A gleam of light pushed through into Koichi’s eyes. He moaned heavily as an ache passed through his head. The young warrior looked forward and realized he was no longer inside the arena fighting David. He was instead lying on a bed inside a recovery room inside the arena management building. The pain in his head spread into his whole body as Koichi tried to move his limbs to regain some of his senses. He at least knew that his nerves were working all around his body.
Koichi sighed and let go, letting himself fall into a rested position again on top of the bed. As the pain subsided he turned his head to the side and looked down at his arm, which he found wrapped tightly in bandages. A bracelet had been placed around Koichi’s lower arm, which carried wires off towards a large machine, and more wires connected the bracelet to a device placed over his bare chest. As the ringing in his ears faded away he could hear a steady beeping from the technology around him.
He felt light footsteps approaching him in the form of vibrations through the metal frame of his bed. Koichi looked down passed his feet and saw a nurse enter the room. The lady spoke to him, but his ears were still too weak to pick up exactly what she was saying.
“What… Did I win?” Koichi asked.
“No, you didn’t!” A familiar voice shot through his ear, “In fact you had a really horrible defeat!”
The nurse removed the technology from Koichi’s body and asked, “Does it still hurt?”
Koichi shook his head and said, “No, I’m fine. I’ve felt worse…” He paused for a moment and said, “…I think.” He looked at the nurse and said, “I can’t remember what happened last night. At least not after I entered the arena for my first time.”
A shadow approached Koichi from the side, and from the shadow appeared David.
“No surprise, brah. Ya tried yer best out there, and ya took some pretty big hits to tha head.” David told him, “Sorry ‘bout that, but its mah job.”
Koichi rubbed his head, which was also wrapped with bandages, and said, “Oh. So how long was I out?”
Celia flashed her hand in front of Koichi and said, “Didn’t you hear? Two days!”
“That’s better than most. People are usually out fer three.” David told him with a grin.
“You would have been fine if they had let me heal you!” Celia complained. She stomped her foot into the ground and said, “But the stupid workers wouldn’t let me near you after you collapsed!”
“That’s their job, too.” David quickly noted.
Koichi sat upright on the bed and said, “So I still have time to work for the next two fights.” He looked at David and told him, “I want to start right away.”
Celia kneeled down beside Koichi and slowly removed the bandages from his body. As each bandage came off she applied her healing magic onto Koichi piece by piece.
“Well brah, I usually give all mah guests the tour anyway.” David told Koichi. He pointed towards the exit with his thumb and said, “I’ll be waiting for ya outside when ya ready.”
Koichi gave David a nod and watched him slide on a pair of sunglasses and leave the room, and as Celia finished her healing magic Koichi stood up and thanked her.
“Thanks a lot for the help, princess.” Koichi thanked her.
Celia stood up with Koichi and said, “I hope you know what you’re doing. Remember that you can resign from the fighting any time before the third match.”
Koichi scratched his head and said, “I know, but I still need to try and beat this guy.”
“You obviously don’t remember anything that happened in the first fight.” Celia said with an annoyed look.
Koichi took a long breath and closed his eyes, and as he exhaled he said, “Well, it comes and goes.”
Koichi stood in the middle of the arena, trembling as he faced David. He still hadn’t figured out how David made it behind him so fast without detecting him. Koichi decided to make a quick move to psyche David out before making his first attack, and he began a charge towards his opponent to execute his plan. He inched nearer to David, but David only watched him the same way he had before without a change in expression.
As Koichi came within attack range he jumped to the side from in front of David and then came into a pounce to attack. The young warrior launched a fist into David, but he was surprised when he found his fist run right through David’s body as if it was only a projection. Koichi stumbled for a moment as he ran through David’s image, and he turned around to watch David fade away. Koichi tightened his grip to the ground and reformed his fighting position, and he began to look around the fighting grounds for his opponent. David was no where to be seen, and this fact was causing Koichi’s heart to race.
“That trick never gets old!” David’s voice sounded off, followed by a laugh.
“What? Where are you?” Koichi called out, “Let me fight you!”
“You want to know where I am? Listen to the crowd, brah!” David told him.
