danzeki's smile faded.
His eyes lingered on the faint, shimmering current drifting around Toka's body.
It flowed with quiet elegance, widening ever so slightly, like mist gliding across the surface of a still lake. There was no violence within it. No oppressive force.
Only calm.
For the first time since the battle had begun...
Danzeki understood.
He's forcing me to take this seriously.
He drew a slow, measured breath.
The irritation vanished from his face, replaced by absolute focus.
A deep silence settled over the clearing.
Even the insects seemed to disappear.
Only the whisper of the forest remained.
Then—
The Seikon coursing beneath Danzeki's skin began to flow.
Not wildly.
Not explosively.
It moved with almost majestic grace through the crimson-and-emerald veins winding along his arms, each pulse brighter than the last.
The clearing fell into complete silence.
Then...
The atmosphere warped.
The air itself twisted unnaturally.
Violent currents rushed together from every direction, colliding into a single point before compressing under an unimaginable force.
The pressure grew heavier.
And heavier.
The surrounding forest groaned.
Towering trees bent violently as if an invisible giant were forcing them to kneel.
Loose stones cracked.
Leaves, branches, and clouds of dust were ripped from the earth and drawn into the spiraling current.
Kairo instinctively raised an arm over his face.
"...What... is this...?"
His voice barely escaped his lips.
The wind no longer sounded like wind.
It screamed.
A deafening, earth-shaking howl erupted through the forest, drowning out every other sound.
Then...
The compressed air became visible.
At first, it resembled nothing more than a swirling pillar of translucent currents.
But the shape continued to grow.
Higher.
Longer.
Larger.
The massive vortex stretched skyward before arching across the clearing like the body of some ancient celestial beast awakening from its slumber.
Its enormous coils wrapped through the forest, crushing everything in their path.
One after another, colossal trees exploded apart beneath its immense body, their trunks splintering like fragile twigs against the overwhelming pressure.
The earth itself split open wherever it passed.
What finally emerged...
Was a serpent.
No...
An anaconda.
Nearly forty feet in length.
Its colossal body towered above the clearing, so massive that its coils alone were thicker than the trunks of the oldest trees around them.
It possessed no flesh.
No scales.
No eyes.
Its entire body was forged from impossibly compressed currents of screaming wind, translucent streams twisting endlessly around one another with such terrifying density that the creature seemed almost solid.
Every movement distorted the air around it.
The forest trembled beneath its presence.
Its enormous head slowly rose until it loomed high above Toka like a living mountain.
Its jaws opened.
The inside of its mouth was nothing but a swirling abyss of condensed wind, where countless razor-sharp currents spun together into a storm capable of pulverizing stone.
Then...
It roared.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!
The sound exploded across the Dead Forest.
Birds scattered into the sky for miles.
The ground caved inward beneath the sheer pressure of the beast's cry.
The trees bowed away from it as though the entire forest feared its existence.
Even standing far behind Danzeki...
Kairo felt his heart seize.
The pressure alone made breathing difficult.
His wounded body trembled instinctively.
"...This..."
His bloodshot eyes widened in disbelief.
"...That's all... wind...?"
The colossal serpent lowered its monstrous head.
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Its gigantic body coiled tightly, every spiral compressing with terrifying force until the entire creature resembled a living natural disaster waiting to be unleashed.
Then...
With a thunderous explosion that shattered the earth beneath it...
The giant anaconda lunged toward Toka.
The impact shattered the clearing.
Dust exploded skyward.
The ground collapsed beneath the monstrous pressure.
The force drove straight into Toka.
For the briefest instant...
His feet slid backward.
A shallow trail carved itself through the dirt beneath his sandals as the overwhelming current pressed relentlessly against him.
Behind the roaring storm...
Danzeki laughed.
The sound rang with absolute confidence.
"...HOW ABOUT NOW?"
Kairo's heart lurched.
His bloodied eyes widened.
"...No..."
The crushing pressure was simply too great.
Surely...
No one could withstand that.
Then...
Danzeki's laughter stopped.
His smile froze.
"...What...?"
His pupils shrank.
Toka's hands had met the rushing current.
Not with force.
Not with resistance.
But with perfect serenity.
