A relaxing night's sleep was what our crew needed after a tiring day of long traveling. It was the next day and after having another delicious meal for breakfast before they headed to the forest side of the island to train. Beforehand this place was readied to, for this purpose. Six of them arrive at the destination while Yumi and Aiko remained at the hotel. A large empty area surrounded by trees. At the center of the ground was a giant white circle, while a few meters to the north the sounds of waves crashing on rocks was heard. Here they prepared for the sessions. Satoru gathers everyone around him and explains.
"Today we will be having 1v1 spars. Do you see that large white circle? That is the area you are limited to during the spar. In order to win, you have to either make your opponent give up or make them go out of bounds."
The faces of Sei, Nobu and Hide lit with excitement. Especially Sei who had been itching for one of these.
"But who against whom? Aren't there just three of us?"
"Correction, there are six of us. You will be going against us."
"What?! We will be sparring against the three of you?" The three of them in a shock exclaim.
"Yeah what are you scared?" Fuka questioned with a smug look on her face.
"Of course not, it was just a bit surprising. This will be interesting."
Satoru brought up sticks of alternating length where every two stick had a similar length.
"Let's draw a lot to see who goes who against whom. Those who draw sticks of similar length will spar against each other."
They all drew the sticks at the same time. Sei having drawn the longest stick scanned the audience to identify his partner. Only to see Nobu's sensei Fuka having a similar stick in her hand. She had her other hand on her face as she smiled widely at the sight of Sei being her opponent. It was Sei against Fuka. Meanwhile, Eli and Hide got the shortest stick and Nobu and Satoru remained with the middle sized one. Thus it was Sei vs Fuka, Nobu vs Satoru and Hide vs Eli.
Sei and Fuka stepped into the circle first. Fuka still had the same expression on her face, eyes closed, wide smiled while her hands were crossed resting below her bosom which made her chest look popped out. Her body and face expressions made Sei a bit uneasy. Not in a way that he was scared but in a different way. Satoru signals the start of the spar by counting down from three to one.
"Finally! But she seems a bit weird. Must have a lot of confidence in herself. I will beat and show Sensei my progress."
As soon as the word "start" came out of Satoru's mouth. Sei took distance from Fuka and placed both of his hands together. Each handheld in such a manner that it was holding something horizontally. He then proceeded to move them apart, putting up a curve at the end before stopping the movement of his hands. After which a dual sword which was hinged together appeared. He grabbed it in the middle with both of his hands and unhinged the hinge, separating the swords.
Now with dual blades in his hands, he charged towards Fuka until his eyes picked up the look on her face. Still unfazed, not even an inch moved she stood there with the same expression on her face, even when he was charging in. This made Sei take a step back. He was confused, he wondered why has she not made a move? Does she have traps set up? Is she that confident? Or was she just trying to mess with him yet again?
Sei takes a few steps back, relaxes and calms himself down. He got a bit too excited at first. He hinged back the swords and stared at the unfazed figure of Fuka. All of a sudden he makes his move, shouting "Havoc wielding : 1st medley special" he did a diagonal downwards slash, before appearing right in front of Fuka with an upward slash. She easily dodged this by moving to a side while the trees behind her got affected by the wind emitted from the slash. Sei now at close range did a slanted descending slash and a horizontal slash with both of his hands holding the swords before shouting "Havoc wielding : 2nd medley special". With this he unhinged the swords and unleashed a barrage of hacks with dual blades in both of his hands.
Fuka managed to avoid this move pretty well too, by moving her body away from the slashes. Nonetheless, at the last hit she extended her right palm towards one of the swords completely shattering it before kicking away the other sword with her left leg. Her left arm made its way towards Sei in a way that she was trying to choke him. This completely changed the expression on Sei's face, fearing the worst; to be defeated this early after all the training he ended up using his trump card. He disappeared from where he was and appeared away from Fuka.
From the onlookers, Eli was completely puzzled. It was the first time she was seeing this move from Sei. Intrigued about it she questioned.
"What did Sei just do? Teleport?"
A serious looking Satoru answered her.
"He switched places with the sword that Fuka kicked away. It is a kind of teleportation technique where he can switch places between two objects. Either himself with something or another person or object with something else."
This put a slight smile on Eli's face feeling proud.
"That is a super cool ability then. why doesn't he use it more often?"
"That is because he can't. To put it simply, it has too many activation conditions, costs a lot of Sen and is hugely negative on the three Sen factors."
