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Intermission: Breeze on the hilltops
*YAAAAWN*~~~
Haruka stretched her pettite body as she lazily lay prone on the soft grass.
She rubbed her eyes with both hands, and staring to the blue skies above her head, she blinked.
The zaphire dome that stretched all over her greeted her with clear emptiness. Not a single cloud was in sight. Her blue eyes made a circle to take in every inch of the beautiful sky.
A soft wind rustled her short hair and slowly, she sat herself to see around her. The hill was a bright emerald green, with some few rocks and a small tree near the top. Looking at the base of the hill, she grinned at the small grey floating MAG that was approaching her.
"Kabachan!" she yelled and with a quick swipe, she grabbed the MAG and hugged it. The MAG let out a happy chirp and rubbed itself against Haruka's cheek.
"Kabachan, did Vryce ask you to come and get me?"
The MAG let out a chirp and a nod.
"Mmmmh... it's strange. I've been here for almost 3 hours, doing nothing... waiting for a supposed challenger in this VR field"
The MAG just shrugged and chirped again.
Suddenly, Haruka's wrist commlink came alive with a blue flash of light and a clear voice.
"Haruka, I'm sorry for the delay. There was difficulty fetching you an opponent, but I think I've found you someone..."
Haruka pouted and closed her eyes with indignation.
"This place is boring Vryce! At least you should have asked the operator, whoever he or she is, to let me get a glimpse of the Temple simulation the other hunters are talking about!"
"Sorry, but your operator and I had some differences... nothing that couldn't be smoothed over by the twinkle of several meseta, but he was really getting on my nerves" Vryce's voice sounded a little exhasperated.
Haruka got up her feet and looking around, she talked to her commlink once more:
"And where is this opponent, Vryce?"
"He should be spawning near you, just watch out, ok?"
"I can take care of myself very well, thank you very much, Vryce" said Haruka.
At that moment, a large ball of flames flew right into the small tree, bursting it into cinders. Haruka's surprise was quickly wiped away as she grabbed her MAG and leapt to the bottom of the hill.
Quickly snatching her Talis cards from her hip pocket and getting on a defensive stance, she glanced where she guessed the Foie technique had come from.
"Very good reflexes, for a girl..." a male voice came behind the small tree's burning remains.
The newman girl quickly glanced at the small bonfire. However her attacker was, he did move very fast. Gritting her teeth, she slowly made an arc with her arm, readying herself to throw a few Talis cards at the slightest movement her eyes could catch.
A few steps into the fire, a robed figure, not too tall, looked down at her from the cinders. Fire flashed against the eyeglasses, and a small grin crossed the young man's face.
"Well, well, well..." said the guy as he put his boot over the tree's stump.
"The infamous Haruka... one of the survivors in the ruins incident just a week and half ago..."
"You have me at a disadvantage... as you know my name and I don't ever recall meeting a little twerp like you!" she said as she tightened her grip on the cards. Her MAG chirped nervously.
"A name is a name is a name..." the young man smirked, crossing his arms over his chest. Closing his eyes, he waved a bang of his hair aside.
"So? Are you ready to begin losing, Haruka?"
"WHY YOU!?!??!"
Quickly, she threw two Talis cards at the emerald robed man and with her free hand, decided to cast a powerful Barta technique.
The two cards were quickly dodged with ease, and before the icy current of mystic power could hit her opponent, Haruka stared amazed at how, in mid-air, the man flipped once in the air and shot off a pair of twirling fireballs, spiralling outwards like a tornado.
Before hitting her, Haruka cast another quick technique. A field of electricity suddenly sprang into life surrounding her like a huge halo.
The fire died out at the moment the lightning appeared.
The green-robed man dashed towards Haruka, and reaching for his vest, he pulled out a saber hilt.
Haruka grinned.
This guy, clearly a well-trained force, was gonna go into melee with her? This was a joke!
Spinning backwards, she threw 5 cards in quick succesion. To her surprise, each one was quickly deflected by a whitish glow coming from the weapon her foe was using!
Stepping back, she cast a Foie at him, but he merely sidestepped and without losing a beat, kept running at her.
Her foe leapt low, with one foot forward and kicking the air out of Haruka, put one hand forward as he spun the white blade in his other hand.
Haruka fell backwards, on her butt, and put one hand on her stomach. Grimacing at her opponent, she tried to quickly think of a solution.
