Preparation (2)

“Father!?” Marion shouted from above us. “What are you doing!?”

“Testing this boy!” he yelled up. “If he’s everything you say he is then there should be no need to worry!”

I, for one, feel an immense need to worry.

This dude looks like a freaking Jojo’s character! There’s no way I stand even a little bit of a chance!

Pun intended.

“We’re gonna fight?” I asked.

“Yeah,” Pink Head answered. “What, you scared?”

A little bit, yeah.

“Just know that I won’t hold back,” I said.

“I was hoping you’d say something like that.”

And then, he appeared in front of me, his form looming like the shadow of death as his raised fist began to come down.

I was not expecting that. I should’ve been using Accelerate from the start, huh?

Luckily, I was able to activate it before he hit me, but there was no way I was going to be able to dodge now. I’d have to meet his attack head on.

Remembering the feeling I had when the Liquid Assassin had me cornered, I summoned that strength into my hand once again and met his fist with a Miracle Punch.

The air pressure created from our fists clashing pushed against my face, I had to squint my eyes so that I could keep my attention on the king. This time I wasn’t pushed back by the force of my attack.

“Nice,” he said. “But didn’t you just say you wouldn’t hold back.”

So he noticed it too…

I definitely wasn’t trying to hold back, but I could tell that this wasn’t even half the strength I had used back then. Why isn’t this as powerful as before?

Does the strength of my Miracle power increase in certain situations, or is this just because I don’t know how to use it? Have I not fully recovered or something?

Maybe it’s because I’m not in a situation where I’d actually die right now.

“If I’m being completely honest, I don’t really know how to use this power,” I said. “It just surfaced when I was fighting that assassin. So I’m not sure how or if I can even control the output yet.”

“Hmm…” Pink Head grunted before saying, “Ready to resume?”

Oh, so we’re still going…

“Ready.”

I activated Accelerate as soon as I finished talking. He shouldn’t be able to just appear in front of me now, I should be able to follow his movements.

I watched as he started running towards me- Wait, he just ran!?

Even with Accelerate’s bullet time effect he’s still moving at incredible speed. Although I’m pretty sure I can move faster, it’s still pretty surprising. I thought he might’ve used magic or something, but he just ran.

As he closed in I ran around to his back.

Let’s see how tough this guy really is.

I let loose a Miracle Punch and watched him fly back. He tumbled for a couple yards but ultimately he still landed on his feet, facing me.

“You’re pretty fast, boy!” Pink Head yelled as he rushed towards me again.

“I could say the same about you!” I said as I dashed towards him.

I used Miracle and punched him in the gut, but he was a lot harder than before. I noticed his complexion had become scaly.

He grabbed my arm and held me in place as he took a deep breath.

Don’t tell me…

He exhaled a bright pink flame that knocked me back, I don’t know how far, but it hurt a lot.

I got to my hands and knees before feeling the king’s foot press down against my back. I had to use Miracle to keep from getting pancaked, but he kept pushing harder and harder.

Damn it! Is he trying to kill me?!

I kept pushing up, trying not to get squashed, but I wasn’t making any progress. In fact he seemed to be pushing me further and further down. This must be what trash feels like in a hydraulic press.

I’m not sure what’s going on anymore, but I refuse to die like some piece of trash!

Suddenly I felt a surge of power before I went flying into the air. I soared past Lizz and Marion and watched as they grew smaller and smaller in my field of vision.

I have no idea how high I am right now. If Marion had been thrown about thirty feet, then I’m at least forty-five feet off the ground right now. I can’t believe I was pushing up so hard that I went flying through the-

Wait, I’m falling now…

Oh Shit! What do I do!? What do I do!?

If it was my Miracle power that got me up here it should be able to help me land, right?

I’m going to Miracle Punch the ground as I crash into it! I saw this in a show once so it has to work!

Wait! He never actually did it in that show! Someone else saved his ass before he had the chance to try it out!

Does that mean it won’t work in real life? Do I even have the time to guess?

Alright, I just need to think of the physics of it all. Will punching the ground cancel out my fall momentum, therefore saving me from becoming an Oliver pizza?!

Um, I think g = -9.81 right? Wait, but this isn’t earth! Gravity could be completely different here! But is it less or more!? I wasn’t really paying attention so I don’t-!

“Lizard’s Eye and Toad’s Frown! Don’t let that boy hit the ground!”

All of a sudden I felt a foreign energy grab me as I started to float in place about seven feet off the ground.

I looked up and saw Lizz was pointing a wand at me.

“Release!” he said as the energy that caught me let go, causing me to fall the rest of the way.

I fell on my face and quickly stood up, but it looked like Pink Head was done testing me. Although I’m not ready to let my guard down just yet.

“Are we done?” I asked.

