LIGHTNOVELWORLD Chapter 7: Reveal
I walked together with Sumi-chan, Naho-chan and Kiyo-chan into mansion's training hall to finally beat Shinobu after mastering Total Concentration Breathing: Constant, only to find her sitting in front of the table with her eyes close. The girls watched from a distance as not to distract me and cheered me on.
"You can do it!"
"Good luck!"
I walked toward her, determined to beat her. When I got near her, she opened her eyes slowly and looked at me with her usual smile.
"Ara, is it already time for me to beat you again?" She asked me with smug aura surrounding her.
"Heh, not a chance. Today is the day I finally beat you!" I smashed my fist together and replied with a grin.
"Fufufu, then shall we start." she gestured the teacups in front of her.
I make my way over to her and sit down on the opposite side. I ready myself and wait for her to start.
"Ready...set...go!"
We moved our hands at the same time, with me trying to grab the cup closest to me and her trying to block me. I grabbed the cup, but she covered it with her hand and grabbed the cup next to the one she blocked.
(I won't let you!)
I put my hand above the teacup just when she was about to picked it up and force the cup to stay down. We stared at each other in silence until she spoke
"My, My. I see you've improved quite a bit. How about I stop going easy on you then."
She let go of both cups and speeds up her hand's movements, and we started battling each other once again.
*whoosh* *smack* *whoosh* *smack*
I begin to sweat as I can barely catch up to her hand's movements. I almost got splash several times, but I reacted just in time. The matches continue and finally I used an underhanded tactic.
I pretended to go for the cup in the middle of the table and when she blocked it and tried to pick up another cup, instead of blocking it, I smacked her hand as hard as I can and grab the cup before she could and finally splash her with the tea.
Smack
Splash
(Yes! I did it! Hahaha, take that... why do I feel chilly all of a sudden?)
"*vein in forehead* Fufufufu, that was a good one. Now, why don't we move on to the tag game but let's make it interesting. Don't worry, you won't be hurt...severely." She said soaked in tea with a dark aura coming out of her.
"Y... Yeah." I replied to her, and we both get up from the floor.
"Now, I'm going to go get some shinai and after I got those, we are going to play tag but let's change somethings. We both are going to have a shinai and we are going to use our breathing styles."
"You're going to try to catch me and instead of just running and dodging I'm going to attack back. If you can't catch me by sundown, then no dinner for you. Is that clear." She explained the rule to me in an angry voice.
"Yes ma'am!" I replied back fearing for my dinner.
"Wait here." She said and went into the storage room to get the shinais.
"Kiyo-chan, Sumi-chan, Naho-chan what should I do? I think I made her angry." I asked the girl for help.
"Um...Oh, I know. Why don't you try apologizing." said Kiyo trying her best to help me.
"I don't think it'll be that easy Kiyo-chan."
"How about giving her flowers."
"*sweat drop* Naho-chan, I not asking her on a date yet. I'm trying to stay alive form her monstrous..." Just then the door opened and Shinobu walked in with two shinais.
"Ara. Were you saying something about me?"
"Not at all!" I replied back nervously.
She throws a shinai at me and said "Good, now don't hold back and try to catch me. You only have 4 hours before the sun goes down and this time I'm not holding back." and stood there waiting for me to come at her.
(Well, now it's too late to back out. This is similar to our first meeting, but the difference is that this time I have a better chance to beat her.) I take a deep breath and dash at her using
Thunder Breathing First Form: Thunderclap and Flash!
And she tilted her body to dodge my attack effortlessly and strike me in the back. *bam* I lost control of my footing because of her attack and hit the wall with my forehead.
(Fuck. It didn't work. Well, how about this.) I quickly get up from the floor and tried again with
Thunder Breathing First Form: Thunderclap and Flash Eightfold!
I performed eight dashes in quick succession while slightly augmenting the power and speed of my dashes to control my speed but had no effect of her. I tried both thunder breathing and water breathing multiple times, but she always slipped away at the last second.
Huff
Huff
"Ara, it's been 2 hours already, and you still haven't touch me. Are you ready to give up?" She said while smiling with her eyes closed and a smug aura coming out of her.
"Not a chance! I will try until the last second with everything I've got!" (I couldn't touch her at all using my fastest attacks and water breathing is too slow. Wait, what if I combined my thunder and water breathing techniques like in the anime. It's worth a shot.)
Fuuuuu
Thunder breathing First Form: Thunderclap and Flash! + Water breathing Sixth Form: Whirlpool
I run at her with the most speed I can produce before losing control and does a spinning attack at her as a faint and when my blade almost reaches her, I change the hand holding the shinai, so my empty right hand pass near her face while I span around her and tried to strike her back with a swing from below.
Shinobu widen her eyes and turned around immediately but was too late as my blade almost reaches her...I slipped and crash into her.
BAM
"*groan* Plese don't tell me I'm in an anime situation... but just to be sure..." I move my hands around the area I'm touching to feel a firm but soft marshmallow like texture. "Ahh." Then I heard someone moan, so I looked up to see Shinobu with a blush in a defenseless position while spreading her arms out.
