Skirk {Theresa} clapped her hands and looked at the twitching legs sticking out of the ground. They belonged to Tartaglia, whom she had slammed headfirst into the earth.
"Come on, stop playing dead, Ajax."
"Same rules as always. I'll fight you with one hand. If you can make me use both, I'll teach you true power."
The reason Theresa had not used a sword in front of Childe was that she had never used any weapon other than the Oath of Binding. In other words, her specialty was crosses.
So Theresa planned to tease and torment Childe barehanded. She was also considering whether to throw a whole Sea of Quantum's worth of the fight and let him win once, giving him the powah he wanted most~
But whether that powah would be anything proper was another question~ It all depended on Theresa's mood.
Crash-
Childe Tartaglia shook his legs rather awkwardly, then flipped himself out of the hole. He looked thoroughly covered in dust and dirt.
"Cough, cough, cough! Master, that was way too sudden! I didn't even have time to react!"
Tartaglia coughed and spat out dust as he spoke, circulating Hydro Elemental Energy to wash the dust off his body and clear the dirt from his mouth. He looked much better afterward, or at least not as filthy as before.
As for Theresa's earlier slam, it probably would have shattered an ordinary person's bones and broken their neck. But for Tartaglia, who possessed a Hydro Eye of the God, it amounted to little more than a fall. He was basically fine, just a little worse for wear.
"Come on. This time, I'll let you attack first."
Theresa beckoned to Tartaglia with a finger and spoke with a smile. The mischievous grin on her face made him pause.
He