Negima and the Curse of the Dreadnoids
Chapter 7: The Chinese Martial Art Duel
As the two sides faced off, the president watched with fear on his face. He wasn't sure if to cheer for Negi's group or call them fools walking towards their death. Kaede chuckled.
"I think I'll let you two handle them first. Don't go and kill them without my approval though." Kaede said. Fei Ku chuckled.
"No worry. I think I can contain my urge." Fei Ku said. She was staring at Kotaro while Chao locked eyes with Asuna. The two charged while Asuna raised her blade. Chao swung a punch that rattled Asuna in her armor.
"Whoa! That's some power!" Asuna said. Chao managed to knock away Asuna's sword and attack her with a barrage of punches. Kotaro and Fei Ku locked hands with their eyes burning with the flames of determination.
"Just so you know...I DON'T plan on losing to a girl!" Kotaro said. Fei Ku laughed and kneed Kotaro in the stomach. He groaned and started losing his grip.
"Well, I have a little power behind this cute exterior!" Fei Ku said. She struck Kotaro hard in the face with a punch and then unleashed a kick that sent Kotaro crashing into Akira.
"Come on Fumika!" Fuka said. Fuka and Fumika charged for Fei Ku when she wasn't looking.
"Now try this!" Fuka and Fumika said. They made multiple clones and they jumped on top of Fei Ku. They completely buried her.
"We got ya!" the Fuka clones shouted. But with a ferocious burst of power, Fei Ku blasted all of the clones off her. As the clones vanished, Fuka and Fumika were left.
"Got YOU!" Fei Ku said. But as she leaped up to attack them, Negi fired a spell that knocked Fei Ku off her focus. Seeing an opening, Kotaro unleashed a straight up kick to Fei Ku's jaw and she went tumbling back. Kotaro dashed for Fei Ku and unleashed a barrage of punches. Fei Ku shielded with her arms.
"Darn it! This kid is good!" Fei Ku thought. Meanwhile, Asuna tried to attack Chao but she was too fast. When Asuna swung her blade, she saw Chao standing on the tip of it!
"Hey! Get off my blade!" Asuna shouted. Chao laughed.
"What's wrong red? Too slow to even fight back? Truly pathetic." Chao said. Asuna growled.
"I am NOT pathetic! Now get off my blade!" Asuna shouted. Chao chuckled and rushed towards Asuna. She struck her hard in the face and Asuna crashed to the ground.
"You are such a wimp." Chao said. Asuna growled and got back up. She planted her sword into the ground and faced Chao with anger in her eyes.
"You're gonna PAY for that! Now you made me REALLY mad!" Asuna shouted. Chao laughed.
"Hopefully you fight better without that stupid sword." Chao said. Asuna charged for Chao and swung multiple punches. But Chao just dodged them all and struck her in the gut. She grabbed Asuna by her hair and raised her head up.
"I don't believe it. You're even a lamer fighter than a sword wielder." Chao said. She drew her fist back and was ready to punch Asuna. But right before she could, Akira blasted her with a stream of water.
"Hands off my friend!" Akira said. She created a water ring around her and fired the blast towards Chao. Chao tried to force back the water. Meanwhile, Negi was facing Kaede to try and weaken her while Fuka and Fumika went over to free the president.
"Kaede! If you can hear me, you have to fight back! Don't let that bug control you!" Negi shouted. Kaede chuckled and swung her giant fists. She missed and Negi hopped onto his staff.
"Coward! No silly magic trick can match the power I have now!" Kaede said. From afar, Nodoka watched with her book opened. She was reading the minds of Fei Ku, Chao and Kaede. On their pages, all three of them were crying out for help.
"Oh. I wish I could do more than read minds." Nodoka thought. From afar, a hooded figure watched Nodoka. Negi rose high in the air and fired a blast of light towards Kaede. The force pushed her back but Kaede wasn't impressed. The spikes on her back created lightning and she fired at Negi.
"Watch it kid!" Chamo shouted. Negi quickly dodged the lightning as fast as he could before getting zapped. He fell off his staff and Asuna saw him falling head first towards the ground.
