Protect What You Love

Hale instinctively threw his arms up as the flood crashed down on them.

The mark on his wrist flared, sending icy power surging through his veins.

A dome-shaped barrier of glittering ice rose up around them, just seconds before the wall of water slammed into it with full force.

Hale’s arms shook under the force, sweat running hot beneath the helmet.

“Ngh… damn…!”

The dome trembled, cracks flickering through the ice like thin lightning.

Behind him, half-hidden in the flicker of the barrier, Koori crouched low.

Her breath hitched; her fingers dug into the sand.

“H-Hale…?”

He could barely hear her over the roaring water.

Even under the crushing weight, he managed a crooked smile.

“Don’t worry. I’ll protect you.”

For a heartbeat, the words seemed to hang motionless in the noise.

Koori blinked.

Something inside her shifted, like light slipping through a crack in ice.

“You… will protect… me…?”

The world blurred, the arena fading into a distant hum, and suddenly she was back on Mount Fuji.

Long ago.

The sky was black, the mountain ablaze.

Shadows writhed in the fire. 

The earth split, ash spiraled upward, screams twisting through the smoke.

In the middle of it all stood a girl, trembling between the rocks.

A silhouette stepped out of the blazing light.

Tall, beautiful, her long hair glowing like burning embers in the wind, her eyes like cosmic stars,  violet, deep and endless.

Her voice was soft and warm, yet as ancient as the mountains themselves.

“Kyrl san… æl vanna ê shal'nara…”

She smiled, knelt down to the little girl and brushed her cheek.

“Don’t worry. I’ll protect you.”

She pulled her close for a moment, tight and comforting, as if she never wanted to let her go.

Then she rose and turned toward the towering, flaming shadows ahead of them.

She lifted her hands; fire and ice flared in her palms, spiraling around each other like two heartbeats.

But before she faced the shadows, she looked back at the girl one last time.

Her voice sharpened, urgent, but full of love.

“Koorisakuya… promise me. One day you’ll grow strong...”

Koori stared up at her, tears running down her face.

“…so that you, too, can protect… what you love.”

Then the shadows broke through the rocks.

A blinding flash of light..

Koori gasped, as the arena snapped back, water, ice, noise hitting her all at once.

Hale staggered; his knees buckled as the ice barrier pulsed and quaked, seconds from shattering.

“Can’t… hold it… much longer…”

Koori looked at him.

His arms shook, his breath came in ragged bursts, yet he refused to take even a single step back.

“Hale…”

Her heart hammered against her ribs, and her mark burned, not with anger, but with something gentler.

The words she had just remembered lingered in her mind.

…so that you, too, can protect… what you love.

Slowly, she straightened.

“What I... love.”

Hale heard her step up beside him and glanced over, confused.

“Koori? What are you...”

Her hand brushed his forearm and a spark shot through the bond between their marks.

Hale froze, his breath caught.

What… is this?

A feeling, strange, yet familiar, welled through his chest like a warm current.

The fabric ears on Koori’s hood trembled in the icy wind.

"I don’t want to hurt anyone… but…"

Behind her mask, her eyes glowed, red like embers.

“…I want to protect you, too.”

Their marks throbbed in the same rhythm until Koori raised her hands and the link between them flared even brighter.

Hale felt the synchronization like a pull in his chest, and inside him stirred the same resolve, the same warmth he’d just felt from her.

And then, in the same breath, they spoke in perfect unison:

“We fight… as one.”

***

“IT LOOKS LIKE ICE KNIGHT & LAVA KITTEN WON’T HOLD OUT MUCH LONGER, NYA! THIS MATCH DECISIVELY BELONGS TO TEAM UMI-NO-ISHI!”

The commentator’s voice thundered through the arena as the giant holo screen zoomed in on the crashing water, slamming repeatedly into the trembling ice dome.

Each time the water receded, Shiraneko sent it crashing back with another sharp gesture, hammering the barrier relentlessly.

In the stands, Nekos and humans alike watched in tense silence.

“They really can’t keep up,” Sato muttered, taking a bite of his onigiri.

Kobayashi crossed her arms. “Mm… they look kind of inexperienced. And those costumes are a bit… strange.”

“Strange!?” Mitsuki blurted out immediately, much too fast.

Several heads turned toward her.

She stiffened, cleared her throat, and forced a small smile.

“A-ah... I mean, it’s probably part of their strategy! If people underestimate them, that can work in their favor, right?”

