Drageria
Ch. 24: Training part. 2
The three weeks of hell had come and gone. Although things were far from calm, they were much less intense than before, much to the great relief of the remaining 500 recruits. Today, they were stationed outside in an open dirt field where they had the opportunity to mingle with one another as they waited. Izuku was one of the few who didn't want to socialize; he just wanted to stand by himself, reflect on the three weeks of hell prior, and feel good that he had made it through. However, that was cut short as a few friendly faces and voices appeared.
"Hey man!", Izuku turned to the voice and saw a very familiar smile of sharp teeth and red hair waving at him.
"Kirishima?", Izuku asked back, stupified, unable to muster a more excited tone in his shock.
"What's up! It's been a while, eh?", He told him while wrapping his arm around his neck, still grinning wildly.
"Yeah...it has.", Izuku says, taken aback by the gesture but also happy.
"I can't believe I didn't notice you until just now.", Kirishima tells him in shock and embarrassment.
"I don't think any of us noticed each other through the three weeks of hell.", Another voice chipped in, causing both boys to look over.
When they did, they both saw a familiar tired expression and purple messy hair, and Izuku exclaimed, "Shinso!"
"So you two made it; good to see.", Shinso said to him, his attempt at a smile looking sarcastic.
"Was that sarcasm?", Kirishima asked.
Shinso sighs at him and replies, "For once, no."
"Well, it's good to see some friendly faces here.", yet another voice says.
Everyone looks to the opposite end and sees a familiar black-haired beauty; at this point, both Izuku and Kirishima exclaim, "Momo!"
"Izuku, Shinso, Kirishima, it's good to see you three.", Momo politely greets and bows to all three.
As they all revealed in their reunion, Izuku stated, "I never would've guessed all four of us would sign up for the recruitment."
"What gave you that idea?", Shinso asked as the rest of them got quiet.
Seeing that his comment may have misled them, he nervously tried to explain himself, "Well….I mean, I wanted to join since there aren't any positions to be a Pro Hero in Drageria. Also, I never knew any of you wanted this job; I mean, I knew you guys wanted to be heroes. I just didn't expect to see you here either. You had other jobs."
"That was just so I could eat.", Shinso told him.
"Yeah, it was just for pocket money.", Kirishima admitted with a sweat drop.
"I honestly didn't know there was something like a hero's job until I heard about it. I was going to stay with that job the whole time I was here," Momo admits, a bit embarrassed.
"Ahem!", a new voice coughed for their attention.
The three boys looked to where Momo had suddenly shifted around. With an embarrassing squeak, she jumped off to the side and motioned to a new girl, introducing her, "Oh! Sorry! Um, guys, this is my new friend, Ochako Uraraka."
Uraraka was a cute girl around all their ages, shorter than Izuku. She had big brown eyes, brown hair in a bob cut, and rosy cheeks. Izuku couldn't help but blush at her, but he shook his sense back before he acted like a fool.
As Kirishima said his greetings and Izuku said nothing, Shinso seemed to study her. He asked, "Aren't you the daughter of that construction company that just came here?"
"Uraraka Construction Co, yep, that's my parents' business.", she said with a nod.
"Why are you here? You should have a pretty steady job with your parents, right?", Shinso inquires.
Uraraka gives a gentle melancholy sigh as this and tells them, "My folks wanted me to find my passion in life. When their business went bankrupt and had to sell, they came here. Things are better, but that's only because there's so much work to be done. Also, I wanted to help my parents out differently, and I heard that becoming a guard has lots of money and perks to go along with it."
"That's….really selfless of you," Izuku tells her, his voice bright with elation.
"Your parents must love you!", Kirishima exclaimed with an excited smile and fist pump.
"I wish I could do the same thing.", Shinso grumbles.
"Aww, stop it, you guys. I'm blushing.", Uraraka tried to stop them, her face growing red, before saying a bit disheartened, "Though I didn't expect that kind of reaction, due to my reason."
The three boys looked at one another before looking back at her, where Shinso told her, "So? Doctors and Police do their jobs for money as well. It's not so unheard of."
Kirishima said, "You don't always have to be pure of intent to do something good."
"Heroes can be all types of people. And you're using the money for your parents. That's pretty admirable.", Izuku adds last, leading the girl to smile happily at their kind words.
"Recruits! Attention!", the General yelled in command, causing everyone to scurry into position.
Once everyone was lined up and at attention before the man, he walked back and forth from one end of the rows to the other to inspect and try to psych out any of them, but not one flinched. Exactly what he wanted to see, he returned to the center of the line and addressed the kids.
"I want you all to look around at your other recruits. See how many of you are left.", he told them, allowing the recruits to glance over at one another. After a minute, he followed up with, "You are all that's left of your three weeks of hell, but don't feel proud of yourselves just yet. In the coming months, your numbers will dwindle even further. And by the end, there will only be a few. That few will be our best. So prepare yourselves for the long road ahead. Your uphill battle has only begun."
The General could almost feel their collective anxiety rise off them and a dry gulp from several more. He knew that the coming months would genuinely make or break.
He marched up and down again, saying, "Starting today, you will be learning how to hone your bodies. Now that you've grown them, you must match them with equal grit and intelligence. You will learn, discover, and sharpen your skills and mind. That is how you all will become great warriors."
He could tell the kids were itching to ask one another about this, so he finished his speech and said, "From here, you will be taught your new skill by my Lieutenant General."
