Welcome to Japan

The next four days went off relatively smoothly. Ulrich trained with Sapphire, even managing to get a few decent hits in on multiple occasions. Dominic also trained alongside them, managing to do a couple push-ups. And alongside her regular stamina training, Lainey also learned a better way to throw a punch, and make Dominic's nose bleed on several occiasions

But, while Japan was on the horizon, Sapphire decided that her and Ulrich have one last sparring match.

"You ready, solar?" she asked.

"Tell you what?" Ulrich replied, shooting two fireballs into the water, causing a pretty big blast that even Lainey could see from the other side of the ship.

"I'll ditch my index fingers, what you think?"

Without another word, Sapphire lunged at him in a single burst, which Ulrich managed to block, putting his arms in the way of his face. Sapphire leapt back, firing a gust of wind at Ulrich, who shot a flame out of his middle finger to stop Sapphire's approach, but she just stepped to the left and delivered a kick to Ulrich's side, and then stomped straight down, setting up a weak current directly underneath him, pushing him upwards into the air. Ulrich tried shooting a full handed flame from his left hand towards her but hit the roof of the boat before he could, tumbling off the edge onto the floor. Sapphire laid a foot on his back, claiming victory.

"Solar, dude, we talked about landings."

"God damn, lucky dude." Dominic sighed, taking a bite of his watermelon, looking at Lainey.

“Not my thing, dude.” Lainey sighed.

But soon enough, the boat ended up on land. The four got off, and their dingy little houseboat was surrounded by ships that seemed like mountains in comparison. The four of them got off, with Sapphire donning a red t-shirt with 'VENOM' printed on it in black letters. Once they got off, Sapphire immediately saw someone at the port, and began talking to her in Japanese.

"Yo, anime boy. You getting any of this?" Lainey asked.

"I'm getting like, 5 percent of it." Dominic replied. "Maybe I'll learn Japanese when I go to college."

"You don't have any ideas yet?" Ulrich asked.

"Eh, I got another year to think about it." Dominic grunted with a stretch "What about you two?"

"Well, I planned on moving to Colorado to study economics in Denver university, but you know, demons." Ulrich sighed, scratching his back.

"Some kinda programming course. But then the band thing ended up working out and I dropped it after six months." Lainey replied.

There was a brief moment of silence, with Dominic trying to find another conversation topic, but Sapphire did that for him when she came back.

"Okay, seems like we'll be able to keep the boat here for as long as we have to."

"Cool, cool." Lainey approved, looking at the woman she was talking to. "So who's your friend?"

"Some girl I met in Kyoto about a year and a half ago." Sapphire responded. "Didn't expect to see her here, but she's doing well."

"She one of your girls?" Lainey asked.

"Nah, she just had some boyfriend issues. She left that nerd in the dust." Sapphire cackled.

"Epic." Lainey smirked.

"So, what plans do we have, anyway?" Ulrich asked. "Like, gem-wise?"

"Actually, yeah. Sapphire, you got any idea on how to look for ancient relics?" Lainey asked.

"Well, outside of our circumstances, not really." Sapphire sighed.

"Guys, it's easy." Dominic yelled, taking the gold gem out of his axe holster. "These are the types of things that'd either be family heirlooms or belong to really rich people. Therefore, we ask a bunch of corporate types if they have anything similar."

"So, which manga store do you think has the gem?" Lainey chuckled.

"Uh, whichever is selling the latest Shounen Leap magazine. I gotta catch up on Three Piece."

"I'll go with him." Ulrich said. "You two can do…whatever it is girls do.”

"Will do!" Sapphire yelled.

And so, the four of them took the train to Tokyo. And once they were there, Dominic pointed at the first restaurant he saw.

Ulrich looked inside, and saw it was some kind of noodle restaurant.

"So, it's around 1PM right now, yeah? How about we meet up here at around 5? That should give us enough time to ask around."

"Sure thing." Lainey answered, taking out her flip phone. "You mind if I take a picture?"

Lainey took a picture, looking at the grainy image of the gold gem.

"Screw it, it'll help." She shrugged, closing her phone.

"Okay, I'm gonna go now!" Dominic yelled, hardly containing his excitement, walking in the opposite direction, with Ulrich following him with a reclused sigh.

After looking around the city for a few minutes, Dominic found an ATM. He went over to it, taking out his wallet, taking out what seemed to be several thousand for an eighteen-year-old.

