The Battlemaster
Thane and Riku watched each other, motionlessly. Riku was tense, knowing that Thane would force him to take the first move, while Thane seemed almost... apathetic about the whole thing. He held Behemoth down at his side, the tip of it touching the ground, and stared at Riku.
?Whenever you?re ready,? Thane said, adding a yawn at the end.
Riku burst into motion, rushing towards Thane. Riku started by bringing his sword up and slicing it down, which Thane dodged easily by simply turning on his heel as the blade came down. Riku brought his arm around though, and sliced it sideways to cut at his opponent again. Thane, though, quickly rushed in before the blade was even close, grabbing Riku?s wrist as he did and holding it out wide. Riku, unable to move his arm, brought his leg around, and Thane simply brought his knee up, so that the boy?s leg hit against his knee, sending a chill down him and throwing him off balance. Thane retracted his arm from Riku?s wrist then, and pushed it forward, slamming into Riku?s face and sending him skipping across the cave, and finally slamming into one of the steel carts that held a peculiar type of ore in it.
Riku leaned against the cart with a moan, as Thane looked at him curiously, ?Seriously??
Getting up, Riku rushed back in towards Thane, and started with a quick stab. Soul Eater only met air though, as Thane jumped up and agilely, amazing Riku due to Thane?s large stature, landed on the blade. Thane then jumped up, sending Riku?s blade downwards as he crouched, and then landed on Riku?s head, jumping again, more quickly, the moment he landed.
Riku went crashing down to the ground, face first. Thane turned around and stared at Riku again, who rolled over to Thane?s side and then rolled backwards, so that he was in a crouching position, already panting.
?Ya know, if you?re not going to take this seriously, then you can just go home,? Thane taunted, but he seemed so serious that Riku thought that his intention was to tell RIku the truth, and not just to mock him.
Riku made a guttural growl, and then charged in again, this time going for strike after strike, slice after slice, and stab after stab. Thane moved around the blade cleverly, but still as if lacking any emotion, any spirit. Thane moved to the left and right, stepping backwards and moving forwards to continuously dodge Riku?s continuing attacks, and finally, he stopped dodging and grabbed Riku?s blade. Literally, he reached his hand out, and grabbed the blade as it came, without so much as a drop of blood coming off of his hand?a true iron grip. He pulled his arm back, yanking Soul Eater from Riku?s grasp, and then pushed his leg forward to kick Riku in the stomach, sending him flying back again, this time into the cave?s side. Riku coughed up blood at the impact, and then fell forward, leaning over and spitting out even more blood still.
?Ah, yes,? Thane taunted, ?Just keep going for random direct hits. I?m sure it?ll work out eventually,? he said, and then his attention went to the sword.
Thane looked at Riku?s sword curiously. He flipped the sword so that he held it by the handle rather than the blade, and noted how peculiar it was. It seemed rather small, a one-handed blade for sure, but it was unlike anything Thane, a master of weaponry, had ever laid his eyes on. He then noticed that there was a slice going through the middle; it started from the center of the blade, and then went upwards to make the blade seem like a claw. Thane knew immediately that this wasn?t there when the sword was made, that it had somehow been cut. Suddenly, as he examined it, the blade disappeared from his grasp and reappeared in Riku?s.
Thane was caught off guard. His sword did this too, along with but a few other weapons he saw, if this blade could do that, then...
Thane?s thoughts were cut short, as a spike of ice pushed up from underneath his foot. He jumped upwards, moving with the spike so that it didn?t impale him but he was still on it, and when it finished, he flipped backwards. As he flipped, he noticed another spike of ice coming from where he would land, and placing his hand on it, cupping it around the spike?s tip, he pushed himself into the sky, flipping over as he did. Thane looked towards Riku, who seemed ready to do a jutsu, but suddenly he disappeared.
And he reappeared right behind a stunned Riku, though still at a distance, ?Jutsu, or whatever that was, already? How dull. I didn?t even swing my sword yet.?
Riku spun around, but by then it was much too late. Thane grabbed his arm and kicked him forward, but quickly yanked him back before the boy could get anywhere, then kicked him again. In a smooth motion after the second kick, Thane?s hand shifted to the back of Riku?s head, his hand thick enough to grip his entire skull, and then spun around, slamming Riku?s head into the side of the cave, face-first.
Riku rolled over so that he was on his back facing Thane. There was a noticeable difference about him, a crazed look. His eyes, they seemed as though they had lost their pupils. There was just an insane whiteness, with red veins that seemed to appear, literally, inside of his eyes. Thane brought his fist forward and slammed it right where Riku?s face would have been, had it not been for a quick maneuver that put Riku in a crouching stance, and from there he brought the butt of his sword up to meet with Thane?s stomach, but his arm was thrown off balance as Thane spun away, now at Riku?s side, and brought down Behemoth onto Riku, slamming it in a vertical slice right down onto Riku, quickly wisely rolled forward, getting away from the cave?s wall and away from Thane?s madness.
Riku huffed for a while, and watched as the mammoth-sized sword with a name that perfectly fit its appearance and strength, slammed into the ground where Riku was only moments ago, making a large crater and rising up the ground itself in an explosion. There was something wrong here. If Riku hadn?t dodged, and he had just managed to do so, then there was no way Thane would have stopped all of his momentum and the sword, redirect it maybe, but that would only suffice in hitting Riku in a slightly less brutal spot than his head, but still in a critical spot that could disable him for life, or perhaps even cost him his life fully. Riku suddenly came to a realization; he wasn?t fighting to train here.
He was fighting for his life.
