He backed off. Griff couldn't handle the fear circling in his veins and took a step back. He couldn't believe it.
His father trained him starting at the age of three. The first ever memory in his life was kicking a steel bar for five hours straight until his legs bled and his tiny little legs couldn't support his body. As he grew older, the training never stopped and only worsened.
He was taught how to escape a kidnapping by using his legs to forcefully break any lock that trapped him. He was taught how to destroy the legs of an opponent weighing hundred of kilograms heavier than he was. He was taught how to mercifully kill an innocent little rabbit that had done nothing against himâ€"Jeremy.
His father taught him how to conquer fear. He was taught how to destroy it.
He went from a scrawny little kid who hated his legs because it would ache the most, to an exquisite athlete who prided himself in having the toughest and strongest legs anyone had ever seen.
But he took a step back. He would have accepted it if he retracted just his hands, but to take a step back was a huge blow to his own pride and ego.
His legs weren't supposed to waver.
But it did. All because of that invisible pressure that he couldn't understand.
Most opponents he faced showed their killing intent and pressure up front. He could feel the opponent's arms itching to grapple him, he could feel the danger in their line of sight, and he could feel the disparity in strength just by seeing their physique.
But this pressure was untraceable. He didn't know where it came from. He didn't know which dangerous weapon his opponent held. And worst of all, he didn't know what would happen if he continued to slap Patty.
That was the worst opponent to face. He remembered what his father once told him that he never understood until now.
Don't fear the opponent you know is stronger than you. Fear the opponent you don't know.
With stronger opponents, he knew what moves he had to avoid. He knew what his win conditions wereâ€"just aim for their weak spots. He was taught how to be David in a Goliath fight.
But with opponents who had question marks all over their body, he didn't know what to do. He didn't know if the opponent outclassed him by a little margin, or was it like the difference between heaven and earth?
It reminded him of the time when he first entered this school. His father finally gave him the chance at a spar. All those years of training, his father never gave him the chance to fight against him. He never had the chance for revenge, until that time.
It felt like facing the heavens. He couldn't even fathom the difference in strength between them. He knew that he couldn't go around him for a surprise attack. A frontal hit was useless. He didn't even know if he'll be able to approach his father without immediately being knocked out.
Even when his father's eyes were closed, Griff knew that his father could see every one of his moves. He felt naked. Like he could see through Griff's very subconscious, his deepest thoughts, his real feelings.
That was the only time he stepped back and didn't even try. Until now.
Because of some unknown force, the trauma, fear, and embarrassment of that night all flashed back. He felt all eyes on him. He felt their gazes piercing through the past as they watched him get humiliated and berated by his father.
His breathing got heavier. Am I underwater? He felt the walls enclose him until he felt his lungs being squeezed until all his oxygen went out his mouth. Am I dying?
He needed to get out. He needed to leave. Get some space. Breathe fresh air. He wanted to live!
Without saying a word, Griff turned back and left the classroom. His three lackeys were confused and followed him out. They asked him all these questions, but the only thing he could hear from them were muffled sounds.
He continued to walk, his steps getting faster, even if he didn't know where he was going. He just knew that he couldn't stay near Patty anymore.
â€"â€"â€"
Patty saw Griff leave the classroom with haste. That was weird, but Patty didn't take that in mind. He was still trying to comprehend what happened.
He was just minding his own business, talking shop with Grammo, when all of a sudden, the buzzing appeared yet again.
BZZZT
This time, the buzzing was really loud. It felt like it was blasting inside his head like a speaker. Not only that, the buzzing was now accompanied by a sharp ringing sound that annoyed him to no end.
The buzzing buzzed so loud and the ringing rang so loud that he couldn't concentrate on anything else. He had to find where that sound came from.
He was so peeved by the annoying sounds in his head that he didn't notice that everything around him was moving slower than before.
This time, when he looked to his right, he saw a peculiar looking fly that was hovering just beside his face. If not for its striking golden yellow eyes, he would have passed it off as a normal house fly.
When he saw it, he immediately remembered about the Muscava. It had a striking resemblance to that 8-bit image of the animal. Not just a resemblance, it was exactly what the beast would look like in real life.
The summoning worked!
He finally found the source of that annoying buzz. How dare it conceal itself like that. Was the minion just teasing him with its buzzes as if they were playing hide and seek?
But only now did he notice that Muscava wasn't looking at him. It was staring in front. He followed its line of sight and saw that it was looking at Griff.
Weird. Why would it stare at Griff? And why was Griff moving in slow motion? He was raising his hand with an angry expression as if he was about to give the nastiest high five in the worldâ€"the kind that would hurt the hands.
But then, like a bolt of lightning, he saw a fluttering image of Griff raising his hand and slapping him directly in the face. It wasn't exactly an image like he would see on a screen, but something like a 3-d projection like those holograph technologies.
He let the projection slap him. And as he thought, it didn't hurt him a little bit. Instead, he saw a projection of himself getting hit in the face, his cheeks getting all crumpled up and his whole face getting scrunched from the force.
The slap would leave a red mark on his face. That would definitely hurt.
He looked at the real Griff again and finally understood what happened. The projection he just saw was a simulation of what would happen to him if Griff successfully slapped him.
Then, he looked at the little Muscava just beside his face.
'You did all this, didn't you?'
Only now did he truly appreciate the little A-class minion. This was its true power and purpose. Maybe the reason why it didn't show itself earlier was because there was no need to do so. He wasn't in trouble back then.
Only when the threat of Griff slapping him became real, did it finally show itself to prevent what would happen. As expected of an A-class minion; he should have never doubted its power.
He looked around and everything around him was in slow motion. He could see their eyes blinking, he could see their chests inflate with air, he could see their cheeks twitching. He could observe everything at this speed.
The 'slowing down' of time was probably due to the effect of his increased senses. It became so fast that everything around him slowed down. The 3-d projection of the future must have been because of his increased instincts.
Those were the powers of the Muscava minion. He didn't think that his senses and instincts would improve this much, but when he thought about it, an A-class minion should have that much power.
Now, to deal with the current situation, Patty decided that the best thing to do was to dodge the slap with the least amount of movement. He just needed to weave his head back at the right moment.
But then, Griff suddenly stopped and took a step back. His face suddenly lost all color as if he had seen a ghost. He turned around and left just like that.
It was at that moment that Patty's surroundings suddenly sped up into its normal pace. Everything was fast paced and Patty turned into his sluggish and slow self.
He looked to his left and saw that the Muscava was nowhere to be seen. With the threat of the slap no longer present, the Muscava had nothing left to do. It did its job and disappeared.
For a second, Patty was disappointed that he no longer saw everything in slow motion. It was a cool superpower. But because the Muscava could only be partially summoned, it couldn't stay in reality for long.
But then he realized that if everything was in slow motion, then days would be veeerrrrryyy long and Prof Ortez's lectures would be mind-numbingly endless. No thanks.