Playing Dirty

72 times.

Lu Xiu had Deathblowed Emma a full 72 times.

Through the nearly self-abusive repetition of clashing blades, she broke down every one of Emma's moves, stripping away their gorgeous demonstration-like exterior until only the most fundamental essence of each technique remained.

Then, without even realizing which attempt it had begun with, Lu Xiu suddenly discovered at some point that all of Emma's moves, which had once dazzled her, seemed to have abruptly lost their meaning.

She seemed to have learned something...

But strangely, she could not explain exactly what she had learned.

So she could only kill Emma again and again.

Then start over again and again.

During that time, she had indeed achieved her goal.

She stripped away the flashy, performative layer of Emma's movements and refined them into their purest forms.

And learned them.

But she had only learned one move.

Mainly because Miss Emma's most threatening moves seemed to be giveaways. Any mid-level thrust, and Lu Xiu could Mikiri Counter it, forcing Emma to kneel in salute.

As for the moves that were not giveaways—the completely unrealistic sliding slashes, Iai Cross Slash, and the like... Lu Xiu could not learn those either.

"..."

Miss Emma slowly drew her blade.

Before the flash of steel had fully left its sheath, she was already close.

The first time Lu Xiu saw that almost windup-less draw, she thought it looked pretty impressive.

But now...

She lightly tapped her toes and Dodge Stepped half a step to the side.

Clang!

Lu Xiu took the initiative to meet the attack. The instant their blades collided, she instinctively redirected the force and used the momentum to spin.

...Reverse Kesa Slash.

Lu Xiu swung her sword with her right hand, cutting cleanly upward from below.

Clang!

Emma raised her blade to block, scattering sparks.

When Lu Xiu's strike failed to connect, she smoothly lifted Kusabimaru high, her right arm raised above her left shoulder. She Dodge Stepped backward, barely evading Emma's strike, and her body stretched fully open like a drawn bowstring.

A second Dodge Step brought her close.

One-Handed Kesa Slash, left cut, One-Handed Right Rising Cut.

Cloud Crossing, left cut, One-Handed Kesa Slash.

Like a dance, Lu Xiu began attacking Emma in an unbroken stream.

The rhythm of her attacks was so tight that it scarcely left room to breathe.

Clang—clang—

After two blocks, Emma could no longer hold on. Both blades struck her body.

She staggered backward. Perhaps it was an illusion, but a trace of shock seemed to surface in her eyes.

Lu Xiu did not notice. She continued dancing.

Another slash came down.

Emma's Posture Bar could no longer hold.

The sound of collapse immediately followed.

Lu Xiu stepped forward.

Deathblow!

Lu Xiu once again pressed down on Miss Emma's shoulder and sent her away.

As that tragic, beautiful bloom of blood blossomed.

The image froze.

"So that's how it is? Setting aside the system bonuses... combat is about controlling distance and timing."

Lu Xiu slowly lowered her hand and fell into thought as she watched Emma return to her starting position.

In truth, her movements just now had completely lost that stiff sense of imitation.

After she peeled away those flashy but impractical demonstration movements layer by layer like an onion, what remained was the simplest, most unadorned, and most useful thing.

However.

Lu Xiu was still only vaguely aware of it and could not yet summarize what she had learned.

"Forget it. Next one."

Lu Xiu did not continue dwelling on it. She had fought the little boss for so long, and she was getting tired of fighting Emma. Her next target was obvious.

...It was time!

Lu Xiu closed her eyes again. It was still the same scene, but this time, Emma was not the one standing before her.

Instead, it was a tall man whose presence was overwhelmingly oppressive compared to the seemingly delicate Emma.

He stood there quietly, clad in black dō-maru armor that reflected a cold metallic gleam under the setting sun. A sword hung at his waist, while an extravagantly large bow was slung across his back.

Genichiro Ashina.

During breaks from fighting Emma, Lu Xiu had practically treated building Genichiro as a form of rest. Now she could fight him right away.

"Come on."

Lu Xiu took a deep breath, looked at Genichiro Ashina, one of Sekiro's most iconic bosses, and charged straight at him, triggering the battle.

She did not even need to prepare herself mentally.

Because she had gained confidence from fighting.

Clang—

After fighting for so long, Deflect had already become instinctive for Lu Xiu.

When Genichiro Ashina suddenly slashed at her.

Lu Xiu casually deflected it.

When his first strike failed, Genichiro sharply pulled back his long sword and immediately assumed a unique stance.

It was the opening stance of Floating Passage.

With his right foot as the pivot, Genichiro spun on his left foot, rotating his entire body to build momentum. Like a spinning top, he whirled as his blade cast layer upon layer of Afterimages.

Seven strikes in a row.

They were absurdly fast.

But...

