So Kepa Ying could skate on one leg, have armor prevent damage, and scan things with her helmet. That was absolutely nothing new! There were a bunch of things that she can’t do, because the armor is in pieces. Other than the fact that she could apparently use the armor on the arm to do some sort of attack, she hadn’t learned anything at all from that whole encounter.

As if to punctuate the bad mood, the guy who had stolen her arm and helmet in the first place comes down the steps, in an aggressive posture.

“Wang Yun, hello,” says the beast, giving face to the bandit for some reason. “While we may have not been introduced in the most amiable manner, I am fully prepared to-”

“This ship ain’t big enough for the both of us,” he interrupts loudly, striding toward Kepa Ying, “Not without you learning your place in the pecking order. I’m the boss around here, and you work for me.”

He gestures at the pile of bottles off to the side, and one rises up into his hand. The liquid inside almost forces itself out as the bottle stops on contact with the man, the cork popping across the hold and bouncing off to somewhere indistinct. The bandit starts to drink straight from the container, only to be stymied when every single bottle suddenly disappears.

“Nooooooo,” says the beast as all the alcohol enters Kepa Ying’s inventory, “I needed some of that!”

“Oh,” says Wang Yun, his eyes narrowing at his suddenly empty hand, “the bodyguard beast taking umbrage at the idea his charge be subservient? I hear from Lin Laotian that you’re not that tough.”

“That was me,” declares Kepa Ying, pulling the open bottle out of her inventory and throwing it behind her, to the beast’s dismay, “I don’t need to rely on another’s strength for everything!”

“If you’re so clearly able to stand up for yourself, how about you show that you aren’t weak enough to be at the bottom of the hierarchy up on deck?”

“Up with the monsters you mean?”

“Those are just another attack to defend yourself from. If the spoiled imperial can’t deal with a freshly spawned random encounter, then clearly you were going to lose the bout anyway.”

“There’s no way I’d lose to you,” she retorts, adding ‘again’ in her mind.

“Be there soon, I’ll be expecting tribute when I win,” the bully says, turning and going back up the steps without even looking back.

Kepa Ying starts to go up after him, only to feel a slight pressure on her chest back toward the beast. She stops, turning around to glare and the beast.

“Hold on, at least let me set up a voice command for the arm’s single shot function. You aren’t me, so you’re going to need to use less efficient methods of controlling the thing. Ideally, that means having to touch as few things as possible, because that means less chance of breaking anything. Would you kindly say ‘fire ki blast’ for me?”

“Fire ki blast? What’s that supposed to mean?”

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“It’s just something you won’t say unless you want to shoot someone.”

“That makes sense,” Kepa Ying allows, and turns back around again to head out.

“Hold on a second,” the beast interrupts again, “before you run off to throw explosives around, give me a bottle from your inventory. This one is empty.”

“Here you go,” she says, tossing something toward him. Much like the previous bottle, the cork pops out as it collides with the target, though the fact that it instead hit him in the face rather than the hand made the effect less impressive. The beast fumbles for the glass before it falls, juggling it up a few times before it drops down onto the wooden floor sideways. Nothing spills out, and the beast drops the stick to bend over and pick up the second bottle. Kepa Ying steals the weapon while he’s distracted by drinking the whole bottle without stopping to breathe once.

She’s unable to look away from the spectacle.

“But why,” she questions, highly concerned.

“I needed an empty bottle,” he responds.

That was fine, whatever. An immortal beast could do as he pleased, she guessed. Ignoring the antics, she just goes back up to beat up the mugger through the power of shooting him.

By the time she reaches the top deck, the guard from before is gone. She had already forgotten his name anyway, it wasn’t like he was going to be important. Instead, Wang Yun is standing in his place.

Rather than wasting time with talking, Kepa Ying raises her arm toward the bandit and realizes she has to talk to fire anyway. “Fire ki blast,” she says, and a small white ball generates from the hand before launching toward Wang Yun’s chest. Flowing like water, he bends to the side and around the sphere, standing back at full height almost before the projectile passes him.

“Nice tr-” he starts, before the white dot hits the wall behind him and explodes. Kepa Ying isn’t sure what kind of energy that was, but it certainly wasn’t fire. Wang Yun stands exactly where he had been, and the concussive force passes him, ending just before where Kepa Ying had fired from. That was good to know, that she should not try to shoot at anything close to her.

Wang Yun seems to come to the same conclusion, charging forward to grab onto the girl with his superior reach and mass. Remembering the last time she saw him, she kicks out with her right, armored leg, hoping for the fire to come out and blast into her opponent.

“Hey hey no don’t even try to use that, the kick is a planet buster,” comes the subtitles in her helmet. Distracted, Kepa Ying barely notices that the man ahead of her dodged the kick, likely because he also remembered the boot to the face from earlier.

“I thought you said there was fire that came out of there,” she complains at the beast.

“It takes about thirty seconds to charge up, and I didn’t even set up a voice command for the jets to activate for you,” he replies, having finally made his way up onto the top of the boat. A bottle in each hand, he just stands at the doorway into the ship, watching the fight.

“Fine, I’ll do this the hard way then,” Kepa Ying declares, pointing her arm at Wang Yun again. “Ki blast.”

The man dodges out of the way, but nothing happens. Kepa Ying steps forward and punches him in the stomach with her left arm, then slides herself backward. With her right, armored leg forward, she pulls back to dodge whatever Wang Yun planned for his next move.

“Hey, isn’t that enough to show you aren’t an easy target,” questions the beast, “you can probably stop fighting now.”

“Calm down, I promise I won’t destroy the boat,” she tells the beast. She might not be strong enough to win, but a cultivator shouldn’t shy away from a fight.

“There’s no need for any boat destroying,” interjects Wang Yun, “I apologize for insinuating that a member of the Imperial Clan would be anything other than a wellspring of raw energy that can obliterate all of us with a gesture.”

Oh that was annoying. She wanted to beat his face in.