As the people started running away, Handeron gave the beastwoman one of his gauntlets, and with his other one he held her hand. Her wounds, hidden below her clothing were being healed, but scars stayed.
***
- Why are some people treating others not in the same way?
- It's nobilities right to enslave enemy forces... Return her, and go away, or I will be forced to overpower you!
- And you look at it with acceptance? I won't accept it from you, either.
- Then I will defeat you, and return her to her owner!
She then threw one of her fans at him. He easily repelled it with wind, but another one was approaching from his right. He dashed backwards to avoid it, and was met with a quick follow up fan from his opponent. She shortened the distance, and when Monadias tried increasing it, he was hit with a low fan from his left, cutting his leg a little, and then took a kick to his stomach. He crashed into a wall, destroying it.
[Augh, okay. I need to focus. They come back to her quickly...]
He then used the wind to move faster. His outfit became greener. As he did that, he tried shooting his opponent down with normal attacks, to which she repiled by dodging them using dance moves.
- I see, so you control the wind?
She then tried closing the distance, but Monadias learned from his mistake and always kept the distance, and as she threw her fans, he repelled them with the wind.
***
As Handeron was healing her, looking around if anything dangerous comes around, the hand, covered in a gauntlet that he was holding, slipped away, and as he tried grabbing again, he saw it going straight for his face. He was sent flying, and smashed through a building. As he tried standing up, he was grabbed by the collar, and lifted up.
- Who are you?! Where am I?!
As Handeron was lifted, he heard Righneas talking to him.
Just command it. If you have one of the gauntlets you can always get the second one back. If you lose both, then it's a problem.
Handeron then took his gauntletless hand up, straightened his fingers and the gauntlet came back to him. As that happened, he grabbed, with both of his hands, the arm that was lifting him, and with not much force he unlocked his breathway, putting himself on the ground. As she tried attacking him, he quickly overpowered her.
- Not a wise thing to do, asking questions when you are choking someone. You are in human city called Ibhfad. You were under some spell, and we snapped you out of it.
- How can I trust you?
- Look at me.
He had some bruises over him due to him taking head on the first punch, and collapsing a few walls.
They were almost all healed, but there still were some that could be easily seen.
- That's thanks to the gauntlets.
- And I had one when I woke up...
- I improvised with this one, but it started healing so I left it.
- Why would you do that?
- So that you could heal.
- Don't you know we are enemies of humans?
- So? I don't care, you were contoled, we saved you, I don't need more of a reason to do that. Anyways, come with me, please.
He then let go of her and went straight to Monadias.
***
The fight for a while didn't move from point, where Monadias was dodging and trying to get some damage on his opponent shooting her, and her trying to close the distance, to no effect, thanks to Monadias speed.
- You still try to attack?
- I am not done!
- Your fans can't get past my wind.
- I wanted to try a few times more, but it seems I need to give it more than the least.
She then threw her fans into the air, and when they came back, her hair changed: it dyed itself in pink, but not entirely. Her battlesuit also changed, it gained multiple flower like symbols on it, that were the same color as her hair.
- Formation three!
Her fans then started flying by themselves. It looked like they were dancing through the air, making curves, flying left and right. Monadias thought that it has to be her power, controllimg them in this way, so he tried blowing both of them in one go.
- Wind blast!
As a wave of strong wind flew through the street they were on, the fans were unbudged by it.
- Wind blast!
He used more force into it, but it still didn't work. As the fans were approaching, Monadias tried dodging, but the fans still hit him, cutting his chest, and arm. The fans were still going further and further, but they were stopped by the girl, opening her hands.
- Come back!
As the fans flew back, they nearly hit Monadias again, but he managed to dodge in time, because they came back in a straight line. They turned around, so that the can be grabbed correctly, when they were close to the girl, probably because she would get hurt if she just grabbed them flying right towards her.
- Resign now! Formation two!
She then went along with her fans, as they were making curves and dashes. This one was different though. A little slower, so that she can keep up with it, and also both of the fans had different routes than in the formation three.
[She knows her attack patterns, and it seems like they need to go in formation no matter what.]
Monadias then started winding up his invisible string of the bow.
[Let's see how they will do against it.]
- Spiral shot!
The shot made a spiral around it, making the attack bigger and probably overall more destructive. But it went right through the fan, without any change of track.
[Damn, I know I am stronger, but I can't take advantage of my strength.]
She then used her fans to jump around, and as one fan was approaching and Monadias dodged it, the other one hit him lightly, and when he thought about them coming back, she hit him in the chest, and he was sent flying.
Monadias managed to reduce the impact of that blow by doing something like a wind cushion, but it still hurt. He rolled on the floor, taking damage. Unfortunately, his still weak body didn't keep up, and his ankle was broken. He tried standing up and helping himself with wind, but was soon put down again, as she didn't hesitate to follow up with her next attack. She had him pinned to the floor, his arms unable to move due to her knees.
- You shouldn't have resisted, that will take some time to heal. Now, where is your companion?
- I don't know, he ran away.
- Then call for him, and don't do anything suspicious.
She put one of her fans near his throat. It seems that they were from steel, covered in some paint to hide that they could be used as lethal weapons. Her hair was, again, brown now, and her battlesuit came back to normal colours.
- I don't need to call him, he is going to be here soon.
- Why do you think he didn't run away?
- He is my friend, afterall.
