The Art Of Sword

Yama and Vivid stand face to face on the stage. Then two screens got lower down, displaying the name *Vivid*----*Kumiho* with the number 0 under them.

Vivid says to Yama: When I said your reward is to dance with me. It’s more like what you did on the Dance Floor, except this time it’s only you and me.

Yama*blinks many times*: I’m only here to have fun, nothing too serious.

Vivid: Is something wrong with your eyes? Stop blinking.

Yama: Sorry, your outfit is hurting my eyes a bit.

Vivid: Is it? I guess this one is a bit colorful for your eyes. Don’t worry, the next one will be less bright.

Vivid outfit changes to a more Lolita style with black as the main color of her dress with additional accessories like lace gloves. Then the music starts to play.

The music feels unfamiliar to Yama. The music feels slow, calm, has good rhythm flow, but it’s not for an individual, it needs two people to be perfect.

Lost in his thoughts and only breaks out when he feels that his body is moving on its own. And see that Vivid’s hands are controlling him on the stage.

Yama doesn’t understand why his mind suddenly goes blank, doesn't know what dance he is performing and his body just gives up on controlling itself. But he can still notice what is going on around him.

His score is stagnating at 2 while Vivid’s score constantly going up as the two dance. Being led by Vivid back to her side of the stage then acts as a point for her to dance around. They continue the same choreography for most of the stage.

At some point, Vivid picks Yama up and spins him around effortlessly. And her score keeps rising while his stays the same.

Finally Vivid finishes the show by having Yama holding her from falling off the ledge after collecting the final point on the stage. Then immediately has him pull her close to his chest as the song finishes.

When the song ends, Yama is finally able to control his body again, and the first thing he asks Vivid while both of their body are so close to each other.

Yama: What was all that?!

Vivid: That is what we call a Waltz a simple yet mesmerizing dance. And you follow really well!

Yama: A what? I don’t even know what it's called, let alone follow your movement.

Vivid caresses Yama’s cheek: I know, but you follow the music, not me. All I did was directing you.

Yama can’t move a muscle and all he can do is speak: Is this ok for you to touch me in front of all of your fans?

Vivid: All of their eyes are fixed on me, no one remembers that you were even here. When the music started, almost everyone was looking at me. Except for…

Yama: Except for who?

Vivid: You! All you did was focus on the music and ignore my present. Your eyes only stay on me for a moment then change their target, never look at me again.

Yama: Is that a problem for you?

Vivid: On the contrary, you’re a fun ‘Puppet’! But I haven’t done testing.

Yama: What are blabbing about?

Vivid pushes Yama away to the other side of the stage. When Yama stops sliding, the crowd goes wild.

Crowd: THAT OUR QUEEN! NO ONE CAN DEFEAT THE QUEEN! GO HOME KUMIHO! DID HE EVEN MOVE!

Yama’s mind (Of course, I can’t understand what they are saying. All I hear is my ears hurting. And why is she the only person speaking English here?)

Vivid: What a performance! I hope all of your eyes were on me… I wonder, was he performing at his best?

She points at Yama, telling him to say something.

Yama:…

Vivid: No time to speak! If you wish to outperform me, you better step up your game! IT’S TIME FOR ROUND 2!!!

After that announcement, Vivid outfit switch again to a black fitted cropped top and black jogger pants with white sneakers. And the music starts.

Yama says to himself (Ugh not these types of songs!) while having one hand on the mask

Vivid sees that Yama’s body looks unenthusiastic, so she smiles at him and snaps her finger. Suddenly the music melody feels a lot different.

Yama (Was that a snap I hear?), removes his hand from the mask and looks at Vivid, who is slowly reaching her hand out for him. For some reason, Yama's body slowly copies her actions. As the music slowly infects his brain.

Vivid simple actions start getting more rapid as the music rhythm pace getting faster.

Yama’s body somehow copies all of her actions perfectly without missing a beat. For Yama it feels like Vivid is directly controlling his body, every movement connects with each other with ease.

He tried to reject it but another force kept pulling him back, the harder he tried the stronger the pull was. Then that feeling of being controlled slowly getting weaker and ended, as the song finished. They ended in a position where they both fist bump each other.

Looking at Vivid.

Yama asks: You ok there?

Vivid wipes her cheek with her thumb and sees there is sweat on her nail.

Vivid: haha, look at that… I’m not supposed to lose that much energy in such a short time with only one person. The ratio is supposed to be 5/1, not the reverse.

A sudden pause then the crowd scream.

“HOLY SHIT HE TIE! I DON’T WANT TO LOSE MY QUEEN! CHEER LOUDER! GO VIVID GO! DEFEAT KUMIHO!”

Vivid: never seen them this riled up before.

Yama looks at both his and Vivid's scores and sees that in that round their score are tied.

Yama asks Vivid: What trick are you using to control my body?

Vivid answer: saying control is a bit much, I prefer using the word guiding. Your body allows me to do my job in the first two rounds. Now you’re on your own!

Vivid walks toward the edge of the stage.

Vivid: ARE ALL OF YOU READY FOR THE FINAL ROUND ???!!!

One guy The Crowd: DON’T LEAVE US!

Vivid outfit starts changing one final time while she speaks

“Who said I’m leaving? I’m gonna make HIM REGRET FOR CHALLENGING ME!!!”

