Fight for the Fifth Place

Early in the morning as the brightness of the moon starts to wane footsteps heading towards the empty dojo can be heard. Lyra slides open the door of the dojo. She enters then starts her morning practice. Her graceful and clean execution of the moves her uncle has taught her shows her progress this three years. In three years that pass she didn't slack nor miss in practice.

Lyra's short wavy brown hair is soaked with sweat by the time she finishes the complete set of moves. Her mesmerizing clear chocolate eyes shine with determination even as she's trying to catch her breath. Noticing the brightening sky, Lyra immediately starts to finish her cool-down stretches. She hurriedly goes back to her room to take a brief shower and heads to the kitchen. Since last year Lyra is now the one in charge of preparing the meals for everyone. Lyra was very interested and cooking and tries to improve it in her spare time. She was able to improve her cooking skills in a short time to the extent that she was able to surpass Nina's culinary skills. Madam Cherry being very sensitive when it comes to food was able to notice Lyra's skill. At that moment Madam notices it, she arranges for Lyra to be the head cook.

As for her other chores, she's now heavily depended on by Nina to do the more tedious cleaning in the house. Lyra didn't mind. Lyra's hard work didn't go unnoticed by Madam. Madam as a reward for Lyra's dedication, Madam gave Lyra the privilege to use the dojo every morning.

Lyra busily works in the kitchen. She's been busy peeling, chopping, and washing fresh ingredients which is rare to attain. As soon as she hears the kitchen door open, she automatically greets, "Good morning, Nina."

"Good morning dearling~" Nina smiles and adds "Ah, I really can't get used to the sight of a ten-year-old scurrying around the kitchen." Lyra only gives Nina a warm smile.

"Is your back feeling better, Nina?"

"Heheh, My back is alright. It's really embarrassing to fall to those evil twins' trick. Never again will I go easy on them!" Nina grins evilly. "You don't have to worry about my back dearling, what you should worry about is finding time to rest this afternoon so when evening comes you won't be too exhausted to fight. Don't forget you have to fight four battles to defend your title as the top six and your fifth battle would be challenging the Ikita who's the fifth in the ranking."

"Don't worry Nina I will surely find time to rest. I wouldn't want to miss out on my chance to finally be in the top five. I've been working hard for this chance. I won't let it slip since any more time wasted..." Lyra becomes silent while still busily cooking but looking closely you could see her eyes moisten.

Nina pats Lyra's head. "I know dearie, you've worked hard." Lyra only nods while blinks away the tears that threaten to fall.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

When the daylight starts to fade and trade places with the night, Lyra readies herself for the upcoming battles. Nina, as usual, accompanies Lyra to the arena. In the arena, Lyra attracts a lot of stares of admiration and envy from both spectators and fellow fighters. Lyra ignoring the stares immediately heads for the stage. For three years she has fought more than a thousand battles. She had to totally devote herself to fighting every evening. There were days in which she had to fight more than twenty battles a night. She has numerous wins but she lost numerous times too. Every scar she has signified her struggle and effort to win.

"Lyra, dear Lyra!" Herold greets while waving his hand. "How is the youngest top ranking fighter?" He smiles as he asks Lyra when she is only a few steps away from the entrance of the stage.

"Shoo! Go away Herold you'll make Lyra late for her fight!" Nina yells and scowl.

"Nina didn't see you there. Did you got shorter again?" Herold teases Nina.

"You want to fight you right here right now, Herold?"

"No, of course not. I think I might win if we do that and it would be an unfair win since your fighting me when you're angry." Herold smiles.

"You truly are irritating."

"I'm glad to hear that I'm so dear to you since I can irritate you to this extent."

"Shameless."

"Only to you dear." Herold bows towards Nina and tries to take her hand to give it a kiss. Too bad Nina slaps his hand away and even tries to slap his face. Fortunately, Herold was able to avoid the slap on the face.

"Bah! Go ahead and enter the stage Lyra dearie, I'll handle this waste of human flesh," Nina tells Lyra while directing a fierce glare to Herold.

