Seth eyed me with a glare. It bordered on baleful. “Do you understand why I am angry?”

“No,” I admitted. I have little to no idea what I am doing at the best of times anymore.

A vein bulged on Seth’s forehead. He took a deep breath, “I had hoped to avoid distractions.”

“Oops?” I managed.

“It’s alright,” Seth said calming himself, “We will deal with that-” he waved at the door, “-and then get back to my planned training.”

I nodded, “Sounds good. What was your plan?”

“I arranged for a few others to spar with you and help you work out possible means to unlock more stages of your martial art.”

“Oh, then this is just on more one the pile,” I said. I turned toward the door.

Seth stopped me, “Is that guy over there single?” He pitched his voice low and just slightly nodded to indicate my British friend.

“I am pretty sure you would have to fight Janie and her gunsmiths to get to him,” I owed Brand a little interference.

I could see gears turning in Seth’s head, “Eh, probably not worth it. …Sorry for the awkward question. I have been a bit lonely since my husband died.”

Willpower check… Successful

Emotional state remains in control

The skill roll wasn’t surprising. The fact that the one guy chosen by the Goddess of War in this specific place just so happened to be a widower like me - like the Titan - No! Like me. I may not be the Titan, but I lost Marnie as much as anyone. Either way this felt staged. Like a fictional story. Was it Lola’s work? Did Wilson do this? Did some other Narrator literally rewrite history to put Seth and I in the same room?

That wasn’t the important bit right this second, “I am truly sorry for your loss.” I almost put a hand on his shoulder, but it felt a bit too forward. Plus my hands are tremendous and it would probably come across more oppressive than compassionate.

Expression check… Successful

Seth nodded, a weak smile on his face. He understood that I was sympathetic and had an understanding of what it is like to lose a loved one. “Don’t worry. I have made peace with it. I mean, I was the one who had to kill him.”

Willpower check… Successful

Emotional state remains in control

Note: Repeated rolls will increase the difficulty.

“Oh,” I managed. This was definitely Narrator fuckery. My thumb touched the nail on my pinkie finger. Don’t let them see this bothered me. I just watched Seth impassively.

Seth seemed to realize what he said, “There is more to it than that!”

“Doug! Are you there!” Gisele called.

“Yeah. Two minutes!” I called back. I focused on Seth again. “Let’s not let this fester pointlessly. Yes or no, did you have a good reason?”

Seth paled before he answered, “Yes. He did terrible things people for the war against the Fantasy Coast.”

Perception check… Successful

Seth is telling the truth.

“I believe you. After this fist fight stuff, I think we should talk through this more. That okay with you?” I asked.

“Yeah,” Seth agreed, clearly not wanting to discuss this further right now.

Brand and Spine clearly saw something had happened between Seth and me. I gave them a thumbs up, and moved toward the door. I opened it and did the usual duck-and-shuffle out. As I stood I saw Gisele was not alone. Bob was with her. So were three more friends. Well, I am assuming they are friends. Otherwise why would they dress so similar?

The first new person was a short lady with a cautious look on her face, and red hat and gloves. The next was a tall young man with a scraggly beard and mustache and yellow hat and gloves. He also looked like this was a bad idea. The last was a skinny lady with long black hair and a blue hat and gloves. She was giving me a strange look. There was a mixture of disgust and horror, and for some reason she was blushing.

“Hey Doug! …woah you look like someone boiled you.” Gisele said. After a moment she poked my neck.

I was surprised and didn’t react, until something burst and gouted blood.

“Oh God!” Gisele screamed. Her friends screamed. Spine pointed and laughed.

Baneridden condition has expired.

Titanic Regeneration plus 38 Hit points

HP: 374/480

“It’s fine. I will heal.” The torrent of blood from neck slowed sputtered to a stop, “See”

“What the hell was that?” Valorie, the short girl with the red hat demanded.

“Blood,” I said with a dismissive wave.

“So you are ready to fight?” Gisele asked. She clearly wanted me to say yes but was doubtful I would.

“I mean, not this second I would like to establish some rules and probably have a 1, 2, 3, go.” I said. The newly grown skin pushed a big scab off my head. It crumbled into dust on the wind. I smiled and gave Gisele a thumbs up.