His palms drifted across the roaring wind in smooth, circular motions, gently following the natural rhythm of its movement.
He wasn't stopping it.
He was listening to it.
His weight shifted effortlessly onto his rear leg.
His stance melted into Kyohō.
Fluid.
Balanced.
Alive.
As his body yielded...
The shimmering current surrounding him quietly flowed into the heart of the attack.
The change was immediate.
The colossal serpent shuddered.
Its violent roar softened.
The crushing pressure that had moments ago torn through ancient trees began to unravel.
Layer by layer...
The immense force dissolved.
The raging currents lost their fury.
The deadly compression relaxed.
The giant anaconda of wind became lighter...
...gentler...
...until its enormous body drifted around Toka like nothing more than a cool evening breeze.
His robes fluttered softly.
His hair swayed peacefully.
Not a single step disturbed his balance.
With one final, graceful sweep of both hands...
Toka completed the circle.
The last remnants of the serpent scattered into the forest.
The terrifying construct vanished completely.
Only a gentle breeze remained.
It rustled quietly through the pine trees, carrying with it the scent of earth and leaves, as though the forest itself had sighed in relief.
Silence reclaimed the clearing.
Danzeki stood motionless.
For the first time...
The calm certainty that had never left his face shattered.
His eyes stared at the empty space where his attack had disappeared.
"...Impossible..."
His voice barely escaped his lips.
His most highly compressed wind technique...
A force capable of flattening the forest...
Had not been blocked.
It had not been overpowered.
It had simply...
...been returned to the wind.
.....
The gentle breeze faded.
Silence settled over the shattered clearing once again.
Danzeki stood motionless, his eyes fixed upon Toka.
For a long moment...
Neither of them spoke.
Then, to Danzeki's surprise...
Toka smiled.
It wasn't triumphant.
Nor mocking.
It was the faint, easy smile of someone who had simply finished a routine task.
Danzeki stared at him.
"...What..."
His voice was barely above a whisper.
"...What are you?"
Toka blinked.
"...Hm?"
"No... I mean..."
Danzeki shook his head, struggling to put his thoughts into words.
"...Who are you?"
His eyes remained locked on the young man before him.
"...How did you do that?"
"There was too much pressure..."
"...Too much force."
"...No one should've been able to stop it."
"...Yet you..."
His voice faltered.
"...How?"
Toka remained silent.
The breeze stirred gently through his hair.
For several seconds, he simply looked toward the fading sky.
Then he lowered his gaze.
"...My name is Tokisora."
His tone remained as casual as ever.
"...From the Hakushō Household."
A brief pause.
"...Guidances for the Inner Path."
The title meant nothing to Kairo.
But the moment those words reached Danzeki...
His expression stiffened.
"...Hakushō..."
He repeated the name beneath his breath.
His confusion only deepened.
"...That still doesn't explain it."
His eyes narrowed.
"...How did you neutralize my attack?"
"...There was too much pressure."
"...It should've crushed anything it touched."
Toka tilted his head.
"...You give me too much credit."
"I didn't do anything extraordinary."
He lifted one hand lazily.
"The mistake was thinking you had to fight the storm."
His fingers traced a slow circle through the air.
"...Instead of resisting it..."
"...I followed its flow."
His hand continued moving effortlessly.
"...Then guided it..."
"...until it remembered what it originally was."
His eyes met Danzeki's.
"...Ordinary wind."
Silence.
Toka shrugged.
"I simply harmonized with your attack."
"I didn't overpower it."
"I didn't destroy it."
"I only gave it somewhere else to go."
"...Once it stopped fighting..."
"...it stopped being a weapon."
Behind them...
Kairo could only stare.
His blood-stained eyes remained fixed upon Toka.
Harmonized... with it...?
The words refused to make sense.
How could someone neutralize an attack that powerful...
...without matching it with even greater force?
He couldn't imagine it.
Across the clearing...
Danzeki slowly shook his head.
"...Impossible."
His voice grew louder.
"...That's impossible."
He took another step.
"No..."
"...That's ridiculously impossible."
Toka smiled faintly.
"...Maybe."
His eyes slowly sharpened.
"...Have you got anything else?"
