Chương 110: Longanimity

Typically, when one only ever encounters threats of completely different hierarchies of power than them, there is a measure of relief in facing far more compatible opponents. Christian had been fighting so many threats that were either too weak to challenge him or too strong for him to even bother contending with that he had gotten far too used to it. Now that he had two opponents conceivably on his level, it was actually hard for him to get used to.

He couldn't concede to overwhelming strength and only try to get a single foothold, and he couldn't coast on the massive gap in skill over a regular opponent. He was forced to actually think, and it was hard to do that when two men were moving like living whirlwinds towards him. His surujin fell to the wayside at one point, though he wasn't exactly in a position where swinging a chain around alongside a polearm was anything but a huge inconvenience.

The naginata he was swinging, however, gave him defined space that Moroides couldn't infiltrate. But that didn't stop the Father from repeatedly trying to prod. Ducking under his swings, leaning over the haft of the weapon, and more. After an attempt to sweep up more hairs from his arm to try and blight the air, Chris thrust the pommel of his naginata into the Father's nose, sending him stumbling back. In the same moment, Father Bambusa thrust his own weapon forward.

The bamboo spear, sharpened and aimed at Flowstate's chest, grazed off as the hero turned just enough for it to slide off. However, that did give Chris great opportunity. As Bambusa's arm was extended from the thrust, and with Flowstate's body turned he could just let one hand go free from the shaft of his weapon. That hand then thrust forward towards the overextended limb, specifically the elbow. A clean palm heel strike, pushing at the joint until it pushed even further past its normal flexibility.

No crack or pop. The muscles in Bambusa's arm were too conditioned to break at even a firm push. But it definitely seemed to hurt as the martial artist stepped away to check the limb for further damage. That didn't give Chris much room to breathe however, as Moroides had swung a leg towards him in a smooth, arcing kick. There was a moment where Flowstate considered just swinging his naginata towards the limb. It'd be a clean cut, take it off entirely.

That'd be effective, but the issue he saw was there was no moving his arm into a position to help the backswing enough that way before he'd get kicked, ruining the strike. His arm was still in a downward motion. But he could still work with that in a way. Following through on the motion of his arm, he instead swung around and ducked under the kick. As he spun back towards the haft, he thrust his palm up and under it, slamming it behind Moroides' knee and forcing him to swing even further forward.

That same motion resulted in another turn, but this time the naginata came with him. Moroides' leg was still in the compensatory over swing, and Chris' weapon was pointed towards the leg he planted down. It all came naturally from there. Whipping the weapon forward, he thrust the blade through Moroides' shin and into the top of his foot, pinning the limb in place as it penetrated the ground below.

The Father let out a shout of what sounded more like frustration than agony, working towards trying to free the weapon from his limb. No time to revel in the victory. He could hear Bambusa off to his side. Looking over, the Father was looking to swing the weapon at him almost like a baseball bat towards him. There was no real space for direct parrying. He was able to land offensive plays everywhere else, but here he had to go entirely for a dodge.

He swung himself back, intentionally throwing himself back-first to the ground to let the bamboo rod swing over his head. As Chris broke his fall the same way he was trained to since he was a child, hips dipped down, and hands reaching back and slapping the ground to kill his momentum. His right hand, however, caught the texture of metal. The chain of his surujin. It was a long weapon, so of course it could scatter both close and far away. Luck was on his side.

Chris immediately gripped the chain, swinging it with abandon toward Bambusa. Seemed that it was the handle of the weapon that went flying, coiling around the neck of the Father. Flowstate did not hesitate to immediately roll over onto the suddenly tense chain, forcing the off-balanced ADU member to the ground. In the same roll, he stuck a leg out, letting his full body weight slam knee-first into Bambusa's back. There, he felt a vertebra pop, and that was the best sensation he could've gotten.

Following through on the roll further, he rolled over the Father and ended up in a kneel on the opposite side of him. Silence lingered in the air, and with that moment of recovery, Chris only then realized how much had happened in what was just seconds. Bambusa was still recoiling from the kick and the metal chain wrapped around his neck, and Moroides had only just finished yanking the naginata out from his foot.

