Kat looked around the battlefield to plan her next move. Xiang and the bandit leader were clashing. Both had a soft white light surrounding them. They were moving in slow motion to Kat's eyes, but considering everyone else wasn't moving at all, it was rather impressive.
Turning her eyes back to the bandits. The three with bows in the back, were slowly turning around, likely trying to assist their leader. *Well, I can't let them attack Xiang. He might be an idiot, but he's keeping the leader busy so this might be fine.* Kat kept up her speed and appeared next to the line of bowman.
They had no chance to react before Kat reached out and tapped one on the shoulder. She made sure to stop herself complete and apply the barest of force with her finger… it didn't reduce the impact as much as Kat wanted. In fact, it hardly reduced it at all. Kat once again heard the crack of bones and the bandit went fly straight into other two bandits next to him, sending them flying.
Kat winced, before turning back around, letting Xiang 'guard' her back. Kat scoffed at the thought and moved back beside the seven remaining bandits from the front. *Ok. Now how do I want to do this? Even a tap is too much because of how fast I'm moving. I could drop the increased perception and speed… but at the same time… I'm not sure how dangerous these guys are to Xiang. They seem a bit too use to killing, and I'm pretty sure I can see dried blood on their outfits.*
Kat considered her options for a few more moments while in suspended time. Xiang and the leader were clashing still, and Kat could see the bandits making the smallest of moves in reaction. Mostly just turning their heads in the direction the people she attacked had come from. Of course, those two sets of three were currently suspended in midair. Kat was tempted to catch them and soften the fall… but they seemed to have lost most of their momentum slamming into the extras.
Eventually, Kat's thoughts picked up another thing to test. *What about my demonic energy trick that lets me pick up things I really shouldn't. That should let me disperse the attack throughout their entire bodies and hopefully not shatter anymore bones. The only risk is if the dispersed force is still enough to cause serious damage to say… the brain or something.*
Kat lined herself up once again, stepping carefully around the falling bandits, not wanting to cause them even more damage. She charged her energy towards the end of her finger and lined the bandit up with the rest of his teammates.
Kat let her finger hover just a hair above the bandit's arm. She watched as the energy went out of her finger and coated the bandit faster than even she could see, no matter the advanced perception. Satisfied that the bandit was covered, Kat once again got ready to tap the bandit. Keeping her whole body completely still, Kat moved her hand so it was just barely above his arm, then lowered her pointer finger just a fraction more.
The impact was instantaneous. The bandit was flung sideways, and the film of demonic energy unraveled and slunk back into Kat's finger. After that instant though, there was no awful cracking, and he hadn't exactly moved that far.
Kat stood back to take a good look and saw that he was about to fly into his companions. Kat smiled and checked her reserves, purely out of habit, to find them two-thirds drained. Kat's eyes shot wide open. *Holy shit ok… what the hell?* Kat then took a round and saw the barely moving figures, and realised she had to be moving at a ridiculous speed for any of this to work. Shit. Checking her reserves again, Kat could see them burning away before her eyes.
*Ok let's get to work quickly I don't want to be out of energy.* Kat moved to the last few people that were in the first line of bandits. She brought out her tail for speed and hit the three furthest to the right to ensure that all the bandits would be taken out. She made sure to let her film of energy settle over them before tapping, and then moved onto the row behind them.
Kat didn't have time to take it slowly, and so she shuffled through them as quickly as she could. Spreading out her two arms and tail, Kat waited for her film of energy to appear before giving them a slight tap and moving on.
It took only a few relative seconds for Kat to get through the other thirteen bandits that had shown up behind her. Kat breathed out and let her mind return to human limits. Once she did there was as grand explosion of air all around her. If the bandits hadn't been tapped, they would have likely gone flying from that alone.
Winds whipped at Xiang's outfit, trying to throw him off his game, luckily, this affected the bandit leader as well, putting them on even footing. Minimal dirt went flying, on account of just how clean the road actually was, so there were no additional projectiles.
The bandits all went flying. The first line of them were thrown to the left side of the road all in a neat pile, and only a few more odd crunching sounds. The back row was all blown back and out. They each hit the ground hard, rolling once or twice before settling onto the road, hardly moving.
Kat felt her breath hitch for a second before her ears picked up the faint sound of breathing coming from the entire group the best she could tell. This let her calm down and face the battle raging between Xiang and the bandit leader.
Their once bright white light was starting to dull on both sides. Kat watched as Xiang got an attack in past the bandit leaders guard… only for it to collide with the white light, turning it into nothing more than a grazing cut as it slid off him.
They were moving fast, perhaps slightly faster than the human eye could see, but Kat found it easy to follow their movements even without the mental acceleration. Checking her reserves for confirmation Kat found them hovering just barely above empty.
*I've got… at most maybe one attack left in me. A few moments of bullet time maybe. I can't do anything else though, and summoning any more fire would knock me out completely.* Kat watched the fight before her, keeping her attention and the pair, and it seemed Xiang was winning.
It wasn't by a lot, and Kat really didn't know enough about swordplay and combat to tell who was winning that way… but the bright light that surrounded the two was fading faster around the bandit. That was something she could easily tell with the power of her eyes alone.
The fight continued on. Kat didn't really know what she was seeing despite it happening in front of her. Oh sure, her eyes could keep up, but they did a bunch of feints, strange foot movements, and Kat was pretty sure Xiang nearly bit the bandit leader at one point, but she was more focused on their arms at the time so she can't be sure, even going back in her memories.
Then, Xiang took a step backwards, and tripped on the cracks in the road. The same cracks she'd just made earlier when she struck her foot down into the road. Kat's eyes widened, as she readied herself to go in.
The bandit leader's eyes gleamed, his sword arm coming down, straight towards Xiang's midsection. Xiang's arms flailed as he fell, then all of a sudden, his eyes went hard. Kat paused her dash before it got started and watched a second longer.
As the bandit's arm came down, so too, did Xiang's 'flailing' arm come up, sword still in hand. Xiang bent further backwards letting the bandit's lunge go over the top of his chest, brushing against his white aura.
Xiang's sword collided directly with the bandit's arm. His aura flickered and died, before Xiang's sword bit hard into his arm. This didn't last long however, as once the light died the bandit went flying. His body spun around mostly in place, as it collapsed to the ground. This seemed to be some sort of signal as the light around Xiang started to splutter, and the kid went down on one knee to start drawing in big gulping breaths of air.
Kat smiled slightly seeing that Xiang was mostly unharmed. There was, of course, a few cuts on his attire, but that was nothing major, and Kat didn't consider it worth mentioning. Turning around, she made her way over to the pile of bandits that included those she first tested on, hoping they weren't dead.. She was pretty sure she could hear their breathing… but better safe than sorry.