Koichi looked out around him and listened to the crowd, but he could not make out anything that the crowd was chanting. His heart began to settle and calm down, and Koichi relaxed and began to go into a meditative state. One by one he tuned out each voice in the crowd, but he could still not make anything out even in total silent concentration. Then when he began to listen closer and deeper into the total silence he started to hear a high pitched howl in the air. He followed the sound in the darkness of his meditation and drew his sword out perpendicular to himself. The sword began to move in a motion as if there were strong currents of wind in the air, but it was actually moving with the traces of sound that Koichi’s ears were picking up. He kept his focus intact and readied the blade for an attack, and then Koichi leaped forward and thrust his sword into the air.
A splash of blood shot into the air and landed over Koichi’s face, and David appeared with a sword slash wound through part of his chest, arm, and leg. Koichi opened his eyes and turned to face David with his sword in hand. This time David looked at Koichi with a surprised look that shortly turned into impressed.
“Good job, brah!” David applauded Koichi, “No one has done that before! Certainly not on the first day! You’re very worthy of your level rating.”
Koichi exited the recovery room and met David outside.
He looked down at David’s arm and leg and asked, “How’s your arm and leg doing?”
“Just fine, brah. We Guardians heal like ya wouldn’t believe!” David told him.
“Well sorry about that.” Koichi apologized.
David waved his hands and said, “Completely understandable, brah. It was in the arena afta all.” He directed Koichi and Celia down the hall and towards an elevator and said, “Now I get ta show ya where ya get ta live for the next month.”
Koichi stopped David and said, “Wait. I never read anything about a time frame limit.”
David paused for a moment, then shrugged and said, “Well, somewhere thereabouts people usually leave or die, y’know.”
“If that’s the case then we’ll have to train as hard as we can before too long.” Koichi said, looking at Celia.
The three entered the elevator and began climbing floors of the building slowly.
“Training?” David asked, “No one’s evah mentioned working out ‘round here between fights, brah.” The elevator came to a stop and opened up, revealing a large high quality living area, and David explained, “That’s why we didn’t really include any work out equipment up here.”
Celia and Koichi were almost blinded by the bright whiteness for a slight moment as the elevator doors opened up to the new area. The room featured several couches and resting chairs which surrounded a large television where several people sat and watched various programs. A snack bar stood not too far from there, and often people sitting around would visit the bar to suit their hungers or boredom. On the opposite end of the room were three pool tables and a long rack of pool sticks. To the right of the pool tables were more smaller chairs and televisions which were connected to various video gaming systems for those who were interested. In the far back of the room was a cage with an automated baseball thrower and baseball bats inside. To the side of the cage were four punching bags that hung from the ceiling by strong chains and beyond those were platforms covered with different types of gymnastic and running equipment. Between the physical gear there was the exit to the actual living quarters where people staying would go to sleep and otherwise have their private or alone moments.
There were only twelve people of different shapes, size, and race visible in this room. Six were watching television and munching on snacks, three were playing pool together, and the other three were sitting down at the game stations. Most of them perked up their ears and turned their heads in slight interest as they heard David and his guests enter the large entertainment center.
“You weren’t kidding when you said no one asked about training equipment.” Koichi said as he looked around.
“Yeah, brah. These lazy bums would rather sit around an play, thinking they have it made next round.” David told Koichi. He directed them to the game stations, leaned on someone’s chair, and said, “But who could blame ‘em? Over twelve hundred different video games, nine different console systems, an one controller to fit the whole bill!”
The fighter sitting on the chair turned around and said, “Hey, screw you, champ! I know I lost the last two times and all, but I’m definitely plotting out a strategy to take out your super speedy moves next time.”
David jabbed the man in the arm and said, “Oh yeah, brah? Brain ovah brawn, eh?”
“Brains nothing. They’re rotting along with your physical power if all you do is sit around all day at this stuff.” Celia said.
Koichi began to walk away and said, “This is going to be an interesting month.” He approached the punching bags and called out, “Princess, come help me out.”
