'King vs. Queen': King vs. Takane Shijou

Takane's vision was kinda spinning. And that was just from one kick. So naturally, she would decide to move her arms in front of her head to protect that vital body part from getting kicked again.

Unfortunately, and expectedly, King would be targeting elsewhere if her head was going to be protected. "AHH!!" The idol cried out as she felt a sharp pain in one of her inner knee, immediately falling to that knee as her hand from the same side of that targeted knee would plant itself on the mat for some stability. She looked up to see the towering King, poised in her fighting stance. It was a fearsome sight, but it was a sight that the Silver Queen would not back down upon.

Gathering strength in her other unharmed leg and gritting her teeth, Takane would leap off the mat with that leg and tried to smash her knee against King's chin in a high knee strike, trying to use this opportunity for a surprise attack!

The kick connected, and on many opponents, King wouldn't have been surprised if it would signal the last leg of the fight, if not the end. She had dislocated knees with it before, broken bones with the hammering strike. But Takane was unique - underneath that gentle, starry exterior, a tiger raged. And just like any beast, she would only take so much abuse before she retaliated.

And retaliate she did, springing up with a rising knee with surprising speed and alacrity. King had expected her to fight back, but not so soon after the inside kick landed, and the knee found its target. She cringed as the blow hit home and made her stagger back, but her training kicked in - her body knew what to do even if her mind was preoccupied. Her leg snapped out as she fell away, striking at Takane's stomach to create some distance between the two.

As her high knee connected, Takane landed on her two feet, only for the sharp pain to return to her striken knee (but not as painful as the initial kick to it). It almost felt as if it would be dislocated should any more pressure is added to it. Her facial expression clearly showing pain, her eyes widened when a kick struck her belly squarely, some saliva flying out of her hung open mouth, releasing a breathless cry. The idol doubled over from the pain before she fell back on her bum, one hand clutching her tummy while the other clutched her knee, panting heavily to regain her lost oxygen back into her lungs. Her vision has recovered back to normal, but at the expense of suffering two hard blows elsewhere and a lingering headache.

Takane feared this is what would happen if she engaged King in a strike fest. Luckily, her opponent didn't use her arms, presumably because of all the shoulder damage she inflicted. But those legs are still quite lethal by itself. She needed to be careful. Slowly, she would get back to her two feet, slightly limping as she quickly tried stretching her leg back and forth in an attempt to fix her knee dislocation problem.

The reflexive kick found its target, a small victory, and it kept Takane from pushing the assault...for now. But King would have to be more careful at close-range. Not only was the starlet a skilled grappler, but her strikes were formidable as well. King was certain she had the edge, but not nearly as much of one as she would have liked - if it came to pure blows, she would win, but not without heavy losses. This required tact.

King fell back a few steps and hit the ropes, forcing her to step forward. She got back into her stance as soon as possible and saw Takane was doing the same...slowly. The inside kick hurt her and opened up a potential advantage. Now King just needed to hammer it home.

She rushed in and took a big step, raising her leg and sending a hard push kick, meant to plant itself square in Takane's generous chest and send her flying. It had more than enough power for the job.

After a couple of seconds stretching, Takane stopped, knowing that she didn't have anymore time as her opponent was about to make a move. She watched carefully, sweat dripping down the sides of her head, her body acknowledging the difficulty of fighting a skilled striker for a second time in a row.

The big kick came straight for her chest, and Takane immediately ducked to the lowest point she can kneel, the kick grazing some of her silver hair strands once more. This time, it was actually more different. The first time, Takane managed to barely duck an unexpected kick. The second time, she saw the kick coming, yet was still able to dodge it by a hair's breadth. Perhaps her speed has already diminished? This will prove worrisome for the idol as the match continues on.

One of her arm wrapping around the extended kicking leg and the other wrapping around King's standing leg, Takane would pull back, trying to make the gentlewoman fall on her back as the Silver Queen held onto both legs. Putting one leg in between her opponent's legs and planting it on the mat beside the other woman's prone body, the silver-haired girl would twist the legs into a knot, before stepping over to turn King over for the deadly sharpshooter, a submission of which brings excruciating pain to the entirety of both legs. Takane would sit on the fighter's back as she pulled back as hard as she could to put as much pressure on these powerful legs of the King.