Thane turned and looked at Riku, a deadly stare that nearly froze Riku in place, and suddenly the large man disappeared, and Riku looked up as he heard a loud roar above him. Coming down with ferocity, Thane and Behemoth were coming down towards Riku, who rolled back towards the cave?s side and reached over to grab a spear that was hanging on one of the weapon racks. Turning with the spear in hand, Riku stabbed forward to keep Thane, who had begun rushing towards him, in his tracks. Thane was hardly slowed by this, if at all, though, as he had enough common sense to step to the side and continue his charge, swinging his blade out wide horizontally, and as Riku ducked over to the side, Thane redirected his blade so that it came back swinging the opposite way as before and arching slightly downwards as it did. Riku put his blade out to the side to defend against it, but Thane pressed on, and Riku, having no other option and being sure that Thane would break through his already damaged sword and then rip through Riku like wet paper, jumped upwards, pushing his blade forcefully downwards to spring his jump all the more, and as he jumped he controlled himself as much as possible so that he landed with both feet on the side of the cave, and then backed up as Thane ran up the wall as well, and continued backing up until he was standing right-side-up on the passageway.
Within seconds he found himself in front of Thane again, and this time, instead of launching large, overwhelming strikes, he came with a flurry of quick blows, now holding a smaller sword in his other hand as Riku tried to keep him at bay with the spear he still held and Soul Eater. Thane was quicker, more powerful, and overall far above Riku?s level though. No matter how much he danced around the blade, and as Thane walked forward and Riku backed up leading them both further up the passage, Thane still managed to get in plenty of hits. Eventually cutting Riku?s left arm so badly that he had to drop the spear, and at that point it was stab after stab, slice after slice, and nick after nick. Riku managed to keep a few hits at bay, but not nearly enough. Eventually, the two were backed further out into the opening at the very top of the path, and Riku found that he had nowhere to go. There was nothing but a ledge here, and Riku could see nothing but the sky where it ended, and the ledge was only big enough for Riku to make so many numbers of maneuvers before eventually slipping up and falling off. Riku tried to keep this in mind, now resorting to parrying as many strikes as he could rather than dodging. Feeling that this was coming to an end, Riku found himself backing near the edge until he felt his foot slip for a moment.
One moment too long.
Thane brought both of his swords, Behemoth and the smaller blade, in horizontal, backhanded slices, tearing Riku twice more and forcing him to lose his balance. Forcing him to plummet into nothingness.
Forcing him to plummet into Soul Eater?s care.
Thane stared after him, squinting at first, and then suddenly realization struck him, as if just realizing what he did, and then it left. If he died this easily, he didn?t deserve to be trained by them. Snorting, Thane turned and walked away.
As he turned though, as he began to walk, Riku appeared behind him, a dark essence streaming from the boy. His eyes... they took on a reddish glow, a dark red glow. Soul Eater had seemed to grow in length, seeming at least twice as long than it had been before, and a coat of chakra surrounded both the sword and the boy. This wasn?t normal chakra though. There was something different about it. Something that was more... ominous.
Something that was unmistakably malevolent.
Thane rushed in, knowing that he would need to finish this quickly, but Riku?s arm stretched out, and from his sleeve a blast of pure... of pure dark chakra shot out of it. Like a giant, black blast of wind. Thane was knocked backwards, back into the cave and off of the path. Stabbing his sword into the side, he regained composure. In one smooth motion, he jumped off of the sword and pulled it out at the same time, as Riku walked into the cave after him. Riku sliced his blade across, and from it came a crescent-like shape of dark energy that rushed towards Thane.
Slicing his blade upward, Thane cut the arc in half, and then threw Behemoth towards Riku. Slyly, Riku twisted his body so that the blade passed harmlessly at his side, but within a moment after, a large amount of fire was released from it, making a giant explosion around the blade, though it remained unscathed. Riku, though, remained unharmed as well, and somewhere during the half-second between when the blade started rumbling before exploding and when it actually released the fire, Riku had dashed away and was now in front of Thane. There, Riku let loose two attacks, first a kick to Thane?s side to put him off balance, and then he flipped over in mid-air, making for an axe kick that sent Thane plummeting down to the cave?s bottom.
Thane just barely caught himself in enough time to perform a recovery in mid-air and then land on his feet, using one arm for support as Behemoth returned in a column of fire back to his other hand, and panting audibly while staring at Riku, who had used the axe kick to jump off of Thane?s head and flip back the other way to land on the path, now looking down and returning Thane?s stare.
Where?d this come from? The sudden burst of power, the dark aura, the... blast of darkness? Thane?s eyes, even though it was far away, locked onto Riku?s sword. It was the only explanation. But...
Suddenly, Riku appeared in front of Thane in the air and slammed Soul Eater down overhead, and, while putting his blade up horizontally to block it, Thane noted that his strike was at least twice as powerful as his last strike, or the blast of dark wind, had been. Thane came to a conclusion at that moment: If he didn?t finish this soon, and if he let this power grow any more, he might just die.
Sliding from under Soul Eater, Thane let kicked it up a notch. As soon as he slid, he brought his leg around to kick Riku in the side, though he was more resistant to the attack this time than before, having only jerked to the side instead of going flying across the arena, and as soon as the kick was done, he brought his leg down and brought Behemoth to Riku?s side as well, though slightly further upwards. With amazing speed, Thane caught up with Riku who was sent flying across the arena and grabbed his head, and slamming it on the ground, rendering Riku unconscious.
Thane watched as the dark chakra dissipated and as Riku, surprisingly still breathing, lay there on the ground. As he watched, intrigue growing and excitement for the future intensifying, Jian came up from behind him.
?Really now, must you do this every time you?re given an opponent?? the older man asked.
Thane breathed in and out, huffing and puffing in heaps, and finally answered, ?Every time? Probably not. This time? I?m afraid so.?