Celia looked across the room towards Koichi and came to his aid. She stood behind a punching bag and held it in place, and Koichi began to punch the bag repeatedly. The young warrior put much of his strength into punching at the bag, but after several minutes he ceased this, let out a sigh, and turned away.
“What’s wrong Koichi?” Celia asked as she came from behind the bag and sat next to him.
Koichi shook his head and said, “I don’t know. There’s not much to do here in a month, and punching a bag and swinging around isn’t going to improve my abilities enough. I just know that much.”
Celia shrugged and asked, “Well what do you think you can do to really push yourself?”
“There’s lots of stuff if ya just use ya imagination, brah.” David told Koichi as he approached the two once more.
Koichi closed his eyes and went into deep thought. He then stood up and went into the middle of the room and raised his hands up high.
“Alright, I challenge each and every one of you to a fight! Me against all of you!” Koichi called out to everyone in the room.
David let out a startled look at Koichi as he heard his challenge, and Celia showed her interest in the form of an annoyed facial expression. Those who chose to be aware yelled back at Koichi with careless tones while the rest shook their heads as if Koichi was crazy and continued to do whatever it was that they were doing before. David eventually let loose and leaned against the baseball cage with an entertained grin across his mouth as he watched Koichi.
“What’s wrong, boys and girls? Scared to fight the new guy?” Koichi yelled at them.
The people at the pool table began to yell at Koichi to keep it down, and the people at the television turned the volume up.
Koichi lowered his arms and said, “Worthless bags of bones couldn’t take out a horse, I bet.”
A man sitting at the television turned around and yelled, “Hey, shut up gas bag! I tipped cows for training back at home!”
“Oh? You don’t look like much.” Koichi said as he looked at the man. He approached people at the television and put his hand on the edge of their seat, then asked, “Can you back those words?”
He leaned down and took a firm grip from under the couch that the men were sitting on. With a deep breath Koichi slowly lifted the couch up along with the people sitting and shaking on top. The men trembled as they were lifted up by Koichi alone, but they would not allow themselves to believe what they did not see. Koichi looked around and became satisfied knowing the whole room then had their attention turned to him.
“Be careful with that stuff, brah!” David called out.
The men jumped down from the couch, and the others watching television stood up and joined them. Koichi turned around and threw the couch onto the pool tables, wrecking the game table that three other men were already playing on.
“Hey jerk, what’s your deal?” another man yelled at Koichi.
Koichi extended his arm and pointed around to everyone and said, “I want to train for my future fights by taking on each and every one of you.”
They all looked at each other and talked among each other.
“All of us, eh, brah? Ah, alright! Now its on!” David exclaimed with pleasure.
David reformed his fighting position and laughed, “Oh yeah, brah! This is gonna be real fun! Now its on!”
“Good!” Koichi exclaimed.
The two charged for each other and first clashed fists directly. Koichi could feel David’s extraordinary power advantage as his fist throbbed with pain, but he would not let this stop him from fighting. He twisted his form around David’s fist and threw his other arm back towards David’s head. David quickly leaned to the side to avoid Koichi and then came back with another swing, but Koichi blocked and pushed it away with his left arm. They locked glares for a moment before David dropped down and back onto his hands and kicked forward into Koichi’s body, sending him back across the arena. The young warrior slowly regained his balance as he fell back and rebounded off his hands onto his feet along the arena barrier, sending a ripple across the energy field.
As Koichi bounced from the barrier onto the ground David made a full charge again. Koichi quickly turned around into a sweep kick, but David jumped up over Koichi to his back side. As soon as Koichi could, he rolled out of the way and jumped to his feet and engaged in a series of punches and blocks with his opponent. He raised his leg up and jabbed David with his knee, temporarily penetrating his defenses, and Koichi began to rapidly jab David’s body.
The crowd went wild unlike ever before, and V-Man excitedly called out, “Yes, friends, you’re seeing it with your own eyes! It looks like Koichi’s holding his own against our champion!”
