---Evening---
After having our meal, and we all settled down for the evening. I had the opportunity to speak with the old couple about their skills after dinner. Evidentially the dojo we met them at was the man's family dojo, and had been in the family for nearly 5 generations. Telling me that the two of them met while training there, it was nice to see a loving couple here. Apologizing for their son's behavior, they admitted that he had been running with a rough crowd for months after a local factory closed and he lost his job.
Joining up with a wannabe group gangsters, the group had taken it upon themselves to loot on behalf of the community in the dojo. They had suspected they were looting via violent means, but had let it slide as they thought their son and grandson wouldn't have resorted to killing. Unfortunately for them that judgment was what put them both in the ground, and what was upset their daughter.
"I apologize as well, taking a life is never good.", I stated.
"This is true, but it is how this new world works.", the couple said.
"I should still probably apologize to his wife.", I remarked.
"She died when our grandson was born, complications at birth.", they sighed looking back at that sad memory.
"I understand, I thank you for accepting our offer.", I said changing subjects, "I hope your daughter can find it in her heart to forgive us."
"She is stubborn as a mule.", he laughed, "She get's that from her-"
"Don't you say it.", his wife scolded.
"Her grandmother.", he changed his answer.
"I see.", I chuckled, "On the topic of her, she appears to be a brawler not a swordsman like both of you. Where did she train?
"Oh yes, she was trained by a close friend at the Ryōzanpaku.", he chuckled.
"Ryōzanpaku...", I asked hiding a twitch behind my Poker Face skill.
"Yes, she refused to learn kendo because she wanted to learn martial arts.", they answered, "She studied under Kensei Ma. He and I are old acquaintance from back when he first visited Japan."
'Oh no...', I thought.
"Based on our heading we should end up near Ryōzanpaku. We highly recommend that we seek them out as they are masters in their respective styles, and would be a major asset to the group as a whole.", the old woman said.
"They also happen to not kill people though...", I said, "Would they really consider joining us?"
"I would hope they would change their minds, at least about the undead.", she stated, "They won't live long if they didn't. Some of these bigger mutations are overwhelming even for us, and it's only getting worse day by day."
Acknowledging that, I thanked for their knowledge and went to stew on this. Climbing up to the highest point of the ship, I called Midna out to explain the situation. I didn't remember being told anything about other franchises, aside from zombie ones, being added into this world.
"What the hell are the Kenichi people doing here!", I asked her, "I never heard anything about them when I was-"
"Why are you so surprised? Didn't you read the fine print in your request? As the world increases in difficulty you will be given the opportunity to gather stronger members too your group. Pass up the opportunity, and you won't get a second chance with those members.", she said before giving me a lecherous smile, "While there is Kenichi here, you have access to all the beauties hiding at the Dojo. You can-"
"Do you see all those women in the wheelhouse?", I questioned, "Tell me why I would need to look elsewhere for more women."
"Uh...maybe because you have a thing for badass bitches and klutzy women?", she pointed out with a smirk, "The women there check those boxes."
"Ugh...I need to confirm that they are willing to kill the undead and Umbrella troops before I can take them. If they are only going to beat them within an inch of their life, they are a liability not an asset. They need to be able to train these people to kill and protect themselves.", I stated.
"If that is your concern, I can tell you they aren't treating the undead the same as living people.", she assured me, "They are more than willing to kill the undead and the mutants without hesitation. Assuming you play your cards right, you can probably convince them about the Umbrella goons. You have to remember they have families too, and they are aware of what Umbrella Corp has done."
"Grr...", I groaned, "Are there any other surprises I should be aware of?"
"I can tell you that the Kenichi group isn't the only ones sheltering there.", she giggled, "Several other deadly women and their group are sheltering there after fleeing their high school full of martial arts fanatics. I would tread carefully with them though, the students had to kill a lot of people they cared about. Martial Artists may be powerful, but they aren't invincible in this world. Not a single person in this world aside from you is immune to the virus, a normal martial artist can get infected from the tiniest cut. The things you do with martial arts is dangerous for most practitioners...especially as the world phase goes up. Your skin is hard enough to stop bullets with ease, most martial artists aren't anywhere near that level."
"I assumed as much.", I admitted.
Sighing, I accepted the task of at least seeing if they would join us. The fact was I had killed plenty of people so they were likely going to pick up on that...same with Saeko. We would see exactly how they would react to us, and more importantly confirm the presence of the other groups there. Putting it too bed for now, it would be several days before reaching our third stop in Muroto anyways so I had time to think.
