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There was a slight uproar, but Michelle vs the trio finally started.

Holding her usual hunting bow in hand, Michelle faced them with a tensed expression. Then I finally realized we hadn’t asked for their names. They were still our clients, so we had to know that much.

I couldn’t just call them mohawk, skin-head, and tattoo-guy, after all.

“By the way, what are your names?”
“Huh? A bit too late to be asking that. I am… Sebastian.”

I could feel myself tilting back when I heard his name. It sounded like the name of a butler of some noble.

“I’m Francis.”
“I’m Andrew.”
“I really need to talk to your parents!”

There was nothing wrong with their names, but I couldn’t help but yell that out. Why did all of their names sound so noble-like? They should be from a fishing village in the countryside.

“You’re one rude woman to be finding faults with people’s names.”
“Ugh, my bad there.”

The one who called himself Sebastian raised a valid point, so I apologized. At any rate, their names were beside the point now. I collected myself and focused on getting them ready for their match.

Michelle was using her hunting bow instead of the Third Eye. The arrows had their heads removed and replaced by cushions to get rid of the lethality. The cushions had easy-to-remove ink on them, so it would be easy to tell if they landed a fatal wound.

The training wooden swords of the trio also had ink-soaked clothes put in the blade parts. It was apparently stuck between two sword-shaped planks.

“Okay then, I feel a little spent here, but Michelle vs three fake nobles…”
“Who’re you calling fake nobles?!”
“Match Start…”

After my dull signal, Michelle pulled out an arrow from her quiver. She instantly nocked the practice arrow and let it loose.

Her insight was unbelievably sharp compared to her previous timid behavior. I always think this, but it was like she had a dual personality with the way she transformed.

Naturally, facing her for the first time, the trio had no way of avoiding it.

Being taken completely by surprise, the arrow landed on Andrew’s forehead. The shock from it instantly robbed him of his consciousness.

Michelle gave him a sidelong glance as he got blown back and fell down sprawled, then pulled another arrow.

That said, they weren’t facing off from a wide distance, so the other locational advantage was on the trio’s side.

Francis was astonished to see Andrew taken down instantly, and turned towards him without thinking, but Sebastian charged at Michelle, determined to not let go of this chance.

“Eat this!”

He raised his sword up and tried to slam it down on Michelle. He was quite something to not miss this chance, but his attack itself was not good enough.

Michelle was also training in close-quarter combat, so she could easily handle such large swings.

She dodged the overhead swing by taking a step sideways, then gave his hand a hard blow with her bow and made him drop his sword.

Then she inserted his head between the bow and its string, got behind him, and strangled him.

He probably had no presence of mind to notice it, but I didn’t overlook the fact that Michelle’s boobs were pressing on Sebastian’s back.

I could see her leather breastplate used for protecting her from the bowstring getting squashed flat.

Sebastian had a bigger problem to deal with while being strangled. He couldn’t breathe properly and lost consciousness after a vain struggle.

Francis was the only one left, but he took an unexpected action. He pulled Andrew up and used him as a shield to close in on Michelle.

“Kyaa?!”

Michelle had no way of dodging his rush while she was still strangling Sebastian.

She quickly removed the bow from his neck and tried to shoot Francis, but Andrew’s body was getting in the way so it ended in vain.

Unable to deal the decisive attack, she got entangled with Andrew and Sebastian and fell down.

Then Francis commenced his attack.

“Uwaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhh!”

Since two of her friends got taken down in a matter of seconds, he had fallen into a half-frenzied state.

I suppose that’s why he managed to resort to an unexpected move of using an ally as a shield.

That managed to take Michelle by a complete surprise. However, that only lasted in his favor for a short time.

His frenzied state didn’t mean his every action would be great. This time, his mistake was swinging his sword while screaming.

In this situation, thrusting the sword in a compact manner would’ve been the correct answer. Being unable to do that and swinging it down instead created a big opening.

Michelle kicked off Sebastian’s body which was clinging to hers and sealed Francis’ movements. At the same time she grabbed the arrow she didn’t previously fire with the underhanded grip and drove it into his leg.

It had no arrowhead of course, so it didn’t pierce it. Normally his leg would’ve lost its function and he would’ve fallen, but the cushioned arrow didn’t deal any damage.

Then Michelle hooked the arrow behind his knee and made him fall.

“Yah!”

Then she straddled his back and pressed the arrowhead at his neck.

It didn’t deal damage since it was cushioned but it was clearly a fatal wound.

This had to be taken as the decisive blow. Thus I decided the duel was finished and announced it in a loud voice.

“Enough. The winner is Michelle.”

Along with my declaration, the training ground was filled with cheers.

Michelle was thought to be a ranged specialist. Yet, even though it was against beginners, she still scored a clean victory in close-quarters combat, so those cheers were warranted.

Those who didn’t know her skill should’ve also realized it with this.