"I'm very sorry!" I quickly let her go and apologized in a dogeza.
"It... It's fine. You've passes." Shinobu said after tiding up her looks and disappeared with a blush still on her cheeks.
"Ren-san. Ren-san are you ok?" The three girls run at me and asked me, worrying about me.
"Hehehe. I'm fine. Kiyo-chan, Naho-chan, Sumi-chan. Thanks for cheering me on." I replied back with a grin and a thumbs up.
"Then Ren-san, we're going to go back to work."
"Bye Ren-san" The three girls say goodbye and leaves the training hall.
"Umu. see you later." I said while waving them and headed out of the training hall myself.
After the accident with Shinobu, I became hungry. So, I walked toward the kitchen to get a snack before dinner and saw Aoi cooking miso soup.
"Aoi-san, is there any snack I can eat before dinner?"
"Yeah. There are some gyoza in the cupboard that you can eat."
"Thanks." I went to the cupboard, opened it and saw some gyoza on a plate. I took the plate out onto the table and started eating while watching her cook. After eating I asked, "Is there anything thing I can do to help?" to repay her for the food.
"In that case can you chop some firewood for me please. We're running low."
"Umu. Sure, I'll be right back." I went behind the mansion to chop some wood log into firewood. After I chopped about 20 pieces, I tied them up and carried them on my back to the kitchen., only to find Aoi still cooking.
"Aoi-san it's done." I said while putting the firewood into a pile.
She turned around, looked at me and said, "Thank you for the help."
"No problem. Aoi-san if it's no trouble, can you answer my question?" I asked her while waiting for a reply.
"What is it?" She answered.
"I wanted to ask, why do you look like you're always angry? You don't have to answer if you don't want to." I asked her politely, not wanting to invade her privacy.
She stopped cooking and became silent for a while before she said "*sigh* I'm not angry at you or anyone...if I had to pick then, I guess I'm angry at myself." She lowered her head and continued "You see, I'm not brave nor strong like you. The only reason that I could be a member of the demon slayers is because I got lucky in the final selection."
"Then I became too scared to go into battle, so I ran away and hid myself from my duties. You must think that I'm pathetic don't you." She asked self mockingly.
"Not at all." I said back firmly.
"Huh?" She raised her head, surprise at my claim.
"I don't think that at all. Sure, you ran away but it doesn't matter. You've help me and every other person who've been injured by demons. I was talking with Kiyo, Naho and Sumi-chan the other day they look up to you know. You might think of yourself as weak and useless but remember that's not true at all. So don't worry about not being able to fight because...I'll fight for you too. So, you can count on me ok." I said while smiling and patting her head.
"Thank you." She slowly nodded and begins to tear up.
"No problem. But you know, I'm not very good at cheering people up so I was worried it wasn't gonna work." I said truthfully while removing my hand from her head.
"Well, thanks for that. I think I really needed to hear it." She said while wiping her tears and making a smile.
"It's ok. It's the least I could do. I'm going outside for stargazing so call me when dinner is ready. I'll be on the roof." I said to her and went out of the mansion and jumped up to the roof.
(The moon's full, the sky is clear, and the wind feels nice. It's a perfect nice for stargazing.) After I reach up to the roof, I lie down while looking at the stars.
(The moon is so beautiful. I wonder if I can go up there with the ship after unlocking it. This remind me of an old song I liked. You know what, now that I'm alone, I can sing it and even if it sounds bad nobody is here to hear it.)
"Fly me to the moon
Let me play among the stars
Let me see what spring is like
On a-Jupiter and Mars"
I continued to sing not noticing the footsteps behind me.
"Fill my heart with song
And let me sing for ever more
You are all I long for
All I worship and adore"
I finally heard a thud behind me, so I stopped singing and turned around to see who it was and saw Shinobu with a serious look.
"Ren-san... are you a reincarnator?" Shinobu asked with a low voice.
"A re... what?"
"You are a reincarnator right? Because I'm speaking to you in English right now."
I replied with a swift kick to her legs and a punch to her gut, but she jumped over me and landed behind me while trying to say something, but I don't hear it as I'm too focus on knocking her out.
I kicked my legs against the roof to try and tackle her and we both rolled over each other on the roof. We came to stop with her under me so I lock our legs together so she couldn't run away and held up her arms with my left arm and grabbed her throat with my right hand and asked her in a deep voice "Who the hell are you and what did you do with Shinobu."
"I..I'm"
"Talk! While I still have my patient."
"yo... your hand." She spoke to me weakly.
Just then, I noticed my hand crushing her throat, so I loosen my grip a little and waited for her to talk.
"*cough* *cough* You went a little rough on me don't cha think."
"I Don't care. Now, answer me."
"As far as I can remember I've always been Shinobu. It's just that I've memories from my past life. To begin my story, we'll have to go back a long time..."