Chapter 30 Resolutions of the Heart

After Azi declared his answer, Shizu's once disappointed expression soon turned up into a smile and she responded in kind.

"SHOW ME!"

Brandishing her sword for the first time in the match, Azi responded by throwing down his weapons. Shizu, Ben, and Bail were confused by his decision to abandon his weapons but were then shocked by his next moves.

With no weapons in hand, Azi took up a boxing stance which caused Ben to speak up.

"YOU NEED A WEAPON BOY. YOUR FIST CAN'T FIGHT STEEL YOU MORON."

Ignoring the outcry from Ben, Azi put all his focus on the one person that was his opponent. He then rushed forward and, in an instant, the blue glow of the veins in his legs and arms shined brightly. Swift like the wind, Azi appeared behind Shizu as if he had teleported but was actually a result of pure speed.

Azi had infused so much magical energy into his arms and legs, that each step gave him slight pangs of pain, but Azi soldiered on and struck out with a flurry of punches at Shizu's exposed back.

His opponent was not easily caught off guard as Shizu quickly turned around and soon both combatants were locked in an exchange of blows with their respective weapons.

While a fist would usually be split by a single slash of Shizu's blade, this was not the case with Azi's fist. Instead of it being sliced in twain, his fist resounded with the sound of metallic screeching. Shizu's blade had met a hard invisible barrier just on the surface of his fist.

Ben and Bail could only gawk at the sight of the battle as the exchange of quick and heavy blows continued for hours between the two fighters. It amazed them to see such a master of combat like Shizu use their weapons with such precision and skill.

But what was more amazing was that the weapons that they were proud of were getting deflected and repelled by the bare hands of a young man.

At one point in the fight, Azi had held his hand in a knife hand position and struck out to strike Shizu's katana. She answered in kind and the two locked "blades" briefly.

The sound of screeching metal rang out again, but this time Azi's knife hand began to cut through the refined steel of Shizu's blade. She backstepped to avoid Azi's knife hand slash that followed through with a streak of blue light.

She then took a moment to look at her sword and noticed that the tip portion of her weapon was cleanly sliced off.

Azi held the severed blade tip between two of his fingers and rushed forward. Shizu took a defensive stance and in response Azi threw the blade's tip towards her.

Reacting quickly, the thrown object was deflected by a swing of Shizu's iron club, but in a split second a moment of opportunity showed itself to Azi.

He again channeled more magical energy into his legs. Kicking off with even more speed and force than his initial charge. Shizu saw him appear in front of her and she could do nothing to avoid him. So she braced herself as Azi threw a punch at her exposed flank.

With her years of experience as a soldier, she had predicted Azi's straightforward move and had taken a precaution. His jab was blocked by nothing, but no discernable damage was done to her.

Since he had not focused enough energy into his fist, all he was able to do was make a mild punch against Shizu's flank.

Feeling that something was not right, Azi quickly backed away in confusion as he thought that the punch should have at least pushed her back a bit but then noticed a slight orange-red glow on her flank.

Shizu had reinforced a single part of her body to block his blow which helped to stand her ground. This was possible due to the difference in skill and technique since Shizu was the veteran between the two of them.

Shaking off his confusion, Azi again rushed forward to make another attempt at her. Using whatever he could think of to slip in just a single successful strike, he trial-n-errored his way to his goal.

While Shizu was a master in fighting foes who wielded a variety of weapons, she was unprepared for Azi's unorthodox style of combat that used his bare hands. She was also caught off by the unusual strength and speed he gained when his veins glowed blue but this occurred less and less as the fight went on.

To Azi, the motions and attacks he did felt familiar to him and Shizu could see how naturally he moved with that style of fighting. It was as if he had done this before.

As the fight continued, it neared to the end due to the ever-apparent increasing exhaustion on the pair's faces, the two fighters back stepped away from each other to break the clash that they were stuck in and glared at each other in silence.

Azi then took up a horse stance while both of his hands were out in front of him with his palms facing upwards. A red glow soon replaced the blue glow of the veins on his arms and with it a small match sized flame appeared in each of his palms.

Seeing this, Shizu quickly deduced that Azi was going to absorb the flames like he did before with Touma to give his punch more power, so she quickly reacted and charged to interrupt him.

While Shizu was focused on the flame on his hand, Azi's eyes followed the iron club in Shizu's possession as she approached. An indiscernible grin formed on his lips as she had fallen for his feint. Instead of gripping the flames to reabsorb them, he instead crossed his arms above his head as soon as Shizu struck down with her iron club.

Timing it just when the strike was about to make contact with his arms, Azi gripped both hands and absorbed the small flame's magic energy.

In the next few short moments, the iron club made contact with Azi's fiery arms, which then pushed back her iron club. A loud bang and then crack resounded as her iron club was shattered by the fiery magic released by his arms.

This made Shizu slightly flinch as the shockwave had traveled up into her body and left her open for an attack.

Moving quickly, Azi bent into a slight crouch and rushed to tackle Shizu in the stomach. Feeling the impact of his tackle, Shizu fell on her back and saw that Azi was now swinging his right fist down at her face.