"You're devious, vulgar," Moroides admitted.

"Why are you wasting your- hnn!" He started, interrupted by a grunt of pain as he adjusted in stance, dropping the weapon entirely.

"-talents with the government? If you joined us, you easily would have the skills and p- hgh!" Another grunt.

"-power to match us. Maybe higher," he panted out.

"Not interested," Chris called out as he thrust his arms down, letting his tonfa slip out of his sleeves and into his hands.

"God didn't put me in this world to kneel to trees." A smile best describable as a severe case of sour grapes spread across his face.

"Then I suppose I'll be taking you out of it!" Initially winding up for what might have been a lunge, Chris was instead surprised by his naginata flying through the air towards him. The lunge was a feint, and he instead used the opening to kick the weapon at Flowstate. Swinging his left tonfa, he batted the weapon aside, but in that moment of whirling, his vision was obscured by his own weapon. Same as the first time he fought these two.

Yet again, Moroides was going for a low tackle, in a perfect position for his tonfa to just punch him square in his nose. But that would be too light. He needed to make sure a message was sent. The last time, he turned the tonfa upwards, resulting in a hit too weak to hurt due to not having enough momentum. This time, he simply bent his arm at the elbow, bracing weapon horizontally, and a bit lower than the nose. If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road.

Please report it. And just like that, Moroides slammed himself teeth-first into the tonfa, having several of his ivories entirely knocked out by Chris' elbow strike. The villainous martial artist stumbled and fell back, blood and teeth flying from his mouth, making him gag in pain. Chris flicked his gaze over towards Bambusa, who was still failing to get on his feet. The hero had maybe ten or twenty seconds before he'd be ambulatory again. If he hit the right area, at least, Bambusa wouldn't be too mobile.

That didn't matter, though. What mattered was Moroides. Grabbing the hafts of both tonfa in one hand, allowing for a greater, club-like mass, Chris approached the prone Father, and with one clean swing slammed the weapon down onto Moroides' knee. The impact caused the joint to give way with ease, bringing out a gurgling scream from the villain that was then swiftly interrupted by another smack across the jaw from the weapon. There was Moroides out of the picture for now.

Now it was time for Bambusa, who was back on his feet. Out from the bamboo shoots along his arms came two more rods, one held in each hand. There were no words as he suddenly began whirling over, swinging low and nearly grazing his own comrade's head in one swift motion. The swings came too fast for offensive action yet again, leaving Flowstate in a position of having to cede ground and back away. He tossed one of his tonfa back into his other hand to wield them akimbo again, gripping them by the ends like clubs.

Bambusa planted a wrapped foot on the other Father's back, changing his grip to an overhand wield of his weapons. He then opted for a set of thrusts this time to avoid getting within the reach of a now-ready Flowstate. This would have worked, if not for the hero using the handles of his tonfa to hook the bamboo shoots and bring them down. Those thrusts were the easiest for him to counter, which made Chris wonder why the Father went for it agai- Foot.

He wanted the forward momentum to set up a flying kick, aimed squarely for his exposed jaw. That same foot that was just on Moroides' back. The impact against his chin and teeth rang through to his jaw, his neck, the back of his head. That alone was overwhelming, but then came the pain of those hairs that Bambusa picked up from Moroides' back, which lit a fire along his mouth yet again. That kind of pain along your face causes an instinctive reaction to open your mouth, and Chris was not immune to the phenomenon.

The notion of cool air rushing past his lips and the hot pain of his teeth was just pure instinct. An instinct that could only lead to regret, as Bambusa dropped one of his rods. The other one swept over Moroides a couple more times. It was in that moment that Chris finally noticed all the built up potential energy of numerous little fibers around Bambusa. That's why he was swinging. he wanted to get a bunch of them in the air all at once.

