"The competition seems very strong this year," Tigress remarked with her arms folded as she glanced at Kira Lee. She still felt impressed by his fighting style that looked similar to hers, but somehow different.
"I have to agree with you on this." Crane started counting on his feathers. "There's already been three matches out of eight. And so far, the remaining ones are you, me, the master of the Magic Kung Fu School, the three masters of the Frog Dojo, and these two guys sitting in this corner." The avian master gulped. "I just hope I won't end up facing the guy from the Magic Kung Fu School."
"Come on!" Yukan impatiently said. "I'm tired of waiting! When is it gonna be my turn to fight?"
"Calm down, Yukan. Yelling won't make things get faster," Kivuli deadpanned.
"Speaking of which, Nunzio is about to announce the next fight," Shining Eagle said with pointing at the elephant.
"Attention to all the participants!" Nunzio said. "We are now going to find out who will be the two fighters for the fourth match! Look at the screen and if your name appears, come down!" Just after saying this, the screen started rolling with the remaining names, looking for the next chosen ones.
Master Sunbird vs Master Snow Kid
"YES!" Yukan beamed with tossing a fist in the air. "It's finally my turn to fight!"
"Great!" Snow Kid also beamed with a smile. "My time to shine has come!"
"Have fun, Yukan!" Shining Eagle said with patting her friend on the shoulder. "Show them all what you're made of!"
"Thanks, Shining," the sun parrot replied as he jumped to get down in the fighting zone. The yeti did the same, though he landed with more grace than his opponent.
"ALRIGHT! LET'S GO, YUKAN!" Po beamed loudly from the platform. "This is gonna be so AWESOME!"
Tigress, however, just crossed her arms. "Time to see if you're experienced enough to criticize my friends and I, sun parrot."
"So this is the famous guy who apparently defeated the Qidan King on his own, huh?" Siax asked with a look of interest in her green cat eyes. "Be careful, Snow Kid; you might end up getting your butt kicked there."
"I can't wait to see if you're up to your reputation, Sunbird," Daito said with a grin, finally getting off the wall and staring at the fighting zone with interest. "It's showtime!"
The sun parrot and the yeti were now standing across from each other in the fighting zone with Nunzio looking at both of them. "Master Sunbird, huh?" Snow Kid said with a chuckle as he ran a hand across the little white hair peaking out of his black toque. "Sorry to burst any pride you may have, but I never heard about you. You must not be that strong of an opponent."
"If you start estimating your opponents based on their reputation, you're in for a world of surprises, pal," Yukan replied with a scoff.
The yeti's eye twitched a bit at this. "Do you at least know who I am, young arrogant?"
"And you? Do you know how much I don't give a sandwich about it?"
"I'm Master Snow Kid from the Magic Kung Fu School. You know, the best Kung Fu academy in all of China?" He pointed a white finger at Yukan. "You better throw the match away right now if you don't want to get bruises and injuries that could force you to retire so soon!"
"I'm willing to take the risk."
"Just one more thing." Snow Kid leaned toward Yukan and talked in a whisper: "The two lovely eagle ladies that are watching the match from the platform, they are your friends, right? Can you tell me if they are single?"
"AND WHY SHOULD I TELL YOU THAT, CREEP?!" Yukan screamed with his eyes widened in shock.
"Okay, okay, just asking. Geez..."
"Are both participants ready for the fight?" Nunzio asked them.
"Yes, sir," Snow replied with a grin.
"Ready as I'll ever be," Yukan said with cracking his wings like fists.
"In this case, let the fourth match of the second phase... BEGIN!"
Yukan spread his legs and positioned his wings to take his Reverse Southern Praying Mantis Kung Fu pose. Snow Kid, meanwhile, stretched his legs a bit and held both fists at his hips level. Yukan recognized this as the Wing Chun Quan fighting style.
"This stance... It's the Reverse Souther Praying Mantis Style?" Crane said while blinking his eyes in disbelief. "That's Yukan's fighting style? That's odd; most avians like me usually adopt the Crane Style of Kung Fu."
"I told you this guy is special!" Po said with enthusiasm. "Let's go, Yukan!"
Snow Kid smirked at the sun parrot. "You don't mind me taking the advantage earlier on, do you?" Right after asking this strange question, the yeti placed both of his hands down on the floor and started focusing. To Yukan's surprise, ice started forming around his hands and spreading all over the floor until it turned into an ice rink.
"W-What the heck is that?!" he asked in shock, struggling to keep his balance.
"Oh, my name didn't give the hint?" Snow Kid asked with a chuckle, showing his two hands which were emanating ice energy. "I possess ice powers. Really cool, huh?"
