"I can't believe I'm doing this AGAIN!" I grumbled to myself as I walked into the gymnasium fully geared for battle. Everyone else was already there waiting for me, including my opponent, Soushu.
Earlier . . .
"Wait, wait, wait," I had said. "First Yamimura, and now Soushu? What's with you making me fight all the time?"
"Yeah, Toshiro," said Omoyo. "That time with Yamimura, I can sort of understand. But this time's different! Why are you going out of your way to start another duel?"
"I would also like to know," said Soushu.
"The answer is quite simple," said Mirai. "I want to prove sincerity."
"To prove sincerity?" Soushu said. Her eyes narrowed into a suspicious glare.
But Mirai didn't shrink from it and replied, "That's right. Both mine and Isaneko's families are neutral, and Omoyo's folks are Soushu-friendly, but the Community Service Club and the Student Council aren't exactly buddy-buddy, thanks, in part, to a certain vice-president and our association with Yamimura of Yamimura from Yamimura. You ask us to help you, but for all I know, you could just be using us for some secret plan to boost yourself."
Soushu flew out of her seat and shouted, "How dare you? I would never do such a thing!"
But Mirai coldly responded, "You're the daughter of a politician and whose own underling attacked a member of this club already. Just saying you wouldn't use us like tools isn't enough to make it believable. Besides, whatever we find out won't mean much to a group that already thinks we're up to no good in secret. WHICH, I might add, is why we were attacked in the first place.
"This fight won't just be proof of your sincerity to us. It'll also prove our sincerity to you. I mean what better way to bare one's heart and soul than through battle?"
We all looked at Mirai, and then I said, "Don't tell me you're making me fight because you believe that baring-hearts-through-fists crap from comic books. And if that's the case, shouldn't I be facing off against Shioyama?"
"That's Shikouyama," Soushu said.
"Soushu's the one asking for a favor," said Mirai. "Besides, I also wanted to see how you'd do against a trained genius and omni-kinetic like her, Oota. Show me how far your training's got you."
And then he leaned forward, his face turned grave.
"This town's not like it used to be," he said. "Lady Shirogami's been overthrown and the Piper's visit really shook up the town. Now we have an arsonist on the loose. There's no telling what sort of trouble we'll all get into next. One of us in this room might end up seriously hurt. It could be one of us who ends up in that river. You don't want that to happen, do you, Oota?"
Remembering the body we found floating in the river a few months back, I balled my fingers into a fist and gave my reply.
And that led to me putting on some kendo armor, picking up a bamboo sword and meeting the others in the gym where I was going to do battle with a girl who could do way more psychic stuff than I can. There were also two members of the student council in audience with the others, Eiji Shikouyama and Hana Kawatori.
As I entered the gym, I overheard Shikouyama say, "I still think-"
But Soushu cut him off and said, "Eiji, what did I say? No talking. At all."
I don't know what went on before I came here, but it looked like Soushu made Shikouyama promise not to cause any trouble.
I took my place on one side of the arena while Soushu stood on the other. It looked like we were going to have the entire gym for our fight.
Mirai stepped forward then, cleared his throat and spoke in a voice loud enough to cause an echo.
"I know you all have other things to do, so I'll make this simple," he said. "On one side, we have Hisao Oota, a psychokinetic. On the other, we have Naoko Soushu, an omni-kinetic. For this match, you can use your psychic powers however you want, EXCEPT to attack one another. The only things you should be hitting each other with are your swords. You can dish out however many hits you want, and take however many hits you want. The fight won't end until one of you gives up, is unable to fight, or time runs out. Hana Kawatori, here, will keep track of how many times each of you lands a hit, which will serve as your individual scores. Do you all understand?"
Soushu replied with a sharp and strong, "Yes!"
I responded with a soft and unenthusiastic, "Yeah."
"With us, we have Eiji Shikouyama and Aika Isaneko who'll help stop the match if things go too far."
Shikouyama made a two-finger hand gesture that read, "I'm watching you." He did that gesture directly at me while wearing a hateful scowl. The guy really had it out for me.
"Well, then," Mirai said. "On my mark."
He held his hand up high over his head and then swiftly brought it down.
"BEGIN!"
I sprang into action as soon as Mirai said the word.