"No wonder." Eli sighed with the smile disappeared from her face.
Meanwhile, it seemed that Fuka for the had opened her eyes for the first time after entering the ring. She moved her eyes around the area to see what was around. Without delay, she signaled a sign; swept both of her hands as if she was touching the surface of a water body. Before raising both of them, which made a horizontal stream of water raise from the ground.
She began to move her hands which made the water move too as if she was controlling the water stream. Extending her right hand to her sides she moved it forward with force. This made the water move at great speeds towards Sei, who barely managed to dodge it. The stream of water raised up and parted ways as she put her left hand into play. Carefully she orchestrated the water towards Sei in two directions making it even harder for him to dodge. She did it a second a third and a fourth time, with each time the water making more and more contact with Sei leaving cut marks all over him.
Realizing that this would be a losing battle if he just dodged, Sei decided to advance towards Fuka. His intention was to get close to her so that the water would end becoming a hazard to her too. He remade his sword and made the run. On his way conjuring up small knifelike blades that he threw at her. Fuka made quick work of these by stomping her feet on the ground creating a miniature wall of water in front of her. This wall stopped the flight of the small blades the moment they came into contact with it. All this while the stream of water was following him.
As he made his way close to her, he shouted "Havoc wielding : Run special" with both of his hands clutching hard on the handle of the sword, he raised the sword to his shoulders length and did a large crosswise slash unleashing a wind blade towards Fuka. He thought to himself "She can't block this attack." Much to his surprise, she jumped over it. This put a dumb look on Sei's face. Upside down in midair, Fuka put distance between her fingers stretching them, tensing the muscles which made the dual water stream into ten separate sharp blades of water. She crossed her hands making the water blades descend on top of an undefended Sei.
For the second time in the fight, Sei had to use his trump card. Switching places with the same sword he switched before. He was just not ready to give up, not ready to lose. He waited for this moment eagerly. To show off his progress not to anybody else but to himself. But all that was happening was him getting his ass whooped by an undaunted Fuka. So far he hadn't even landed a single hit on her.
"Going with the dual blades to show Sensei might have not been a good idea. I only can use up to the first two medleys right now, I should probably switch." Before he could take any action his field of vision was completely overtaken by the color red. This made sense as Fuka that day was dressed in a red gown. "How did she get so close to me so soon, what?!" In total disbelief Sei just jerked his head forward with a wane expression on his face, ready to be knocked out of the circle by Fuka. But what he felt was not kick to the stomach, neither was it a punch to the face, instead, he felt his head touch something soft as if he rested it on a pillow.
It took a while for him to realize what this comfy feeling was. His head had come into contact with Fuka's chest. Fuka was taller than Sei, this allowed his to head to be rested easily on her chest. Scared, he lifted his head up to see for the first time a flustered expression on Fuka's face. She was completely frozen in place. Sei immediately moved backward and looked at the bystanders, to see varying expressions and body language from them. Nobu with a facepalm, Eli giving him the death stare, an unimpressed look on Satoru's face and while Hide had an envious look on his. Sei quickly made hand gestures suggesting he didn't do it on purpose and apologized. Suddenly the flustered expression on Fuka's face changed to that a sly smile. She made eye contact with Sei and pointed downwards towards the ground.
"Ara Ara Sei-kun, the most important part of a battle which focuses on a limited area is to always have in mind your position."
Unknown to him, Sei was out of bounds. When he substituted for the second time he was already dangerously close to the edge of the circle. He was too focused on Fuka and his inability to show off his work that he forgot about his position. Fuka deliberately got close to him making him go out of bounds on his own. It was not just a defeat for Sei but a humiliation, completely crushed, salt on top of wounds.
With a defeated look on his face, Sei made his way towards the bystanders. He was greeted by a disappointed looking Satoru who had a lot to say.
"Seiichi, I am very disappointed in you today. You were too eager, too excited, not calm at all, rushed every move and acted on impulse every time. On top of that, you used and unrefined technique twice which really affected you. No wonder you lost in such a fashion. I expected much better Sei."
"Exactly. Your movement slowed down after you first used that teleportation technique of yours. It was way easy to notice as you took comparatively longer to conjure the second sword. On the second time your senses had become quite weak too. You didn't even notice me getting that close to you. Not only that but I felt as if your mind was somewhere else." An exasperated Fuka commented about Sei's performance.