"Negi!" Asuna shouted. As Akira kept Chao at bay, Asuna dove for Negi and caught him in her arms. She shielded him as they slid on the ground. When they stopped, Asuna got up and looked at Negi.
"Negi? Negi? You alive?" Asuna said. Negi coughed and sat up.
"Th...Thank you Asuna." Negi said. Chamo was hanging onto the staff.
"Negi! Help!" Chamo shouted. Negi got up and called the staff back. He caught it along with Chamo. Chamo sighed.
"Thanks a load Negi. I...look out!" Chamo shouted. Kaede charged for the three of them with her giant fist ready to swing. Negi tried to move but his leg was hurt a bit from the lightning.
"Oh geez!" Asuna said. She picked up Negi and leaped away before Kaede's fist could get them. Asuna looked at Negi.
"Negi! You stupid kid! You just got zapped with lightning!" Asuna said. Negi said he had to help the others somehow. Meanwhile, from atop the palace roof, the same two hooded figures from Venice watched them. The taller one looked to the other.
"Very well." the other said. The figure nodded and descended down towards Negi's group. Kaede chuckled and grabbed Asuna in her giant hand. She dropped Negi and was raised up to Kaede's face.
"Stay out of my way!" Kaede said. She threw Asuna away and headed for Negi. But Asuna's shouting came to an abrupt end when the hooded figure caught her.
"Huh? What was...huh?" Kaede said. Everyone stopped fighting to see the hooded figure descending to the ground with Asuna in it's arms.
"Hey! Who are you?!" Fei Ku said. The hooded figure put Asuna down and put her hood down. Negi and Asuna gasped. The face beneath the hood was Chachamaru!
"Chachamaru?! What are you doing here?!" Asuna said. Fei Ku saw Chachamaru as a more interesting opponent than Kotaro and rushed towards her. Chachamaru saw Fei Ku charging for her. When Fei Ku got too close, Chachamaru ducked down and kicked Fei Ku hard in the gut.
"Gah! What a...hit!" Fei Ku thought. Chachamaru punched her and Fei Ku went tumbling back into Kotaro. Kotaro grabbed Fei Ku by her legs and started spinning her around.
"Let's see how you like this!" Kotaro said. When he spun around fast enough, he released Fei Ku and she crashed into Chao. Meanwhile, Fuka and Fumika had just freed the president.
"Quick! Get out of here!" Fuka said. He nodded and started to flee. Kaede saw him escaping and roared. She grabbed Negi tightly in her grasp. Negi's pain from earlier was starting to hurt.
"You and your friends have had it!" Kaede said. Negi looked at her and saw her spikes generating electricity again. He saw his staff on the ground and got an idea. He managed to levitate the staff to his hand and shouted a spell. Once the spell was finished, he threw his staff towards the ground beneath Fei Ku and Chao.
"Bad move!" Kaede said. She fired the lightning but it was directed towards Negi's staff and she zapped Fei Ku and Chao!
"What?!" Kaede said. Negi chuckled saying his spell turned his staff into a lightning rod. Kaede growled and slammed Negi into the ground.
"So what? I have my fists to finish YOU!" Kaede said. She drew her fist back with Negi cowering in fear. Asuna tried to rush to him, but Fei Ku and Chao cut her off.
"No! Negi!" Asuna shouted. Suddenly, just as Kaede swung, she was frozen in place! Her fist was encased in blue energy.
"Wait. What...What's going on?!" Kaede shouted. Suddenly, Chao and Fei Ku were glowing the same as Kaede's fist.
"I feel weird!" Fei Ku said. Just then, Nodoka saw a hooded figure leap down with her hands sticking out from under her sleeves. Her hands were using psychokinesis to hold Kaede and the others in place. When Chao saw who it was, she gasped.
"Why are YOU here?! You're supposed to be helping us!" Chao said. Nodoka looked at the hooded figure and tried to see her face. But with a bump of her elbow, Nodoka was pushed back. However, Nodoka got a quick glimpse of what looked like dark blue hair with two bells on it. Nodoka gasped.