Before it made contact, Azi stopped his attack when he suddenly felt cold steel pressing on the side of his neck.

"MATCH OVER. WINNER! SHIZU!"

Only a few millimeters separated Azi's fist from Shizu's face, if he was a second faster Azi would have been able to land a single successful strike on her.

Seconds passed as Shizu and Azi looked at each other and saw that they were both panting. It seems that the fight took its toll on both of them and they had given their all in this match.

They then withdrew their respective armaments away from each other, but Azi did not move to get up. Instead, he looked down and realized that he was straddling over Shizu.

Noticing the compromising position he was in, he quickly moved to get up but when he tried to put pressure onto his right foot in an attempt to stand, he slipped.

The feeling in his legs were faint due to the overuse of magical energies and the over stimulation he put them through when he pulled his stunts to get behind Shizu or to rush at her.

Very similar to the day he slipped down that mountain and met Ozen, Azi fell forward into the snowy ground. His face fell next to Shizu's head and the sound of a soft thump could be heard.

Going red in the face, Shizu writhed a bit under him as she felt embarrassed by how shameless this looked.

"Hey can you get up? I can't really move if you are on top of me, also this is embarrassing."

Azi responded in a soft tone that was so weak that Shizu could barely hear him.

"I ... can't move. Feeling..... Sleepy..... *snore* ZZZZZZZZZZZ"

Apparently, his head had hit the ground in just the right way that it rattled his brain into an unconscious state.

Shizu sighed but knew that this was somewhat her fault. 'I guess I pushed him too hard. Maybe I should try spoiling him a bit so that he feels motivated?'

Exasperated, Shizu then began to wrap her hands around Azi's body and lifted him up and off of her. She then moved him to a more comfortable position to hold him against herself. Ironically, Azi reflexively hugged whatever was near him and locked his legs and arms around Shizu's waist and neck.

This caused Shizu to chuckle since his actions were the same as when he was unconscious after she had bear hugged him until he went blue in the face.

Azi unconsciously acted as if it wanted to be pampered like a puppy begging for attention, so he grasped tightly to whatever felt soft and warm.

"I guess I am the pillow now? Hahaha." Giggling a bit, Shizu realized that Ben and Bail were approaching. Before they got within ear shot, Shizu patted Azi on the back in thanks for a good fight.

Seeing their interaction, the twin brothers smiled wryly at the sight. Ben spoke out first as he was impressed by Azi's display of power.

"The young lads got quite the talent."

"He goin to be ok?" Asked Bail.

"He should be fine, just a bit of exhaustion on his part. By the way, take this." Shizu tossed over a money pouch containing Azi's current budget.

"I overheard what he was buying. This should cover it and the rest is for the damages to the weapons."

Ben and Bail nodded in affirmation to Shizu and accepted the pouch.

"Well be heading out now, You two have a good.... huh? night?"

Shizu was confused by the sight of the night sky. To her, they had started their match when the sun was still out and she was too caught up in the fight to realize that such a large amount of time had passed.

"How long were we fighting?"

"You only notice now? You and the boy have been fighting for the past few hours. There were quite a few spectators earlier, but they left when it got dark. Ben here was worried that you might kill each other though so we made sure an apothecary was nearby."

Hearing Bail's explanation, Shizu felt a bit embarrassed but kept it from showing.

"Thanks for staying to watch over us. I'll drop by sometime in the future with a few stiff drinks as repayment."

"I look forward to it. So, where are you headed now?"

"An inn. It would take too long to get back to Kajima's house and Azi wanted to visit one. Please let Kajima know that we'll be at an inn tonight. I'll be on my way then, Good night."

As she left, Ben and Bail waved goodbye until she was out of sight.

After Shizu left with an asleep Azi clinging to her like a koala, Ben turned to Bail.

"That just happened right?"

"Yes, I saw Ben."

"Let me just make sure, you saw a fist counter and deflect a sword?"

"Yes, Ben I saw it."

"And that the fist was from a young boy?"

"Yes! Ben!"

"A young boy who was fighting Lady Shizu the Ordain Knight?"

"Yes!"

"Shizu, the one who is known as the Man Killer, who just now carried and willingly hugged a man."

"Ben?"

"Yeah?"

"Just shut up, I want to get a drink and sleep."

Letting out a sigh, Ben retrieved the liquor he received from Azi and handed it to his brother.

"Agreed."

After the two men had one of their apprentices deliver a message to Kajima, they then spent the next few hours getting black out drunk as they complained about the sheer absurdity that they had just witnessed. They went on and on until they fell asleep from the alcohol and were awakened when morning arrived.

Their apprentices were used to this kind of event so they knew how to wake the two up without any trouble.

But when they awoke, they did have to scramble a bit to quickly get Azi's materials ready as they preferred to not get on Kajima's bad side as he had a reputation of being hard on those that weren't timely on their agreements.

(A conclusion to a good fight and with new power to boot.)

(Look forward to Azi's growth and Shizu's development.)

(Comment on what you think about the series.)

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