Clang clang clang clang clang clang—

The crisp sound of steel striking steel rang out endlessly atop the Heavenly Watchtower's highest lookout.

Lu Xiu seemed utterly at ease amid Genichiro's violent blade flashes.

She felt that everything followed a pattern. Her arm rose at precisely the right moments as though guided by muscle memory, blocking each strike.

And every block precisely triggered the Perfect Deflect effect, sparks exploding wildly between them.

At last.

Lu Xiu successfully deflected every strike without taking any damage. Instead, the instant Genichiro Ashina's assault ceased, she seized the opportunity to slash him.

Huh?

As Lu Xiu continued circling around Genichiro Ashina, she found it strange.

Was it really this easy to deflect?

She remembered this move being quite difficult in her past life's game. She had even wanted to learn it... so she could use it directly against Isshin Ashina someday.

As Lu Xiu let her thoughts wander, she kept shifting and maneuvering.

The moment Genichiro Ashina stiffened.

Lu Xiu did not need to think at all. Her body moved faster than her mind as she took a large step forward, Kusabimaru shooting out like a Viper from its burrow and piercing Genichiro's chest.

Deathblow!

Blood burst forth.

His first life ended.

Genichiro Ashina dropped to his knees, then climbed back up, leaped backward to widen the distance, and assumed his stance again.

Lu Xiu stood where she was and blinked.

"...Huh?"

Even she froze for a moment.

That had gone a little too smoothly.

But before she could think further, Genichiro charged at her again.

In the second phase, he was still bold and aggressive, brimming with menace.

His long sword sliced through the air.

Arrows shrieked past.

But Lu Xiu's expression grew increasingly strange.

Because she... had not taken any damage at all!

Every movement Genichiro Ashina made looked clumsy to her.

Sword slash, Deflect.

Again, Deflect.

Thrust, Mikiri Counter.

Horizontal slash, jump.

She even began to lose focus.

"Strange..."

Genichiro Ashina used Floating Passage again.

The familiar spin.

The familiar seven consecutive strikes.

Clang clang clang clang clang clang—

Sparks burst like rain.

This time, Lu Xiu blocked them all as well.

Very quickly, Genichiro Ashina's Posture Bar filled again, and Lu Xiu stepped forward once more.

Deathblow.

His second life.

"..."

After completing another Deathblow.

Lu Xiu looked down at the sword in her hand and finally realized it.

It was not that Genichiro Ashina had become weaker...

It was that during all the time she had spent clashing blades with the little bosses, during her repeated battles with Emma... she had truly learned something.

But it was not any particular technique.

It was something more fundamental: the essence of combat. Control over distance and timing, control over the centerline and structure, treating the weapon as an extension of the body, the contest of initiative...

Once she gradually understood those things.

Once everything came together.

She began moving beyond memorizing patterns. She started paying more attention to shifts in an enemy's center of gravity before they attacked, feeling out the rhythm of their assaults, and catching openings.

"I've gotten stronger!"

The moment that thought arose.

Lu Xiu felt as though a weight had suddenly lifted from her mind.

But right then.

"Well done... shinobi of the Divine Heir."

"What a pity."

Lu Xiu abruptly looked up and saw Genichiro Ashina remove his armor, tearing into the third phase.

The sky suddenly darkened.

Black clouds churned.

Thunder rumbled.

Genichiro Ashina slowly straightened.

Lightning from the sky struck his blade, yellow arcs of electricity crawling over his body.

Lu Xiu: "..."

Third phase.

Way of Tomoe, Genichiro Ashina.

"Wait."

"I remember..."

The smile on Lu Xiu's face froze just as the thought arose.

Genichiro Ashina leaped into the air, removed the massive bow from his back, and gathered the yellow lightning crawling along it into an arrow forged from lightning, aiming it at her.

Not long after.

[Dead]

The scene reset.

Lu Xiu returned to one side of the dojo. After adjusting to the slight disorientation caused by the spatial shift, she...

She looked at Genichiro Ashina not far away, fell silent for a moment, then immediately bristled. "...That's cheating! We agreed to spar with swords, but because you couldn't beat me, you just struck me with lightning? How is that an honorable duel? You clearly couldn't win with real weapons, so you started using magic."

That no longer counted as a normal duel.

No matter how much Lu Xiu had grown, she could not see through that thing at first glance.

Still, Lu Xiu was only complaining... Genichiro Ashina's third phase had always been designed that way.

Besides, the farther one progressed through the dungeon, the more outrageous the enemies' moves became, increasingly resembling magic.

That was an unchanging fact.

She had merely just built up some confidence, only to be taught a lesson immediately afterward, so she felt a little annoyed.

But only a little annoyed.

Lu Xiu stepped forward again.

She was confident she would not be stuck here for long.

In fact.

She even planned to fight him a few more times and learn Floating Passage.

In her current state, learning it would not be difficult.