Sato blinked. “…Strate-what?”

Mitsuki waved both hands quickly.

“I-I mean... people might let their guard down. Maybe that’s what they’re aiming for...”

Her voice softened as she fidgeted with her sleeves.

Kobayashi gave a small, knowing smile.

“You seem very concerned about them, Kawashima-san.”

Mitsuki twitched. “I-I’m not! I’m just saying it’s possible, that’s all!”

Before she could continue, a murmur rippled through the section.

“Eh? What’s that!?” Sato said, suddenly sitting forward.

A strange light began to flicker beneath the twisting surge of water

First blue. 

Then red. 

Then both at once, like an ignited aurora trapped inside the wave.

The audience leaned forward as the light grew brighter.

Mitsuki rose halfway from her seat, hands pressed over her mouth.

Then a deafening boom.

A circular shockwave of blue frostfire exploded outward from the center, vaporizing the rushing water into scalding steam.

The wave flashed into vapor and exploded apart like an erupting geyser.

Shiraneko and Isozaki were hit head-on, flung back, tumbling across the sand before skidding to a halt, gasping.

For a moment, nothing could be seen but thick, white fog.

Then light sliced through the mist, two glowing lines of fire.

The fog tore open like a curtain, and there they stood:

Hale, his right side encased in crystalline ice, glittering in the arena lights.

Koori, her left side burning like molten lava, sparks dancing around her gloves.

Both leaned forward slightly, ready to move.

Silence held for a single breath.

Then Mitsuki shot fully to her feet, voice shaking:

“Y-YES!! GO! GO, YOU TWO!!”

A heartbeat later, the whole arena erupted, cheers shaking the stadium.

The roar of the crowd swelled, mixing with the commentator’s excited shouting.

“ICE KNIGHT AND LAVA KITTEN ARE BACK IN THE GAME, AND HOW!!”

***

Down in the arena, Shiraneko staggered to his feet, eyes wide.

“What in Nekogami's name was that, nya!?”

Isozaki stepped up beside him, her pupils pin-prick small.

“Their resonances… they overlapped. H-how is that even possible?”

“Doesn’t matter right now!” Shiraneko hissed, twin water whips spiraling into shape in his paws. “We can’t let them regroup! Keep attacking!”

Isozaki’s first volley of shellcrete projectiles flew into the thinning fog just as Ice Knight and Lava Kitten moved.

“Frostfire Surfer! Just like we practiced!” Hale shouted to Koori.

A bright-blue streak of ice unfurled beneath his feet, and he surged forward as if riding a frozen wave.

Koori gave a sharp nod as the sandy arena below her feet began to glow, hairline cracks forming, orange light leaking through.

With a controlled exhale, she let the magma rise, a narrow flow running beneath her boots.

When she pushed off, it looked as though she were gliding over liquid fire that formed itself anew beneath every step, the path behind her cooling rapidly into dark volcanic rock.

They zigzagged forward, and Isozaki’s shots slammed harmlessly into empty sand.

“Damn it, I can’t hit them, they’re too fast!” she yowled.

Hale swept the ice track left, Koori flared the lava right.

In the next heartbeat, they switched sides, crossing in the middle like a rehearsed routine.

Frost mist and heat haze blurred their outlines as they streaked through the arena like twin streaks of light.

Shiraneko showed his teeth in a vicious grin.

“You think that’s enough to win, nya!? Don’t get cocky!”

Two spiraling water whips lashed out from his paws, twisting like living vortices as they cracked toward the pair.

Hale and Koori had to brake hard.

“SHIRANEKO CUTS OFF THEIR ADVANCE! THAT WAS CLOSE!”

Hale caught one of the water whips, sending the cold of his mark rushing through his arms. 

The water froze in an instant, coiling into a spiraled, glass-like serpent in midair.

Koori seized the opening, rushing in and hurling a sphere of blazing lava straight at Shiraneko.

But the Neko snapped his other whip around, and the burning projectile evaporated mid-flight as if it had never existed.

“Bad idea, nya!” he snarled.

At the same moment, Isozaki thrust both paws upward and a narrow pillar of shellcrete erupted from the ground beneath Koori.

It smashed into her side; she flipped twice and skidded across the sand.

The crowd gasped.

“O-OOOH! LAVA KITTEN TAKES ANOTHER HIT!”

On the ground, Shiraneko was already charging toward Koori, water whips snapping relentlessly.