"Yeah, his mind was busy of you trying to seduce him the whole time. Even letting him get contact with your bosom." Eli declared with her eyes fixated on Fuka, fists clenched body stressed up.
This made Fuka make direct eye contact with Eli as she turned around towards her. She then replied with a seductive tone.
"Ara Ara, Eliina-san, are you claiming that I let him touch my chest on purpose?"
Realizing what she just said Eli shrunk down, her head dipped with her eyes stuck on a blank stare at the ground.
"Ye-Yes."
"Is that a bit of jealousy I feel."
She gives Eli a smirk with her eyes narrowed and moves in towards Eli to whisper a few words into her ears which made Eli's eyes widen, making her silent and obedient.
"Right, let's continue who's going next." Her expression changed to that of a happy smiley face and she tapped on Eli's shoulders before moving beside her.
Sei joined with Nobu and exclaimed in frustration.
"Man your Sensei is such a handful!"
"I know right now imagine her plus the three other brats."
Nobu headed towards the circle as he said this. It was him against his old sensei Satoru. Both Hide and Sei wish him good luck while Fuka gave him a thumbs up.
Both of them stare at each other while being at opposite sides of the ring. Fuka counted down and started the spar, yet both of them still were at the same place. Unmoved. Tactical and intelligent, Nobu was always gifted when it came to fights. Satoru who knew of this fact very well moved carefully. Two of them being careful fighters this spar is expected to be a much longer tactical one compared to the last one which ended in a flash.
Each look on with utmost focus at their opposite partner to see who makes the first move. They move from side to side, keeping the same distance from each other. It seemed like a mental showdown. Suddenly there is a slight shift in Nobu's body language which Satoru detected instantly and went into a defensive position. From range he arched his hands focusing Sen on the sides of his palms swinging them at pace towards the direction of Satoru.This launched a fast thin stream of water towards Satoru. With blade-like streams of water heading towards him, Satoru placed his foot in front of him on the ground directed a little towards left before moving it to the right. This instantly rose up an arc of mud wall in front of him that stopped the oncoming attack.
All of a sudden his eyes catch Nobu jumping up, using his mud wall as support. Due to the wall covering Satoru's view, Nobu was able to close in without being seen. He launched the same attack at Satoru again while being in midair before using the mud wall again to jump backwards. This time Satoru dodged this attack instead of blocking it by flipping backwards. At this moment his eyes caught the smirk on Nobu's face.
Quickly realizing what was the forthcoming attack he used his hands to touch the ground, as he was landing after the backflip. Touching the ground he laid himself flat on the ground creating a miniature bed of rock around him, covering his whole body. Soon enough the wall he set up earlier was blown to bits by an oncoming strong wave of air. Nobu had set this up earlier before making the jump attack. Having maintained maximum surface area with the ground Satoru was kept from being blown away out of the ring.
Blown bits from the wall flew towards the audience, Fuka raised her hand towards the pieces which made them stop in midair. She then relaxed her hand making them drop to the ground. At this moment in time, Satoru stood up stomped his feet on the ground to raise two small parallel walls of rock in front of him. He clenched his fist and hit hard on the top of the rock wall, this sent a segment of it flying towards Nobu, who dodged to the side only to be faced by another segment.
Satoru was using a series of punches and kicks to send segments of the wall towards Nobu. "I can't dodge all of this, he is predicting and aiming to where I would dodge." Nobu put together his hands before extending them away from each other. This put a lightning aura around his hands. He then quickly proceeded to hit the oncoming rocks which made them part in half. By the time he took care of the rocks, his senses picked up forward movement of Satoru, who had moved really close to him.
Satoru came in for close combat, throwing a straight punch towards Nobu, who used the back of his right hand to divert the hit and moved his left with pace towards Satoru's stomach. Satoru replied by using his left hand to take a hold of Nobu's oncoming punch before using his feet to sweep down Nobu.
Noticing the movement of his opponent's feet Nobu immediately makes a small jump after which he swung his now airborne feet towards his sensei. Who with a smirk on his face ducked down and placed his hands on the ground raising a pillar of mud towards Nobu. Being in midair Nobu had nowhere to go, he got hit by the pillar raising him up high with his face planted onto it. Concerned looks on the face of the bystanders as Nobu was heading towards the edge of the ring.
