She failed miserably, as Adama’s palm strike took her in the belly. The attack had been perfectly calibrated, launched toward where she was going, not where she was, and it sent her flying back into a nearby tree. With a loud CRRRAACK, Aiz smashed straight through the trunk and continued flying back into the woods. The tree came falling on the obstacle course, before Adama leapt up and kicked it head-on, sending it flying away. He landed back on the wooden poles, standing up straight and holding his sword in the ready position, his body steady as a rock. Adama grinned cheekily, and while he couldn’t see Aiz’s face, he suspected she was flustered.
Both warriors were blindfolded, and they’d been trading blows while running over the wooden pilons for the last 30 minutes. Adama had held the advantage against his higher-level opposition the entire time. The blindfold and the obstacle course diminished the physical difference between the two of them considerably. Aiz couldn’t use the full extent of her speed under these circumstances, and she needed to be especially careful about where she put her feet and how she shifted her weight. Adama’s superiority in skill asserted itself clearly under the conditions, and the swordsman couldn’t help but think back to their first meeting, when Aiz had nearly killed him by accident. He'd come a long way. The swordsman called out toward his opponent, “You’re still thinking too hard. Calm yourself and step to the music.”
Aiz shot back out from where she’d been sent flying, landing on the pilons and striking out at Adama again. It was well executed enough that the Sage was forced to block, her diagonal stroke sliding down his angled ‘blade’ with the slither of wood on wood. Even after diffusing the force of the strike, however, he felt a powerful tremor up the length of his arms. The webbing between his fingers split completely, sending blood dripping down the sword’s handle, though Adama didn’t miss a beat as he stepped back. He slid out of the way from Aiz’s next attack, careful to dodge rather than block this time.
They were using wooden practice swords rather than their standard weapons, fearing quite reasonably that they’d accidentally kill each other otherwise. They still did some decent damage to one another as they went back and forth, especially Adama. He didn’t go for kill shots; he just opted to strike Aiz in the most painful way possible whenever he could. After another thwak, he barked out, “Stay focused. Tune everything else out.”
It was annoying advice, though it was like that by design. Adama knew that Aiz knew she needed to stay focused in a battle, no matter what. She was pretty good at it, actually, only faltering a little even after taking an extremely painful hit. Most watchers wouldn’t have noticed the slight flutter of her mental state, but Adama could feel it in his mind’s eye. On top of his hits, his criticism was intended to needle her. She needed to hold her focus even through verbal provocation, and Adama was proud to watch as Aiz stepped forward with a perfectly placed stab, her posture totally unaffected. In fact, the stab was so perfectly placed that it grazed Adama’s ribs, shaking his body and forcing him on the back foot for once. The swordsman decided to take his own advice, locking in and losing himself in the dance of blades. Time flowed like a river as he felt all of Aiz’s moves before they were unleashed, Adama reading the flow of combat like an open book. The Sage’s own attacks took on a profundity and significance that only a highly skillful observer would pick up on.
“Looks like you two don’t even need me. “, Takemikazuchi joked from the sidelines, watching as the two of them went at it. They were both too deep in the bubble to react, a status quo that was broken when Aiz stepped to her right a little awkwardly. Her foot slipped a little at the edge of the pylon, and Adama pounced. Quick as a viper, his foot flickered outward and struck her in her off-balance shin. Aiz’s attempted attack waved through empty air impotently, allowing Adma to hammer her with a horizontal swing to her side. The swordswoman shot backward like a rocket, crashing through the brush yet again. This time, Adama took a breath and fell into a rest position, holding up a hand and shouting, “All right, switch out. Take, you’re up.”
Aiz was surprisingly tired, so she sat out and watched as the two men from the sidelines. Even though his movements had been much more efficient, and he’d received less of a beating, Adama was pretty exhausted himself. Take blindfolded himself and hopped across the pylons, but he noticed Adama’s fatigue and hesitated a while rather than attacking. Unwilling to give himself a more extended break, Adama gestured impatiently, “Come on, we don’t have all day.”
…
The sun was well on its way toward the horizon before the trio decided to call it a day. Takemikazuchi had reached the point where his purely human body was no longer able to continue, but he stayed on the sidelines and continued to give the others a few pertinent pointers. Nevertheless, he’d proven extremely dangerous under these conditions before becoming too fatigued. He’d pushed Adama heavily, forcing the swordsman to adapt and meditate more deeply on his sword arts and techniques. Aiz’s footwork and battle sense had grown noticeably better over the day, and she ate up the instruction of the others voraciously. She was particularly disappointed when Adama finally called things.