Hale leaped to go after her, but Isozaki slammed her paws down again.

A massive wall of shellcrete burst from the ground between them, closing around Hale on all sides.

He almost slammed into it, throwing his arms up as the stone trapped him in place.

“You stay put,” Isozaki said coldly.

Meanwhile the whips crashed down toward Koori, and every time she tried to flare her fire, water hissed against it, dampening it, smothering it.

She backed away, jumped, slid over sand and chunks of cooled lava as the pressure mounted and Isozaki kept Hale at bay. 

He slammed his fists against the wall, but to no avail.

“Damn it… I have to get to her!”

He heard the crack of the whips, heard Koori’s ragged breaths, heard the crowd cry out.

His heart pounded in his throat.

She needs my help. Without me she’s… she’s...

Then he felt it through the pulsing mark on his wrist. 

Her feelings.

She wasn’t panicking, she wasn’t desperate.

She was calm.

Determined.

And suddenly Hale understood.

“She’s… not afraid anymore...”

On the other side of the wall, Koori spun backward, almost fell, then caught herself, her boots digging into the sand.

The shadows of the water whips came slashing down at her once more.

“Keep it up, she’s about to break!” Isozaki shouted.

“I’ve got her, nya!” Shiraneko snapped.

But suddenly Koori stopped retreating. 

She crouched, touched the ground with her fingertips, and a soft crackling sound arose.

Thin red lines spread through the sand beneath her, glowing like veins of magma.

Then the ground in front of her erupted in a perfect circle.

Superheated air expanded all at once, like a snapped pressure seal.

A shockwave burst outward from the center, smashing through the air like an invisible hammer.

“NYAA!?”

Shiraneko was hit straight on, flung several meters back, while Isozaki was thrown into her own shellcrete wall.

The crowd roared.

“W-WHAT WAS THAT!? LAVA KITTEN JUST COUNTERED THEIR ASSAULT WITH SOME KIND OF THERMAL SHOCKWAVE!! NO ONE SAW THAT COMING!”

Koori stood tall.

No wobbling.

No panic.

Just embers blazing behind her mask.

“I don’t want to be the one who always needs protecting…” she whispered.

Behind the wall, Hale had felt every moment.

He clenched his muscles; the temperature around him plummeted.

Spikes of ice shot down his arms, covering his hands and shaping into two massive, jagged gauntlets.

He drew back his fists.

“RAAAH!”

With a single punch, he blew a gaping hole through the wall, sending dust, stone shards, and frost exploding outward.

Hale stepped through the breach just as Shiraneko and Isozaki struggled to get back up.

He slammed both fists into the ground, and two waves of ice rushed across the sand, racing up their legs, encasing them to their chests in a heartbeat.

Both opponents froze in place, shivering, eyes wide.

But the match wasn’t over yet.

Isozaki’s fingers twitched, and with a furious growl, she forced her magic through the ice, activating a runic circle at her feet.

Beneath the frozen layer, another shellcrete spike began to push up.

Shiraneko bared his teeth.

“NYA! We’re not yet done…!”

Thin threads of water seeped through tiny cracks in the ice, pushing desperately outward.

But Koori simply raised her hand and her fingertips glowed.

Just a breath, a small, controlled exhale, and the ground beneath the two Nekos turned dark red.

The ice around their feet melted, not to free them, but to weld them even deeper into place.

The half-formed shellcrete pillar beneath them softened into a steaming, viscous mass, then hardened instantly as Koori drew the heat back.

A violent hiss. 

Steam burst upward, engulfing both fighters.

And when the mist finally thinned…

...Shiraneko and Isozaki were encased in a single solid block of fused ice, shellcrete, and stone.

Unable to move.

Shiraneko let out a low, frustrated growl.

"Damn it..." 

Then, for a moment, the arena was utterly silent.

“TEAM UMI-NO-ISHI CAN NO LONGER MOVE! THE MATCH IS DECIDED!”

The stadium exploded.

Cheering. Screaming. Stomping paws.

Koori and Hale turned toward each other, their breaths steaming behind mask and helmet.

“Did I… did I do well? Did I protect you…?”

A hoarse, breathless laugh echoed from inside his helmet.

“Yeah. You did. You've been awesome.”

For a moment, they just stood there, holding onto each other, wrapped in a storm of cheers, heat, and frost.

Above them, in giant glowing letters, the result flared across the holo screen:

WINNER: TEAM ICE KNIGHT & LAVA KITTEN