"Holy shit, dude." Ulrich whispered to him. "How did you get all that?"

"Oh, the money? Mostly from my dad." Dominic replied nonchalantly.

"Damn." Ulrich muttered. His living conditions seemed pretty average, at least from an American standpoint. But with the several grand he had on him, it seemed he could have a way nicer house. "What does your dad do, exactly?"

"Beats me." Dominic mumbled. "All I know is that he has to leave me alone for six months."

"Shit, dude. What about your mom?"

"Shit, when was the last time I saw her?" Dominic asked, looking up from his money. "When I was like, four?"

"I get that, man." Ulrich sighed, knowing what it was like to only have one parent around.

"My dad just sends me money every month for bills and shit, plus a little for myself. I just tell him the rent went up, and I'm basically able to blow my money on whatever. Now let's go, I gotta catch up on Three Piece."

The duo found a manga store after searching for a couple of minutes, and Dominic's eyes bulged at what was there, practically dragging Ulrich in with him.

"Dude, the latest Shounen Leap!" Dominic yelled, flicking through the pages. "Holy shit, dude." He stood there in shock over the events of the magazine.

"Right, I'm buying this. Anything you want?" Dominic whispered, eyes in shock.

"Hm? Oh, I guess I'll look around." Ulrich replied. He had money, but he wasn't one to give up free…whatever this was.

He looked around the store for a few minutes, checking for anything that interested him. It was all in Japanese, so he didn't know much, but it was kind of fun just looking around at whatever was there, except the weird sexual stuff.

Eventually, he found a complete boxset of the Demon Ball X manga, for around 10000 yen.

"Yo dude, how much is this?" Ulrich asked.

"About 65 pounds, I think?" Dominic replied, carrying about three bags of books. "If that's all you want, then come on. I'll pay if you carry one of these bags."

"Sure thing, you want me to pick you up one?" Ulrich asked.

"Nah, I don't like Demon Ball." Dominic answered, handing Ulrich a bag.

The statement that Dominic didn't like Demon Ball was pretty weird. Like, this was a guy who styled his hair after Prince Nebula, who always wore a bright Demon Ball X shirt.

"What do you mean you don't like Demon Ball?" Ulrich asked slowly, just kinda confused. If he remembered correctly, he had a couple figures and posters all over his house.

"You're thinking about the Demon Ball shit I had in my house, right. I like the look of the show, but I dunno, the fact it takes so long to get anywhere, and that everyone who dies can just come back to life. It's just kinda lame, in my opinion."

"I mean, there are those rumours of that directors cut version coming out, that gets rid of those pacing issues. Maybe wait for that?" Ulrich asked, still not really wrapping his head around Dominic not watching Demon Ball.

"Oh yeah, I heard about that." Dominic responded. "Maybe I'll go to your…you can come over to my place and watch it when all this blows over."

"Sounds good." Ulrich nodded.

After a while of shopping, the duo found themselves around a couple stores, looking for the gem. They checked for anything resembling the gem in a couple jewellery stores, and all they got was aggressively advertised to. They tried asking around a couple random people, but they all seemed confused as they were. Eventually, Dominic's uPod said it was 4:30, so they had to head back.

By 4:45, the girls weren't there, so Dominic just reopened his Shounen Leap magazine.

"Dude, you know Three Piece?"

"That really long Viking anime, right?"

"Yeah. Chapter 507 was insane. Platinum Ray knows the history of the world, and admiral Singejaune was introduced."

Ulrich just sat there, unaware of what any of that meant. "Sounds cool, but I'll just stick to Demon Ball."

"Actually, I've been meaning to ask, you base your attacks off Demon Ball moves, right?"

"Uh, is it that obvious?" Ulrich asked.

"I mean, yeah. And I've been meaning to ask, can I borrow your gloves?"

"You want my gloves?" Ulrich asked. "Why?"

"I don't have powers." Dominic shrugged. "But if I had one of your gloves, then I could do some cool stuff with it."

Ulrich thought about it for a minute. He never really thought about letting somebody else use his gloves besides that one time with Lainey. But in all fairness, it didn't seem like a bad idea.

"What time is it?" Ulrich asked. If he could find somewhere private in a busy Tokyo, he thought his could work.

"About 4:55" Dominic replied, his smirk hardly remaining over his jittery excitement.

