Chapter 21: Going for the Gold
My eyes shot open. I sat straight up in bed. I was ready to start the day, then kick its ass. I could have woken up a little less crazy though. My quick movements woke up Fluttershy.
"Dako? What's wrong?" She asked slowly waking up.
"Uh, nothing, go back to sleep." I said to her softly.
I got up out of bed, much slower this time, and got dressed. After that, I made myself as big a breakfast as I could, and still leave some food in the house. Then I headed off to Twilight's.
I won't bore you with the details, but I got up really early. So when I got to Twilight's and stood there knocking on her door for, like, five minutes, she wasn't very happy about it. So when she answered the door, she wasn't in a good mood, even if it was me.
"Dako!? What the heck are you doing knocking on my door so early?" She asked me angrily.
"I, was coming over for training? Remember? I need to beat the bad guy, fate of Equestria?" I said.
"I know all that! I mean, why are you so early?" she asked.
"I need all the time I can get! Let me explain, you guys are all counting on me, right? If not, Princess Celestia sure does! And I don't know about the rest of you guys, but I don't feel too confident in my self, and on top of all that I'm really stressed out! I'm freaking out over here!" I said to her frantically.
"Okay, okay! Just come inside, quickly, it's freezing out there!" she urged me.
She offered me some hot chocolate, which I excepted, since I was standing outside in what I guess was 10 degree weather, and it was beginning to snow lightly.
"So, where do we start?" She asked.
"Wait, hang on, I thought you were gonna make some schedule for me?" I asked her.
"I didn't have time to, sorry." She said.
"Oh, okay, well, I guess I can always use my words to convince him not to level the planet, I mean, if it worked for Gandhi." I said sarcastically.
"Wait, I can still help you, I never said I couldn't do that, I just said I didn't come up with a schedule." She said. "So, where do we start?"
"Well, I guess you could read my strength or something?" I suggested. "If I knew where I stand at the moment in terms of strength and power then I'd know where I can or need to improve the most."
"Okay, well, I do have this thing that I found." She said, pulling a strange device from a shelf.
She levitated this device of hers over to me using her magic. I couldn't believe my eyes when I had realized what it was. It was a freaking scouter!
"Holy crap! Where did you find this!?" I exclaimed in disbelief.
"I found it in the snow on the edge of the Everfree forest during a trip to Zecora's. I thought it might be useful, and I've been trying to reverse engineer it ever since I found it." She explained.
"Well, did you get it to work?" I asked her.
"I couldn't read anything it displayed; it was in some other language or something. Eventually I had to use a transformation spell of some sort in order to understand, it kept saying things like, "Power level detected". Maybe we could use it now." She said.
"Of course we can use this, scan me." I said to her.
She put the device on and pressed the button on the side; it beeped a few times, then stopped.
"It says you have a power level of fifteen thousand." She said.
"Whoa! But, I'm not even doing anything, that's amazing." I said. "We gotta take this outside."
"Why?" Twilight asked.
"Do you want me to use the Kaio-ken indoors?" I asked her. She understood.
I waited for her to put on her scarf and boots, after that we were able to go outside in the worsening weather. It was now completely snowing.
"Okay, let's hurry this up, I'm freezing my tail off!" Twilight complained.
"Right! Kaio-ken!" I yelled. I was engulfed by the bright red aura of the Kaio-ken as I began to power up. I could hear the scouter beeping as it automatically detected my increasing power level.
"Twenty thousand! Thirty thousand! Thirty five thousand!" Twilight yelled out.
I kept going higher and higher, powering up as high as I could stand without killing myself.
"Forty thousand! Forty five thousand! Fifty thousand!" Twilight continued.
I had already passed the Kaio-ken times three, time to really crank things up.
"Kaio-ken, times five!" I shouted as a new burst of energy surged, throwing out a larger wave of wind around me.
"Seventy five thousand! Keep going Dako!" Twilight cheered me on.
"Kaio-ken times Ten!" I yelled. The snow beneath me began to melt under the warmth emitted by the aura and all of the energy.
"One hundred and fifty thousand!" Twilight yelled.
I may have gone times fifteen against Xendo, but it appeared ten was my limit, the more I tried to power up, the more I tried to hold back the energy so that I didn't explode or something. I took a deep breath and dropped out of the Kaio-ken, sighing in relief.
I looked around me and noticed that despite the cold, some ponies heard the commotion, and were looking out of doors and windows, staring at me.
"Uh, that's all folks." I said, trying to calm them. "Nothing to see here but, practice."
I walked back inside with Twilight. We decided that now we know where I stand in terms of energy, we know where I can improve in terms of strength, and fighting skill. All I knew was that if I wanted to beat Xendo, I would have to be much stronger than I was right now, especially since my current strength was barely enough to beat Xendo last, and now he'll only be stronger.
"Okay, so, now that we know you have a power level of one hundred and fifty thousand, it's time to get you stronger, and help you learn how to use that power efficiently, and get even stronger." Twilight said with a smile.
"Oh, you make it sound so easy. So where do we start?" I asked her.
"First, how do you primarily fight?" She asked.
"Well, I don't much martial arts, or any fighting skills. I try to punch and hit the other guy, but I'm not good at it. Xendo pretty much caught every punch I gave him, so, yeah. I can't really fight worth a damn, even with all of my power and strength, and what not." I explained to Twilight.
"Okay, well, what about your laser beams?" She asked.
"You mean, Ki? My energy control? Those are pretty much the only thing I'm good at, in fact I'm a pretty good shot, I can shoot an apple off of a fence post from 100 feet away, just point an' shoot, heh-heh." I said.
"Okay, then let's work with that later, first your fighting skills will be refined and honed." She said.
