Tenshio Hakuro slowly turned. His steel eyes, empty and cold, reflected the crimson sunset, but no anger, no challenge. Only readiness for work.
"Circumstances have changed, Morohashi-san," he said evenly, like a voice interface. "A duel does not fit current operational parameters."
"Parameters?" Ryūnosuke bared his teeth, his metal Scars under his skin stirring, gleaming with a dull, leaden light like mercury under skin. "I'm gonna scatter your parameters across the rocks right now."
He didn't wait for an answer. There was no dash. There was a shift in reality. The air between them cracked with a pop as Ryūnosuke vanished from the spot. Not with the supersonic fury of Seiya, but with monstrous, concentrated explosive power he had honed in countless spars with Akira, where the only shield was speed and the weapon was crude, unyielding might.
He was in front of Tenshio before the soundwave from the launch reached the walls of the ruins. His right fist, already coated in the liquid, leaden sheen of "Iron Oath," flew in a straight line for the center of the opponent's chest, without finesse, without feints. Just annihilation.
Tenshio reacted. His plate-shields, like folded fans, slipped from his sleeves and closed before him into an instant barrier. An alloy created in TAMA laboratories—light, resilient, designed to disperse energy and withstand a 20mm shell impact.
Ryūnosuke's fist met the barrier.
The sound was not a strike, but a catastrophe.
BA-BOOOOM!
The air howled and tore. A deafening soundwave, visible as a trembling heat haze, ripped in all directions. Observers hiding in surviving logs within a ten-meter radius cried out, grabbing their ears, blood spraying from their nostrils. Dust rose in a ring.
The plate didn't shatter. It buckled. Before their eyes, with the screech of tearing titanium, its silver surface bent into an arc of almost thirty degrees. Tenshio didn't bounce back. He was flung. Like an empty tin can hit by a tank shell. His body soared, described an arc, and slammed back-first into a stone outcrop of a half-destroyed wall fifteen meters away. The stone cracked and crumbled. Tenshio collapsed to the ground, but a second later, with mechanical effort, rose to one knee. His face remained impassive, but a trickle of blood flowed from the split corner of his mouth. His plate, hopelessly damaged, hissed and detached.
"Vulnerability in right shoulder," he forced out, his electronic voice slightly crackling. "Excessive energy expenditure on initial attack. Efficiency coefficient dropping."
"Don't give a damn," Ryūnosuke hissed through his teeth and moved forward again.
Tenshio didn't wait. His left hand flung three discs at Ryūnosuke—mobile traps. They hovered in the air, flared up, and created a three-layered force field between them, like an interweaving of blue lightning. The air inside thickened, groaned. The field was designed to completely stop a large-caliber projectile or freeze mid-level techniques.
Ryūnosuke didn't stop. He crashed into it.
The first layer of the field shattered with a sound of breaking glass as his left shoulder, reinforced to battering ram status, passed through. The second layer slowed him like thick tar. Muscles on his neck bulged, tendons stretched taut. He growled, and his right fist, still pulsing with leaden heaviness, slammed into the center of the energy matrix.
GRUUH!
The second layer disintegrated into sparks. Ryūnosuke took a step, and his forehead, covered in the same metallic sheen like a ram, smashed into the third, final barrier. A deafening clap sounded, the field vanished, and the disc-traps, overloaded, fell to the stones as smoking junk. Ryūnosuke exhaled, his breath ragged, but he had slowed for only a fraction of a second. The demonstration was clear: high-level tactical defense didn't save you from concentrated, brute force.
Tenshio, seeing the approach, tried to counterattack, thrusting a palm forward with a short burst of compressed air capable of piercing concrete. Ryūnosuke didn't even dodge. He caught that arm. His fingers, turned to steel vises, crunched shut on Tenshio's wrist. He didn't scream. Only his eyes narrowed momentarily from pain and data recalculation. "Grip strength exceeds calculated. Simulation error."
"Just shut up already," Ryūnosuke hissed and yanked Tenshio towards himself, simultaneously raising his knee.
The blow landed in the solar plexus. A dull, unpleasant sound. Air was forcefully expelled from the Tokyoite's lungs. His impeccable posture broke, his body bent double.
And the beating began. This wasn't a fight. This was punishment.
Ryūnosuke, not releasing the wrist, delivered short, hard blows with his elbow, the edge of his palm, his knee. Each blow accompanied by a dull thud and crunch. He wasn't aiming at vital organs. He was breaking. Shoulder. Rib. Collarbone. Each time Tenshio tried to gather himself, utter another analysis ("Fracture of third rib. Recommendation: retreat"), a new blow would fly in, scattering thoughts.
In a fury, Ryūnosuke threw Tenshio away and, before he fell, was beside him. His leg, like a descending hammer, struck the ground a centimeter from the downed opponent's head.
THOOOOM!
The earth trembled. In the compacted, centuries-tamped soil of the training zone, a crater two meters in diameter and half a meter deep formed. Stones and dust fountained up. Tenshio, lying on the edge, jerked from the ground shockwave.
Ryūnosuke stood over him, his chest heaving heavily, steam rising from his heated body. Tenshio's face was unrecognizable: one eye swollen shut, nose broken, lips split and bloody. His impeccable gray uniform was torn and stained with dust and his own blood. He tried to rise on his elbows, but his body wouldn't obey. In his eyes, clouded with pain and shock, calculation lights still flickered, but the machine was broken.
