The group ended up going outside of the city and into the plains in order to watch a special matchup. The majority of the group had gotten to the side and had sat down in the grass to watch. As the knights were getting a pep-talk from their captain, the duo of Yuri and Tai got their weapons drawn and waited for them.
"So, you excited about fighting them?" Yuri tried to start some conversation with the teenager.
"Not really; the sooner this is over, the better," Tai shrugged, tipping the point of the bat on his shoes in a bored manner.
"Aww, come on; not one shred of anticipation on beating the guys up who gave you a hassle back in the capital?" Yuri smiled, trying to get the kid to speak the truth, but once he was only rewarded with a 'no-nonsense' look, he backed off and continued, "Fine, fine. I'm just rather surprised for a really skilled fighter that you're not really wanting to fight so badly."
"I don't like to fight at all," Tai said, looking away, "I only do when it's necessary. That's it."
"Then why train at all to be strong if there's no interest in fighting for you?" Yuri asked, tilting his head a bit, his curiosity starting to get the best of him.
"There was a point in my life where I thought I might like to go outside of Halure before I went with Estelle. So, I trained just in case," Tai began to feel like Yuri was trying to get him to tell information about him he wanted to be secret.
"So, mind telling me how you were able to get the artes then? I doubt those are just the kind you pick up randomly during a battle. How'd you get them and make them work with your glove?" Yuri tried his luck and asked.
There was a bit of a silence, which signaled to the man he probably wouldn't get any clear answers. But soon, he was told them.
"Normally, I'd either tell someone to buzz off or just ignore them, but since I've met Estelle and Raven, I'm going to kindly tell you I'm not going to answer that; it's personal and private, okay?" Tai said, rubbing his neck by reaching into his hoodie.
It was this kind of dodging around giving answers that made Yuri be reminded of the old man, actually. Instead of the Tai way of being silent and then saying 'that's not your business', Raven would usually try to make a bunny trail off the topic and make a joke answer followed by laughing. He placed a hand on his hip and smiled.
"Fine; keep your secrets. I will find out what you're hiding though," he said, but to Tai, was unknown whether he was really serious or using satire.
In all seriousness, Yuri doesn't like to be confused, or have secrets held from him. He loves to push things until he gets all the info, and deep down, oh how he wanted to get that glove's information out of Tai. Not like Rita who wants it for research, but if it holds a threat to the safety of who he holds dear to his heart, he wants to know. And the fact that Tai hangs out with Raven of all people, the jack-of-all-trades, yet the master-of-all-secrets, screams that he needs to know about this. But not now; they were going to have some fun.
"You hold secrets so well, you remind me of the old man," Yuri said, looking at Raven, who was relaxing in the grass, and lying down.
He heard a slight chuckle from Tai, something that was rare to hear from the teenager.
"You know, that wasn't meant to be a compliment," he raised both eyebrows and said truthfully.
Tai slightly smiled at him and shrugged, "Well, it is to me."
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
"Be safe, all of you! But do a good job, Yuri! You too, Tai!" Estelle cheered as the group had sat down together to the left of the fighters.
"Oh, is the fight startin' now?" Raven flash-speed sat up, then made himself comfortable by laying on his side.
"You're sure making yourself at home, old man," Rita said, rolling her eyes.
"Shhh! I wanna see this fight! Oh, man, I can't wait to see what Yuri and Tai do!" Akihiro grinned and joyfully said, barely trying to not yell as Repede gave him an agreeing bark.
"Oh, yeah, and I'll get to see how the freak actually does those artes," Rita muttered with a confident smirk, only Estelle able to hear her, the latter of whom looked at her then at Tai with worry.
Leblanc then walked over to the group and sat down next to Raven, saying, "My men have really been training since they last saw you, Sch- Raven. I'm very interested in how they do."
"Yeah, I gotta agree there, but uh..."
"Sir?"
Raven smiled as he looked at the battle, "It's not Yuri or the Schwann Brigade that I'm watchin' here. I wanna see what Tai does in this fight."
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
As they realized the starting fight would be soon, Tai looked over to Yuri, asking, "So, how are we going to do this?"
"What, you mean fight? Don't we just beat them senseless until they're on the ground twitching?" Yuri asked.
"No, I mean, do we just go after both as a team, pick a man and do one-on-one, or do our own thing?" Tai sighed and asked.
"Uhh... I don't really care," Yuri shrugged, smiling into a exhaling chuckle, "I just crush whoever is in my way, that okay?"
No answer was going to ever satisfy that, Tai thought. He rolled his eyes as he readied his bat and decided he'd do things his own way. It was around that time as well that Adecor and Boccos were ready too.
"At last! Our honor will be restored! We shall taste victory against you two!" Boccos declared loudly.
"I say, prepare to fall to the blades of light that is the Schwann Brigade!" Adecor joined in, raising his sword.
"All right, let's get this started!" Yuri said, almost laughing in anticipation, where all four fighters were in their stances, ready.
Flynn had been made the match master, and was in charge of starting and stopping the battle at any time. He stood to the right of the match, opposite of everyone else and began to announce in a loud voice.
"All right! It is now time; Yuri and Tai versus the Schwann Brigade! Ready... set... Fight!"
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Check this tutorial?
