Earth (Buryoku Book 6)

by Aaron Oster

  It was as if Doragon expected this, as his muscles flexed, a look of almost savage rage crossing his features as he brought the airborne construct slamming down onto the stone ground.

  It buckled under the force of the attack, the stone cracking as the construct shattered. The third tried attacking again, this time with a punch, and Doragon let it hit him, not even budging an inch as the construct stepped back, spinning into a kick.

  He stepped into its range and threw another hard punch, sending the off-balance construct tumbling end over end. It blasted into the far wall, cracking the stone and exploding into silver light.

  The last two didn’t take much longer to beat, Doragon flattening them both in seconds before turning to Roy.

  “Can you tell me what I did differently?” he asked, crossing his arms.

  Roy could not. He had watched him carefully the entire time, trying to find some way that he could be cheating. His power had remained consistent throughout, and unless he was switching too quickly for Roy’s senses to catch it, Doragon had just crushed the constructs with no more than simple hand-to-hand fighting.

  “No,” Roy finally admitted as Doragon gestured him over to the center of the fighting area.

  Even as he walked, Roy could see the stone healing itself. The cracks vanished, filled in by new stone, and by the time he reached the pedestal, there were no signs of any damage to the area. Doragon put a hand on the pedestal, and this time only a single silver construct appeared.

  “You’re going to destroy that construct,” Doragon said. “But this time, you’re going to follow my instruction while you do. No techniques. Only basic enforcement using Essence. I’ll know if you use anything else. Got it?”

  Roy reluctantly nodded. He had agreed to listen for a single day, and after watching Doragon utterly destroy the constructs that had given him such a hard time, he didn’t really much feel like arguing about it.

  Doragon walked to the edge of the fighting area but didn’t leave as he had last time, turning back to face Roy and crossing his arms again.

  “Get into your regular fighting stance.”

  Roy did as he said, keeping his eyes locked on the approaching construct.

  “Now plant your feet wider,” Doragon said. “Your stance is too narrow.”

  Roy didn’t really want to spread his feet wider. Sure, it would be a more solid stance, but it would also hamper any quick movement he might want to make. In a real fight, speed was something he leaned into as much as power. If anything, it was his explosive speed that gave him all of that extra force that he’d put behind a specific attack.

  He spread his stance wider all the same, watching the faceless figure continue striding over to him. To Roy, the construct seemed to be moving quite slowly, and he had to wonder if Doragon had purposefully done this somehow.

  “Raise your hands higher and relax your hands and wrists.”

  Roy’s hands were already at eye-level, and his fists were tightly clenched. Once again, this wasn’t something he wanted to do. The Unaru Kuma, the fighting style taught to him by Irusaru and refined by Hermit, required taut muscles for quick bursts of movement.

  He raised his hands further until the knuckles of his thumbs were level with his temples, then relaxed his hands to the point where they were barely curled into fists at all. Doragon appraised him silently for a few moments, then nodded to himself.

  As though waiting for the signal, the construct burst into a run, streaking across the remaining distance in just seconds.

  “When it gets within range, punch it,” Doragon said calmly. “Put everything you have into it, and remember, only basic Essence enforcement. No techniques.”

  Roy stared at the oncoming faceless figure, wondering what the point of this exercise was. Changing his stance wasn’t going to make him any stronger or pull out any bestial strength as far as he could tell. But, remembering what Doragon had done to the constructs was enough to keep him rooted in place, waiting for the construct to arrive.

  It reached him just a couple of seconds later, one of its hands moving to punch him in the face. Roy’s muscles tensed as it struck, flooding his body with Essence, then, doing as Doragon had told him, threw a punch as hard as he could while simultaneously slipping the construct’s attack.

  The construct was sent reeling back as Roy’s fist collided with its head, but no actual damage was sustained, and after just a few seconds, the construct regained its footing.

  “Well. That did absolutely nothing,” Geon said.

  “Did I tell you to dodge?” Doragon asked as Roy turned to glare at him.

  “Did you expect me to just let this thing hit me?” Roy asked as the construct regained its balance and came after him again.

  “I never said to let it hit you,” Doragon said. “I’m just telling you not to dodge.”

  There was no time for another reply, as the construct was on him again, driving a fist at his face. Though it went against his every instinct, Roy did as he was told and just threw a punch as hard as he could without dodging. The result was as he’d expected. While his attack did hit the construct, it was only after it had landed a solid and painful blow to his nose.

  Roy staggered back a couple of steps, cursing silently and blinking past the tears that had come unbidden to his eyes.

  “You’re too tense,” Doragon said. “Loosen up.”

  Roy wanted to yell back at him, but the construct had already recovered from his attack and was coming after him again. He had no choice but to plant his feet and try to attack again. He failed miserably as the construct’s fist once again crashed into his nose. This time, his attack was so weak it barely made the construct step back.

  It came after him almost immediately, forcing Roy to backpedal.

  “Stop retreating,” Doragon said. “Plant your feet and fight.”

