Chapter 5: Explanations
Haru couldn't believe the way things had turned out. He had been certain he would have to fight each of the shaman and that he would be forced to find a new shelter. However things had not gone as he had expected, and he didn't mind at all.
When Haru had re-entered the house he saw all the kids sitting in a circle around a girl with blond hair, she was wearing a black dress and had red beads hanging around her neck. She looked up at him when he entered and told him to sit in front of her and Haru complied.
"Now I want you tell us what happened, don't leave anything out and don't bother lying because I'll know if you do" she told Haru glaring at him
Haru didn't look away but continued to stare straight back at Anna before replying
"Who are you? And what gives you the right to order me around?"
Haru then noticed that the room was completely silent; before the other Shaman had been talking quietly to each other, not loudly but loud enough to be heard. Now there was complete silence. Haru looked around and noticed that they were all cowering behind a couch.
"I'm Anna the Ikato and this is my house so I can do whatever I like!"
Haru saw something move to his left, he instinctively raised his hand and blocked the girl's attempt to slap him in the face. He looked at her and whispered
"Nice try, but my sister likes to play the little dictator as well and she's twice your age so anything you do I've seen before"
There was gasp and Haru turned to see the gang all looking at him with their mouths open.
"No way! He just stopped Anna's infamous left hand slap" said Manta in utter disbelief
"Wow I didn't think that was possible" Yoh said in awe.
"Ahem" It was Anna, she glared at the gang before saying,
"Lets get on with this shall we? I would like to know what happened sometime tonight"
The gang murmured their agreement and sat in a circle around Anna and Haru.
Anna sat with her legs crossed and stared into Haru's eyes and said "Well? Start talking"
Haru bit back an insult he had been about to use and took a deep breath and started talking
"As you probably know by now my name's Haru Ogama and this is my guardian spirit Zhou. We were walking in the rain when we saw this building…"
Haru told them about how he had come to seek shelter and had fallen asleep. Then how Lee Pailong had attacked him before he had explained why he was there and then about how Jun had run into kitchen to grab a knife and had tried to stab him.
"Speaking of Jun" said Pilika in a confused tone "Is it just me or has she been acting odd?"
"What do you mean odd?" said Ren darkly
"Well it's just that she's normally always fussing over you, and now after your fight with Haru she hasn't said a thing"
"That would be my fault" Haru said as he raised his hand
"Why what did you do to her you…" Ren started angrily
"Calm down I just hypnotized her so that she'd stop trying to kill me, but if you want her back to normal then fine" Haru finished the sentence by snapping his fingers and Jun fell down asleep.
"Jun…" Ren started to say but was cut off as Haru snapped his fingers again. Jun yawned and got up slowly and looked around,
"Why was I sleeping on the floor…" Jun started but when she saw Ren her eyes widened as she took in the bruises and cuts that covered his body,
"Ren are you all right? What happened? You look awful…" Jun continued to fuss over Ren who started to turn red with embarrassment when Haru snapped his fingers again and she fell down asleep.
"I can keep like that if you want, it'll be a lot quieter" Haru told Ren
"Yeah, thanks" said Ren still slightly red from his sisters concern "Pailong could you take Jun to her room"
"Of course master Ren" Pailong picked up Jun's sleeping form and carried her off to her room. Ren then turned to look at Haru
"How long before she wakes up?" he asked
"Oh she'll wake up some time in the morning" Haru answered
"Um excuse me…" Haru turned and saw that he was being addressed by what appeared to be a talking doll.
"Who are you?" Haru asked the little kid
"Oh my names Manta, anyway can I ask you a question?"
"You just did" Haru saw that the kid looked slightly uneasy at his answer as though unsure whether he could ask another question.
"What's your question?"
"Um well at the end of your fight with Ren I was sure that you killed him because I saw your sword go through his neck…"
"No it didn't"
"Yeah it did I saw it" Manta argued
"All right then" Haru pulled out the hilt of the sword from its sheath and showed it to Manta who backed away, afraid he was being attacked.
"Relax I'm not going to attack you, I just want you to explain how a sword with no blade could cut through someone's neck"
"But it had a blade, you made one for it and I saw it go through Rens neck" Manta persisted
"Are you suggesting that I made a blade out thin air?" talking to Manta as if he crazy
"Well yes, I saw you make it when you started fighting" Manta replied
Haru grinned slightly but his eyes were still emotionless and said "well your sharp I'll give you that. But I didn't create a blade; it was already there, I simply gave it enough power to become real in the physical world"
"What do you mean?" asked Manta confused
Haru sighed and held out the hilt showing it to Manta and saying "it would take to long to explain properly so I'll give you a simplified version."
