The door explodes inward, showering the dimly light of the Yakuza safehouse with splinters and dust. You don’t flinch. The last of the foot soldiers lies unconscious at your feet, and the clan leader, bound and gagged, watches with wide, terrified eyes from the corner. You were just about to ask him some very pointed questions about the distribution of certain enchanted artifacts. The interruption is… inconvenient.

She steps through the smoke and debris like she owns the air she’s breathing. Black leather, blonde hair, a posture that speaks of a fight already won. Dinah Drake. The Black Canary.

“Evening,” she says, her voice cordial but edged with something harder than steel. Her blue eyes sweep the room, taking in the scene—the defeated men, the terrified boss, you standing calm between them with the twin swords, Enten and Cloud Gouger, resting easily in your hands. “I’ll make this simple. Hand over the blades.”

You knew this was coming. The Justice League’s meeting wasn’t a secret to you; your sources are good. Batman’s refocus on retrieving the Enchanted Blades was a predictable, logical move. Sending their best close-quarters combatant to retrieve them from the “mysterious son of a legendary swordsmith” was also logical. You admire the efficiency, even as you resent the presumption.

“No,” you say, the word simple and final.

A slow, fierce smile touches her lips. It’s not a smile of amusement, but of anticipation. “I thought you might say that.”

That’s the truth of it, isn’t it? The cordial demand was just protocol. She wanted you to refuse. She needed you to refuse. A part of you understands it—the thrill of facing something new, the legendary weapons her old comrades once wielded, now in the hands of a stranger claiming a legacy. For a warrior like her, a request denied is an invitation issued.

There’s no further warning. No theatrical declaration. One moment she’s standing in the ruined doorway, and the next she’s a blur of motion, closing the distance with a speed that would humble most of the men now littering the floor. Her first strike isn’t the Cry; it’s a testing jab, a fist aimed with surgical precision at your solar plexus. She’s gauging you, feeling out the man behind the myth.

You move Enten in a fluid, rising arc, not to cut, but to deflect. The flat of the pale blade meets her forearm with a solid impact. The impact vibrates up your arm. She’s strong. Impossibly strong for her frame. You see the calculation in her eyes as she disengages, flowing seamlessly into a spinning back kick aimed at your knee.

You pivot, Cloud Gouger singing as it cuts through the air to intercept. She’s already gone, using the momentum to create space. Her eyes flicker to the blades, studying their movement, their reach, the way you hold them—not like tools, but like extensions of your own body.

“So it’s true,” she says, her breathing still even. “You know how to use them.”

“They’re mine by birth and by right,” you reply, settling into a ready stance. The Yakuza boss whimpers in the corner, forgotten by both of you. This room has shrunk to contain only two people and the dance about to unfold.

“Birthright doesn’t mean much in my world,” Dinah says, and this time her voice drops, taking on a different quality—a low, gathering hum that seems to make the very dust particles in the air vibrate. “Only what you do with it.”

You brace yourself, the enchanted metals of Enten and Cloud Gouger seeming to grow warmer in your grip, as if awakening to the challenge. She wanted a fight with an Enchanted Blade wielder. Now, she’s going to get one.