CH_2.18 (049)

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The effects of Yoshio's forest 'lesson' could be seen entrenched in the group as they approached the last days of the basic training. Team-5 operated the same as before the forest challenge, but the same couldn't be said for others. The two winning coalitions had members of the four teams, meaning that at least one member in each team had chosen to give up completing the challenge with their teams to win the reward.

"The teams are broken," Takuma commented while watching Ai spar against her opponent. "If we're careful and play our cards right, we can get into the final tournament."

Yoshio's group consisted of five teams of five competing against each other on the weekly rankings leaderboard. No one could claim they knew exactly how the rankings worked as the criteria for grading was absent, and Yoshio only disclosed the rankings at the end of the week. But through some clever observations, the group members had deduced that the sparring record for every week held significant weight in the criteria.

But that didn't mean that sparring was all that mattered.

As it stood now, out of the five teams, three were in the lead with two No.1 rankings in the weekly— Team-5, Kameko's Team-3, and Cho's Team-1.

Team-5 got their second No.1 in Week Six from the forest challenge and were the latest to do so.

Unexpectedly, it was Team-2, a team that hadn't been No.1 before, to ace in Week Seven due to them preventing the abduction of a wealthy civilian merchant's wife and daughter while patrolling their route— a single incident that had rocketed them to win the week. Proving that sparring wasn't the end-all criteria.

Week Eight, however, didn't have any outlier events that could sway the rankings, neither did it have any challenges that had helped Team-5 win their two No.1 rankings.

Looking at the history, the chances didn't look good for Team-5 as they had never won a No.1 ranking based on sparring alone. They could even be considered in the same category as Team-2.

But things were different for Yoshio's group in Week Eight. Teams of strangers had learned to operate as cohesive units in their time together, but the forest challenge had thrown a wrench into the smoothly running teams. The number of mistakes during team exercises made up of a lot of training schedule, were as high as they were in the early weeks when the teams weren't used to each other.

Which presented Team-5 with an interesting situation.

Takuma pumped his fist and cheered as Ai sliced a gash into her opponent's arm. He grinned, "We have been the best team this week by far. Luck has been with us this week. Nenro and Masaaki haven't lost a single fight. Ai is going to win this one. I have been doing decently," even when he was holding back his brand new trump card for the final tournament, "and surprisingly your record isn't in the red."

"Stuff it," Taro grumbled. Taro's record was always more losses than wins. Takuma didn't say it out loud, but it felt great to have a higher win record than Taro— when just last year, Taro would've pounded him into the ground.

"If nothing crazy happens and we keep winning, we can ace this week," Takuma ripped the grass beside him.

"If we keep winning, that is," Taro replied.

In front of them, Ai threw her kunai, which embedded itself into her opponent's thigh, bringing them to their knees. Yoshio called the fight.

Taro continued, "As you said, we have been lucky with our pairings. But there are only so many people. It's only time before we get matched against someone powerful," he glanced at Kameko, the strongest in their group, "that might drag us down."

Takuma had considered that option, but he still thought they had every chance at winning as long as they continued to perform well outside of sparring.

Ai returned from lugging her opponent to the Shady Guy's tent. "Did you see that? I totally tricked him into committing when he shouldn't have," she had a healthy sheen of sweat on her.

"I saw. It was amazing," Nenro smiled as he handed a towel to Ai. He continued and added to the ongoing discussion, "I agree with Takuma. If we keep doing whatever we are and others don't suddenly get back into tune, I think we have a good chance."

Yoshio called for the next pair, and Masaaki stood excitedly as his name was called. He pushed his hand into his back pouch to pull out a knuckleduster around his fingers.

Takuma gazed at the shining metal adorning Masaaki's hand. He didn't use jutsu, but with those things around Masaaki, he didn't need to. Masaaki had broken bones with simple punches. Takuma glanced at Kameko. In his opinion, if Masaaki had an accompanying bukijutsu, he could rival Kameko's kenjutsu.

'We can do this,' he thought.

———

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It seemed the luck was true with Team-5, as it was already Thursday, and things had gone as Takuma had expected. They had kept a favorable win rate, and the other teams struggled with their synergies.

But not all things were up and up.

'She looks pissed,' Takuma thought as he looked at Cho in front of him. The girl's charred brown twintails looked particularly evil right now, matched by her eyes that were viciously staring at him. She still held a grudge against Team-5 for winning the tree-walking challenge before Team-1.

Takuma and Cho stared at each other as Yoshio walked away. There was no official starting point. Technically, they could attack the moment Yoshio called their names.

Takuma usually didn't make the first move, preferring to react and counter. But today, he made the first move. He pulled away from Cho, but at the same time, he threw three shurikens at her.

Cho's problem, Takuma thought, was that she tried to get through fights without taking a single hit. It made her too defensive, which gave him the opportunity to press him.

