This Round

Kazuma did not even hear the doorbell.

He was currently in a "meditative" state. This level of noise could not disturb his mind.

He was excited because he realized that his combat experience had increased again as he hummed.

Now he was at Actual Combat 5.

The speed of leveling up was indeed a bit too fast. Before today, he did not have actual combat in his list of skills, but now, he had achieved Actual Combat all of a sudden. After all, it had taken Kazuma so much practice just to obtain Shinto Style 6.

In comparison, he felt that the speed of his leveling-up was abnormal.

But thinking about it, there was a saying in the army that soldiers who had been to the battlefield were strikingly different from those who had not. The difference could be seen at a glance.

In the same vein, one could probably gain more experience from actual combat than from years of training. It made sense.

Besides, there were fewer opportunities to engage in real combat compared to normal practice.

The founder of the Shinto Style, Tsukahara Bokuden, had fought in a total of 19 real sword fights in his life. And this amount of actual combat experience could already make him a legendary figure with the title of the Sword Saint.

Following the same logic, it was completely reasonable for Kazuma to gain so much experience points in one round of actual combat.

After all, this was a trophy that he had won by risking his life.

Now, Kazuma had plateaued at Actual Combat 5 for quite a while. His rationality told him that all the experience points from this battle should have been squeezed out. However, his sensibility made him continue to hum—it was a hard-fought battle during which he had put his life on the line. What if there were still some experience points that he had missed?

'As long as we don't stop moving, the road ahead will continue to extend…'

Suddenly, he felt something coming at him!

Before he could react, the thing hit his face. The strong impact made him fall backward.

'What's going on? Did Nishikiyama trick me?'

***

It was Kiryuu Chiyoko who'd opened the door for Fujii Mikako.

After all, the police were still searching around the area. It would be troublesome if the yakuza members with black-and-blue faces opened the door and were seen by the passing police.

When she opened the door, Chiyoko composed her facial muscles and gave Fujii a dirty look. 'If this woman had not been caught, my brother would not have had to risk his life,' she thought.

Chiyoko had been on the verge of tears when Kazuma risked his life to launch the most decisive strike just now. She was also a kendo practitioner, and she could tell straight away that Kazuma had given up on defense in order to go all-out.

Chiyoko did not want to lose any more of her family, so even though she was scared to death, she'd still rushed forward.

Previously, Chiyoko had only been watching from the side. She did not join the fight because her calves were trembling. She knew that she might even distract Kazuma if she were to fight by his side.

Anyway, kendo was a form of martial arts that required a lot of space.

It was sometimes more effective for multiple kendo practitioners to attack one by one instead of all together.

Chiyoko had wanted to help, but she was more worried that she would become a burden. That was why she had been watching from the side, ready to assist at any time.

However, she could no longer stand by and watch as her brother prepared to risk his life to attack.

Now that she thought about it, it was actually a risky move for her to strike back then. If she had not managed to knock off Nishikiyama's knife, she might even have disrupted her brother's attack and got caught in the meantime.

After the battle had ended, the more Kiryuu Chiyoko recalled the scene, the more afraid she got.

Now, all the lingering fear had turned into anger toward Fujii Mikako. 'If you weren't such a noob that you got caught, my brother and I would not have had to experience the thrill of brushing with death.'

Hence, Chiyoko's expression was quite sour.

Obviously, Fujii was terrified.

"Where is Kiryuu-kun?" Fujii asked in horror.

Chiyoko replied coldly, "I'm a Kiryuu too."

"I mean, where's Kazuma?"

Fujii immediately changed the way she addressed him.

In Japan, only people on very close terms would call each other by their given names. Even normal friends would address each other by their surnames.

Moreover, Japanese people often used honorific speech when addressing others, such as "XX-san" or "XX-chan."

Usually, Fujii would call Kiryuu Kazuma "Kiryuu-kun." When she would occasionally call him "Kazuma," she would blush for a long time.

Sometimes, when young couples had just started to address each other by their given names, they would at first still add honorifics to relieve their shyness. However, Fujii had skipped this step too.

It seemed that she was really worried about Kazuma and could not care about these details.

But this made Chiyoko even more displeased.

'Who are you? Why are you calling my brother "Kazuma"? Is that how you should call him? Did you get my permission? I don't care if you're thinking of me as your sister-in-law, because I haven't approved of you yet!'

"My brother is meditating. It's best not to disturb him…"

Before Chiyoko could finish her sentence, Fujii had pushed her aside and went into the Kiryuu family's house. She rushed to the dojo with loud footsteps.

"Kiryuu-kun!" Unknowingly, she had returned to her usual form of address for Kazuma.

Hence, she shouted "Kiryuu-kun" as she opened the door to the dojo.

At that instant, she froze for a moment and closed the door. Then, she took a deep breath.

"Kiryuu-kun!" she shouted again and opened the door.

***

As soon as Fujii opened the door, her first reaction had been to close the door and open it again.

'Did I just see a bunch of badly injured yakuza men? I must be hallucinating.'

She closed the door and opened it again.

On the other side of the door, there was indeed a bunch of badly injured yakuza members lying on the floor. Kazuma sat in the center of the dojo, facing the door that led to the courtyard.

Outside the door was the wide engawa of the house. The wooden floor was covered with cherry blossom petals.

The large cherry tree stood quietly in the courtyard outside, its petals fluttering down.

Kazuma was humming a tune. It seemed to be the theme song of Takakura Ken's "You Must Cross the River of Wrath."

He looked completely different from how miserable the yakuza people looked. For a moment, Fujii was petrified.

The sight before her gave off an unusual sense of beauty beyond common sense. Fujii felt that as soon as she stepped forward, she would bid farewell to a familiar ordinary life.

At this moment, Fujii heard someone next to her say, "What are you waiting for? Have you never seen how they do it in movies? After everything is over, the beauty will go forward to hug the hero who has just ended a grueling battle, right?"

Fujii thought that this person was right. She looked to the side and was shocked by the demon face tattoo that suddenly appeared in her vision. The tattoo extended from the man's entire back to half of his shoulders.

The person with the demon face tattoo held a cigarette in his mouth and looked at Fujii. "I'm sorry, yakuza tattoos do what it takes to scare people. Did I scare you?"

Fujii shook her head repeatedly. Then, she rushed toward Kazuma.

Chiyoko wanted to grab her wrist to stop her, but she failed.

Fujii pounced on Kazuma, throwing him to the ground and hugging his head tightly to her chest.

"Great, you're fine… That's awesome!" Fujii murmured softly.

Kazuma struggled to grab her shoulders then pushed her away a little. He squeezed out a sentence past his teeth, "I… can't breathe!"

Chiyoko rushed up, grabbed Fujii's ponytail, and pulled it back. "Let go! You're suffocating my brother!"

"Ouch! Ouch! My hair!"

It suddenly became a huge mess.