Side: Shizuka
As Shizuka treasured Corona House, her inheritance from her parents, cleaning and maintenance were daily chores of love for her. She was a constant figure around the building, and she was always the first to notice when something was strange or amiss.
“What’s the matter, Karama-chan, Korama-chan?”
Today, that strange thing was Kiriha’s two haniwas, who appeared to be doing something like dancing in the corner of the Corona House grounds.
“We realized that we can’t rely on others to get stronger, ho!”
“We decided to master the ways of martial arts to get stronger ourselves, ho!”
“So that wasn’t dancing, but martial arts training?”
“That’s right, ho! We’re developing our own technique, the Haniwa Divine Fist, ho!”
“We’ll strike those soulless machines down into to hell, ho!”
“I see... I guess human martial arts won’t work for you, huh?”
It turned out that what had looked like dancing to Shizuka was actually the haniwas’ way of practicing martial arts. Their tiny, odd proportions were completely different from a human’s; they didn’t even have legs. That’s why standard martial arts wouldn’t work for them. If they wanted to fight, they’d have to develop their own haniwa way of doing it.
“So far, we’ve figured out that the Jet Headbutt is the strongest, ho!”
“Spiritual Energy Field Punch isn’t bad either, ho!”
The haniwas showed Shizuka a few moves. Martial arts typically relied on the inborn powers of the individual, but for the haniwas, that included things like flight and barriers. Their way—these haniwa martial arts—was something truly unique.
“Oh... that looks fun.”
Shizuka took an interest in the haniwas’ training, and stopped cleaning to watch them. As she did, she slowly came to the realization that perhaps she should be doing the same thing, and called out to the Fire Dragon Emperor inside of her.
“Say, Uncle...”
“Yes?”
“Should we come up with moves like that too?”
“I think so. Mana would be put to more effective use, which would mean it had a less profound effect on your weight.”
“Really?!”
When Shizuka used Alunaya’s power, she partially took on the appearance of a dragon. A horn grew out of her forehead, claws on her hands, wings on her back, and a tail at the base of her spine. On top of that, her physical abilities increased exponentially. Surely, with all of that going for her, there had to be an effective way of fighting in such a form.
“Karama-chan, Korama-chan, can I join in too?”
“You’re very welcome to, ho!”
“Our school is always open, ho!”
Shizuka left her broom leaning against the wall, and tried throwing a few punches and kicks while imagining herself in her half-human, half-dragon form. She’d been training in karate since she was a child, and so far had relied on that to get by when fighting. But like she’d just realized with the haniwas, it was a human martial art. It had some serious flaws being used in a nonhuman form, the best examples of which were her wings and tail. They drastically changed her center of gravity and created drag. So when she was spinning around for a roundhouse kick, for example, she had to do her best to tuck them in. There were countless other such adjustments that had to be made as well.
“Haaah!”
“Take that, ho!”
“And that and that and that, ho, ho, ho!”
Eventually, the three of them began sparring. They were each grateful to have an opponent, and had fun playing around with their new moves.
“By the way, Haniwa-chans, why did you suddenly want to start training with martial arts?”
“There are simply times when men must fight, ho!”
“More specifically, we want to stand out when we do fight, ho! We want to outshine Ruth-chan’s fighters, ho!”
“That’s a surprisingly selfish reason.”
“It’s not very different from trying to keep your weight down, ho.”
“You’re selfish too, Shizuka-chan, ho.”
“Ahaha, that’s true!”
Shizuka and the haniwas continued their practice for a while longer. Several days later, Shizuka would get complaints from the other tenants about all the shouting, but she was blissfully unaware of that for the time being. And so she and the haniwas would spend the day enjoying their training in the soft light of the autumn sun.
No Comments Yet
Post a new comment
Register or Login