Danzeki frowned.
"...What?"
"...Any other tricks."
The question hung quietly in the air.
Danzeki didn't answer.
His mind was still trying to understand everything that had just happened.
Seeing the silence...
Toka sighed.
"...I see."
He slipped both hands back into his pockets.
"...If that's all..."
His smile returned.
"...then I guess..."
"...it's my turn."
The instant the words left his mouth—
He vanished.
The air rippled.
Nothing more.
Danzeki's pupils shrank.
Where—
A presence appeared directly before him.
"...!"
Toka.
Before Danzeki's thoughts could catch up...
WHAM!!
Toka's fist drove upward beneath his chin.
A perfectly timed uppercut.
The impact snapped Danzeki's head backward.
His feet left the ground.
His body soared through the clearing, hurtling past Kairo before crashing across the forest floor several dozen meters away.
The earth shook beneath the impact.
Fragments of stone and bark scattered through the air.
Silence followed.
Kairo blinked.
"...Fast..."
His voice barely escaped him.
Toka never looked toward where Danzeki had landed.
Instead...
He calmly walked toward Kairo.
Step.
Step.
Step.
He stopped only a few feet away.
His expression remained as relaxed as ever.
"...Can you stand?"
Kairo met his eyes.
After a brief pause...
"...Yeah."
Toka gave a small nod.
"...Good."
He glanced beyond Kairo toward the shattered clearing.
"...I'll need you to move a little farther back."
"I'd rather not have you in the way."
Kairo frowned.
"...What are you doing?"
"...Hm?"
Toka tilted his head.
Kairo looked at him quietly.
"...Why are you doing this?"
For the first time...
Toka actually seemed to think about the question.
He scratched the back of his head.
"...Do I need a reason?"
The answer caught Kairo completely off guard.
His eyes widened.
Toka shrugged.
"...Besides..."
"...I do whatever I want."
"I don't need anyone's permission."
He looked toward the forest ahead.
"...Call it instinct..."
"...if you like."
"...That's just how I am."
For a moment...
Kairo said nothing.
Then, despite the blood running down his face...
A faint smile appeared.
"...I guess..."
He let out a tired breath.
"...you're right."
Using the nearest tree for support...
He slowly forced himself back onto his feet.
........
Kairo had barely found his footing.
His weight had only just settled beneath him—
Something tore through the forest.
A violent blur exploded from behind him.
The air cracked.
"...?!"
Before Kairo could even turn his head, the streak shot past him like a missile, so fast that the rushing wind tugged at his clothes.
His eyes widened.
That speed...!
It was Danzeki.
His body cut through the clearing in an instant, closing the distance before either Kairo or Toka had the chance to react.
Toka's eyes shifted.
Just enough to register the incoming blur.
Too late.
BOOM!!
Danzeki slammed into him with the force of a battering ram.
The impact echoed through the forest like a cannon blast.
The earth split beneath their feet.
Toka's body was driven backward as Danzeki refused to let up, propelling him across the clearing with relentless momentum.
CRAAASH!!
The first tree exploded apart behind Toka.
Then another.
And another.
Towering trunks splintered into showers of bark and timber as the two figures tore a destructive path through the forest.
Neither of them touched the ground.
Danzeki continued driving forward, carrying Toka like an unstoppable projectile.
Broken branches rained from above.
Dust swallowed everything in its wake.
The forest shook beneath the sheer violence of the charge.
Only when the trail reached a massive stone outcrop did it finally end.
BOOOOOOM!!
Toka's back crashed against the enormous boulder with enough force to fracture its surface.
A web of cracks spread through the ancient rock.
Fragments burst outward in every direction.
For a heartbeat...
Everything stood still.
Dust drifted lazily through the air.
At the center of the destruction, Danzeki remained pressed against Toka, one forearm driven firmly across his chest, pinning him against the shattered stone.
The calmness that had defined his face throughout the battle was gone.
His expression had twisted completely.
Veins pulsed beneath his skin.
His jaw clenched so tightly that his teeth ground together.
His eyes...
Burned with unrestrained fury.
The quiet composure of moments before had vanished.
In its place stood a warrior consumed by rage.
................................