"It is called the Dragon Blade and was made for my family by a Shaman weapon smith, because it was made by a shaman it has certain properties that normal weapons do not. One thing you will have already guessed is that it allows me to create a blade for the hilt by giving it some of my Furyoku. However this weapon posse's more than one type of blade, as you saw when I was fighting your friend; each blade that I summon posses' different qualities: The Aura blade for example cannot pierce human skin, nor can it kill; it has no edge but it can still cause a great deal damage. The Spirit Blade which I used to defeat your friend also cannot pierce human skin."
"But I saw you…" Manta began
"Let me finish. Although the Spirit Blade cannot harm the flesh it can damage the spirit, which is what it did to Ren. The blade passed through his flesh and attacked his spirit. This caused Ren to loosed consciousness, because his spirit needed some time to recover from the attack. There are other blades that I can summon but I won't bore you with the details right now."
"That was the short version?" Manta asked Haru his mind still buzzing from he had been told.
"The full version takes two days to explain" Haru said calmly.
"Hey dude I got another question for you " Horo said in his usual hyped up voice "When you were like running right at us after Rens thing got stuck in the tree you just disappeared. How'd you do that?"
"Yes I think we'd all like to hear the answer to that" said Ren with just a touch of bitterness
"First of all I didn't disappear I just changed" replied Haru in a dull voice as though he was bored.
"What do you mean changed?" said Yoh puzzled
"Yeah do you mean like…" Choco started one of his jokes but was quickly cut off as both Ren and Horo punched him in the head which knocked him out and left his eyes spiralling anime style
"Dude just shut up" Horo muttered
"No one wants to hear your pathetic attempt at a joke" said Ren glaring at Choco
"What do you mean changed?" said Yoh repeating his question
"I went from flesh and blood to air" replied Haru
"How?" said Ren sharply
"Through Zhou; he came from a long line of wind elementals and therefore has considerable power in the wind element of nature. By channelling enough of Furyoku through him I can change into air"
"Wow that must be really cool" said Manta excitedly, you could go practically anywhere just by changing into wind"
"Unfortunately it's not that easy, I can only do it for short periods of time and doing it repeatedly drains me"
"Hey could you teach me how to turn into air?" Yoh asked with a goofy grin on his face
"No" replied Haru, Yoh face fell, "but I could tech you how to put an aura on your sword to make its attacks more powerful. This caused Yoh's grin to come rushing back
"Awesome when can we start?" Yoh asked with enthusiasm
Before Haru could reply Anna cut in saying
"Haru, you said that when you came here the door was unlocked, didn't you?"
Haru heard someone gulp and then try to move away very quietly. He continued to look at Anna, shrugged his shoulders and said "Yeah so?"
"Yoh…" said Anna slowly, looking to where Yoh had been when he was talking to Haru, but he had mysteriously disappeared. Anna got up and went to look for him and Manta started to ask Haru more questions, which were making his brain hurt, when suddenly…
"Yoh where do you think your going?" Anna steely voice drifted in from the hall
"Uh well…" Yoh started to say in a nervous voice
"You forgot to lock the door didn't you" it was a statement not a question
"I think I'll get started on those laps I owe you" Yoh said running for the door
"Yoh Asakura get back here!"
Haru heard both of them run outside and said to Manta casually
"Delightful girl I can see why Yoh wants to live with her" his voice was heavy with sarcasm
"They're engaged" said Manta quietly
"Arranged marriage?" Haru asked
"No" replied Manta, "Anna saved Yoh's life once and asked him to marry her when he became Shaman King"
"Poor kid if the tournament doesn't kill him his fiancée will"
Author: Finally some proper reviews,I would like to thank those who reviewed my story and hope that they recommmend it to others
Mikauzoran: I appreciate the fact that i could have revealed my characters name sooner but i was having trouble thinking of one. Secondly Haoprobably won't have a major untilaround chapter 8 or 9but if i get enough reviews asking for me tointroduce him sooner i may change my mind.
Anon: thanks for the support i wasn't really sure whether i had done Jun correctly becusae she doesn't normally say a lot but the other characters seem to have a definite apttern in their speech.
AnywayI will be updating quite soon this week becuase i have been getting so many ideas, i just need to find a way tofit them into the story. There will be a few more OC's and i will do a bit about Haru's history. If there is anything you wantto ask send me an email or a review.
Also please remember to REVIEW