The two checked the back of the restaurant. The building behind him didn't have any windows for people to see, and all that was there were two garbage cans. Ulrich handed Dominic his left glove, and Dominic thrust his gloved hand out a couple times.

Nothing happened.

"Am I doing something wrong?" Dominic asked, his eyes screaming nothing but pure disappointment.

"Not really?" Ulrich answered, as confused as him. "I have to transfer my body heat to my arms, you try that?"

Dominic tried following the instructions and moved his shoulders to his arms and finally thrust his hands out once again. and it doubled his fire output. Shame that initial output was nothing.

"I mean, maybe it's a link thing?" Ulrich asked himself. "Like, I was the first person to wear the gloves, so maybe it's just me they work for."

"Oh, son of a-" Dominic muttered. "One more time. Show me a move, and I'll try copy it."

"Sure thing." Ulrich sighed. "But if it doesn't work this time, we go back inside."

Ulrich channelled the heat from his right pinkie and let out a small flame from his glove. He didn't put any weight into it, just casually flicked the fire forward. Dominic, on the other hand, put all his energy into his, and still got nothing, except for the attention of a middle-aged Japanese man. He was in some kind of sanitation uniform, so Ulrich assumed he was there to take out the trash.

"We're magicians." Was all Ulrich managed to blurt out.

The garbageman's face lit up, and he made his way to the main street, yelling something in Japanese.

"So, you doing a magic show now?" Dominic asked nervously.

“No." Ulrich replied, trying to process what he had to do. “We’ll just go back inside while he’s talking about us.”

Hesitating, Ulrich stepped out into the main street, and there was a goddamn audience in front of him in a matter of seconds. He let out a few stray flames, and some of the audience he had gathered clapped, and a few threw out coins to him, which Dominic collected.

Ulrich continued for a few more seconds, putting in more flourish to his moves, trying to imitate Demon Ball, but with more technique.

He was doing good, but then heard a voice yell out "What the hell?!"

It was Lainey, and she looked horrified. She approached Ulrich.

"Hey, buddy." She approached calmly, before upping the anger "What the fuck is this?"

"Magic show, for the people." Dominic replied nonchalantly.

"Okay, but maybe showing off your powers is kind of a bad idea." Lainey mumbled through gritted teeth. "I carry my guitar case around with me for a reason."

"So, you want some help on this?" Sapphire asked.

"What?" Lainey replied, completely deadpan.

"Come on, solar. Shoot something."

Ulrich did as she was told, throwing some fire into the air, which Sapphire sent a wind blast towards, making it into an S shape. Ulrich threw out more fire, and Sapphire made more shapes, like a heart, a skull, and the state of Michigan.

After about three minutes of this, Ulrich started freezing up, slouching over on Lainey.

"Yeah, I think we're done."

"You three are idiots." Lainey moaned, deadpan.

The four of them went back to the restaurant. Luckily for them, it was warm inside, so Ulrich wasn't gonna die, and Sapphire just needed some water. Dominic checked to make sure all his manga was where he left it, and it was. Dominic and Lainey began counting the money they collected.

"Okay, so we have 16000 here. You know how much that is?" Lainey asked.

"About a hundred and fifty, I think?" Dominic asked, slightly uncertain. "That should be enough to get anything on the menu, anyway."

"Oh, there won't be any need for that."

Dominic looked over, and a cheerful looking man was standing in front of their table. His neat black hair went nicely with his white button up shirt and fancy trousers. The heat of the restaurant caused his blue rimmed glasses to fog up, so he took them off and began wiping them.

"Mind if I talk about your magic show for a few minutes? I'll pay for your food."

"Sure thing." Dominic shrugged, moving over to the end of his table, pushing Ulrich closer to the wall. The man calmly took his seat.

"Well, my name is Shin Kobayashi, and I work at a local college. So, do you mind telling me how you did those tricks of yours?"

"Oh, my gloves." Ulrich replied hastily. "There's like, a fuel compartment inside, allows me to release a few flames at a time."

"I see." Shin smiled, turning towards Sapphire. "And what about your gloves?"

Sapphire stopped for a few seconds, looking to Lainey, who just buried her head in her arms while mumbling "We're getting arrested again, aren't we?" to herself.

"My…necklace?" Sapphire countered slowly. “It has…a new oxygen supply in it. It’s the latest from Canada.”

"No, no. You four can be honest with me." Shin assured them. "After all, I know mages when I see them."