As soon as the training mode has loaded, Mumei starts pressing buttons. Her character swings their scythe, jumping and moving around the screen. "Okay, I get how to move, but how do you do all that cool stuff?" She looks at me. "Well, it's faster if I just show you." I say as I press a button on my controller and the character across from Mumei's suddenly starts moving. "First of all, now that you've figured out movement and attacking, how about you learn how to defend. Just hold back, that is, away from my character." I press a few buttons to attack, showing Mumei different ways to block. After a few minutes of explaining different types of blocking and other terminology, Mumei starts to understand. "Nice, you're getting the hang of it. Now try to hit me after blocking a move." As Mumei does so, everything on screen suddenly slows down as the speakers blast a single word over the music. "COUNTER!" Mumei is quiet for a little bit, but then turns to Nia and tilts her head in curiosity. "Was that good?" Nia gives her a smirk, before she nods. "It sure was, birdie." Mumei smiles wide and tries it a few more times. "Okay, so next lesson. Special moves" I say as I give her a thumbs up. "If you look at the bottom right, you can see my inputs there." She observes as the little D-Pad icon starts moving all over the place. "The most important motions you're gonna need are quarter-circle and half-circle." I do the motions, first slowly, then faster to show off the actual moves. "You see? That way you get all the cool stuff. In the menu you can look up what your special moves do and what button combination to use." Mumei looks confused for a moment before turning back to the game. She tries the inputs and I try to help her along. After a few attempts, she manages to make her character shoot an orb of blood along the ground. "That was it, right?" She asks. "There you go, good job." "Ey, ya gottit now, birdie." Nia and I say simultaneously. After explaining the last few buttons and mechanics to her, I just let Mumei practice for a little while.
"You wanna try a real challenge?" Nia asks Mumei after about ten minutes. "Oh... Uhm... I don't know." "Ah, come on. I'll go easy on ya. Best way to learn is to play and lose." "I guess... But that doesn't sound fun." "You'll be fine, lass. Come on." "I guess one game couldn't hurt." And thus, Mumei and Nia decide to go at it. Mumei picks Testament, the character she'd been practising with. Nia picks Anji Mito, a more defensive character. "Ah, so that's how you're gonna be handicapping yourself." I smirk at her. "Well, it seems only fair." She replies. "Gotta give those young'uns a chance." The match starts counting down. "TESTAMENT... VERSUS... ANJI! DUEL 1! LET'S ROCK!" Not a second goes by before the announcer is heard again. "COUNTER!" As Mumei's character slows down dramatically for a split-second. "Gotcha! You chose poorly." Nia declares as they get going in earnest.
The back-and-forth seems fairly even, although Nia is clearly holding back. Mumei turns out to be a fast learner and after having lost the first set, she immediately went back in for another one. It takes her some time, but after the fifth set she actually manages to win a set against Nia. She cheers and falls backwards onto the beanbags. The white snake she had been playing with before lands on her face. "Good job, Mooms. You're really starting to learn. Care for a game against me?" "Actually," she replies "can I try Nia's controller? This one is starting to make my fingers hurt." "Oh sorry, I completely forgot that you were using that one. That shouldn't be a problem." By the time I finish speaking, Nia has already handed over the controller to Mumei. She fiddles around with the joystick and the D-Pad for a while. "Okay, I think I got it now." She states as we return to character select. Mumei once again picks Testament. I pick Ky Kiske, the character I usually use when helping people learn the game. Then, I pull up the song list and select Birthday Train as the soundtrack for our match. Nia looks very disappointed at me. "Really? Are ya taking the piss? You gonna use that in a serious fight?" "I just like the song okay. It's not a crime." I confirm my choices. "KY... VERSUS... TESTAMENT! DUEL 1! LET'S ROCK!" Suddenly, a very happy and upbeat tune starts to play as our match finally begins. Mumei seems somewhat caught off-guard as she doesn't do anything for the first few seconds. She manages to recover herself and starts fighting back. She's already way better at the game, but still loses the first set. She turns to me with an angry expression. "That's not fair. You did that on purpose so I couldn't concentrate." I simply shrug. "What can I say? I just like the song." She pouts at me before hitting rematch. "Hmpf... is not fair..." She mumbles as we start again. She manages to actually take a round, but sadly still loses the set. By the third set, she's figured out most of my cheap tricks and actually manages to win the full thing. "Way to go, Mooms! You're really getting a handle on things." "Yeah, I think I get it. But... maybe I need to try someone else. Testament doesn't really work with what I wanna do."