"YOU-HOO! General!", a loud and feminine voice called out, cutting off his train of thought and speech, leading him to sigh in exasperation.
Without turning around, he stood there and waited for the sound of feet stopping at his side, at which point he lightly scolded, "Namiel, you're late."
The woman, Namiel, acted coyly as she twiddled her fingertips and cutely apologized, "I'm sorry about that. But I was being held up with other priorities. You know I'm a busy woman."
The General gives an aggravated sigh while pinching his nose's bridge, saying, "Don't make it a habit. We're in crunch time."
"Every day is crunch time for me.", Namiel shot back with a shoulder shrug.
Douglas shook his head as he looked back to the recruits and informed them, "Recruits, this is your Lieutenant General, Namiel. I'll let her take it from here."
Namiel was a stunning and voluptuous woman. Her eyes were blue, shined bright, and reflected something that couldn't be understood. Her hair was blonde, long, silky, and perfect. Her skin was flawless. She was a vision of beauty! She wore an American-style Army Uniform like the General's, but hers was less practical and more…available.
Her "uniform" was very, very exposing. From a mini skirt with stockings to a short uniform shirt that showed off her stomach and exposed much of her extremely large cleavage! The only normal thing she wore was a hat on her head, alongside a horsewhip in her hands.
Apart from that, she was the strangest mutant there was. Although she looked like a regular bombshell blonde, only certain parts of her were out of place. She had large bat wings on her back, a long spear-tipped tail, hooves that gave the impression of heels, fangs, sharp nails, and a set of black horns that encapsulated her head like a crown. The horns merged into her forehead before sweeping back with two large ones, two tiny ones poked out in front, and two medium ones curled around the back of her ears. In the center was a red gem.
All in all, she looked like a military-style succubus.
"Good afternoon, recruits.", Namiel greeted them while approaching forward.
"Good afternoon, Lieutenant General, ma'am!", All of them sounded off.
Namiel giggles while shifting excitedly, and she states gleefully, "I love the enthusiasm! From here on, I'll be your combat instructor."
"You!? Ha! Don't make me laugh.", A voice suddenly called out.
Namiel tried to spot the heckler, but she didn't need to try very hard when a path opened up by the kids to reveal the person who said it. Namiel smiled coldly at him and stated coolly, "Oh! I see we have a sharp tongue in the group. I would've thought that your three weeks of hell would've killed things of that nature, but I suppose clearing thorns is harder than it seems."
The boy chuckles at her statement and says, "With all due respect, ma'am, you don't look anything like an instructor, let alone one for combat. You look like a teacher of S ."
"What I do in my time is my business.", Namiel stood firm in her defense, cracking her whip.
"My point still stands.", The boy says back with an impish smile.
Namiel looked like she would say something, then stopped. The gears turned in her head, and ideas sprouted forth as she offered, "Oh! When would you like to prove that point?"
The boy looks surprised by this at first, but then he doubles down and agrees with a smile, "Yes, ma'am."
Namiel twirls around her whip and tells him, pointing to a white ring off to the side, "Then step right up. As for the rest of you, at ease."
The two of them then walked into the ring and stood off on opposite ends. The boy got into a fight stance while Namiel did something like a baton cheerleader with her whip. After throwing it away, she motioned for the teen to come forward. He obliged and ran towards her, readying a punch. Once he was close enough, Namiel sidestepped and allowed him to punch the air.
The teen is shocked by this at first but then tries to swing for another and misses yet again. This goes on for quite a while, with the teen trying to slug her while Namiel sidesteps away, ducks, or slaps away the attacks—all while laughing with zeal! The teen gets extremely fed up with this, roars in frustration, and goes in with a haymaker!
Once again, Namiel dodges, but this time, she does a spin and whacks the teen in the side of the head with one of her hooves! The boy falters and stumbles to his knees. He gets up quickly and tries to tackle her, but she simply stands there and steps her legs out with her tail!
The boy falls to his head and lies on the ground, coughing in pain! After a minute, he gets back up, activates his fire quirk, and throws a fireball at her! Which Namiel blocks by slapping it away with her wing. The teen jets off after her in an attempt to crash into her, but Namiel does something shocking!
She takes backward low stands, and once he's close, she makes a shuffling swinging motion and punches him square in the gut! The teen almost barfs but doesn't get to as Namiel grabs his arm, flings him over her shoulder, and slams him into the ground! From there, she stationed herself atop him and grabbed one arm back with a knee into his back!
While pinning him down, she asks, "Do you still think I'm not qualified?"
"Yes, ma'am. I mean, no, ma'am. I mean, I don't know.", The teen painfully squeaks out between gasps.
She nods at this and looks to the other teens while asking, "Anyone else need a demonstration?", Almost immediately, they all shake their heads and step away..making her change her dangerous expression to one of positivity as she says, "Good!"
She then released the boy and stood up to address the others, telling them as she retrieved the whip, "Well, recruits, from here on, I'll be teaching you how to hone your newly developed bodies into fit fighting machines! I'll teach you all from hand-to-hand knife play to gun handling!" With a crack of her whip, she said, "From there, I'll teach you all individually to find your personal fighting preference!"
The teens almost seem excited by this until she tells them, maliciously mischievous, "Now I hope you all can handle these next few months." She then cracks her whip again while licking it, and she says with excited anticipation, "Cause I won't go easy on any of you." This Leads all the teens to gulp dryly at this and the General to just shake his head at her.