After a cold shower, to conserve the hot water for others, I went to the wheelhouse to find Saya at the helm. Giving her a playful smile, I gave her a hug and a kiss on the lips. Smelling the perfume on her, I gave her a compliment as it was one that I had bought her for her birthday last year. Asking her how things looked out there, she said that it was incredibly dark as it was a new moon tonight. Offering to take the helm so she could rest, she took the offer and went to lay down. Taking her place, soon afterwards Rei slipped into my lap to watch the dim scenery around us. Keeping me company till my shift was over, Saya and her kept me company in bed while I got a few hours of rest.
---Afternoon---
Getting the Grandmasters introduced formerly to the group, I had them lead the day's training so I could focus on repairs. Thanks to Kohta and crew, they had managed to find the parts I needed lying on the beach at our last stop. Pulling the engines into my inventory briefly, I swapped the parts and applied the injector cleaner to the engine. Placing them back afterwards, I cleaned up the alternator contacts by hand to remove some of the corrosion that was building up. Getting them fired back up three hours later, we were back on the move again at a much faster rate.
"Good job!", Rika laughed slapping me on the back.
"Thanks, we should make good time now.", I chuckled motioning that I wanted to shower.
Letting me go, I went in and got into the shower. Using degreasing soap and shampoo from my storage, I quickly removed the caked on grease from the engine bay. While I was scrubbing my face, I heard someone enter the room trying to be sneaky. A few moments after that, I felt a familiar sensation on my back.
"Sneaking away from training, Saeko and Pucca?", I said.
"All I did was put my breasts on you, and you knew it was me.", Saeko said wrapping her arms around me.
"They are currently doing sword swing drills, and we were excused.", Pucca said moving around to my front, "How long has it been since we were in a shower together?"
"About a month?", I snickered, "You were getting pretty busy with your training before this happened after all."
"I know...I kept saying I want to skip this year no matter what, but I didn't expect this.", she laughed.
"Is it just you two, or is there another person?", I said rinsing my eyes out.
"They were right, your senses are very sharp.", Yuko giggled.
"I am not surprised you three got out so easily.", I stated.
"It actually wasn't that easy.", Yuko replied, "Their daughter really doesn't like us."
"Why is she mad at you?", I inquired.
"Not just me, everyone that sleep in the wheelhouse. It's no secret that all of us that sleep up there are your lovers, and she hates you.", Pucca told me, "Since we killed her brother, she wants revenge but is respecting her parents wish to keep it peaceful."
"Ah...", I groaned.
"Anyways, she wants to fight you next. She wants to see why we elected some muscular high school guy to be the leader.", Yuko said in a mocking tone.
"Ouch! My Pride!!", I gasped faking the pain.
Laughing at that we got cleaned up, after preforming a routine full body examine, and left the shower room. Going out to the deck, I saw the elderly couple drilling everyone like they were pupils. Even the children were being drilled to build their endurance and core strength. Giving Kikyo a smile as she glanced over at me, her son Saito gave me a big smile too.
Saito had taken to me like glue since saving his mother and him. Any tasks that he could assist me with, I had him help me so he could learn new things. His mother was over the moon with it as working with me put a smile on his face. It reminded me of my past life during the take your child to work days at my parent's jobs. At this point, I was damn near close enough to her to be her lover. Her and Namiyo got along great, and I secretly thought she was part of the reason why Kikiyo was so flirtatious.
"You like her?", Saeko asked.
"She is a very nice woman, but she also feels a bit hesitant given how things went with her husband.", I answered.
"That's true, it is disappointing that he just left them alone.", Saeko stated.
"Very disappointing, Saito is nice kid.", Yuko said.
Seeing us coming out of the shower, the elderly couple waved me over. Thinking they wanted to talk to me about something, next thing I knew a practice sword was tossed to me. Telling me they wanted to see my level of proficiency, I reluctantly agreed to the test. Making room for us to spar, I swung the sword a few times to get an idea of the balancing before giving my go ahead to them. After a signal from Yuko, the fight started but neither side moved. Seizing each other up, I was relatively surprised that both of them were taking me on in unison instead of on an individual basis. That either meant they felt I was that strong of an opponent, or they practice a style that used two fighters.
'The fact that outside forces are here, I can't let my guard down.', I thought.
A few moments later, I decided to make the first move. Launching myself forward, I feinted going for a wide swing but at the last second dropped down to do an upwards slash using my legs to provide the power. Unsurprisingly they saw the feint coming, and simply stepped out of the way. Continuing my slide, I used the side of the boat as a launching pad aiming for the man first. Moving faster than most people his age would, he drew his blade and immediately went for my neck. Using my martial arts training I constantly worked on, I avoided his blade by a hair length, knocked the sword free from his hand, and grabbed him by the shirt.