Takane was slower, but not quite as slow as King needed her to be. She managed to duck under the lethal kick, and King couldn't help but let out a small hiss with the frustration, as her attempt start a solid string once again failed and fell short, sailing harmlessly over Takane's head. Her only chance was to bring it back around and hit her with a hook kick on the return, but it would be a weak blow even if it did connect.

King never had the chance to try it, however, as Takane moved in to counter, grabbing her legs and putting her flat on her back. King was familiar enough with the sport to realize that quite a few moves began this way, and none of them were pleasant for her legs. Moreover, Takane went for one of the worst - the dreaded sharpshooter.

King cried out and started pounding her fists as the pain shot through her back like a hot iron, her spine stretching to the limit. It took her a moment to push enough of the pain away to really think - there was a lot of it, and it ate away at her thoughts like a cancer. Move. She needed to move forward at all costs. She dug her fingers into the canvas and started pulling, beginning her long journey towards the ropes and salvation.

Takane gave herself a quiet sigh of relief as she managed to lock in the sharpshooter and keep King immobile for the time being. She tried to keep her feet planted firmly on the mat, making sure that her opponent would need to use a lot of strength just to move towards the ropes. "Give up!" The idol shouted, mainly out of sympathy because being in a sharpshooter is really painful. She felt it once when she was training to be a wrestler, and it wasn't pleasant at all. She even cried from all the pain she was receiving. But that's another story.

Slowly but surely, King would be moving towards the ropes, crawling for what seems like eternity. This crawl was even noticeably tougher since the Silver Queen was sitting on the woman's back. Takane's footing would be slowly inching backwards regardless, gritting her teeth as her opponent still has quite the fight in her. After a while, King would indeed make it to the ropes. The ref motioned the silver-haired girl to break the hold, even starting the disqualification count. However, she would keep it locked in until the fourth count, before she would release the sharpshooter and back off from the gentlewoman.

Agony seemed like an inappropriate word for what King was going through.King felt like she could literally break in half.

It was hard to imagine someone with such a gentle and genteel look could cause such pain, but Takane was, apparently, that sort of person, pulling her back to the very limits as King crawled forward. It took a supreme effort not to submit, and there were times King considered - after all, injury was a very real threat, and she wanted to have a legitimate career in AFW. Losing was one thing, but getting injured so early on was unacceptable, the sort of thing she couldn't recover from mentally even if she did do it physically.

By some miracle, she grabbed the ropes and broke the hold, earning a break and getting a temporary rest. It didn't last long, but it was far better than nothing, and she managed to muster enough strength to grab the ropes and pulled back up, aching all the way, and looking for an attack out of the corner of her eye.

However, contrary to what King had expected, Takane didn't attack. In fact, it would be foolish of her to do so. Charging in blindly would probably make her receive some deadly strike to her head or elsewhere. Patiently, she waited until her opponent was ready, getting into her wrestling stance in the meantime.

The idol is liking her chances so far. The sharpshooter must have caused great distress on the other woman's legs and back. Not to mention the shoulders were already focused on in the beginning of the match. So even if her speed had diminished, Takane has more confidence to dodge the more slower strikes now due to the submissions she applied to the gentlewoman's limbs. Or so she believes.

Once King was ready, the Silver Queen would move in. She decided to replicate a strategy King had used on Takane in the match, hopefully to get a strike in and capitalize on that with a chain of attacks. When in range, the girl would lash out her right leg, trying to roundhouse kick the King on the side of her head. However, mid way, the leg would stop and bend at its knee, stomping onto the mat. Pushing off the stomping feet, she would send in her left leg, already bent at the knee, and strike her knee against her opponent's mid-section, trying to double the crossdresser over her knee.

King could recover. She wasn't the toughest to ever step in the AFW ring, she knew that, but after a minute or two the pain would fade enough for her to start striking back and take the momentum once again. It was just a matter of surviving, and against an opponent like Takane, those two minutes would feel like an eternity.

Takane was kind enough to wait for King to get on her feet and take a weakened version of her stance, sagging into it a bit. But when she started moving, she made up for the lag with blazing speed. King brought her arms up as the roundhouse came in, ready for an unforgiving impact, bracing herself, and...nothing. Her eyes widened in the half-second before she realized it was a fake, but by then it was too late. Takane's on leg was already well on its way to sending a knee into her stomach.

She bent over the blow and gagged, but she was by no means done. Instead of recoiling, she held that position and tried to grab Takane's leg before she could pull it away, twisting her body about in a sharp turn and looking to put Takane down for a little while.