"Cool, but, how long could this take? 'Cause, Xendo could attack any day now, and I don't wanna be taken off guard." I told her.
"I don't know, to train you could take, months, weeks if you're a fast learner." She said uncertainly.
"Hm. So how about we start on energy control? Think you can teach me to do a Kaio-ken times fifteen or twenty without popping like a balloon?" I asked her casually.
"Ugh, Dako, you can't take the easy way out. You know as much as I do that you're nothing without any actual fighting skill." Twilight lectured.
"That's not true. Remember when I cut that topiary, bush, thing into a statue of Fluttershy?" I asked her.
"Showing off won't win you any competition. Remember when Trixie first came to town?" Twilight asked.
"I remember. Oh yeah, and that time I saw Trixie at the carnival and ruined her act, ha-ha ha-ha, I made her cry, that was funny, heh, lawl!" I said, joking around.
"Focus! Besides, you can't use your energy forever anyway." Twilight added.
"Yeah, it kinda wears me out a little. So does swinging and punching, but less so than energy attacks. I got it! Can't you just find a book on martial arts and magically beam the knowledge into my head?" I asked her.
"Are you crazy? Get real, I perform magic spells, not miracles." She snapped at me.
"Well I don't know what to do, I'm strapped for time here! I'm scared, Twilight. I'm genuinely terrified, look at my hands, I'm shaking! I don't know what I'm supposed to do on such short notice, I got a world to defend! I'm worried I won't beat him. I'm worried he could hurt, or kill you guys. I'm scared that he'd hurt Fluttershy, especially because of our relationship, and he'd use her to stop me." I said, my voice starting to shake.
"I'm sorry Dako, but, I don't know if it's possible. We could try." She said to me in a softer, more sincere tone.
She levitated over a book using her magic.
"This book says it's a complete guide to advanced martial arts. It has detailed training courses, charts and diagrams for poses, and covers at least three forms in their entirety. Let's see if we can teach you in record time." She said, a grin forming on her face.
"Wait. Are you, gonna try?" I asked her.
"Yes." She said sternly.
Her horn began to glow brighter. She opened the book up at page one. She shut her eyes to focus. I could see her mental effort as she began clenching her eyes shut. Glowing magical streaks of purple light began to appear, looking almost like smoke. They began to swirl around the book, slowly at first, but speeding up until you could hear it. They were swishing around very fast, so fast you could feel some wind coming off them. The pages began to flutter in the intensifying wind. Suddenly, the words on the pages began glowing faintly, as though printed with glow in the dark ink. In a flash, beams of light shot out of each letter and punctuation mark. The letters were lifting off the page in a string of sentences, then whole paragraphs, like one line of yarn. They were twisting up in a ball of letters, all glowing purple, swirling with the whirlwind of magic. Without warning, the mass of text shot out straight for me in one straight line.
The words spun around me, surrounding me in a cylinder of text. They stopped dead in their tracks, and began to close in on me. To be honest, I was, concerned. Yeah, let's go with "concerned". The text tightened around me, then began making contact with my body. As it made contact they printed onto me, then faded away. I began seeing pictures, words, and letters. I could feel knowledge appearing out of nowhere.
Twilight opened her eyes and gasped as she dropped the book. It hit the floor, closing automatically.
"So, how do you, feel?" she asked, panting breathlessly.
"I. I know things. I know lots and lots of things. Things I wish I had never ever known before." I said with a blank expression on my face, my mind scarred.
"What? What happened? Tell me." She said.
"You used the wrong book." I said, slowly pointing to the evil tome now lying on the floor.
"I what?" She asked in disbelief, still trying to catch her breath.
She looked down at the book she had used by mistake. Her eyes went wide.
"Oh, oh my goodness! I'm so sorry Dako! I'm so, ha-ha ha-ha, sorry!" Her sincere apology turned to laughter as she sat down, laughing uncontrollably.
"Don't you laugh at me! I saw things! Horrible things! Unspeakable evil!" I shouted, a little angry.
Spike walked down after hearing all the commotion.
"What's so funny Twilight?" He asked with slight concern.
"I used a spell to teach Dako the contents of a book, ha-ha ha! But I used the wrong one! Now look at him!" She screeched laughing still.
Spike picked up the unholy binding of leather and paper.
"The Pony-Sutra? What the heck is that?" Spike asked confused, Twilight only laughed harder.
"Dammit! Now I got that in my head forever! How am I gonna beat Xendo if all I know are those, ugh, positions!? I needed fighting skills, not, those skills!" I shuddered at the thought of what I now knew.
"Relax crybaby. Let's do this again, this time I'll make sure I have the right book." Twilight said calming down.
"Can you remove all of that from my mind?" I asked.
"Sorry, I don't think I can, once you've learned something, do you ever really forget it?" She said to me.
"Well, if it's like anything I've ever learned in math class, than hopefully it'll be gone after a night's sleep." I said hopefully.
She repeated the process again, this time with the right freakin' book. I'll skip the details for you, but this time it worked, and it was awesome. Now I knew pretty much every single thing I'd need to beat Xendo.
"So, it worked, right?" Twilight asked.
"Did it work? Did it work!? Ha! Knowledge is power!" I shouted comically. I made Twilight giggle a little, so it wasn't all for nothing.
"Thank you so much Twilight, thank you for all your help. Now we can start working on my strength trai-Ah!" I was cut off as I felt something cold as ice run down the length of my spine. I gasped for air as I fell to a knee.
"What? What's wrong? Dako?" Twilight asked worriedly as she rushed to my side.
"Oh god! Oh shit, no! Not now!" I said in terror.
"Tell me what's wrong!" She demanded.
"It's him!" I muttered. I looked Twilight in the eyes. "He's here!" I said, quietly stunned.