David shook his head and grinned at Koichi as he took in the punches, and suddenly Koichi’s punches began to go through David as they did the first time Koichi ever tried attacking him. David shortly appeared again behind Koichi and thrust a fist into the young warrior’s back, pushing him against the arena barrier. As Koichi lost control of himself he bounced off the side of the arena and was caught by the arm by David, who lifted him up with one arm and sent him flying across to the other side of the arena with one solid punch. The youth hit the side and began to slowly slide down off the barrier. When Koichi landed he staggered and shook his head for a moment, but before he could make another action he felt David grab his head and take grip on his hair.
“Come on, brah. If you don’t try harder you’ll lose!” David told him.
Koichi barred his teeth and snarled, “You want harder?”
Koichi gathered his strength and jumped up and flipped behind his opponent with his hair still in grip.
“Repeated Strike!” Koichi called out as he quickly drew his fists back before David could react.
In a quick burst of speed, Koichi began jabbing at David’s back. He even penetrated David’s flesh with the claw on his glove, leaving a series of blood pouring stab wounds all over the champion’s back. David’s eyes opened wide as he felt the points of the claws thrust into his back, and he soon let go of his grasp on Koichi’s head. After almost a half minute Koichi ceased his onslaught of punches and leaned back with his shoulder up.
“Now, Buster Break!” Koichi called out as he charged forward and tackled David.
The attack blasted David forward and down to the ground, and a sonic boom sounded off throughout the arena from the force exerted.
“Wow! What a sight, ladies and gentlemen!” V-Man exclaimed, “One… Two special attacks by the newcomer, Koichi! Could he be the one to best our champion? David looks like he’s been hit down hard!” Koichi wiped his face of sweat and backed away from David as he listened to the announcer, “No one’s lasted this long in the arena with the champion before in their first round!”
Koichi let out deep gasps of breath and began to wipe away spots of wet blood from his clothes. He then looked out at the crowd and searched for Celia, and then he looked down at the ground and saw a shadow in front of him. Koichi swallowed hard and looked up to see what awaited him next.
“Nice going, brah.” David said as he patted Koichi on the back, “Ya managed ta take out practically all of the fighters who came up ta challenge me. How was it?”
Koichi shook his head and regained his train of thoughts. While he was fighting the twelve men and making a wreck out of the whole entertainment center he became lost in his memory. Koichi stood in the middle of a group of moaning, crying fighters. The televisions all were out of place and shattered. The couches were bent and broken over other objects. Kitchen utensils were thrown all over the room. Celia was working as fast as she could to make sure everyone made quick recoveries using her healing magic.
“I’m sorry; I was lost thinking about my arena fight.” Koichi told David.
David shook his head and said, “Don’t worry. This place needed a make over anyway. I gots da greens ta fix it up, and maybe I’ll put in some decent stuff for training next time.”
“Guys, I don’t think I can heal all of these guys with my magic alone.” Celia called out. When Koichi came to her side, Celia said, “My power is running out pretty quick here, and there’s still lots of people who are hurt.”
David approached Celia and spread his arms out as he suggested, “Why not use charge?”
Celia shook her head and said, “No good. I don’t know how to do that yet.”
“Aight, Nucheka.” David said with a shrug of his shoulders, “C’mere babe and I’ll teach ya.”
Celia looked annoyed by the commentary and said, “I’d rather do it over here.”
A man from across the room cried, “My hip! I need a doctor!”
She looked even more annoyed and cracked as she yelled, “Fine, I’m coming.”
As soon as Celia arrived before David, he spaced his feet off from each other and brought his hands out to his sides and said, “This is how ya charge. I want ya ta close yer eyes and focus on yer inner center and feel it with your soul. As soon as ya got the feel I want ya ta grab it and pull it an stretch it. You’ll get a real big tingly feeling all over ya, which’ll tell ya if yer doin it right er not. Keep at it an then submerge yerself in your inner center and feel that energy come in.”
“That’s real weird.” Celia said. Her hands glowed slightly, and the glow extended up her arms and then all over her body as she followed what David explained to her, “This… feels great!”
As soon as the aura faded away, David asked, “Ya don’t seem ta know much about yer real powahs yet, do ya?”
Koichi shook his head and said, “She only knows healing for the most part, and then there’s some shielding spells she’s used before, too. If she has any attack powers or any other qualities then she hasn’t learned how to use them yet.”