Vivid outfits now change to a more casual street wear that is often seen in Dance Battle with an addition of a ball cap.

Vivid points at Yama: Now you get in position!

Yama feels that he now has more control over his body than before, and the body feels even more flexible than ever before. Those two rounds did more to his body than all of his later yoga sessions.

Both Yama and Vivid get into their position and the music starts. They both wait a few seconds to let the melody soak in their body.

Yama doesn’t know what to do first, but Vivid does.

She runs at Yama and grabs onto his shoulder then uses him as a pole to spin around, turning the zone around him gray.

Yama knows that one misstep from himself can cause a lot of damage to Vivid’s body.

Yama waits for the perfect moment to use his ‘Shockwave Element’ from his shoulders to release Vivid’s grasp. Then uses the Element again from his palm to knock himself into Vivid’s starting position.

But a bit of miscalculation of the Element power knocked him off the stage, luckily he managed to grab onto the ledge and launch himself into the air with the ‘Shockwave’ then land onto the stage in the split pose to maximize point collection. Then trigger the Element once more time from his palm to spin him 360 degrees to collect the points around him.

Yama (I just did that! 4 in a row!)

Same guy from The Crowd: HOLY WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT!

Yama (That scream was crazy) glances at the crowd to see where that sound came from.

Vivid looks at the guy that just screamed and thinks (Looks like one break out of the trance.) Then she turns to look at Yama and says.

“I like your performance just now!”

“I want to see more!”

“I want to see more!”

“I want to see more!”

“We want to see more!”

Yama turns back to face Vivid due to hearing voices from her.

Now in front of him, there are three Vivid with Round 1 2 3 outfits.

Yama (She been wearing different outfits this whole time? Then what were those glitches before?)

R3 Vivid rushes at Yama while the other two stay back.

Yama's eyes suddenly fixate on R2 Vivid and he can not move his own body. When R3 Vivid gets closer to him, his body suddenly lowers itself and creates a platform with his own two hands.

R3 Vivid jumps onto the platform and Yama launches her high up in the air, and she lands perfectly on the square behind him. She winks at him and runs to claim other squares.

Yama sees that R2 Vivid has the same pose as him (Dammit how can I get out of this situation… Maybe…)

Yama release his ‘Shockwave’ from the side of his torso, knocking him flying toward the squares that R3 Vivid was hunting and successfully stealing them for himself. But that knockback also flings R2 Vivid into the squares on the opposite side of the stage and due to the unexpected force, she flies off the stage and disappears into smoke.

R3 Vivid standing behind Yama says “Whoa you killed her!” then taps him on the head and runs to other squares.

Right now the score between Yama and Vivid is tied, and there are only a few points left to steal.

Yama now knows that his Element can be used to push himself around and has gotten a bit better with it in the last minute.

Yama launches himself toward the squares that R3 Vivid is going for, he manages to travel faster than her but is immediately grappled by R1 Vivid, which loses him the scores to R3 Vivid.

R1 Vivid says to Yama: Want another dance?

R1 Vivid’s hands are both very strong and soft, it feels impossible to get out of her grasp. Then she starts moving both of them out of R3 Vivid's way.

Yama: What even are you, some kind of illusion?

R1 Vivid: Technology has gone a long way isn’t it? It looks like you aren’t going to win.

Yama: I was not planning to win in the first place. But I ain’t losing while doing nothing. Since you have such a good grip and are not real, you don’t mind being pushed around?

R1 Vivid has a confused look on her face then she suddenly feels a strong force dragging her away with Yama.

While collecting the rest of the available points, R3 Vivid sees that Yama and R1 Vivid keep spinning at high speed on the stage.

R3 Vivid (We going to have a nice ending)

…

Yama: I can’t believe you can hold on this long.

R1 Vivid: I’m just preparing for the final…

In that moment R3 Vivid slides through Yama and R1 Vivid's legs. R1 Vivid turns into smoke right after that and Vivid grabs both of Yama’s hands and stops his momentum, which releases a big gust of wind from the stage.

The music stops, and the crowd is silent until the two screens merge together and display this message.

*VIVID IS THE DEMON QUEEN*

The crowd goes wild: YES THE QUEEN WIN! SHE STILL STAY WITH US! I NEVER LOSE HOPE!

Yama says to Vivid: I have to say that was pretty fun.

Vivid “I also enjoy it too!” takes a step back.

Yama: What are you doing?

Vivid: I wish I could show you the way out but schedule is full so the security will.

The part of the stage that Yama is standing on is slowly being moved down.

“I hope I’ll get to see you again in the future!” is the final thing he hears from Vivid before being lowered into a room under the stage.

Waiting there for him is the ‘Glasses bodyguard’ from before and he is holding some food.

Yama: How did you get here so fast?

Glasses bodyguard: That you don’t need to know. Hurry I need to get back to my post. You and the Penguin girl.

Yama: Penguin girl?

He turns his head around quickly and accidentally hits something. He takes a few steps back and sees that it is W. The bump was quite painful for her.

Yama: Are you ok?

W frowns and then rips the mask off of Yama's face, the mask disappears into smoke when it got removed. Then she immediately goes for a hug, Yama just accepts and doesn’t say anything.

A few seconds pass…

Glasses bodyguard: Are you two done? I’m in a hurry.

W and Yama quickly release each other. The ‘Glasses bodyguard’ walks out first then the other two follow.