"My point, Haruka..." he said, putting the blade parallel to his other arm.
The newman girl suddenly realized what kind of saber-like weapon could be strong enough to deflect mystical projectiles. It was an Elysion! She had heard tales of it from Vryce.
"Well? Concede and I'll let you go back to the city Block where you live unscathed... try anything dumb, and I'll be most unhappy to marr your otherwise cute features..." he said, smiling slyly.
She let go of the Talis cards in her right hand.
Her foe just grinned at her, his face becoming alight with victory.
Then she grinned suddenly, and pointing with her right hand to her stomach, made her opponent look at her other hand.
"What the...?"
A large, purplish swirl of energy was coiled, ready to spring out at her foe. It was a very concentrated Megid, and by the look of her opponent, he knew this as well.
"I think I'm the winner here, whoever-you-are!" she said triumphantly.
But her enemy didn't flinch. He just smiled back and wiggled the outstretched hand's fingers.
"A stalemate, then?" he said.
"Huh?" Haruka felt the air around her charging up with mystic energy. A whitish glow gave her a clue of what was happening.
"WHY YOU DIRTY #@~!%&!!"
"Ah ah ah~!" said the guy shaking his head reprobingly "Language, my cute newearl..."
"Well... the results are in..." said Vryce as he surveyed the two persons standing in front of him.
One was Haruka. She looked as pissed and bad-tempered as when she wasn't allowed to go treasure hunting with him. She crossed her arms in front of her and pouted. Her foot quickly tapped the floor with one shoe with impatience.
The other was the green robed man. He looked happy, with a wide smile on his face. He just had his hands behind his back.
Both looked disheveled and dirty. Their hair all a mess and sticking out in all directions.
Their clothes had seen better days.
"Haruka, you got great marks for showing a great ability to use your techniques to counter your opponent's attacks" Vryce paused and went straight to the bottom of the page, and read aloud "You got a B rank, according to the data..."
"WHAT!?!?!?" she stomped her foot with indignation.
"Quiet you!" Vryce looked at her with a stern glance, and Haruka just steamed in silence.
"Kit, you showed great skill with both mystical and weapon training... however, you left yourself open at the last moment, costing you an otherwise flawless victory... the computer gave you an A Rank for your performance..."
"Oh well... it's hard to concentrate while fighting such a cute girl..." he smiled, and half cocked his head towards Haruka.
"HOW DARE YOU!?!? KIT???? WHAT KIND OF A NAME IS THAT?!?!?!" bellowed Haruka, flailing her arms up and down.
"A very short name I guess..." he shrugged, still smiling, but putting his hands in front of him to protect himself from the angry newman girl.
"Still, because of your inadequate conduct at the end of the exercise, you both got C rank grades..." Vryce wasn't smiling as usual... actually, a vein had popped up in his temple.
"WHAT!?!?!?!?!"
"Oh well..." said Kit simply
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN 'OH WELL'????" Haruka was just an inch from strangling the young man "DO YOU KNOW HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE TO GET THAT GRADE BACK AT 'A'????"
"Of course, but it's nothing if I help you out"
"YOU?!? HELP ME OUT?!? HA!!!"
"I think I can manage with my schedule to give you some late lessons with melee fighting... after all, I am very busy during the day" he said, smiling innocently.
Haruka seemed about to explode at that moment.
Vryce put a hand over her shoulder and told her, sternly:
"You need to get as much help as you can get"
"But but but but..." she blinked twice at the words that Vryce had just spoken.
"And I can't have Raz help you out in this one..." he glanced at Kit, who seemed very pleased with himself, even with the low score he had made in the VR test.
"Agh... oh well..." her shoulders slumped down in defeat.
"I can come back in about 8 hours... is that all right with you Haruka?" Kit smiled at her.
"Yeah, yeah... whatever..."
"All right! It's settled then!" Kit said as he grabbed her hand and shook it.
Haruka didn't look too pleased at this, and withdrew her hand as quickly as she could.
"See you then, it's a date!" said Kit, waving his hand at the two and exiting the test room.
"IN YOUR DREAMS!!!" she stuck out her tongue and crossed her arms, fuming.
"Oh god..." said Vryce as he pleaded to some higher power to give him patience.
To be continued...
 Tsunami K · Wed Sep 13, 2006 @ 09:33pm · 0 Comments |
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