The moment the shuriken left his hand, Takuma canceled his backward motion and charged toward Cho. In the small window, as she dodged the shuriken, Takuma laid a low kick into her shin. Cho cried as she was forced to kneel. Takuma pressed ahead aggressively, but Cho grabbed his arm and threw him over her as she rolled.

Takuma skidded on his landing and immediately ran back towards her. Cho, with shame and anger on her face, pounced into attacking. Takuma should have backed down, let Cho's aggression break on a wall of defense, but in the heat of the moment, he opted to match aggression with aggression.

They crossed blades, broke apart, and swung almost like drunks, each missing twice until Cho clapped Takuma on the side of the head with the hilt of her kunai. Takuma wavered, and Cho hit him again, hard. He dropped to a knee, and Cho brought her kunai down, going for a 'killing blow.' Takuma got his kunai up in time to block, then rolled away before lurching to his feet.

Cho tried to give him no space, but she wasn't aggressive enough, and Takuma successfully traded blows to get into a position to defend himself. He decided to immediately gamble his newfound breathing space and went in for an elbow drill into Cho's shoulder, and then, as she hopped back in pain, he cracked her in the neck. Cho made a strange high-pitched sound as she went down.

Takuma dipped into his pouches, and senbon were the first weapons he found, so he threw them. Cho, despite clutching her throat, rolled away and the thin senbon embedded into the yellow ground.

Takuma clicked his tongue and moved towards Cho, but as he whipped his head, a wave of dizziness struck from when he was hit in the head. He gritted his teeth and hid his stumble within a step and looked toward Cho with a glare that shouted punishment— but his eyes widened when he saw the two hands facing him making a bird hand seal. Still lying on the ground, Cho raised her head to face him and smiled viciously through the grimace.

Air rapidly distilled around her accompanied by the sound of flowing gales before a burst of winds assaulted Takuma with the force of a truck. He felt his body flatten against what felt like a solid wall of wind. All of the air was knocked out of him, and when he hit the ground, did he find a rushed breath return to him. His world turned into a poorly drawn water painting dripping in water as colors swam in his vision.

Cho unsteadily got up to her foot and ran towards Takuma, who had been tossed several feet away by the wind blast from Fuuton: Boufuu Kyouzuu no Jutsu (Wind Release: Gale Surge.) As she arrived near Takuma, he suddenly swung a kick and swept her legs, and the already unsteady Cho sacked to the ground.

Takuma couldn't hear anything but a sharp ringing as he pulled himself up. His vision was trying to make him puke his guts out. He straddled Cho and smashed her in the head, and luckily it hit despite his swarming vision.

It would've been fine if Takuma had grabbed Cho's head and pounded it against the ground. But in the state of nausea and anger, he made the hand seals of Raiton: Shokku(Lightning Release: Shock) that he had practiced so much he could do it in his sleep— it just wasn't his fault the jutsu didn't work well for him. He pressed his hand against Cho's chest as the arcs of lightning snaked around his hand, and then— Zap! Cho's body spasmed as if she was having a stroke. While the jutsu couldn't travel far or cause the amount of damage it was supposed to— at point-blank range, it was as effective as a heavy-duty taser.

Cho raised her quaking hand towards Takuma's face, but it fell back to the ground halfway up.

Takuma removed his smoking palm and didn't care anymore. He got off Cho and collapsed on the ground beside her. He looked to his side and saw that she was curled up and jittering. Face hot and heart drumming, but victorious, Takuma put his hands up, and he didn't care if it would make him feel miserable, but he yelled.

He had won.

———

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Takuma hadn't felt worse in his entire life. One would think that a day would be enough to recover from a fight with minor cuts, but Cho's wind release jutsu had left a deep stinging pain in his body. It was so bad that he loathed the idea of standing.

"Will you stop groaning?" Ai shot him a glare.

Takuma groaned as he stretched his back and felt the pain in his bones. "I can't... I can't do it today. If he makes me fight today, I'll throw hard. Fuck the final tournament. I don't need the C-rank jutsu, I'll figure it out," he whined. He had skipped his early morning training because of the pain.

Takuma ignored Ai and continued to groan and did it louder when she hit. He only stopped when Yoshio arrived, and they had to file into the grid. He met eyes with Cho and glared at her when she had the gall to glare at him when she was the one who had made his life miserable!

"The final tournament is going to be held tomorrow and the day after that," were the first words that came out of Yoshio's mouth.

For a moment, Takuma forgot about the pain.

"I'm going to announce the weekly ranking for this week early," Yoshio continued. "The team with the highest number of wins will participate in the final tournament as my representatives. One of you guys better win. I don't appreciate getting embarrassed in front of my co-workers."

Takuma felt more restless than ever. Why couldn't he just get to the point?!

"... No.1 for this week's ranking is... Team-5," Yoshio turned to Team-5. "That makes you a three-time No.1— which means you're going to the final tournament."

Takuma blinked as he stared at Yoshio's face.

It felt so... anticlimactic.

"I disagree!"

Takuma turned towards the sword-wielding girl who had spoken up.

Now, that felt more climactic.

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