"Ah~ I'm touched that Nina would personally take care of me~" Herold flatteringly declares making the spectator cringe.

"Got it, Nina. See you later." Lyra used to Nina's and Herold's bickering enters the entrance of the stage.

The overseer of the stage whenever it comes to top-ranking fights becomes more like MC hyping up the audiences. "Welcome ladies and gentlemen! I'm sure everyone is looking forward to seeing our youngest top ranking fighter, Lyra! She's also the first one to enter the ranks in such a short time! Only three years in the arena and she's able to fight through the top! and what more shocking is she's only ten years old!" Lyra tenses up and presses her lips whenever the overseer starts to announce. She forces herself to take a deep breath and relax as she notices the notification on her bracelet for her to enter the stage.

Her first fight of the night. She enters the stage. At once, Lyra's opponent shortens their gap quickly and starts a barrage of attacks at her. Lyra swiftly blocks each and every attack by her opponent. Her opponent getting frustrated about not able to hit Lyra lowers his guard and goes full-frontal assault. Lyra noticing her opponent's impatience and lack of guard spots an opening. Instantly she sidesteps disrupting the opponent's momentum and taking that chance, Lyra delivers a powerful kick on the side of her opponent's knees. As her opponent falls, she quickly follows it with an elbow strike on her opponent's neck. Her opponent falls unconscious. She wins.

Once again she takes a deep breath as she enters the stage for her second fight, this time ignoring the overseer antics. She enters the stage. She notices that this time her opponent is a lady. The lady eyes Lyra with caution. Lyra does the same. For a while, they only eye each other's movements. Eventually, Lyra's opponent takes the initiative to attack first. Her opponent pulls out a whip and starts to attack Lyra aiming for her head. Nimbly, Lyra is able to avoid the whip and starts to shorten the gap between her and her opponent. When Lyra is close enough, she delivers a kick to her opponent's wrist. Unfortunately, her opponent truly is skilled in using the whip for she's able to manipulate the whip to instantly coil around Lyra's leg outbalancing Lyra before Lyra kick can connect with her opponent's wrist. Pushing herself up and swiftly pulling on the whip coiled around her leg, she outbalances her opponent since her opponent didn't expect that. Lyra then kicks aiming for the opponent's face. Her opponent couldn't help but let go of the whip to cross her arms and block Lyra's kick protecting her face. Seeing her opponent drop the whip and tries to block her kick, she quickly changes her aim from the opponent's face to her ribs. *Crack* Her kick hits her opponent's ribs. Her opponent could help but scream. But Lyra didn't stop there, she then delivers a chop on the back of her opponent's neck rendering her opponent unconscious. Another win for Lyra.

She notices the slight trembling of her hands on her way to the stage and the slight pain in her leg. She takes a deep breath to steady herself. Lyra nows enters the stage for the third fight of the night.

The first thing she notices when she enters the stage is her opponent's overexcited gaze towards her. This puzzles her but that didn't stop her from instantly putting her guard up. After seeing her opponent just standing there and staring at her with a weird look in his eyes, Lyra finally takes the initiative to attack. But before she could even get close to her opponent, her opponent forfeits the match just like that. And before her opponent exited her opponent tells her "I just wanted to see you that's why I tried to compete tonight." Puzzled Lyra stares at the back of her opponent as he exits. Lyra wins.

In the fourth fight, Lyra is able to catch a short break from her unexpected easy win from the third fight. Although the pain in her leg starts to throb. She just gives a short massage and tries to calm her nerves once again. She enters the stage. Like the first fight, right away she's greeted by a powerful barrage of attacks.

But unlike the first fight, her opponent this time is capable of steadily maintain a balance between his attacks and his guard for a while making it hard for Lyra to counter and only block the attacks. Lyra finally spots an opening when her opponents launch a roundhouse kick. She drops down and quickly does a leg sweep. Her opponent falls but quickly pushes himself up leaving Lyra unable to attack further.