Of course! "Snow Kid", it should have made him understand! The yeti started skating his way toward Yukan, ready to deliver a punch. The sun parrot attempted to move out of the way, but the slippy floor prevented him from running. He received the blow across the face and was sent sliding head-first into the arena wall.
"Ouch!" Shining Eagle exclaimed with wincing. "That must've hurt!"
"Godamnit!" Yukan groaned as he stood back on his feet and touched his nostril with his wing to see a little blood coming out. He then turned to glare at Snow Kid. "I'll teach you about pain, pal!" Using the wall for momentum, the sun parrot pushed himself toward the yeti and got ready to deliver a punch in return.
However, Snow Kid just moved aside and, as Yukan failed to stop his own momentum, crashed into the arena wall again. "So predictable," he chuckled to himself.
"... What was that?" Tigress asked. "He is visibly having a hard time on the ice. Why doesn't he take to the skies like a normal bird? That would give him an advantage over Snow Kid."
Shining Eagle frowned a bit. She and the other members of the Frog Dojo knew that Yukan did not like to fly and preferred to stay on the ground... but they had no idea why. He never explained his reason.
"You still wanna fight, young parrot?" Snow Kid asked as Yukan got back up once again. "You know, there's no shame in giving up right now. I'm sure everyone watching would understand." Yukan glared at Snow Kid. Pushing a battle cry, he once again used the wall to give himself momentum and charged at the yeti. This last one sighed. "You never learn." He moved aside to dodge.
However, at the last moment, Yukan used his talons to dig into the ice, change his trajectory, and delivered a big punch across Snow Kid's face, knocking him to the ice ground. The yeti kicked up and rubbed his cheek where Yukan hit him. "Didn't see that coming, did you?" he asked in a mocking tone.
Snow Kid immediately went on the attack by skating toward Yukan once again, jumping at full speed to go for a devastating kick. However, Yukan jumped high in the air to avoid the attack and looked down at the frozen ground. So Snow Kid thought he couldn't be defeated with this environment? Time to break his illusion! The sun parrot filled his lungs with air before spitting a Phoenix Breath out. The jet of fire melted the entire ice floor in a matter of seconds.
And of course, the audience was surprised to see this.
"H-He can spit fire?!" Crane asked in surprise.
"Of course. That's why he's called Master Sunbird. You didn't know?" Po innocently asked.
"Yeah, makes sense," the avian admitted as he fanned himself with his wing because of the attack's heat.
Yukan landed on the now hotter and wet arena floor and gazed up at his opponent. He couldn't help but form a grin in the corner of his beak as the surprised and shocked expression on his face made him understand he realized the situation. Snow Kid controlled ice. Yukan controlled fire. Therefore, he was the one with the advantage in this match.
The yeti shook his head and immediately regained his stance. He threw his fist to shoot an ice blast at Yukan. Not impressed, the sun parrot did the same thing, launching a fire blast that melted through his opponent's ice and flew at him. Snow Kid found himself performing a backflip to avoid the fire which passed inches away from his face. Mumbling a swear under his breath, Snow kept shooting ice blasts at Yukan who melted them all with his fire jets.
"This is so COOL!" Po beamed. "Snow's ice is useless against Yukan! He totally got this!"
Siax, meanwhile, frowned. "Snow Kid! Can't you see you're making a fool out of yourself?! Stop messing around and start fighting seriously!"
"That's what I was gonna do, Siax!" the yeti replied before turning his attention back to Yukan. Taking his fighting stance once again, he charged at him and started delivering a series of punches and kicks. Luckily, they were pretty easy to block and dodge for Yukan. After a while of being on the defensive, the sun parrot decided to go for a spinning leg sweep. Snow Kid, however, avoided it by performing an amazing somersault.
What Yukan failed to notice was that the yeti charged some ice energy into his foot during the somersault and used the momentum of his move to deliver a kick right into Yukan's unprotected back. "Iceberg Hammer!" The attack made the sun parrot feel a painful rush of cold run from his back all the way to his abdomen. This forced him to clutch his guts in pain and cough a bit - some steam coming out of his beak.
Snow Kid, meanwhile, rolled back to put some distance between his opponent and himself. "Like my ice attacks, young parrot?" he asked with a grin. "And that's barely what I'm capable of. I strongly suggest you stop fighting now if you know what's good for you."
Yukan, however, kicked up and panted a bit while grinning at Snow Kid. "Are you kidding? This is getting fun..."
Author's note: The battle of fire and ice has started! Who will win? Yukan Tori or Snow Kid? I mean, logically, it would be Yukan because fire beats ice, but as you can see, the yeti is not someone you can take down easily. Let me know your thoughts and as always, may the gods watch over you all.