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“Don’t pout. We can do this again tomorrow.”, Adama commented, reflecting that a training day like this was more productive than his battles in the Dungeon, in some ways. He probably wasn’t getting significant stat boosts, since his Predator skill wouldn’t be activated. But he was rapidly improving in his ability to tap into whatever Take did that allowed the war god to punch above his weight. In some ways, that was much more valuable.
They broke for the moment, and Adama met up with Theresa in the living room of their Familia home. She gave him her updated stat sheet, which the swordsman had asked her to prepare beforehand. He needed to get an idea of what she was capable of before training her,
Theresa Val Alf
Level 1,
Strength: F-324
Defense: G-212
Dexterity: D-565
Agility: D-531
Magic: I-0
Spells:
[Empty]
Skills:
Flurry of Arrows
- Active Skill
- Temporarily boosts Dexterity tremendously if holding a bow.
- Allows the user to fire off a plethora of arrows in a short period of time.
Aero Sense
- The user intuitively understands the wind and things that fly through the air.
- Improves accuracy of the user’s own projectiles, as well as the user’s understanding of where other projectiles will land.
- User can read the air’s currents to sense incoming danger, discern the weather, among other things.
Adama gave a low whistle when he read those skills, impressed tremendously by the whole stat sheet. Theresa had only been an adventurer for a few months, and already she was pushing the middle ranks of Level 1 adventurers. It was much slower than Adama, but he’d had a growth skill, along with a few pivotal experiences. If Theresa kept this up, she could probably start to think about hitting Level 2 within a year. The lack of magic was unfortunate, yet many adventurers got by just fine with empty spell slots. Flurry of Arrows gave her a good offensive option, and Adama was particularly impressed with her Aero Sense. It was an endlessly versatile ability that could be very useful in the right hands.
The swordsman had heard that Theresa had obtained two skills when she’d become an adventurer, but he’d only gotten the abridged version of what she could do. Truth be told, these past few months had been something of a test for the young elf. Adama had suspected she’d only joined his Familia on impulse, which was a part of why he'd kept her at arm’s length. It would have been a huge waste if he’d swooped in and started training her immediately, only to have her quit on him after a month. His question had been simple: Could Theresa demonstrate a decent amount of maturity and patience?
Well, she had. She’d passed his test with flying colors, making Adama’s strategic neglect seem petty in hindsight. She’d earned his more deliberate attention. Now, it was time to do some real training.
“Let’s go.”
…
After Adama and Theresa entered Babel, the sun continued to fall until it hit the edge of the horizon. The city soon came alive with its regular nightlife, and it was joined by an unusual visitor. Mikoto walked alone down one of the seedier city boulevards, the woman athletically gliding around the other pedestrians and scrutinizing the passersby. Not finding what she wanted, she turned down a side street—and walked right into the red-light district.
Scantily clad women called out from doorways, propositioning pedestrians with lusty passion. Red lights strung across the rooftops cast the scene in a salacious crimson glow, a glow caught by the panoply of sickly-sweet smells wafting out from the buildings’ windows. The burning incense masked the smell of sweat and other fluids, the curling smoke beckoning more customers with its languid fingers. More women lounged in those windows, their faces often painted geisha style as they gazed down on their potential customers with seductive eyes.
Mikoto kept her eyes away from the prostitutes and covered her mouth with a cloth. She suspected that there was a light aphrodisiac in some of that smoke, which she should be immune to thanks to her Abnormal Resistance, but better safe than sorry. She held her focus on the Johns, the customers who’d come here to use the prostitutes. Or be used by them, as the case may be.
She was here at the behest of Hestia and Takemikazuchi alike. The duo was worried about their old drinking buddy, Hermes, whom they suspected of being in some trouble within this district. Mikoto hadn’t obtained the whole story, but she’d inferred a few things. Hermes had gotten himself tangled up with some woman in the district, unbeknownst to his Familia, and now he was about to get scammed somehow. The other two divinities had asked the members of Take Familia to come here and check up on him. Maybe even bail him out if he was being outright robbed. Mikoto felt that the request was a little silly, since Hermes was here of his own volition, but she was willing to help.
As she was walking by, however, she caught a glimpse of something strange in the corner of her eyes. A pair of fox ears marked one of the girls in the windows as an unusual fox-type cienthrope, which combined with a curtain of long blonde hair to create a striking sight—a sight that, to Mikoto, was surprisingly familiar.
“Harumhime-dono?”