“Is that so?” David asked as he smiled at Celia, “Well Nucheka, hows you say we spend some quality time together and I’ll help ya learn yer powers? You’ll be able ta give yer friend a run fer his money when he trains with ya.”
The girl immediately said, “Okay, but I have one condition.” She stepped closer towards David and poked him in the face and said, “Don’t call me Nucheka.”
David smiled and said, “Alright, brah, whatevah you say.” He approached Koichi and patted him on the shoulder and said, “I’m gonna have ta take yer friend ta anothah room for this training, if ya don’t mind, brah. Have fun here with the others.”
Koichi walked passed David and Celia and went towards the living quarters and said, “That’s fine if Celia is fine with it. I trust that you won’t do anything stupid to her, and I’ll be able to contact someone to find you for me if I need either of you.”
David nodded and sure, “Sure brah.”
“In that case, I’m going to a free room and get some rest.” Koichi told him.
As soon as Koichi disappeared, Celia went back to healing the remainder of the fighters. David looked around at all of them and sighed.
“Sometimes I wonder if everyone registers just ta play around in the entertainment room and get free stuff.” David sighed as he looked at the injured people. He walked through the room towards the elevator and said, “Well at least now I have one worthy opponent that lasts more than two minutes.”`
Koichi stretched his arms as he walked through the living quarter hall and began looking for a vacant room. The rooms near the entrance were all taken or otherwise occupied. The young warrior walked to the near back of the hall and selected a secluded room so that he might not be disturbed by the other fighters who had more wild and disorderly intents.
Before he could put his hand on the doorknob and enter the room he had selected he heard, “Wait a sec!”
Koichi turned towards the entrance to face the voice and noticed several fighters from the entertainment room approaching him. They sounded more interested in him than they did before Koichi beat them all.
“You don’t seem like a normal person by your strength and technique.” The man told Koichi, “Are you one of them, too?”
Koichi tilted his head slightly and asked, “One of them?” He shook his head and said, “Don’t get me confused with the Guardians.”
“Then how did you become so strong?” Another man asked.
“I used to be captain of the guards at a castle in the place you probably know as Old World.” Koichi explained. He shook his head as the men gasped in amazement at Koichi and said, “But that’s not how I became so strong. I had a rough childhood is all.”
“I don’t know what this Old World you’re talking about is, but a kid like you was appointed a guard captain?” Another voice said.
The front man of the crowd stepped up once more and said, “We came to you because we’ve never felt so inspired after being beaten. We were all hoping you would help us train for our future fights as well!”
“My hip has never felt so good either!” the hip man added.
Koichi leaned against the door to his room and folded his arms together and said, “So you’re asking me to take you all in as sort of apprentices and train you as I train myself?” he looked up at the men and said, “Training with living, thinking beings is always better than training with inanimate objects. I’ll start fighting with all of you when my friend returns, but for now you all had better go back and start warming up yourselves.”
The men roared in agreement, and another man said, “We’ll get to work cleaning up the mess out there as soon as we can!”
“Good. We’ll have David buy a fighting ring to place in the room as well as weight sets and other training gear.” Koichi said with a nod, “If you all give yourselves two weeks with me I assure you that your physical strengths will increase more than ten times what they are now. Planning on what you’ll be doing in a fight will be all up to you to figure out.” He stood up from the door and turned to it and thought, “Hopefully working with people like them will help me become strong enough to take on David’s super speed.” Koichi opened the door and entered into the dark room and for an instant saw a faint image of David waiting inside, and he thought, “I can already feel my strength rising, and to be compared to a Guardian only makes me feel stronger. You’ll see my true potential soon enough.”
“I applaud yer efforts, brah, but both of us know that yer not a true match for me.” David told Koichi.
Koichi looked up into the air and felt his heart skip a beat as David hovered in the air before him.
“No way! I’ve hit Ro-Ten that hard and even he flinched with his stone skin, but…” Koichi exclaimed, “Something’s definitely wrong. What type of Guardian are you?”