Pulling him towards me, I flipped him over my shoulder and threw him towards his wife. Catching his sword in midair, and waited for my opportunity. Once her sight line of me was broken and he had his back to me, I dashed forward and stopped just short of delivering death blows to both of their necks. Conceding that they had lost the fight, the two of them gave me a grin.
"You have a rather unique style of fighting. It would appear you are versed in many weapons, and it has changed your fighting style.", they said as I helped the old man off the ground, "If this were a real fight, you would have killed us instantly. You were holding back."
"Is it that obvious?", I inquired with a smile.
"It is, watching your movements displays the level of dedication and training you have reached.", he said.
"I didn't have much of a choice in the matter, most of my childhood was spent in military boarding school as my father didn't have the time for me.", I chuckled, "I picked up a lot of my skills from there."
Shaking their hands, I returned his sword to him and the one they gave me. Resuming training again after that, I stood by and watched how things went.
---A Few Days Later---
As approached the jut out piece of land that Muroto was positioned on, it became clear they had experienced quite a fight here. From the direction we came from, Muroto was positioned on the other side and a large of amount of smoke was coming over the ridge separating us. Looking at the mini map, the place was crawling with undead but there was a single place that survivors were holding out at. There was about forty people fighting with a handful of others stuck in thein the middle of the group.
Watching the dots on the map, several of the undead were moving much faster than I had seen before. We were at 87% of Phase 1 which told me that new mutations would start appearing soon. Assuming that we could be dealing with that, I told everyone to be ready for a fight. Understanding what I was implying, everyone hurriedly got ready for conflict. Taking the kids and the weakest members onto the bus, I left the elderly couple and Takashi's group to protect them all.
Kohta and Merna groups took the rear of ship, mine took the forward position, and the remainder of our forces shored up the empty spots as we rounded the tip of the landmass. As the city came into view, most of the place was ablaze with undead running around like they had lost their minds. Trying to figure out what the situation was, we encountered a chrome plated cyborg zombie...it looked like the bloody thing came out of Doom along with a mutant dog.
"Hey Midna...you happen to know if I can buy the Doomslayer armor yet?", I asked quickly raising the attack and defense power of my group, "I have dozens of pages of equipment I could buy, and honestly it's easier asking you."
"Yep, want me to buy it for you?", she inquired.
"Can you tell me about that thing first?", I said.
"Ah, well that was the route Umbrella was going to go with originally before perfecting the Tyrant Virus. You should know that while it may not be as physically strong as a Tyrant, all that tech isn't just for defense. It's packing several rockets, guns, and a laser in it's robotic arm.", she informed me, "As for the dog, I don't think I need to tell you that about that one."
"Yeah...let's buy the Doomslayer armor.", I stated, "How much?"
"20,000 points, and it's only the base model. None of the attachments or firearms come with it.", she said buying the armor.
"How much for the BFG?", I asked.
"Hehe!", she laughed with a big smile, "You will need 100,000 points for that, and each round is 5,000 points."
"Looks like I am going to need to gather some points then, I might need it later.", I chuckled.
Putting the armor in my storage, I kept us out of range of the cyborg sensors. Watching it patrol the streets like a stalker, this thing looked like it had hurriedly been rushed along. The dog also looked like it was patched together with zombie and dog parts.
"What's your plan?", Rika asked, "Those things give me the creeps."
"Well, easiest thing to do is shoot it and see if a headshot kills it.", I said as Rei handed me my .50 rifle.
Instructing everyone to take cover behind one of the vehicles, if the bullet didn't kill it the thing would turn and attack us. In the even that happened I didn't want people getting hit with rounds from it. Once everyone was behind cover, I lined up the shot aiming straight for it's head.
"Midna, could I transfer the power from Ebony and Ivory to this gun?", I inquired.
"No, the energy and ammo are only useable in the items purchased with them. Ebony and Ivory's Demonic Energy is tied to them, and can't be transferred or stolen.", Midna told me sitting on my head, "You going to take the shot or not?"
Sighing I took a deep breath, and then fired. Hitting the cyborg dead center of the head, the cyborg stumbled forward acting like it was drug for a moment before subsequently exploding. Sighing with relief I cautious waited to see what would happen next. Knowing that it probably wouldn't be that simple, I watched the mini map to see if anything would come this way.
"Did you get it?", Shizuka asked.
"I did, but everyone stay down for a few minutes. I don't know if the explosion will bring another one.", I said.
"They haven't been that smart before, it will most likely only attract a horde. We can wait until they disperse.", Saya stated.
"I don't want to put any faith in that till I see it for myself. Umbrella is only going to improve their hand, we need to be-"
Before I finished a helicopter came into the area. Coming to where the cyborg exploded a team quickly picked up the unit and the dog before quickly vacating the area.