- Oh, yeah. This is not a first time I heard something like this from a bandi...
She heard footsteps coming towards her, and then saw a man, with his gauntlets, walking towards her with calm expression.
- You! Where is the beastwoman?!
She asked and threw one of her fans at him. He blocked it off easily. She then again went full color.
- Where is she?! Formation three!
Both of her fans started to fly towards him, this time in a different way. Handeron didn't really react, and as both of the fans were flying at him, they suddenly changed tracks and flew somewhere else.
- Huh? You know how it works already?!
Handeron didn't focus on what she said, and was looking at Monadias.
- What was that fight, huh? Can't you use your head?
- First time, don't judge me.
- Still, you should have at least landed a hit.
As she saw she is being ignored, she interrupted their conversation.
- Don't ignore me! Come back!
The fans started to fly towards the girl. Handeron saw them, and without any effort, he dodged, and, as they were in an arms reach, managed to grab one, and was also pulled towards the girl.
- What? No!
Her fans came back, and she was soon overpowered by Handeron. He grabbed her wrists and stretched them opposite sides. She tried kicking him, but it was useless. She didn't give up on her fans, though, and tried throwing them with her fingers only. The force was too small, and the fans scratched Handeron. She was quite surpirsed that he was healing each and every throw she did.
- Come out.
The beastwoman soon jumped from the roof to land near Handeron.
- Could you please grab her, so that I can heal this guy?
- Mhm, Mr. Womangrabber
- Don't call me that, it's dumb.
- Nope.
Handeron passed her to the beastwoman, and she then grabbed her wrists from behind, like a policeman would a prisoner, the difference being that the prisoner is usually handcuffed, and she wasn't. Her fans made their way to her left side, where she had a special handle for them. The girl was stunned, like she saw a ghost. Handeron in the meantime started healing Monadias
- You... can hear him?
- Yep, no problems with that, what do you mean?
- And you... even... talk back?
- What is wrong with talking, weird human girl.
- I thought... no... it can't be... I... when I really forgot and moved on... I..
- What do you mea-
She then made her fans fall out of her handle, kicked them, and commanded them to come back, and as the beastwoman was distarcted by them, she freed herself and kicked her. Some more kicks and cuts, were enough to make the beastwoman fall on the ground unconsious.
- When I finally gave up.... fighting for the sake of the enslaved beastpeople.... I finally believed that it can't be undone.... and now you appear.... a knight in white armor... to save them? After all the bullying I got because I actually wanted them to be free?... After all the suffering my mother came through....
Monadias and Handeron turned over to her, Handeron holding the gauntlet, that Monadias wore, by it's wrist.
- What is she even talking about?
- Don't ask me, not my opponent.
Handeron then took his gauntlet from Monadias, and was waiting for her move. She then jumped towards him and hit him in the stomach, at least she tried, because Handeron blocked it. He also saw one of the fans coming straight for his neck, and repelled it also. It came back to the girl almost instantly. She then started attacking Handeron with her fans head on, he blocked them still.
- You are too late... for me... for my mother. Formation one!
Her brown hair again became colorful, and the fans were heading for Handeron. They were very chaotic, and also, unpredictable, but Handeron seems like he is confident in how it works.
[I need to check this, too...]
He tried blocking one of the fans approaching, and it pushed his hand away. If it weren't for his gauntlet, he would lose it. As Handeron dodged the incoming fans, getting hit here and there, she said:
- Didn't you forget about your friend?
- He can take care of himself.
Soom, Monadias used his wind to move himself out of the place. He landed on the wall nearby, and soon enough the fight was happening near him again.
- Catch it.
Monadias caught one of his gauntlets, while Handeron kept his opponent busy. As he put it on, Handeron caught him, and started running away. As he did that, Monadias was healing, while rolling on the ground.
- What are you doing?! Can't you engage me?
- Nope.
- Why?
- I am not your opponent, and besides, this guy has got to gain some experience.
- So you are playing with me?
- Nope, it's really challanging to keep up with your formations, but I got used to it somehow now, so it's not that bad.
- How did you figure it out so easily?!
- All it took was some observation, nothing much.
As it went on for sometime, Monadias was fully healed, and thus, Handeron went to the sidelines.
- You got it now?
- Maybe, we will see.
- She is fully immersed now, so be ready.
- Okay.
She then attacked him with Formation three, but Monadias quickly flew through the air, and was trying to shoot her. As she was heading for him herself, she needed to dodge, because he was ready for that. Her fans came back, and as she was doing the same thing over and over, he was getting better and better at dodging. He winded up his weapon faster and even landed a hit.
[She is going to lose this if she doesn't do something. He really is doing better now, taking advantage of his speed and target shooting training.]
Yeah, but he could be better.
[Well, he was the one who took punches more than punched, he isn't really used to it right now.]
As the fight was more and more intense, Monadias opponent was definitely not keeping up.
[Mother, I.... it's all his fault.... If he was here when we... no... that doesn't matter... what matters is that now I can prove that I am stronger than the one who saves people you tried saving... no, I am no match.... I can't hold back, even if I know that I shouldn't hurt him. He saved that girl, and can save them all, but for the humiliation I got at school and the bullying we both got, I want to beat him up. Or at least I want to try.]
She then merged the tips of her index and middle fingers, looked through them at Monadias and said.
- Ionsai!
^^^