Fury still seethed in Ryūnosuke. He raised his fist, intending to drive the final point into the ground next to this walking calculator's head, so he'd remember the roar forever.
And brought it down.
BOOOOM-BOOOOM-BOOOOM!
The fist strike into the ground was an act of pure, uncontrolled rage. The energy of "Iron Oath," mixed with inhuman strength, went into the soil, into the rocky foundation of the "Garden." The ground under the feet of hundreds of people within a fifty-meter radius jerked, shook. Stones swayed, dust and debris rained from ledges. Sensors placed around the perimeter for monitoring the training registered a local tremor of three points on the training scale. This wasn't earth magic. It was physical force transitioning into a seismic shock.
In the sudden, stunned silence that followed, broken only by Ryūnosuke's heavy breathing, footsteps sounded. Slow, clear. And a voice, cold as naked steel, quiet as the whisper of a blade on a sheath.
"Enough."
Haruya Tanaka, first-class instructor, stood at the edge of the destroyed area. His dark haori was unstained by dust. "Tsukinome"—the Moon's Eye—rested peacefully at his waist. But his presence was heavier than the earthquake just experienced.
His gaze swept the scene: the beaten, helpless Tenshio, the smoking craters, and Ryūnosuke, still standing in a victor's pose, his face contorted with echoes of rage.
Behind Tanaka, from behind ruins and crevices, others began to appear. Students and instructors from both academies, drawn by the roar and tremors. Kaede, lips pressed tight. Akira, with an inscrutable face. Pale but composed Seiya. And the Tokyoites—Higashi with a stony face, Miyuki quickly assessing the damage, and Hajime Saime himself, whose gaze slid over his lying subordinate without a trace of emotion, then fixed on Tanaka.
Silence fell, cut only by Tenshio's ragged breathing.
And then Tanaka spoke. Not shouting. His voice carried across the area, reaching every ear with chilling clarity.
"Morohashi Ryūnosuke," each word fell like a verdict. "Your actions are a disgrace to the traditions of 'Tenran.' To the centuries of honor, discipline, and dignity upon which this academy stands."
Ryūnosuke tried to say something, but Tanaka's look silenced him. That look was worse than any scream.
"What happened here is not a fight. It is a brawl. A crude, thoughtless, animalistic reprisal. You have forgotten who you are. You have forgotten that strength without mind and honor is mere destruction. And today you destroyed not only stones. You trampled the reputation of your ancestors, your clan, and this school."
Tanaka paused, letting the words sink into the minds of all gathered. The Tokyoites listened with stony faces, but satisfaction was in their eyes: discipline here, it seemed, was not an empty word.
"For this transgression," Tanaka continued, his voice becoming official and inexorable, "you receive a strict reprimand with entry into your personal file. Your access rights to special training halls and technique archives are suspended until further notice from the Instructor Council. And, as atonement," he indicated the ruined sector of the "Garden" with his gaze, "you alone, without using Kokurō, will restore the destroyed menhirs and cleanse this sector of all traces of today's... disgrace. Every stone. Every chip. Understood?"
Ryūnosuke stood, fists clenched, his face burning with a mix of shame and not yet subsided fury. He nodded, once, sharply.
"Good," Tanaka concluded. He turned to Higashi and Saime. "Professor, Saime-san. 'Tenran' apologizes for our student's unworthy behavior. Disciplinary action has been carried out. We hope this incident does not mar further cooperation."
His words hung in the air—a perfectly calibrated, impeccably cold performance. Everyone understood its true meaning: we showed our fangs. We punished our own for excessive cruelty, but we kept the right to show fangs for ourselves. The games are over. The strongest on the field sets the rules.
Higashi nodded, coldly and briefly.
"The consequences will be noted. We are satisfied... with the prescribed measures. After retrieving our students, we will withdraw."
The Tokyoites, without another glance at anyone, moved to pick up their broken soldier. Saime, passing by Ryūnosuke, threw him a quick, assessing look—not of malice, but of cold accounting of a new variable in his equations. Then they vanished into the twilight.
The crowd began to disperse. Instructors led students away, whispering. The area emptied, leaving only destruction, craters, and Ryūnosuke, motionless amidst it all.
After a while, Reiden Kagetori approached him. He walked with his hands in his pockets, with his usual carefree grin, but understanding shone in his golden eyes.
"So, hero," he said, stopping nearby. "Gave the people a show, made a mess of the stones. A real festival of destruction."
Ryūnosuke didn't answer, looking at the ground.
Reiden chuckled.
"Overdid it a bit, of course. Could've been more elegant. But overall... not bad. Made it clear our home isn't a testing ground for their cold experiments."
He put a hand on Ryūnosuke's shoulder, and his voice became quieter, almost conspiratorial.
"And about those... community service hours. Don't sweat it. I'll make sure the cleanup is... productive."
He winked, turned, and walked away, whistling some carefree tune.
Ryūnosuke was left alone in the emptied, ruined hall. He looked at his bloodied knuckles, at the craters, at the broken menhirs. Shame and fury slowly receded, replaced by heavy, weary emptiness and a strange, sharp premonition. The battle with Tenshio was won. But the war, as was now clear to him, was just beginning. And his place in it was already defined—not as a disciplined soldier, but as a hammer that strikes without warning, shattering any calculations and plans. He sighed, taking in the dark evening air smelling of dust, blood, and cold steel.