“Yes,” the king answered.

Thank goodness.

“So, how’d I do?”

“You have a tremendous amount of speed and strength, but you’re not all that good at actually fighting,” he said. “You need to work on being a little less one-note with your attacks and also on controlling your power output before it becomes a live or die situation.”

I personally don’t think I’m that one-note, but I can see his point. This was my second fight since coming to this new world.

“Right,” I said. “Those weapons in the armory, am I allowed to use those?”

“Why?”

“I was hoping to do some training. I also believe there might be a weapon in there that I already know how to use.”

“Very well then, I shall have Lizz assist with your training while I take care of other matters,” he said.

What other matters? Although, as a king in the midst of a war I guess there must be a lot of “other matters”. I don’t envy his position, but his power, that’s a different story.

He looks like a truck so there’s no surprise he can hit like one, but how was he able to move so fast?

If he actually wanted to kill me, there’d be little I could do about it. He’s fast enough so that I can’t really run away, I feel like I’d reach my limit with Accelerate before he ran out of breath. He’s strong enough to counter Miracle and he has those pink flames. Plus, that thing with the scales increased his defense so much that my Miracle Punch didn’t even faze him.

I already thought as much before, but he is definitely someone I don’t want to get on the bad side of. I have to complete this quest without messing up. If the contract doesn’t get me, he will.

…

“Would you hurry up and pick a weapon already?” Lizz said impatiently.

“It’s not like I’m trying to make this take forever,” I replied.

Me and Lizz had been in the armory alone for a while now. Marion had left soon after Pink Head to finish getting prepared herself.

Meanwhile, I have been touching the various weapons in here trying to find the one Canvas said I would know how to use. The only problem is I don’t even know how to tell if I know how to use it.

“What’s even taking you ssso long anyway? You ssaid you know how to use one of thessse, right?”

“Allegedly I should be able to.”

“What’ss that sssuppossed to mean?”

“Look, it’s complicated for me too, alright?”

So far I had touched swords, axes, hammers, clubs, bows, spears, etc. I didn’t touch every single weapon in here because that would take too long, but I already reached the end of the row twice now doing that, so I guess I’ll need to change my approach.

I was now at the katana section again. Right after the longswords and right before the claymores.

I looked over them, each one was ever so slightly different than the other ones, but they’re all training swords so it doesn’t really matter anyway. Although one of them caught my eye this time around. It was the only one that was in its sheath while on the rack.

Strange.

I put my hand on the hilt.

No no, you don’t grab this type of sword by the hilt unless you’re attacking with it.

I grabbed it by the sheath and pulled it off the rack before strapping it to my waist, making sure the sheath was on my right side since I’m left-handed.

“…”

Huh?

Is this what Canvas meant when she said I’d know how to use it just by touching it? And what makes this so different from a regular katana anyway?

“Hey Lizard Wizard, I know this might seem like a dumb question, but what’s the difference between this type of sword and the other ones?” I asked.

“Hmm?” Lizz replied while turning his head in my direction. “You’re right, it does ssseem like a dumb question.

“That is a Ssshissu Blade, meant ssspecifically for the use of the Sshisssu Ssword Art, which involvess-sswift movements and sswinging the sssword out of itss-sssheath and resheathing it during combat. Real sshissu blades ussually have an elemental core insside of the sheath sso that you can build power while in the sheath and use an elemental style, but that’ss a training ssword so it doessn’t have one.”

“Interesting…” I said. But since we’re alone I need to take this opportunity to ask him a very important question.

“Why do you hiss your S’s like that?”

“I wasss just born like thisss,” Lizz replied. “It happenss every time I ssay an Ss.”

“I doubt it.”

“What, you think I’m lying to you?”

“Yessss.”

“How dare you!” Lizz shouted. “What proof!? What grounds!? What gives you the-”

“You literally just said two S’s in a row without hissing!” I refuted. “You’re the one who’s lying!”

“And why do you care?!”

“I don’t really! I just want to know why you do that all the time!”

“It’s because it’s cool!” he replied. “If you ever tell anyone about this I’ll use my magic to rupture your sstomach sach and force your body to produce so much stomach acid that you disssintegrate yourself from the insside out!”

Can he- Can he do that?

“Let’ss, not waste anymore time,” Lizz said. “You’ll be ussing that Sshisu blade, right?”

“Yeah,” I answered.

“Good, now that you’ve picked your weapon we can finally begin. We need to train your flair usssage and ssee just how ssskilled you are with that blade before we can sssend you off in good faith to complete this quesst.

“Let’ss-sstart by tessting your sword abilitiess,” Lizz said as he went back out into the arena, beckoning me to follow him.

As I walked into the arena once more, I wondered just how much training I was going to be doing today.