Yes
No
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All parties readied for battle once the okay was given by Flynn. Being watched closely by the commandant to make sure who was knocked out or not badly injured, Yuri rushed right at the knights as they came at him.
"Kiss your freedom goodbye, for it ends today!" Boccos yelled as he swung his spear at him.
Clashing with it, and causing him to back up with a swing of his sword, Yuri raised an eyebrow and asked, "Um, why are you telling me that? I'm not in trouble with the knights anymore, so I can't lose my freedom."
"Be quiet, I say, and feel the power of the imperial knights!" Adecor ordered as he rushed at him and swung his sword at him, clashing swords.
"What's the matter? Can't focus when I'm talking? Maybe I should keep talking then?" Yuri said, causing a long verbal argument with the three of them.
Yeah, this wasn't going to improve or do anything at all. Just looking at them, Tai decided to just lay low and wait until something happened. He watched as Yuri really was handling the two by himself quite perfectly, he really felt like he didn't need to fight whatsoever. But with the sudden looks and gestures from the group that said 'get in there', Tai soon found Adecor looking at him, noticing how he wasn't moving.
"Fear not, youth of the generation! Fight me, and let me regain my honor! Come at me!" he bravely called out and challenged.
Taking a deep breath, Tai slowly bent down as tiny bits of aer became visible around him. But this was not a spell. It was in fact some type of new ability not ever known in Terca Lumireis before. The aer wrapped around him as he suddenly dashed forward with blinding speeds. It seemed as if he teleported somehow to be right in front of Adecor. It smashed into him, destroying his guard and causing Adecor to be dizzy.
Everyone's breath just stopped for a brief second as Tai took the advantage to use his bat and swing upward, knocking the knights down. He stood ready, as Adecor shook out the cobwebs from his head, so to speak, and stood up.
"W-What form of magic be this that grants you immense speed?" he said shocked.
"He broke through your guard, Adecor!" Boccos said, shocked.
"That was amazing..." Yuri said, wide-eyed and blinking as he jumped back and joined Tai back to ask, "How on earth did you do that? Is that some sort of arte?"
"No, it's a battle technique; it's called Aer Dash," Tai answered, but kept his eyes on the two knights.
"Aer Dash? I've never read about that technique before," Estelle said, all the group looking at her as she said that.
"Really now? The master reader don't know about this?" Raven said, rather surprised.
"Give her a break, old man; she doesn't know everything," Rita grumbled as she stuck her tongue out at him.
"That's because Aer Dash is a technique that's recently been discovered," the group was interested in hearing Akihiro explain loudly, for everyone to hear, for he knew, "It's no wonder no one has really heard about it that much yet."
"Really? So can you tell us about it?" Estelle asked nicely.
With a nod, Akihiro began explaining, "Aer Dash is basically a new battle technique where the person can use the neighboring aer around him or her and use it to increase his or her speed in a straight line. It doesn't matter whether the person had a blastia before hand or not; it still is a move anyone can use."
"Using aer into your body for increased speed? I didn't think that was possible," Rita voiced her disbelief of it.
"Well, now that the blastia are no more, human and animal bodies have adjusted to aer much more easier than normal. So, that way, using it doesn't cause harmful effects to the body. Now, there's two versions of Aer Dash," Akihiro said, then pointing at the battle, "The one Tai used is called Advancing Aer Dash. Using that lets you chase after enemies that are running away or are far away in a flash. It collides into the enemy, and if you're lucky, it causes their guard to be shattered, like Tai did with Adecor."
"And what's the other one?" Leblanc asked, rather stunned still.
"That one's called Backstep Aer Dash. It's basically the opposite; you use it to go backwards, like to get out of situations and tough attacks that can't be blocked or escape by just running. But both dash technique require an insane amount of energy just to pull it off, so you can't just do dashes over and over again," Akihiro finished, folding his arms confidently.
"You think you can learn it by watching?" Tai asked as he dropped into his stance again.
"Sure thing; let's see if I can try that again," Yuri smirked and got ready to fight.
Slowly closing his eyes, he focused closely on his energy to make sure he was ready. Soon, a tiny bit of aer dots appeared around him. Not as large as Tai's dash, Yuri pulled it off and was able to collide into Adecor again. It knocked him a bit off guard, but not like Tai did. Then, he tried it backwards, but was only able to get halfway to Tai. Forced to run back, he panted as he readied.
"I guess I'm not good at this technique," he said rather upset.
"Well, of course not; you just used it; it takes time and stronger people to do it. You gotta keep practicing in order to use it right," Tai explained.
"All right, enough talk," Yuri said as he grinned, "Let's try this battle for real now!"
"That's my line, I say!" Adecor yelled back.
"But that's my line!" Boccos whined as the four charged at each other.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
While using Aer Dash, all attacks will bounce off you and you will be invincible during it. There are certain advantages to each type of dash. Advancing has more power and can knock down any enemies in the way of your target, while Backstep allows more distance to be covered away from your opponent. Mostly Advancing is used for melee fighters, and Backstep for spell casters. But be warned; using Aer Dash calls for 75 TP, so use it wisely.
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I thought I'd give TOV 2 a brand new battle technique since it would be as a sequel and sequels try to add more stuff. Sorry if this chapter is a bit short, but I wanted to do a quick Tutorial on this new thing. Enjoy and keep reading! ^^