"Yue?" Nodoka thought. She looked to her book and called out Yue's name. With a gasp, the hooded figure looked back at her. Asuna and the others saw her as well.
"Wait! Is that...Yue?!" Asuna said. Realizing the danger Negi was still in, Asuna hurried over and got him. The hooded figure looked back at Kaede and her group. She clapped her hands and that caused Kaede's group to crash into each other.
"Agh! Can't...move!" Fei Ku said. Negi told Asuna that someone should give them the elixir now. Asuna found the bottle in Negi's shirt pocket and threw it to Fuka. Fuka rushed over to Kaede and the others. She managed to give them each a dose. The three shrieked loudly and their bugs were ejected from them.
"Talk about medicine that really works." Fuka said. Kaede, Fei Ku and Chao returned to normal and the hooded figure released them. But just as she was turning around to flee, she bumped into Nodoka. As Nodoka approached her, she slowly backed away.
"Yue. It's really you." Nodoka said. Nodoka managed to grab her hood but had a hard time getting it off.
"No Nodoka! Don't look at me!" a voice said. The voice sounded exactly like Yue's voice. After the struggle, the hooded figure broke free. The only problem was her hood fell off. It was Yue! She had pale blue skin, her left eye was normal while her right eye was black and red and she had a third eye in the middle of her forehead.
"Yue! It's you! I'm so happy to see you!" Nodoka said. She hugged Yue tightly in her arms. Yue tried to break free but Nodoka wouldn't let her.
"Hey! It IS Yue!" Asuna said. Negi looked at Nodoka and Yue struggling.
"Yue? Is that her?" Negi said. Kaede, Fei Ku and Chao were coming around and they looked around.
"Uh...where are we?" Kaede said. They looked at Nodoka's smiling face as Yue tried to break free. Later that day, Kaede, Fei Ku and Chao learned everything that happened from Negi's group. Yue was still with them. She figured Nodoka wasn't going to let her go.
"Man. And to think we almost killed you guys. That's just wrong." Kaede said.
"Yeah! Who said these weird guys could use me like a puppet on strings?!" Fei Ku shouted. Negi looked at Chao and Chachamaru.
"What I don't understand is why you two are here." Negi said.
"Some weird Dreadnoid guys attacked me in my time and kidnapped me. As you saw, they made me into one of those things." Chao said. Chachamaru and Evangeline were working with the Dreadnoids. Chachamaru broke away from her to be with her professor.
"So...Evangeline is all right then? That's good." Asuna said. The group looked back at Yue.
"I suppose we should fix you now Yue." Asuna said. Yue looked at them worried.
"You sure that stuff will work? Yue looks seriously sick." Akira said. Negi said it should work. But when he looked at the bottle containing the dean's elixir, it was empty! Fuka used the last of it in curing Kaede, Fei Ku and Chao!
"Oh no! We're all out! This isn't good." Negi said.
"What?! We can't be out!" Asuna said. Fuka gulped.
"Did I...do something wrong?" Fuka said. They looked at her.
"Don't sweat it. We must have used most of it with our earlier battles." Kotaro said. Negi agreed with him while Asuna groaned.
"That means we need to go see the dean to get more." Asuna said. But what else was troubling Asuna was Negi's condition from getting hit by the lightning earlier. He looked wobbly in the legs.
"Uh...on second thought, we should stay a while. Our professor looks really hurt." Asuna said. Negi looked at her confused saying he was fine. But a pain in his legs made him think otherwise.
"Professor!" Nodoka said. Asuna held Negi up by his arms. Kaede and the others promised to stay with them and help Negi heal himself.
"Thanks you guys. We could use it." Akira said. They looked at Yue and she looked at them.
"I suppose...I'll stay too. I hope...you guys are...all right with how I look." Yue said.
"Of course Yue. We all know that's really you in there." Fuka said.
"Yeah! You're the same Yue no matter what you look like." Fumika said. Yue felt better and smiled.
END OF CHAPTER