As the first guy came into the appropriate range, Nem looked away for a second, making the skinny man's eyes flash in excitement. It was time to strike.
The criminal made one step forward and Nem suddenly spat out the water directly onto his face, making him close his eyes unconsciously. Then, he took out one stick and dashed towards the man, who took a small step backward reflexively.
Not bothered by it, Nem continued his dash and stabbed with his stick, which had a rounded end, towards the guy's genitals. After all, they were at the perfect height for a stabbing attack.
The strike connected, only a bit mitigated by the retreating motion of the man who immediately curled his body in pain with a muffled sound. Nem didn't hold back at all and quickly switched hands, bringing the stick to his left hand.
Taking advantage of the fact that the skinny man's head was momentarily reachable, Nem swung his right hip, bringing the momentum to his right shoulder, elbow and then wrist. All three of them were aligned to bring the strike at full power, and Nem's open palm collided with the man's face. The bottom, which held the most power, shattered his teeth, which Nem identified as a weak point due to their poor condition. The upper part of his palm flattened the guy's nose.
The pain, stress and horror of having almost all his front teeth violently removed from his gums weren't to be underestimated and the skinny guy screamed in agony, his body writhing in pain.
Nem briefly looked at the other man, who only had the time to tense up in surprise, before looking down at his friend again, who was now sitting on the floor, his back against the wall and twitching in pain.
Nem narrowed his eyes, threw the stick into his right hand again, and extended his left hand towards the skinny man's throat. He pushed out his claws and violently pulled back, ripping out a piece of flesh and making blood gush out of the artery.
The red-eyed child then retracted his claws and calmly stared at the other man, observing him more attentively while his friend was choking on his own blood.
This one wasn't skinny at all, in fact, he could definitely be called chubby. His clothes were also in a much better state than his friend, although still poor. The man's unattractive face was greasy and red and his expression was twisted in horror while watching the skinny man's agony.
He had just pulled a knife out and held it with a somewhat shaky hand. Still, it didn't seem like he would flee at all and his body language showed he was relatively confident.
'Well, this isn't strange I suppose. I'm still a child in his eyes after all, and my moves could simply be explained as the other guy being weak and me hitting the right places.'
'However, this is good for me, at least I won't have to kill him in front of other people.'
The knife definitely was a problem, but fighting against it was something every orphan in the monastery learned very early. Nem even had some practice with it in his original world, although never with a real knife.
While he was thinking, Nem noticed that the scum in front of him was still not moving, perhaps because he didn't understand how the child in front of him had gouged out his friend's throat.
'This one is going to be a bit harder... The thing to avoid at all costs is to fall and be trapped under his weight. As for the knife, it's a good thing for me, since his hands aren't steady and I'm faster than him.'
Using a bit more time to size the guy up, Nem noticed that the man's eyes were a bit jaundiced and that he smelled like cheap booze, even when they were still far from each other.
This indicated alcohol abuse, he remembered from a TV show he had enjoyed on Earth. And alcohol abuse resulted in a weak liver... The fat on the guy's body made his defense higher but his joints more vulnerable.
An instant later, Nem determined that this fight would be a lot harder if he didn't use his claws straight away and that he needed to move quickly, in case the man's hands became more stable.
As the skinny man let out a moaning sound and a stream of blood was ejected of his throat, the boy immediately started to dash towards the fat man, stick in hand.
His enemy was also right-handed, and he quickly used his left hand to try to grab the kid while looking for an opportunity to stab with his knife.
Nem dodged by lowering his body, making use of his short body and exposing himself for a slashing attack targeted at his shoulder. Having anticipated it, Nem simultaneously parried with his stick and reached out with his left hand towards the man's wrist.
The fat guy, already thinking about putting the strange kid into a headlock, suddenly felt a searing pain on his right wrist, dropping the knife in shock. Nem's claws had pierced the soft skin where the veins were exposed, even damaging the nerves.
Not even bothering to look at the knife, Nem ducked even more, put his left hand on the ground to support himself and kicked high with his right leg onto the fatty's liver, which was just over the stomach. The movement was so fast that the adult man didn't even have time to brace himself or even touch the kid in any way.
The pain and impact made him lose his breathing for a bit and the holes on his wrists were starting to drip blood. Still far from being incapacitated, the criminal took a step back and punched out with his left hand downwards.
However, Nem was still faster, and he avoided the attack by rotating his body, with his hand on the ground to support him. The alley wasn't large and he didn't have much room to maneuver, so after grabbing the knife with his left hand, Nem dashed out of the fight, avoiding a random kick the man had thrown.
"What the hell ?" The fat guy cursed between his teeth. He glanced at his injured wrist, noticing the small holes and scratches. He was confused, thinking the kid must have very sharp fingernails but couldn't really come to any solid conclusion. The pain of his liver was clouding his judgment and not managing to grab the boy made him really angry.
The two exchanged a glance, one angry and a bit out of breath, the other excited and cold.
However, since Nem had the knife, the fat man wouldn't give him a chance to use it. He suddenly started running towards Nem like an American football player, shoulder first, aiming to knock him out with his weight.
Nem grinned and swiftly jumped, immediately reaching almost the same height as his opponent and used his right leg to make contact with the wall. His new shoe didn't immediately slide off the uneven surface, allowing him to push on the wall to make another jump.
Still soaring a bit higher, Nem used the knife he held in a reverse grip of his left hand to stab towards the man's throat, which was completely unprotected and now perfectly reachable.
A small moment later, Nem was back with his two legs on the ground, his heart beating wildly, while the fat man was clutching the side of his neck in panic and disbelief. They both had their backs turned to each other, until Nem decided to exercise caution and look at his victim. Being cool was one thing, but dying because of it would be really dumb.
The man was falling on the ground, not far from the already dead body of his friend. He had a knife still embedded in his throat and was slowly losing consciousness.
Nem expressionlessly looked at his hands, one clutching a now chipped wooden stick and the other stained with blood, claws out.
'Killing with my hands really feels different... It's way better. Or perhaps it's because I didn't know those guys ?'
He decided to take a break to sort his emotions. It was his first time after all.
What he felt was... a mix of satisfaction, loss, disgust and exhilaration. Succeeding in killing two opponents in a fair fight made him feel powerful, removing two awful people from the world of the living was responsible for the satisfaction. The rest was the inevitable consequence of killing a human being.
'That's alright... Killing someone is a bad thing after all, it would be bad if I started having too much fun doing it.'
Nem believed that human beings could tell whenever something was wrong or not, and that morals weren't something our species just pulled out of nowhere.
Based on what he knew, if you asked someone what was wrong and what was right, he would be able to give roughly the right answer, no matter the era.
Well, as long as he didn't lie to himself or got brainwashed at least.
Killing definitely belonged to the former. No matter how bad these guys were, they probably had some kind of family or friends that either relied on them or loved them.
Still, as long as Nem could be sure that they deserved it, he would never regret killing them. And those guys literally threatened him first, even if he looked like a sick little boy. Even feeling bad was the privilege of the strong, the weak couldn't feel anything, being dead and all that.
'Well, perhaps I should say winner rather than strong... This guy could probably crush me to death just by falling on me hard enough.'
Nem opened his dark-red eyes that he had closed to think, retracted his claws and went to pull out the knife out of the man's throat, making blood flow out slowly. His heart had already stopped beating.