  Roy growled under his breath, then slammed his back foot into the ground and threw a punch at the construct while its fist came for his face again. It didn’t end any better for him this time either, pain exploding behind his eyes as the blow connected and once again destroying his balance.

  “Your stance was too narrow,” was Doragon’s only comment.

  Over the next fifteen or so minutes, Roy was repeatedly punched in the nose, over and over again, as Doragon called instructions. Though he’d promised to listen to what the man had to say, his temper was beginning to rise to the point where he felt ready to blow this whole Dungeon to pieces, training be damned.

  “You’re still too tense,” Doragon said after he’d been punched in the nose for about the fiftieth time.

  It was red and swollen, and blood trickled from one of his nostrils. The construct wasn’t hitting hard enough to break it, at least not yet, but the repeated blows were starting to take their toll.

  “How am I not supposed to be tense when I keep getting punched in the face?” Roy exclaimed, turning to yell at his teacher.

  Doragon just shook his head as Roy’s slipup cost him, the construct’s fist crashing into his jaw this time and tossing him clean off his feet. He was back up in an instant, Chakra flaring around him in a crackling nimbus of power as he prepared to utterly destroy the construct, the training field, and everything inside.

  “Basic Essence reinforcement only,” Doragon said.

  Roy ignored him, and as the construct moved to attack again, he shot forward, throwing a powerful punch right at its head. Doragon’s hand closed on his wrist, stopping it just an inch from the construct’s blank face, the unfeeling monster having paused at a silent command from the man.

  “What did I say?” Doragon asked, narrowing his eyes.

  Roy punched him with everything he had. He put every ounce of power he could bring to bear into the fist that hadn’t been caught, trying to knock the smug bastard’s head from his shoulders. It didn’t work, of course, and his hand was caught just as easily as the first, leaving Doragon holding both of them.

  Without so much as a word, the man hurled him
across the training area, where Roy promptly slammed into the far wall. This time, it did buckle, along with half the ribs in his back. Roy gasped as he fell to the ground, coughing and wheezing, gasping for air as he lost his cycling rhythm, interrupting the flow of Chakra through his body.

  “I think I’ve been taking it too easy on you,” Doragon said, placing his hand on the pedestal. “Maybe this will help speed things along.”

  Roy glanced up, and through blurry vision, saw ten more constructs appear, and these weren’t Purple-Belts. He could feel the power they gave off. They were at the same level as him. These appeared far more solid somehow, and it only took him a second to realize why. These constructs weren’t made of Essence. They were made of Chakra, which meant that destroying them would not only be harder, but in all likelihood, outright impossible.

  “Good luck,” Doragon said as the constructs charged him.

  Roy shoved himself painfully to his feet, seeing that Doragon wasn’t going to back down.

  “Oh, and if you use anything but Basic Essence enforcement or try to run, I’ll toss you through another wall,” Doragon added, almost as an afterthought.

  “You should probably listen to him,” Geon said unhelpfully. “Your squishy body isn’t exactly made for smashing through things.”

  Roy screamed internally as he raised his hands and spread his feet wide, feeling the grating of ribs in his back. He was in a lot of pain, not only from the ribs but also from what felt like some spinal damage. If Doragon had wanted him to succeed, why injure him this badly, then toss even more powerful enemies at him?

  He wasn’t just angry but enraged. Roy honestly couldn’t remember feeling this angry in a very long time. His fists began to tremble, despite how hard he fought to keep his muscles loose. It was difficult, seeing as he was in a lot of pain. The anger didn’t help either. Then, the constructs were there.

  They didn’t pull their punches, nor did they attack one at a time. They came at him from all sides, slamming punches into him with more force than should have been possible for a Base Red-Belt. Pain immediately bloomed in Roy’s shoulders, upper arms, chest, and face as the blow rained down on him.

  His muscles and bones creaked under the pressure of the attacks, and the only reason he wasn’t sent sailing across the fighting area was because he was surrounded, and another attack from the opposite direction would always keep him grounded. Basic Essence reinforcement was doing little to shield him from the heavy blows that rained from all around, and more than once, he was tempted to try and break free, but every time he did, the pain of his broken ribs reminded him why that would be a bad idea.

  By this point, Roy wasn’t just infuriated. He was on the verge of full-blown rage. His body felt hot, his muscles tenderized from the repeated blows and more bones on the verge of breaking. His teeth were clenched as he tried fighting back, to throw even a single punch that might land, but the pain just kept coming, and his attacks were laughably weak against these creatures.

  “You might want to try fighting back at some point,” Doragon said, his voice drifting to Roy as though from far away. “If you don’t do something soon, they might just kill you.”

  “Um…Roy, I don’t think he’s kidding,” Geon said. “I think he really will let these things kill us if we don’t get out ourselves.”

  “And how the hell are we supposed to do that when I can’t use any of my techniques, have a dozen broken bones, and am being attacked on all sides?” Roy all but yelled back.

  For once, Geon didn’t have a snarky reply, instead choosing to remain silent. Another blow hit him squarely in the nose and finally breaking it. Roy wasn’t enjoying the repeated breaking of his nose any more than the beating, but his anger was doing absolutely nothing for him. His punches did nothing. His defenses were barely keeping him from unconsciousness and the fact that he was so severely limited in what he could do was not helping things.