David folded his arms and smiled at Koichi, then said, “That’s for me and my fans to know. I save my true powers for only the worthy.” He glided down to the ground, and as he landed he brought his hands forward with a glowing aura surrounding them, “It’s been fun keeping this up for so long, brah, but to be honest I could have taken you out a long time ago. I’ve been taking in everything you’ve sent for one big finale.”
“The champion seems to have taken in a lot of damage from the challenger, but it seems like he isn’t putting it to waste.” V-Man called out, “It seems like our David is turning it all into his renowned attack once again!”
“Oh yeah, the show must go on!” David exclaimed as he brought his right hand back into a fist. He then charged forward, saying, “Split Punch!”
Celia jumped up from her seat and yelled, “Move Koichi! Get out of the way!”
The words went through Koichi’s head, but they did not move him at all. He repositioned his stance for defensive maneuvers and watched David charge at him, ready to block and deflect the oncoming attack. As David made his rapid approach things seemed to slow down around Koichi, and the air seemed to thin around him. Koichi could feel David’s aura coming up and entangle him, and it then occurred to him that no matter how he took on the attack he would not be able to safely guard himself. The young warrior began to fall back away from David and moved to the left to try dodging him, but it was far too late for Koichi. David’s fist collided with Koichi’s right arm as he moved out of the way with a force that caused the bones along Koichi’s arm to shatter and the muscles to rip.
Koichi’s sense of focus became disrupted as he balled away with his left arm over his right. All of his concentration became red, disabling his ability to feel where David was coming at high speeds. Koichi felt his knees weaken and eyes begin to blur, but he would not allow his body to give in this late into the fight. As he struggled to keep himself up, David made another passing and thrust his fist into Koichi’s back, causing him to jolt up and forward several steps. A flash of steel and sparks flew through the air as Koichi brought his sword out to fend off David with what little he had left; however to his surprise David had blocked the weapon with his bare arm. Blood shed from David’s arm, but the champion’s skin was so thick that the sword could not make a clean cut beyond a simple scrape.
Down Koichi went to the ground as David pushed him away, and the young warrior lost grip on his sword. It was hard for Koichi to feel his head bang against the solid ground with the rest of his body in such agony. All he could do was drop his head to the side and let out several bloody coughs. Koichi looked through the very corner of his eyes to see David over him, checking to see if his opponent had any fight left in him, and then every sight and sound in Koichi’s world went black.
Koichi shook his head as he came back from his deep thoughts. He understood that to defeat David he would need to acquire a method to conquer his speed. He also realized that he would need to beat the Guardian with as few attacks as he could before David could initialize any of his Split Punch attacks.
David walked Celia outside the large building and into an empty, open park.
“Where is everyone on a beautiful day like this?” Celia asked David.
David looked around and said, “Probably at work or school. This will be a suitable location ta help ya with yer powers as the Guardian of Nature.” He closed his eyes and briefly sighed, then said, “Celia, this may sound strange to you, but you should probably know this. If you ever cross paths with Zareon again it’d be best if you got away from him. He’s an evil Guardian, and it won’t be good if Euzhacho finds you two together again.”
“You told me about it already, but you sound different about it this time.” Celia said.
“You don’t remember any of it, but it’s probably best you didn’t know of the history of our people when it came to the clashing of Zareon and Euzhacho.” David told her.
Celia shook her head and said, “Well I assure you that there is no Nucheka or Zareon anymore. Just Celia and Joel.” She sighed warmly and said, “Besides, Joel is special to me.”
Knowing what he did David shrugged and said, “Well, brah, let forget what I just said an get workin at yer own training.”
So the two Guardians began working on training of their own while Koichi preformed his own methods of training in preparation for his future fights. For each day their strengths grew for the more they trained, and each night Koichi and Celia sat at the arena sides and watched David fight other opponents. Soon Celia was able to unlock the powers she never knew she had and was controlling forces she never understood before. One major thing remained in Celia’s mind for the time the two stayed, and that was the things David had said about Joel. Furthermore she still wondered where Joel was in the world and how much longer they would be apart on their own missions. The true answers lie only in the future of Aeon Souls.
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