"Hey, hey, hey!" you shout, backpedalling from the attempted grab. "Personal space, man! Respect it!"

"Shut up!" Scowly Guy snaps, throwing a punch.

You weave to one side to evade the swing. "Whoa, look, whatever I" - dodge again - "did to offend you" - take another step back, crap, here comes the other guy - "I'm sure we can" - dodge yet again, you're running out of room - "talk it over like" - right, that was too close - "okay, maybe not. Help! Security! Adults! Unwanted advances! Bad touch!"

Stone Face makes a genuine expression at that, one of shock and horror. He recoils from you immediately, waving his hands and stammering something in rapid-fire Japanese that you almost can't follow - but only almost. Scowly Guy, on the other hand, just gets angrier and presses his assault. Seriously, aren't ninja supposed to have better emotional control than this? Or are you just that annoying?

Gained Acting F
Gained Evasion F
Gained Japanese E++
Gained Trolling F

Regardless, it seems your current approach to the situation is reaching its limits. Despite your calls for aid, there's been no fortuitous appearance of grim-faced tournament security guys, or even of other adults drawn by the noise. It's possible that their casualties from yesterday's monster incident have forced them to cut surveillance in a few places - and if you were in their shoes, monitoring competitors from tournament brackets that had already concluded wouldn't be all that high on your list of priorities. If that's the case, then Authority may not be coming. On top of that, Scowly Guy's offensive is rapidly exceeding your ability to simply avoid - any more of this and you'll have to start blocking and hitting back if you want to avoid getting pummelled.

"Alex," Briar says, "if you don't zap this bozo in the next five seconds, I will!"

Now there's an offer you hadn't expected to hear.