Fortunately, Lyra uses this opportunity to put some distance between her and her opponent. She presses her lips since that kick of hers earlier made the pain in her leg intensify. She can't help but endure the pain and push on. She still has one battle to fight after this. And that fight is the most important one. Her opponent didn't hesitate but launches multiple attacks again. This time Lyra forces herself to concentrate on the tiniest movement of her opponent to find an opening that would immediately lead to her making her opponent unconscious.

Finally, Lyra finds an opening. She quickly avoids her opponent's punch and forcefully drives the heel of her palm at her opponent's chin and follows it with a powerful knee strike in his groin. The opponent faints. Lyra wins.

The last of the night for Lyra. Also the most important one at that. If she wins this fight she'll prove to Madam that she's strong enough.

As Lyra enters the stage she could already hear the overseer's exaggerated tone announcing the battle, "Ladies and Gentlemen, one of the most anticipated fight are about to begin! The battle between Lyra and Ikita, who is number six vs. number five in the ranking!" the deafening cheers from the audiences heightens the tension. "Now, will Ikita be successful in defending his title from Lyra or will Lyra overthrow Ikita? Ah but the odds seem to be in favor of Ikita since Lyra already fought four consecutive fights to defend her title as number six while Ikita is only starting his first fight of the night! Well, I'll stop blabbering so the fight can start~, Alright, fighters Ready-set-fight!"

Lyra's aware that she has to end the fight as quickly as possible before the pain in her leg intensifies further. She could also feel her strength has been drained by her previous fights that's why her hands are noticeably trembling now. She's also having trouble steadying her breath and avoid panting. Regardless, she's ready to give her all to win this fight by any means possible.

Lyra enters the stage full of vigilance. Ikita too enters the stage and instantly puts his guard up.

They both circle the stage looking at each other, ready to counter at any moment. Lyra can't help risk it and be the first one to launch an attack. She dashes shortening the gap between her Ikita. then immediately barrage Ikita with multiple attacks. Her attacks are precise and accurate hitting the same spot over and over again. Ikita is having difficulty in avoiding Lyra's attack since they come from angles that are difficult to defend with but he's able to withstand Lyra's attack.

Lyra seeing her attacks are becoming useless stops and moves away creating a great distance between her and Ikita. Panting she wipes her sweat with her sleeves and tries to ignore the throbbing pain in her leg. Ikita seeing Lyra's exhausted appearance didn't hesitate to attack full force. Lyra quickly tries to block Ikita's kick but the force behind is just too strong. Her arms are numb from the kick and she even pushed a few steps.

Ikita without giving Lyra time to counter follows with a jab aiming at her face. Lyra quickly ducks down. Lyra attempts to do a leg sweep but Ikita is able to avoid it by jumping. Lyra then rolls away. Breathing hard, Lyra bites her lips to keep her focus on the fight and not on the pain on both her arms and legs. Ikita gets the feeling that he has the momentum of the fight starts multiple well-timed combos of attacks on Lyra. Lyra with all her might tries to avoid Ikita's attacks.

Unfortunately, some attacks still get through her guard. The side of Lyra's ribs gets hit when a momentary spike pain in her arm takes her focus making her bite her lips hard drawing some blood. Ikita still full force attacking Lyra is impressed by Lyra's endurance. Lyra starts to feel light-headed. She decides to risk it and do a counter or else she might really fall unconscious if this continues. So she waits for Ikita to punch then she swings her upper arm across the front of her chest which the outer edge of her arm comes to contact with Ikita's arm successfully blocking him. This block gives Lyra just enough time to put all her strength on her knee strikes Ikita's groin. Ikita was caught off guard by Lyra's desperate move that he failed to block the knee strike. And so he faints from the sudden severe pain.

"Lyra wins!" the overseer announces as the audience went wild with cheers.

When Lyra sees Ikita faints, and the overseer loudly announces she wins, she couldn't help but let the tears in her eyes freely flow and fall to her knees.

"Finally...Finally, I'm finally strong enough to see uncle again. Even if it is only his corpse. Uncle, I'm coming home to get you finally." Lyra weakly whispers.