In retaliation Nobu used the technique his sensei Fuka has been teaching him. The water laser technique. He opened his mouth, made his lips circular and shot off a jet of water from it, which cut through the pillar breaking it apart. Still, in momentum, Nobu had to stop himself. He turned his mouth around behind him and increased the flow of water which counteracted his forward movement landing him at the edge of the circle.
The series of actions by her student put up a proud look on Fuka's face. As soon as he hit the ground, Nobu put up distance between him and the edge of the circle. Taking utmost that he doesn't end up in the same fate as his friend a few minutes ago. Both Nobu and Satoru were back in a standoff just as they started.
Strong wind blew the leaves on the ground as clouds gathered in the sky. Nobu and Satoru have a stare off yet again. Each waiting for the other to move. They slowly got closer to each other until this time Satoru charged in with his palm held up. He feigned his first hit and slid through Nobu's legs who already was already in a defensive pose. Satoru took a hold of Nobu's legs during the slide and dragged him down to the ground.
He then stood up and tried to use brute force to throw Nobu out of the ring. Nobu, however, had other ideas, he turned his body around facing Satoru and used the same water laser technique towards him which made Satoru put up distance from him. Before Nobu could take a breath, Satoru was again right next to him this time landing a hard-hitting punch right on Nobu's face which launched him far ending up groveling on the ground.
Less than a few centimeters to the circle line, Nobu slowly made his way up from the ground only for the periphery of his eye to catch swift movement towards him. Satoru had yet again closed the distance between them rushing in. Immediately he did a sideways cartwheel in an attempt to dodge the oncoming attack, a hit now surely meant his defeat as he would be taken out of the ring. Landing on his feet after the cartwheel Nobu used wind to jump backwards putting up the maximum distance between him and Satoru.
"Sensei is pressuring Nobu a lot. Getting close to him all the time." Hide commented.
"Yes that boy, his weakness is close combat after all. Seems like Toshihiro-san knows his students really well." Fuka sighed as she observed her student struggling.
For a good while, Satoru kept closing down Nobu at all the opportunities he got whilst Nobu tried his best to evade and hit long ranged attacks. At this rate, it was only a matter of time before Nobu exhausted himself or does a mistake catching himself in one of Satoru's attacks. On the front foot, Satoru had no worries as he barely took a hit from the long-distance attacks. Having the affinity for Earth, Satoru excels in defense especially when it comes to long ranged attacks.
"Only way Nobu is beating me is by using lighting since Earth is weak against lightning. But he never was good at lightning attacks so this should be a rap up soon." Satoru thought to himself as he charged in for the umpteenth time. This time however Nobu didn't try to evade or dodge, he himself came charging towards Satoru and took the hit to the stomach head on, which made his stomach bulge and face expressed dire pain.
Even then Nobu held strong as he tackled his sensei lifting him up from the ground. Suddenly a strong gust of wind blew, Nobu used this to his advantage adding his own wind making it massive sending both of them flying at great speeds out the ring. Having been in front of Nobu, Satoru had exited the ring first meaning Nobu had won the spar.
The onlookers looked on with shock. Their eyes widened while some of them had their mouths open.
"What just happened?" Hide questioned in awe.
"I don't really know. He took the punch and flew with Toshihiro-san?" Fuka confused tried to make sense of what happened.
Sei still frustrated of what happened earlier had nothing to say while Eli looked as confused as Hide. Both of the fighters arrived shortly afterward. Satoru had nothing but praise to Nobu who was flustered, clutching the back his head while smiling.
"As expected of Nobu. Using the environment to your advantage. It had become quite windy and you used the gust of wind to make your wind even stronger blowing us out of the ring. You had the vision to lift me up from the ground too as that would make it impossible for me to use Earth techniques to stop my momentum. Genius."
"It was nothing much Sensei, I was pretty nervous at first, I just got lucky as it got windy."
"Ah, it makes sense now. That is my student." Fuka proud went on and placed her hand on top of Nobu's head.
Hide all cheery went up to Nobu congratulating him while Eli quietly looked and gave Nobu a cute smile as he looked at her.
Sei getting to witness all of this, had mixed feelings. He was happy for his friend but at the same time, he was disappointed in himself. You can say he was feeling a bit envious about it too. "Sensei you held back against Nobu. Matsumoto-san didn't." These are the words he wanted to say but couldn't muster up the courage nor the will to do so. Eli who observed this behavior of Sei moved closer to him and placed her arm across him and comforted him.