"Sure thing. Nothing wrong with experimenting. You can't expect the first character you pick to be the best for you." We go back and forth for a good while. We decide to rotate the loser out after each game, so we all get to play.
Suddenly, my phone starts buzzing and ringing in the middle of a set. The distraction allows Mumei to find a gap in my defence and thus she wins the game. As she lets out a victory cry, I look at my phone. "30 minutes to bed" is displayed on the small screen with a "Snooze" and a "Stop" button. "Okay ladies, time for final elimination matches" I declare. Mumei looks at me confused as I hand my controller to Nia. "Wha? What does that mean?" "Well, it means we all get one more round per opponent and the person that wins the most is the winner." Nia says as she picks Faust. "Oh, come on. You're not going easy on her, are you?" I complain as Mumei tries to find a good character "Well, I've gotta take it easy on your kids. We still want her coming back, yeah?" "I'm gonna try this guy." Nia and I both turn to the screen as Mumei selects Happy Chaos. Both of us remains silent as Mumei browses her colour options. In the next moment, Nia looks back at me, concern evident on her face. "I... I guess I don't need to try so hard after all." I mirror her worried look as the match starts. "This sure is gonna be something." Mumei seems to be completely unfazed by our weird reactions. As the match loads up, a jazzy piano theme starts playing. "FAUST... VERSUS... CHAOS! DUEL 1! LET'S ROCK!" The match starts and the first thing we see is Mumei's character punching Nia's in the stomach with the announcer shouting "COUNTER!" I just sit there and watch all the chaos happen as Nia is seemingly caught off-guard, but she quickly adapts and manages to win the set 2-0. Next up, it's my turn to fight Nia. "Well, if you're not gonna be serious about this, then neither will I." I declare as I select Elphelt Valentine. "Oh, so you're just gonna press one button and think you can win like that?" Nia snorts as she accepts my challenge. "I can and I will." Our match begins and the first round is over as quickly as it started. "It's unfair. You can just keep doing that cheap crap and I just have guess what gonna happen?" "Sucks to suck." I reply as round 2 begins. The second round is a lot tougher for me. Nia has decided to start throwing around Faust's items to cause mayhem and hit me while I'm worrying about something else. She wins the round, unsurprisingly. Now it's time for the final round. "Okay, no more gimmicks. This one's for all the marbles." "Yeah, sure. Just don't crying to me when you lose." Nia replies. This third round is a close one until I decide to make a risky play and jump towards her. She responds by inputting her super , which causes her character to dash forward and hit me. In the cinematic as my character falls over, Faust pulls a wheelchair out of nowhere and runs towards them. It hits my character in the ankle, causing their face to contort in pain. As I sit there, seething in frustration, I hear a high-pitched squeaking coming from my right side. Mumei has doubled over and is rolling around in an immense laughing fit. "HAHAAHHAHA... AH... AH.. I... I did not... I did... What was that?!" We hear her gasping for air as she shows not signs of calming down. Nia just observes her with a suprised expression. "Right... you hadn't seen that before..." I say as realization dawns on me. "That... that was.. oh my god.. why did that.. I have so many quesitons. That was the best thing I've ever seen." She manages to gasp out in-between gasps for air. Eventually she calms down and manages to compose herself once more. "Okay... Phew.. Oh, I'm crying. That was the dumbest thing I've ever seen." She lifts her glasses and wipes her eyes with her sleeve. "Okay, let's get to that final match." She selects Happy Chaos once again and I pick Ky Kiske. The match starts and Mumei quickly wins round 1 by constantly shooting me in the face. At the start of round 2 I predict her jump and manage to counter her. After a successful combo, she's in the corner... which she immediately rolls out of. As she gets back up and starts shooting me once more, I block. But then she suddenly she hits me with a charged Dust attack and sends me sky high. As her character jumps after mine, Mumei just starts unloading bullets. Eventually both characters crash back down, leaving us in the same positions as the start of the match. As I move in to attack, Mumei suddenly activates her Super and just completely riddles my character with bullets. In his win animation, Happy Chaos just casually summons a car and laughs maniacally to himself as the announcer cries "CHAOS... WINS!"