By the time Chris had noticed, Bambusa raised up the lone bamboo rod he still had, which was when Chris noticed its hollow, tube like structure. Bambusa then blew right into it, sending fibers flooding into Chris' mouth and lungs yet again. The fire and lightning was born anew and it made him see stars. He couldn't even gag, just the tensing of his throat felt impossible from the pain.

Instinct took over again as Chris simply whipped one of his tonfa forward, throwing the weapon with enough force to slam into Bambusa's head with a meaty slap that sent him stumbling back and clutching his face. Flowstate had mere seconds to recover from this. Digging through his costume, he procured the Green Whistle that was handed to him, immediately starting to inhale its frigid air. The first inhale did little more than cool the fire in his airways, but it was a start.

The second began to relax the tensed muscles. The third was when the fatigue set in. He couldn't make his muscles tense anymore. But the pain relief was necessary. Bambusa was wiping the blood from his face, cursing out something as he tried regaining his balance. The fourth inhale was taking him from just tired to downright sleepy. The cool inhale made it even more alluring. Bambusa was stable. He already had a bamboo rod out, which he was readying for a javelin toss. Chris didn't care.

The fifth inhale was necessary, but now he could feel his arm struggling to hold it up, his legs struggling to hold himself up. The bamboo spiraled through the air. Chris couldn't parry or break it. His body was too tired. So he simply went with the flow, and fell back onto the ground. The fatigue made him so slack that the hard concrete didn't even hurt. The painkiller fell out of his hand, leaving him limp as his body processed the Green Whistle.

What worried him was that the fatigue did not stop immediately like Leo told him. It must've needed a minute to metabolize or something. But in that time, it meant he couldn't be forceful. He had to rely on his enemy's own strength. Chris slowly pushed himself back to his feet, and at the same time Bambusa was already closing the gap, swinging another bamboo shoot.

Ducking under it was easy enough, but it occurred to him with the kind of momentum Bambusa was throwing out with his hands, there was a way to disable that grip. He lazily brought a hand up to the incoming swing, barely securing an isolated middle finger in the movement. The force of Chris weaving forward while Bambusa swung past him was all the force he needed, as the digit was not only yanked out, but crackled and popped as it tore through flesh and left it hanging halfway down his torn hand.

Bambusa couldn't even pretend to maintain composure as he let out a horrible scream from the pain, dropping the weapon to clutch at the wound. But Chris knew the adrenaline would kick back in soon enough, so he had to disable Bambusa completely in that split second. He didn't have enough strength for another beat down. He had to aim for a soft target, with the least amount of tension in his hands. He could keep just that bare minimum in his hands with his fingers splayed out.

His ring and index finger sat parallel while his middle finger raised up enough to not get broken from the incoming strike. With one clean thrust- plk His two fingers dug into Bambusa's eyes, down to the second knuckle. The Father couldn't even scream at that point, letting out this choking noise as Chris limply pushed him off.

The two ADU members were left curled up the ground, humiliated and broken, as Flowstate stumbled towards his naginata and procured it on his stride over to where the civilians were caged in by Bambusa's bamboo.

"Sorry you all had to see that," the hero stated groggily before two clean strokes of his weapon broke down a portion of the cage to let them all rush out, others having to limp from pain inflicted by Moroides.

"I have to do a few things here. I need you guys out within ten minutes, it should only be a five minute run to get out of here," he explained, before giving them the path he took to get to them. As they all rushed out, Chris brought a hand up to his earpiece.

"Sam, let the national guard know I've got civilians coming out in a few minutes. Tell them they're good to come in to collect the ADU guys here too." She gave the okay, and then Chris took to body collection. He just piled them all up a decent ways away from the tree trunk, knowing they weren't exactly going to go anywhere as they nursed their injuries. He then dug through his costume to procure the burning device he was given, approaching the tree.

Stabbing it into the trunk itself, he then sunk his thumb against the plunger. There was nothing for a few moments, before a brighter orange made itself known under the bark. He could already feel the heat spreading. The heat of smoldering Wyrdwood. The heat of victory, that both soothes and burns.