  “I think we should try breaking his legs. He doesn’t seem to know how to keep a proper stance, so I don’t think he’ll have much use for them.”

  Doragon’s words broke through the haze of pain, right as one of the constructs stepped back, its leg pulled back to sweep at his own. It was at that point that Roy finally snapped. He didn’t know how Doragon had known about the crippling injury to his right leg that had forced him to wear a brace nearly all his life, but the fact that the constructs were being specifically told to go for his legs was just too much.

  The heat that had been suffusing his body suddenly felt like an inferno, as though it were burning him up from the inside out. He barely even felt the attacks of the other constructs as he stepped forward, his leg slamming down so hard that the ground beneath him buckled under the force.

  Then, without even taking a second to think about what he was doing, Roy threw a punch with all his might, right at the blank, expressionless face of the monster that was trying to break his legs. The construct had been in the middle of its attack when Roy struck, his fist slamming into its face before it even had a chance to make contact.

  For a moment, the creature didn’t seem to budge, Roy’s fist planted into its face with the full force of his body right behind it. Then, with a massive boom that created a visible ripple in the air, the construct was blasted off its feet, flying across the training area and smashing into the far wall in an explosion of dust and debris.

  Roy stared across the stage, the burning heat still flooding his body like molten stone. He stared blankly at the construct — or rather, where it had been. There was no longer a single sign that the silver construct had ever existed. All that remained was the crater Roy had made using its body, one that covered the entire fifty-yard width of the training area.

  The far wall had been utterly destroyed, wide cracks running across the walls and ground, radiating out from the area of impact.

  “I think that’ll do.”

  Roy half-turned, noticing that the fighting area seemed oddly empty for some reason. Weren’t there supposed to be other constructs here?

  It was only then that he noticed the area around him. It wasn’t just the far wall that had been destroyed. Roy found himself standing in the utter wreckage that had once been the training area, completely alone, with not a single construct in sight.

  His eyes flicked to Doragon, who was watching him carefully, his arms still crossed.

  Roy opened his mouth to ask what the hell had happened, but it was at that moment that the intense heat flooding his body suddenly vanished, leaving him feeling completely drained. Then he was falling, the world going dark around him.

  Roy was unconscious before he even made it halfway to the ground.

  34

  “Can we really trust the word of a traitor like that?” Duncan asked.

  He and Hermit were sitting together, discussing the information given to him by the man claiming to be Doragon.

  “Roy and Aika were both with him,” Hermit said, rubbing his chin. “I get the feeling that there’s more to him than meets the eye.”

  Duncan didn’t seem pleased at all, especially by the fact that someone he’d taken in, adopted into his clan, had just up and vanished after failing to find his son. Now this person had his son and was refusing to bring him home. Not only that, but all the while, he was making outrageous claims about training him for some kind of challenge they would be posing to Mororna and the other enemy Scions.

  “I don’t like this,” Duncan said. “I don’t trust this. We should contact Kaeru and Violet and tell them to hurry up. Have you been able to find their location?”

  “You know I can’t,” Hermit said with a sigh. “They’re all out of our reach.”

  The man was silent for a moment, likely trying to find a new angle to convince him this was a good idea.

  “I don’t want to send Kaeru anywhere near him,” Hermit said, taking a completely different approach.

  “Why not? He might be able to get my son out of there.”

  “Because Doragon kill
ed Aika’s father and betrayed the Tonde clan. As its head, he would be obligated to try and kill him, and I don’t feel like losing someone who’s on the verge of becoming a Sage.”

  “You don’t think Doragon could take out a Gold-Belt, do you?” Duncan asked incredulously.

  “Think about this logically,” Hermit said, still completely calm. “Someone contacts me claiming to be a man from your clan. A man I also know to have once been part of the Tonde clan. He has Roy and Aika with him, both of whom assure me they are fine. He then gives me pertinent information about an Ancient Cavern Beast. This is information he shouldn’t have access to.

  “He then implies that there’s a way to drive it back and tells me exactly how I might go about doing that. After that, he tells me to just call his name and tell him what terms were agreed upon so that he can plan accordingly. Does that sound like someone who would lose to a Gold-Belt?”

  Duncan stared at him for a few moments, as though by doing so, he’d be able to pierce the man’s implacable expression and examine the contents of his mind.

  “There’s something you’re not telling me,” Duncan finally said. “There’s no other reason I can see for you to be trusting this man so much.”

  “Yes,” Hermit admitted, not even trying to hide it.

  “Are you going to tell me what it is?”

  “Do you trust me?”

  Duncan paused at that, once again wondering what was going on behind those eyes of his. Hermit was a Scion, just like he was, so there was no forcing anything out of him.

  “Yes,” Duncan said, after a few more silent moments.

  “Then trust me when I say that you don’t want to know what I do. At least not yet.”

  It was hardly a satisfactory answer, but Duncan nodded all the same.

  “Fine then. I guess we proceed with the plan that was laid out for us.”