Truth be told, it wasn't just because I was desperate for help in catching the arsonist that I agreed to this ridiculous game. I was always curious about Oota's strength ever since I overheard a rumor that he had defeated Yamimura in battle. That curiosity only grew after I learned that he fought toe-to-toe with Shikouyama, whose family has always been combat-oriented. Yamimura's was too.
No offense to Oota, but the guy's the very definition of an herbivore and sloth. This isn't because I'm biased against regular folks or because he's part of the Community Service Club under Mirai's control. It's basically what I've observed of him while I spied on the Community Service Club the last couple of months. And I'm a pretty good judge of character.
Anyway, as an omni-kinetic, I have control over many different kinds of powers. First, I threw my sword at Oota and made it fly on its own with telekinesis. Oota jumped away super far, given an extra boost from his psy-armor. And then he charged at me with all the signs of a low side slash.
But before he could reach me, I erected a wall of psychic energy between us. He crashed face first and tumbled back. I swiftly conjured some water in my hand from the moisture in the air and threw it at his feet. Just as I planned, when his heel touched the wet floor, he slipped and fell onto his back. And that was when I attacked with my sword.
Using telekinesis, I made my sword fly to him while he was down and had it poke him in the face over and over again. One, two, three, four, five. My sword poked his helmet five times before he finally rolled off his back and returned to his feet.
"Seriously?" I said. "Only a few seconds in, and I already scored so many points. Since I've seen you practice with the Kendo Club, I knew not to expect much of a challenge, but I'm still disappointed."
That said, I wasn't about to give him the chance to close the gap between us. I commanded my sword to fly again, but this time, Oota was on the defensive and created a bubble of psychic energy around him. The bubble deflected the incoming sword several inches away from his chest. But I wasn't deterred. Not in the least. I had a five-point lead and was determined to keep it that way.
As long as he couldn't attack, he couldn't score any points of his own. And as long as he stayed on the defensive, he couldn't attack. So, I had my flying sword attack him again and again, and again, and again. Anyone watching would quickly grow bored of the one-sided fight as I did.
But it wasn't as one-sided as I had thought, which I eventually found out a couple of minutes into our contest.
I started to get light-headed and my vision began to blur. And even though I hadn't moved a muscle for a while, I started going out of breath. My sword even started to slow down its attacks against Oota's barrier. That was when Oota decided to counterstrike.
He got rid of his shell of psychic energy and tried to jab me with his sword, but I ducked away just in time and fell to the floor. I used telekinesis to make my sword fly at Oota, but he swatted the sword aside before it reached his face and then slashed his sword down over my head.
I rolled away, hearing Oota's sword slap against the floor, and got back up. Thanks to my lightheadedness, I nearly tangled my feet together, but managed to keep myself from falling down again.
I made my sword fly back into my hand just as Oota started slashing at me again. Our swords sang a brief duet of clacks. Because I was tired and sore from exhaustion, I slipped up and lost a few points to Oota. I was still ahead of him by two, I broke apart from him and stepped away to give myself a brief respite.
As I tried to catch my breath, I thought to myself, wow. Oota was better than I thought. Because of how little he exercised, I was sure I had this contest in the bag. But it seems I underestimated him. He was really close to scoring some points because of how tired I made myself from that constant barrage of attacks I lashed out at him earlier.
"I need to be more careful," I muttered to herself. I was five points ahead, but there was still a chance for him to catch up with all the time we had left, especially if I end up tiring myself out before Oota did.
Frankly, part of me thought that was what Mirai was aiming for. It was mighty fishy of him to make this contest an hour long. A rule like that made this game more like an endurance contest. Could it be that Oota's been built for endurance contests? Even though he doesn't exercise as much as I do, he had his psychic powers. That could be what's keeping him from tiring out. I should have realized it sooner.
But even though the rules were rigged in Oota's favor, I was pretty confident in my chances of winning. I decided to try and stand still, move as little as possible to save energy. Oota looked like the defensive type so maybe I'll even be able to rest a little.
However, Oota was more impatient than I thought, because the moment the idea to stay still crossed my mind, he attacked. He came at me so fast that I couldn't move away in time and had to defend. Our swords clashed many times after that. I earned a couple of more points, but so did Oota. Close to the end of the game, when I became more sluggish, he actually started catching up to a tie.
And then . . .
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