Smell

While countless feathers were getting primed, ready to be thrown all at the same time, Jessica held out her katana to the side, as though she were pointing in a direction.

It was at this point that Emma had finally come looking over at her with a bit of curiosity. Though there appeared to be a hint of hostility mixed with that. She put a finger to her chin, pondering over something.

"So it was like this? But the smell..."

Jack had looked over at her curiously, wondering what she was talking about. However, he lost interest quickly and went back to focusing on the fight. As for Mia, she was feeling a mix of concern, but also confusion. She did still feel like it was Jessica, but couldn't see her as a pure human anymore.

Especially when she very likely wasn't one.

In the end, Mia only watched on silently, unable to bring herself to cheer whatever Jessica was right now.

Though, whether or not she needed any encouragement was an entirely different thing.

The crow let out a loud high-pitched cry, before sending hundreds of feathers at Jessica all at the same time, covering practically every angle, and even with her erratically fast speed, she wouldn't be able to dodge anything.

Not that she had tried in the first place.

While her head hung back, the katana slowly tilted itself while the veins in her hands began bulging as they tightened around the handle. Though they didn't tremble, unlike how it would normally if someone over exerted their strength.

Just as the feathers were about to hit her, she took a step forward, making a crescent slash, while turning to the side and whipping her body back, matching that crescent slash. Only a small fraction of the feathers made contact with her blade, but each one of them were deflected. Their trajectory diverted just enough so that none of them did anything more than graze past her body.

The surrounding feathers boomed as they struck the ground, collectively causing a large wave of dirt to explode into the sky.

After the debris cleared, it revealed Jessica, not so much unscathed, as there were cuts all over her body. However, none of them were fatal, or even crippling in any way.

On the other hand, the crow was visibly tired, breathing more heavily. It continued to flap its wings, but despite that fact it was gradually lowering, unable to maintain its position in the air.

The mist that it had conjured dispelled on its own, leaving the bird with hardly anything left.

It was clear that it had bet everything on that attack. And unfortunately, the bet didn't pay off. While logically it was the right decision, as it was unrealistic to get out without crippling injuries, or even survive in the first place.

Yet, Jessica performed the unrealistic. Or at the very least, whatever was making her do these actions.

Eventually, the crow flopped down onto the ground, no longer with any strength to continue flying. Despite this apparent weakness, Jessica didn't capitalize on it, instead standing still and watching on silently.

With a jolt, she had straightened her legs and put them right next to each other, as though they were chopsticks stuck together. For a little while, they were at a standstill, with the crow unmoving on the ground, and Jessica standing awkwardly there like a signpost.

For all intents and purposes, it seemed that Jessica had won, as strange as the situation looked. Even if the crow wasn't exactly dead yet.

Jack scratched the side of his head in confusion.

"Um, what's happening?"

The man in the suit looked over at him for a second, but didn't say anything, instead turning back to look at the standstill. After a few minutes had passed, the crow started to convulse.

A thick dark mist began emanating from its body as it got up. Though it looked a little different.

Both its wings were clipped from the body, with only bloody gashes left where they were supposed to be connected. Yet, that was more of an afterthought at the sight of exposed organs from its body, most of which were either bruised or crushed.

The dark mist roiled before it exploded outward.

Jessica had already began rapidly backpedaling, touching the ground mainly by the tip of her heels, almost like she was falling over but never actually lost her balance. Despite going backwards ridiculously fast, the black mist was still rapidly approaching her, though the density was far weaker than it had originally been.

Once it was seconds away, she directly did a small jump and leaned back, with her sword behind her. She pushed the blade into the ground, before tilting it and pushing up with the flat part while slashing, causing a wave of dirt to be thrown at the mist.

The debris was immediately contaminated, becoming black and visibly heavier as it slammed into the ground like a heavy metal.

Right after, two rapidly spinning wings shot towards Jessica, both at different, but fairly low elevations, predicting that she would fall down in her position. However, she transitioned it into a backflip, increasing her effective air time and letting the wings pass by harmlessly.

The mist was rendered useless, so there was no worry about that anymore. As for the wings, they took to the air once more and started to boomerang back. Jessica turned to face them, though with her body and not her head.

Her sword was raised ready for it.

Yet, just a moment later, their spinning slowed dramatically, before falling out of the air powerlessly. After a few seconds, Jessica's body suddenly crumpled to the ground. It almost appeared as though they had mutually taken each other out.

Though after a few moments of silence, the man in a suit spoke up in a low voice.

"The winner is the... human, I believe."

There were several meanings that could've had, or even multiple at the same time. The man didn't seem too keen on clarifying it, however. Instead, he simply threw a card towards Mia, who was startled but still caught it.

She was still trying to process her emotions, and ended up just holding it awkwardly.

As for Jack, he was also processing things, but it was the actual fight itself. He had a finger on his chin, then suddenly raised it up with a smile.

"Ah, I understand now! She was waiting for the strong attack and didn't get hit because of it!"

He continued to mumble various things to himself. At the same time, Jessica herself appeared to wake up, sitting up like a normal person. Her brows were furrowed rather tightly, and she rubbed her neck uncomfortably.

"What?...What happened?"

She closed her eyes while grimacing, visually in quite a bit of pain. With confusion, she looked down at her body, raising her hands and turning them around, as though expecting them to be missing, or heavily injured.

Mia felt the urge to call out to her, but it was stifled by her memory of the strange inhuman movement she had seen earlier.

Jessica looked up at the others and only got more puzzled.

"Am I... alive? But how? Did someone help me?"

To her question, Emma had walked up with the same smile she always had.

"No, nothing like that. You did it all yourself, though I have to ask, do you feel ok?"

After getting next to Jessica, she got down on one knee and gently put her hand on top of hers. In return, Jessica looked back at her, a bit overwhelmed by the strange sudden affection.

"I... I think I'm ok, but I feel really uncomfortable and it hurts a lot. Did I really win? It doesn't feel like that."

Emma nodded slowly while tilting her head to the side ever so slightly.

"And also, may I know if you remember anything from earlier? You did hit your head a little hard after you won..."

Jessica rubbed her forehead a bit.

"Ah, yeah. I really don't remember anything about the fight at all. Why... did I decide to fight anyway?"

There was a moment of silence, prompting Jessica to look up at Emma, wondering why there wasn't a response. And she saw Emma staring back at her rather intensely. It was at this point that she realized something was wrong.

While trying to ignore the cold sweat on her back, Jessica forced a few shaky words out. She couldn't help but remember how easily she crushed the T-Rex from earlier.

"D-Did I say something wrong? I'm really sorry, please I didn't mean anything bad."

Her first instinct was to try and get on her knees for the sake of sincerity, but it was too painful for her to do so. Though Emma didn't seem to notice any of her words or actions. Despite only looking blankly with a smile, Emma's hostility nearly appeared to radiate out from her. Then out of nowhere, she leaned in rather closely, before...

Sniffing her.