Slice
Stab
Fwoosh
Bang
Crash
While Alyssia had the physical advantage over him, Mihawk had far more experience fighting and adapting to strong living opponents as he learned to overcome them.
There was also the fact that he had better mastery over his Haki but with each clash of their weapons, he could feel that his opponents blades did not waver as they pushed forward.
The battle continued on for a day without rest as the two of them showed remarkable improvements in their own way.
The biggest improvement was Alyssia's mastery over her Haki as she got to fight someone more skilled than herself and continue fighting them for a long time but she had also brought more life to her martial arts style as she was improving and adapting just as Mihawk was.
She was able to block and parry many of his slashes with her scythe blades and then counterattack with a kick but Mihawk was always skilful enough to protect himself.
Mihawk stepped back and raised his sword ready to send out another large slash from far away. "Interesting.. how come I have never heard of you before?"
Alyssia grinned. "It is a great honour to be recognised by the legendary sword master but my name has only spread so far. It is Alyssia Lucine, I hope that we can fight again one day. This has been a valuable learning experience for me."
Mihawk nodded. "One final attack?"
Alyssia agreed as she threw her scythe blade aside with a look of confidence on her face. "I do not think I need this anymore."
Mihawk replied sternly. "Are you certain that you are not being too overconfident?"
Alyssia shrugged lazily as her breathing became more focussed. "I was never a swordsman anyways so all it had been was an extra layer of protection in combat against strong weapon users. Now I have some confidence in my ability to match your attack with my own even without a weapon."
She had confidence in her body and techniques to the point that she could break swords, shields and armour but against a black blade, she had previously been hesitant since her Haki was lower than her opponent so she had to use her scythe blades to better protect herself and match her opponent until she gained more confidence that she would not be cut by her opponent when she met the attacks.
Her breathing had become even more focussed as her body became relaxed and very flexible, in her concentrated state and fully using Life Return, Paper Art and Iron Body there was a series of movements that followed as she expertly gathered her bodies strength and strengthened her bodies hardness even more at the moment of attack.
One turn of her body with a small jump as she swung her leg around, another that followed behind as the heel came around until the first leg came back around and then pushed forward with all the gathered power of her body and the momentum gained from her movements created a strong shockwave which crashed as if piercing into the large flying wind blade before completely piercing the middle of the wind blade. "Divine Snake: White Serpent Tempest Dance!"
The wind blade broke apart and dissipated and the piercing shockwave continued onwards as it crashed into the large sword which was raised go guard Mihawk.
As the smoke and dust had cleared, Mihawk's dirty figure could be seen as he looked quite pitiful.
Alyssia pointed to the long line of foot marks on the ground that had been the result of him being pushed back. "You lost, I pushed you from your original position."
Mihawk coughed. "Uh.. you are right. It is my defeat, I guess I was the arrogant one this time but I will not lose again."
He had confidence in his ability to improve himself and had his own pride as the best swordsman so he could not lose his confidence so easily from a battle that had ended in such a way.
However he did not know was that Alyssia had been holding back her Electro and a small part of her overpowered physical capabilities as she had still been wearing weights under her leg and arm warmers.
The difference in abilities between them had been shortened greatly between them but she was not satisfied. "We should fight again though, if you feel that this was an unjust loss at all then I will be happy to fight you."
Mihawk revealed a look of excitement. "We can fight again after we rest up."
Not long afterwards, another long battle went on but this time, instead of scythe blades meeting the large sword, Alyssia's feet, heels and legs which had been further toughened by the Iron Body technique and her continuously tempered Haki as she was learning how to match even one of the strongest black blades in the world.
Each of her kicks created strong wind blades, blunt shockwave attacks but also piercing effects each time so each variation of attacks allowed her to turn her legs into a dangerous weapon that could potentially even break apart the black blade but she held back a little as she was more focussed on gaining more experience and tempering her Haki.
A single kick came forward and stopped the large sword as they met straight on then it followed with a flash step as Alyssia appeared by his side and sent a sweeping kick to his waist and knocked him back.
Alyssia looked down at the winded Mihawk who had suffered similar attacks many times already. "Have you given up yet?"
Mihawk breathed heavily and tried to adjust his breathing. "Monster… hah.. you have grown far too quickly that even I will struggle to catch up to you. I give up for now but I will want to challenge you again. What is next for you?"
Alyssia replied calmly. "It is lonely at the top so I welcome any rivals… for now I want to challenge many strong opponents so expect to hear news about me in the future."
Mihawk nodded. "Mm.. maybe my student may be the one to surpass me and challenge you first but for now I will hold the position as the first swordsman since you do not wish for the title. Maybe I will be able to challenge you again if fate allows it."
Alyssia laughed. "Un.. ahaa.. swordsman does not suit me, the title for the strongest martial artist best suits me. I look forward to your improvement, even if you become a crazy sword demon… I will be waiting. You have lots of humandrills that have probably copied my techniques so use them as practice partners. Hehe."
Meanwhile everyone that had been watching the battle and were enjoying the festivities had finally seen the end of the battle.
"Boss.. has grown this much.."
"What a talent."
"How overwhelming."
"Crazy."
"Can I give up training now? I do not think that is something we can reach even if we try harder."
"Tsk, shut up. She might hear."
"Demonic instructor Alyssia will not let us all go so easily so enjoy your rest while you can."
"Sigh.."
Alyssia looked towards Zoro, Perona and Mihawk one last time as she refreshed the collection of abilities and skills around her before she turned around and boarded her ship.
Nobody in the outside world would become aware that the strongest swordsman had been defeated not once but twice by a young female Mink that had not even reached the age of eighteen yet.
Even if they were aware of it, there was not much they could do about it besides coming up with a way to restore their damage that would be done to the Warlord system and possibly some may even have an idea to attack Alyssia because of the scary potential she had shown..
However since the duels were privately done on the island and Mihawk was busy remaining secluded with Perona and Zoro, the news would not spread out.
The MMA left the island and Alyssia rested on board as she went over her experiences of the battles.
On the table by her side was a fruit bowl that had many weirdly shaped fruits that resembled different types of chocolates, candies and deserts which came from the new Boin Archipelagos food area.
She picked up one which was coffee coloured and took a bite of it as she felt her stamina being restored but she also was caught up in her feelings of gluttony as she enjoyed the taste too much. "Sho.. good! Coffee chocolate flavour berry. Omnom. Nom."
By her side was Yvie who was also eating one that was shaped like a nut. "Haa.. hazelnut chocolate berry so.. good.."
Meanwhile Nica looked over from far away and sighed. "Gluttons…"
Little Li sat on the ground not too far away and kept watch over the high quality treats that she loved in the hopes of looking cute enough to catch the attention of her owner and be rewarded with some. "Meow!"
Ghost who was nearby looked towards little Li with a sympathetic gaze before resting as the journey continued.
Val continued to look over the actions of everyone in silence but inside her robotic brain, she was going over everything that had happened in the battle as she started to properly analyse it by herself and she was learning from watching such a high end battle and would continue to do so in the future.