Looking at the old man stretching, I was having a hard time finding words to describe the gentle giant. With a stature that rivaled both Mr. Browns and the muscle brothers, one was inclined to believe that he also should have a personality that reflected his physique.
However, from our two days together, it was clear that that was not who he was. His sexual orientation aside, he was just a nice, but an incredibly shy young man. So the fact that he for some crazy reason challenged the teacher who was at least [A]-rank was not just a huge surprise, it felt infeasible.
Yet, here we were, the rest of the students looking intently at the young man who was desperately trying to get his nerves under control. "Don't worry, young man! I'll be gentle! Hahaha!"
"T-thank you..."
Taking a little peek to my side, I could see Arthur standing with his palms together, his eyes closed in prayer for the innocent young man that didn't realize what kind of person the teacher was. To be honest, I wasn't sure either, but from his demeanor, I could derive that he wasn't someone who would be 'gentle'.
"Don't worry, Thomas, even if he acts like that, he would never truly hurt a student. I think..."
When even Ms. Turner was struggling to encourage the gentle giant, I felt like my assumption had been quite accurate. But there was nothing to do but wait and see how things would play out.
With both of the fighters walking up to the center of the ring and shaking hands and walking back, I saw Thomas take yet another deep breath as Ms. Turner started the countdown. The big metal gauntlets that he had equipped a bit earlier rattled for the last time.
"5,4,3,2...1... Go..."
'Oh?'
Even with the faltering voice of his teacher, something changed about Thomas as soon as the countdown finished, his earlier weak eyes suddenly becoming sharp and resolute. Seeing this, the brawny teacher got a huge grin on his face.
Going down into what could only be described as a sumo position, Mr. Brown yelled at our classmate, "Come!"
Now, there was no hesitation in Thomas, as he dashed forward, wielding his huge gauntlets weaving through the air. It didn't take long until he made it to the teacher, and then the show began.
*BAM, BAM, BAM, BAM!*
A flurry of punches ran down on Oliver, all carrying extreme power and speed if one factored in the fact that Thomas wasn't more than [E]-rank. It was even to the point where I felt myself becoming uncertain if I could have dodged them all if he had been just a bit faster.
Then again, I wasn't a close combat specialist like Mr. Brown was, nor was I an [A]-ranker yet. Although it looked like he was being pushed back, the reality was that he was just casually swatting away the punches with his bare hands.
After allowing the student to try his luck at hitting him for a while, the teacher decided that it was time for a counterattack. Right after the gentle giant, who didn't look so gentle anymore, had missed a left hook, a right straight was launched toward his head in retaliation.
Though it was obvious that Mr. Brown was taking it easy, it was still way too fast for an [E]-ranker to dodge in this situation, with his arm still next to Oliver's neck. Or so I thought...
"Happ!"
Disobeying the image of his body, Thomas somehow bent backward, showing off some incredible flexibility and agility for his large body as the teacher's fist punched the air above him. Not wanting to miss the opening, Thomas even went one way further, putting his hands on the ground while kicking upwards.
'That's crazy... How can he move like that?'
It was like watching a beast fight, seemingly only moving on instinct with complete disregard for what was considered normal.
*BAM!*
"Nice one, kiddo! However, this seems to be my win! Gahaha!"
Not allowing Thomas to rejoice even for a second, Mr. Brown had caught his leg, now holding it in an iron grip with his hand. And, as if he had seen enough, he just casually threw him out of the arena, right into the arms of Brad and Bradley.
The two brother's appeared to be just as excited as their teacher, rejoicing over finding out that, even though he was shy, Thomas was one of them.
"Nice work! Man, you got some impressive muscles. You should work out with us sometimes!"
"Yes, that was impressive! You got some power in you, don't you?"
At this point, all the excitement had been sucked out of the stadium, with the stupid teacher ending the fight way too early for anyone to be satisfied, the disappointment just growing larger as we all witnessed the stupid brothers trying to recruit our classmate.
'Ah, there was a reason I haven't talked to them, after all...'
Finally, Ms. Turner's voice rang out with a sigh, "Haaa... The winner is Oliver Brown. Congratulations on beating a freshman."
Walking up to her confidently, the bald man wasn't deterred in the slightest, "Hahaha! Why, thank you, Ms. Turner. It was a hard fight, but I managed to come out on top in the end. Gahaha!"
Ignoring the annoying man, she just continued on with her day, while Thomas was trying his best to escape the clutches of the two brothers, "Now we have the final two duels before we end this little event. Stella Klein and Sophie Red, please step into the arena."
A pink-haired girl and a blue-haired girl both stepped into the arena, wearing equally excited faces. Now, if Stella knew who Sophie was, which I assumed she did as she had called her name out, there was no way she didn't know what she was getting into. Something which made her excitement even more bizarre.
Now, there were some crazy guys around the academy, Sebastian and Peter to name two, but if I had to choose, I would say that the women were generally a lot scarier than the men. And these two weren't exceptions.
No, these two were probably two of the best examples of how scary women at the academy truly were. There could be made an argument as to why Stella wasn't so scary, with how nice she was, but, when thinking about how she got this excited about being pummeled, I would never agree.
And Sophie? I didn't think anything needed to be said about why she was one scary lady. Not only was she a fighting addict, her obsessive love for someone she hadn't even met was even scarier.
The worst part of all of this was that I somehow felt like, right now, these two were the people I was most comfortable around... So what did that say about me?
Taking out her huge shield and relatively small sword, Stella started walking up to the center where Sophie was already waiting for her, as she had no preparations she had to make before fighting. After all, her whole body was a weapon.
"Let's have a good match!"
"Yes, I'll do my best!"
Having a longer handshake than normal, tension quickly started building up in the arena. Even though both of them were smiling, their eyes were staring daggers into each other, both of them seemingly burning with fighting spirit.
Before Sophie turned around and started walking in the opposite direction of where I, Caroline, and Akane were standing, I thought I saw her look at me for a second while nodding. A nod that I had no idea what it meant.
'Am I supposed to understand that?'
At the same time, when Stella turned around, she gave me a huge smile as if to say 'Watch me closely!', something that I could only mentally shake my head in response to. 'Oh, sweet summer child... You have no idea what you are up against...'
Naturally, I only gave her a smile back, to which she swiftly responded by slightly blushing and turning her eyes away. "Please get ready!"
Now facing each other, they eagerly awaited the countdown, and Ms. Turner wasn't one to torture them by delaying it.
"5,4,3..."
'Sophie, please be gentle...'
"2,1..."
*Fwosh!*
Before the countdown had even finished, Sophie transformed her hands, showing the blue scales and sharp claws to the world once again, them gloriously emerging from the blue fire. 'Or don't...'
"Go!"
*DON!*
A massive wave of pressure was released from the pink-haired girl, and I could see the other freshmen reacting, with their legs shaking and their breathing getting rough.
Thankfully, my rank was too high for me to be affected, but when looking into the arena, there was a certain someone who absolutely wasn't in the same situation as me. Though she was still tightly holding on to her shield and weapon, her legs were visibly shaking as a result of her standing even closer than us to the monster that was Sophie.
"Here I come!"