Later that day, after Ren and John had enough space to calm down, Kelsey called for them—because finally, they would get their first mission.
They were in the trio's waiting room. Every trio had a waiting room. It was basically like an office, but not really—it was where they could relax, and where their handler would hand them missions and other stuff like that.
Anyways, the three of them sat on the couch opposite of Kelsey, who was looking at her futuristic iPad and pulling up their mission.
"Come on, what is it?" John urged her to hurry up.
"Calm down. I know you're excited because this is what we've been waiting for for a while, but still… this is your first mission. You should know it's not going to be something really special, right?" Kelsey said.
That reminder disappointed John a little, but he quickly focused back on the mission.
"Okay… right. But still—what type of mission is it?" Ren asked.
And this time, Kelsey answered.
"Well, you need to go and take down this guy—Duke. He's one year older than you and Kai. Last night, he got drunk and wandered through the street until he ran into two students that he—seemingly out of nowhere—beat up badly," Kelsey said.
"And I guess the reason he wasn't caught last night was because of his ability?" Ren asked.
"Well, yes. His power is called Power Up. It's very simple. Once he activates it, his physical strength, ability, speed—all his physical abilities—increase dramatically. And with training, the amount of strength he can gain can grow. But once he finishes that, he needs to wait The same amount of seconds—five seconds—to use his ability again."
"That sounds interesting…" John muttered.
"Also, this is a note to keep you alert," Kelsey continued. "He is training to be in PMMA. Power Mixed Martial Arts—basically like MMA, but with the fighters having powers."
"Well, I guess his power fits the range for him to enter there," Ren said.
"PMMA has limitations on powers Because they don't want people with extremely powerful powers to join, and they don't want people with destructive powers to fight around civilians. Naturally, they also don't want people with weak powers to join that league, so there's a strict power set you need to be a part of to qualify. So naturally, the amount of fighters in it is not a lot."
Later, Ren, Kai, and John stood in front of an apartment building.
Ren looked at his phone. "Well… this is the place. This is Duke's apartment building," Ren said.
And then they went inside.
"So we just need to take him to the police station or the SIED office, and our mission is done, right?" Kai said.
"Yes, but I think we should go to the police station since there is one closer to the apartment," Ren said.
As they were heading towards Duke's apartment, John stayed silent.
Ren noticed it, but he didn't bother asking what was wrong, since he was still a bit frustrated about the argument from earlier.
Eventually, they arrived at the floor where his apartment should be, and when they walked down the hallway, they saw him in front of his apartment door talking with two people—they were probably his friends.
The three of them walked towards them, and Duke and his friends eventually noticed them.
Ren was the first to speak. He pulled out his badge and said, "Hello. My name is Ren. We are from SIED. Could you please come with us?"
Once he heard that they were from SIED, Duke freaked out.
"Wait, wait, wait… are you guys here because of last night? Please, guys, I'm sorry—I didn't mean it. I was drunk. Please, guys, I can't get arrested. My chances of getting into the PMMA will lower if I get arrested, and my parents will be so pissed. Please don't do this."
Ren just sighed.
He was hoping that Duke would cooperate, but maybe after some talking, they could calm him down, and he could just go with them to the police station.
But then John took a step forward.
"Well, I guess if you don't want to come with us, we will beat you up and drag you back to the police station," John said.
WHAT THE FUCK? Ren shouted in his head.
Why the hell is John threatening Duke? He's making this situation much worse. He's escalating the situation.
What Duke did was bad, but not to the point that if he showed any type of resistance, they should beat him up first.
Before Ren and Kai had a chance to explain that they won't do that and that they just wanted to talk this out—
Duke and his two friends already took that threat seriously and were ready to fight.
Duke and the friend in front dashed towards John and Ren.
Duke, who used his ability, went straight for John and smashed through the railing.
That distracted Ren for a couple of seconds—enough for his friend to do the same to Ren—leaving Kai alone with the third friend.
Hi…" Kai said awkwardly, but the third friend just activated his ability—setting his whole body on fire—and ran towards Kai.
So Kai activated his ability, summoning a fire sword, and immediately blocked the fire guy's punch, then counterattacked. But the guy took a step back to make some distance.
Then Kai dashed towards him and threw a couple of slashes.
Luckily for them, the corridor had enough space for Kai to swing his sword around. And Again luckily for them, there wasn't something like a carpet or any flammable material on the ground, so these two fire users could freely fight.
The fire guy blocked and threw a couple of punches at Kai, which Kai managed to block pretty easily.
This fire guy is a pretty good martial artist, if Kai has to guess. He's probably someone who wants to be in the PMMA just like Duke.
But then, through the highly intense clash between Kai and the fire guy, suddenly an opening popped up on the fire guy out of nowhere—which Kai took, hitting him pretty hard on the side. Not cut, but hit—he purposely used the flat side of his sword—but that was okay. It was no less devastating.
Good. I'm starting to get the hang of it now, Kai thought to himself.
This is the swordsmanship that he learned from John—the most basic swordsmanship on his home planet.
And the principles behind it are very simple. It revolves around their power.
Basically, it's a swordsmanship style where the user fights the opponent and purposely tries to create an opening. Once they do, they hit it with a charged blow. It's a nearly devastating strategy since no one can easily survive such a blow unless they have super durability and can take the blow.
And this style was still great, even though Kai doesn't have the same ability as John and his species.
Anyways, even though this swordsmanship style sounds great, it's flawed since if the user's opponent is good enough to not have any openings created, then there's a big problem—considering this is the main selling point and the strongest part of the style.
And that's why there are other swordsmanship styles on John's home planet that are much better and different.
So that's why John, when he taught Kai this swordsmanship style, purposely made him keep practicing his old swordsmanship style. Even though it wasn't as good, it was still reliable when his new one failed him.
But currently, it wasn't failing him.
His fight was going great, and he could easily win.
On the other hand… things weren't going so well for Ren.
(wow, this is kind of bad The way I wrote this is Chapter is kind of bad. I seriously should get something like an editor as soon as possible to make my writing be more professional)