“Okay, I am going to take charge here. Each of you gets one round fighting Doug. This is NOT a duel. It will not be a duel! Everyone will respect tap outs. If you want to stop, say ‘I give!’ Also, if I say stop, you stop.”

Everyone but me nodded like that was all really basic and how things should be. Not wanting to be left out, I nodded right along.

“I call first!” Gisele yelled.

“That’s fair,” I agreed

“I don’t care,” Seth muttered, he shivered, “I’m freezing my tits off. I need my coat out here.” he marched toward the door and stopped, “ 1, 2, 3 Go!”

Gisele attack blocked x3

Gisele didn’t need to be told twice. First she aimed a quick jab at my center mass. I swatted it away with my left hand. She turned that into an uppercut, but I caught that with my right hand. Grinning like a mad woman she then tried to sweep my leg. Her shine collided with my knee with hammer force.

She all but instantly juked back to avoid whatever counter-attack I had planned. Which would have been smart if I had planned a counter-attack at all. I was more than a bit distracted. Gisele’s attacks were well aimed and executed almost perfectly. Trouble was I felt a systematic force slowing the strike, dampening her strength and giving me more time to react.

Gisele saw the contemplative look on my face and the mad grin faded. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No,” I said. Still puzzling through this, “Could I do something that could be considered rude before attacking?”

“Go nuts, I'm not shy,” She said. She changed her stance slightly, bracing for an attack.

Analyze check… Successful

Name:

Gisele Carvalho

Race:

Human (Marked by Power)

Class:

Master Martial Artist

Level:

23

HP:

58

Power:

7

Mobility:

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

7

Body:

6

Mind:

4

Face:

4

Magic:

4

Boon:

Pink Energy Coin

The chosen bearer of the mystic trooper coin. Allows access to the mystic trooper equipment and locations.

Trait:

Ideal Bone Structure

This perk allows for increased ability to learn martial arts. For the sake of mastering martial arts the bearer of this trait is treated at one level of scale higher.

Perks:

Battle Joy

Some people just like fighting. The bearer of this perk can add the highest of Body, Mobility, or Power to all Mind and Face base rolls to resist mental effects while in combat. Also you get to have fun and feel good while fighting.

Cold Weather Acclimated

Unlock survival skills related to cold weather environments. Also gain one level of scale to resisting cold.

Disposition: Gisele thinks you are really cool, and kinda hot. Normally she isn’t into overly burly guys, but you pull it off. She is also overjoyed at getting to spar with what she sees as the peak of combat power.

Yep, that was the issue. Gisele was pretty high level… I think. That said her attributes were simply too low. The way the system worked she just could not roll higher than I could unless I critically failed. The fact this skill also offered insight into people’s thoughts and mood was still invasive.

Wait! Why was she attracted to me if I wasn’t her type? Ah shit, that stupid achievement from Adora. I needed to get that sorted out sooner rather than later.

“Okay, I know I said I am not shy, but that may have found the limit.” Gisele said, wide-eyed.

“My bad, wanna try punching me in the head? See if that makes you feel better?” I offered.

The look of fear changed to realization, “It would. Don’t hold back!”

I planned to hold back.

She charged. First she tried a quick one-two punch and kick. I blocked both. Then she bobbed down and struck out with a rising uppercut. I dodged that. Her attack flowed into a spin kick. I caught her leg, and without thinking flung her away. Oops, I hadn’t looked where I was aiming. It was right at the wall. I flinched, waiting for the crunch.

It didn’t come. Gisele did some sort of hyper-bendy midair flip and landed feet first on the wall of Seth’s shed. She then immediately sprang back at me with a heavy kick aimed at my head. That was surprising. Not enough to stop me from blocking her, but close. Kinda. My hand stopped her cold.

She pushed off and landed about ten feet back.

Seth stepped out clad in his coat. Seeing the two of us both still standing he scolded, “Quit sandbagging.”

“I am just level setting,” I explained.

“Not you. Her,” Seth said, adjusting his hood.

In about the same time it took me to stare at Set with a dumb look on my face, Gisele pulled a glowing Pink Disk out of her Pocket, “Mystic Trooper Pink!” she shouted while posing.