"Next time you will do better Sei, just keep in mind things you learned today. It is okay to make mistakes as we only learn from them." She gave a bright smile with her eyes closed which to an extent calmed Sei down. He then replied to her with a simple nod.
It was time for the final spar of the day. By now it had become noon. Black clouds gathered as the wind picked up. Hide and Eli made their way to the circle. On the way, Eli requested Sei to make the same sword he used. She calls it the chaos blade or Havoc. Sei completed the task and handed her the sword to which she replied.
"Look on Sei this is how you properly use the Havoc."
Both of them entered the circle, each player examined each other, Eli had a pretty confident look on her face while Hide had an excited look on his. Hide knows Eli's abilities yet Eli has no idea of what Hide's ability is. With the drop of the hand, they began their duel.
Eli spun her sword as Hide charged without a thought of mind. He started to throw his unclenched hand towards Eli aiming for her hands and stomach. Eli expertly dodged the hits, rolled around his hand and landed a direct hit to his chest with the sword. Much to her surprise, there was absolutely no reaction from Hide who used the moment to hit her Eli in the stomach with his palm sending her back a few meters. "Physical resistance?" Eli thought to herself as she prepared to get into a defensive state as Hide looked on with a wide grin on his face.
From the earlier battle, the stage had a lot of debris laying around. Broken pieces of large rocks. Hide took a few of these and flung them towards Eli as a distraction. Eli turned her swords sharp and cut through these rocks, before seeing from the corner of her eye Hide extending his foot towards her aiming for a kick. She quickly jumped backwards creating a slight distance between them. Then she unhinged her sword and used her left hand to strike Hide's foot knocking him out of balance, before using the other sword to land another direct hit on Hide's stomach, this time with a lot of force sending him flying the distance.
Picking himself up quickly Hide rushed again with no visible damage on him, it was as if he was never hit by any of these attacks. He feigned his first hit and made attempted to connect a jump kick. Eli saw this movement and used the handle of her sword to block the kick before using her own leg to land a kick on Hide sending him flying yet again
. This time however Hide recovered even quicker appearing immediately in front of Eli before she recovered from her kick. He successfully landed a hit on her elbow joint with his palm knocking the sword out of her hand before swinging his other hand trying to hit her on the chest. Replying to this Eli used the other sword in her hand, extending its surface area transforming it into a makeshift shield blocking Hide's attack. The sheer impact of the hit sent Eli a bit back, she used this to get away, even more, taking a breather.
"So that is Kohiruimaki- sans's Sword Manipulation." From the audience Satoru questioned.
"To be able to convert your sword to a shield now that is skill. I admire her a bit." Fuka licked her lips while her index finger rested on them as she said this.
With a little time in her hand, Eli hinged her sword and this time she rushed in towards Hide. Swinging the first two times similar to that of Sei before adding a vertical slash after that, she shouted "Double sword-wielding style: 3rd medley Special" which made her do a semicircular slash with the sword releasing wind blades. Hide excelling at close combat dodged the first three strikes, however, he was caught in the final hit almost sending him out of bounds. Still unhurt, unfazed, untouched, Hide stood up and cleaned his clothes off the dust.
"You manage to hit me multiple times Kohiruimaki-san. You are pretty strong." Hide still with the grin on his face stated.
"Of course. I was chosen for this job for a reason. But you, you have some sort of physical resistance right?" With a confident look on her face, Eli questioned Hide.
"Obviously you would have noticed by now." Immediately he moved closer to her after this statement and tried again to hit her. Various punches and kicks, Eli dodged all of them while letting in hits of her own. Hide was fast but Eli was faster. The bystanders looked on with, intrigued faces, Satoru paying close attention to the fight.
All of a sudden, Eli broke away from the relentless barrage of Hide's attacks, she put up distance between them. In a blink of an eye, she charged in with her sword doing a series of slashes, five slashes to be exact which Hide dodged again, before saying "Havoc wielding : 5th medley special." She held the sword by the hinges and spun it around her body. Making it to be yet another simple move hide just jumped back in an effort to dodge it. But suddenly he felt something hit him that carried him away out of the ring smashing him onto a tree. "Huh?" Hide thought to himself as he was being carried away, he looked down to see Eli's sword stuck in his stomach extending all the way.
"Hide you, idiot." Nobu facepalmed from the crowd. While Sei had a relieved/determined look on his face as he saw the smiling face of Eli after her victory.
"Interesting," Satoru said while Fuka had both of her hands on her side of her face with a wide smile on her face.