The world went dark and a speed metal guitar riff blazed into existence. Gisele slowly lifted into the air and began spinning around as Pink armor materialized around her. Where was the wind coming from? She was in a massive updraft, but this spot at least was fairly sheltered. She was really twirling now. How did she not get sick? I turned to ask Seth ‘What in the name of Saban was going on?’ but all the others were standing statue still. I walked over as voices sang out about ‘heroic magic mystic troopers’.

Yep, this was a time stop. I poked Seth and nothing happened. Testing something. I pushed him back a step. He slid freely but his body was locked up almost like stone. Weird.

There was another flash of light. “Hyah! …uh, where’d you go?” Gisele asked.

“Fuck!” Bob squeaked.

“The hell?” Seth asked.

Both of them jumped a good foot in the air realizing I had materialized in front of them. From their perspective that had to be upsetting.

Gisele was clad in a mixture of pink tights and armored plates. Her head was encased in a pink helmet with a black visor. She also had one of those spears with a machete blade on the end. “Seriously, how you get over there?” she asked. As she spoke she moved her head a lot and gestured broadly with her hands to better convey emotion, confusion in this case.

I shrugged, “We still fighting?”

“Damn skippy we are!” she yelled while pumping her arm. She then hefted her weapon and spun it a few times before charging.

Bob screamed again, and the others scattered.

Gisele attack blocked x4 and dodged x2

Okay, this was different. She could really make that weapon of hers move. The first swing would have brought the blade down on my head. When I blocked it Gisele swung the but of the spear sideways right at my face again. Blocking that up over my head meant the blade was swinging up at my stomach. When I slapped that down, she whirled and brought the club end down on my shoulder. When I smacked that aside she did a spin step into my reach and nearly chopped my knees off. I flipped over the attack, planting a hand to then have to jump using my arm to clear the kick she sent my way.

I landed on my feet but she pressed me hard. She was almost twice as fast, and hit nearly twice as hard. The systematic influence was also holding to a tighter window. It seemed like she had somehow boosted her stats, and probably scale. Gear is cool that way.

Sadly for her it still wasn’t enough. Hands down she was the more intelligent fighter and her technique was superior to mine, but my attributes were higher and the scale difference meant I was rolling bigger dice. So with the deck stacked so high in my favor I merely had to keep blocking and dodging. The opportunities to hit her were everywhere. After each blocked attack and every dodged Strike the Shadow prompts appeared. Ignoring them, I tried to observe her methods.

They weren’t bad. Sure, Gisele was extremely aggressive, but she wasn’t dumb. The pole arm gave her some serious reach. If she was fighting anyone shorter than me they would have a hell of a time reaching her. She would also set her attacks up in a chain. The first attack was meant to off balance the opponent, for the second to punish the obvious reaction.

“This isn’t enough! Another of you guys get in there.” Seth instructed.

“What the Hell?” Gisele and I demanded.

“This isn’t play time!” Seth shot back. He pushed Bob toward us. One transformation sequence later and Bob was shooting arrows at me. Now between the two of them they could land the occasional hit. Trouble was my regen was way too high for that to amount to anything.

Eventually Seth pushed Tamara, the girl in blue, into the fight. She had a chain with weights on either end. This introduced a new level of complexity. If I blocked the chain it would wrap around an arm or leg and slow me down more than a bit. This would let both Gisele and Bob get a hit in. While that wasn’t enough to chew through my regen it sure as hell didn’t tickle.

So i started using Ablative Shell. I also made it a point to exclusively Dodge Tamara’s chain. Then when Bob shot at me I would block his arrow and Redirect the arrow at Gisele.

Bob attack blocked

Redirect Check … Successful

Attack against Gisele … Blocked.

Turns out I wasn’t the only one who could block attacks. Gisele had to try harder than I did though. It wasn’t long before I had a second layer of Ablative shell. It was when I managed to vault Tamara’s chain, catch Bob’s Arrow and throw it back at him, land, grab the Chain and swing Tamara into Gisele that Seth sent Tobias, the yellow trooper into the fight.

A crowd had also formed and folks were cheering the kids on. Apparently I didn’t have a fan club. Eh, what can you do? Spine and Brand were… not cheering for me either. Instead they seemed to be taking bets with some members of the growing crowd. I am guessing they were betting on me. I mean, I hope they were. I wasn’t planning on throwing the fight.

Tobias had an oversized baseball bat with metal rivets in it. He was a big guy and knew how to be a bully boy. The impact of his attacks, blocked or otherwise, knocked me back a good yard each time. Like I said though Tobias really knew what he was doing. He would knock me into the other’s attacks, which upped their chip damage significantly. Right about the time I could get my third layer of ablative shell up they managed to crack the first, bringing it back to two.

I was still hesitant to actually attack these guys. Assuming everyone was a similar level to Gisele most of them could be dropped in two hits. I wasn’t fully informed but I was pretty sure the system would also do something nasty like break bones or something when my attacks connected. They certainly maimed the snow lions something awful.

To hell with snow lions.

Deflection check … Successful x2

Damage negated

That was surprising. Again, because the system thought balance was for bitches, while having multiple stacks of Ablative Shell meant I was allowed to make multiple deflection checks for each attack. Seriously, I was all for never getting into a fair fight, but this was nuts. The impact only ever applied to the oldest layer, but the roll for deflection seemed to occur in sequence. That meant that the ten percent chance to negate damage was actually nineteen percent with two layers and presumably just over 27 percent with three. That is when I realized I was an idiot, and the armor I was wearing would also have a chance at deflecting an attack. This meant fully stacked I had a 35.848% chance of negating all damage from a hit.

This reality, plus some minor adjusting in tactics to Block Tobias, Deflect Gisele, Dodge Tamara, and Block plus Redirect the attacks of Bob at the others, allowed me to get the third stack of ablative shell up with more that half on the damaged layer remaining, and lightly pepper the mystic troopers with Bob’s arrows. It didn’t really hurt them as far as I could tell but it scratched the armor hellaciously. Sparks everywhere!

Adjusting tactics again, I dodged Tobias’s big swing. Stepped into Tamara’s chain, let it wrap around my arm before pulling it tight. This tripped Gisele who crashed into Bob. I then put my strength into pulling the chain. Tamara held on and went for a ride. I swung her in a loop before crashing her into Tobias. The big guy would have kept his feet but he stepped onto Gisele and Bob.

That is when Valorie joined the fray. This was a little different. Her weapon was a red sword that was occasionally on fire. Mostly a split second before she hit me with it.

Clash of Styles!

Burning Blade Vs Unrelenting Glacier

Burning Blade has elemental superiority to Unrelenting Glacier

Burning Blade will gain an additional level of Scale.

Burning Blade damage doubled

That is an ominous prompt.

The more pressing concern was between Valorie, Gisele, and Tobias all trying to pummel me and Bob and Tamara running interference, my completely defensive strategy was pushed to its limit. To further the inconvenience they weren’t dumb they quickly figured out that Valorie was both more successful in hitting me and her attacks did more damage to my armor. So the others immediately adjusted to open as many opportunities as they could for her to stab, chop and slash me.

I kept using Deflection to minimize this, but was hard pressed to find something other than attacking them back as a response. That was a bit of a moot point since with all of them wailing on me at the same time was was

Deflection check … Successful

Damage negated

Deflection skill is now at Trained Level

Cosmic Martial has advanced

The fourth stage of the martial art is Rebounding Force

To strike the glacier is to attack a very force of nature. It is rare for such actions to not provoke consequences. Perform a counter-attack against up to Mind Attribute opponents who successfully attack you. A successful Deflection check will allow the counter to occur at a range of Magic Attribute yards.

Counter attack… Successful

Valorie takes 48 points of damage

Damage inflicts the Oh Snap Condition

Muscle memory kicked in when this advancement offered me a new counter attack option. I took it. I slammed one hand up on her wrist and one down on her upper arm. This caused bones to break with a nightmarish “Snap!”. To make matters worse, the sword swung back on Valorie and lodged in her neck.

We all just sort of stood there for a couple seconds.

Valorie screamed.

I screamed.

Blood spurted out of the injury!

The crowd let out a “Ugh!”

“Do we take it out? Do we leave it in?” I asked no one and everyone.

Valorie paused her screaming to kick me in the dick.

For once, it didn’t do anything because I still had Ablative Shell up. Well I guess it did communicate her feelings toward me.

Just as I was about to ask if I could do something to help, a snow lion pounced on me from off the top of Seth’s shed.