章 59: Chapter 59 - An Unexpected Lesson
A few days later, on the sixth day, Kazuya and Orihime stood before Kenpachi. It was about 6 a.m. that day, and the weather was cold. Winter was gradually dawning upon the region, and everyone was aware of it, but this morning's sudden cold weather seemed to have come out of nowhere, as yesterday's condition was hot compared to this.
Each of the three warriors (Kenpachi, Kazuya, and Orihime) wielded their wooden swords, pointing at the opposite ones (the master against the students). It had been about five days or so since Kazuya and Orihime began their training with Kenpachi, and his hands were now covered in blisters and bandages. Kazuya and Orihime also had bandages, but theirs were mainly on their faces and around their foreheads.
Genta and the others who treated them wanted to advise them to stop the training process, but they chose not to do so as they felt they would fall out of line by doing that. And even though magical healing techniques were required, they still needed time to rest for proper recuperation. But that was a luxury they couldn't afford, given the circumstances.
"The both of you have made significant progress on this, and I'm glad that training you gets harder with every succeeding session." So now, I'm not going to be in defense; I will come at the both of you like I intend to kill you," he warned. "However you wish to react to that, that would be completely up to you." My advice is to fight to kill and don't hold back. Understood?"
"Hai, Sensei!" both of them chorused.
Then, before either of the duo could even take a step, in a flash, Kenpachi got close to Orihime, who gasped when she noticed he was already right in front of her within a blink. Before she could react, he kicked her belly, sending her flying and crashing into the nearby wooden wall.
Kazuya, though the Sensei had already made it clear that he would be fighting them as if with the intent to kill, got angry and lunged at him with his sword raised high.
Kenpachi blocked Kazuya's attack. He was surprised to see Kenpachi with a slight villainous grin on his face.
"You fiend!" Kazuya yelled as he began consecutive attacks from all directions against Kazuya.
"It is good that you are angry, but learn to challenge your rage." Before Kenpachi could finish his sentence, Kazuya attacked again, striking too fast and too many times over and over again that Kenpachi couldn't give his lesson.
Kenpachi then got back on offensive mode and began striking relentlessly, but Kazuya was efficiently dodging his attacks, trying to get close enough to smash his wooden sword on him. Kenpachi tried over and over again to counter his strikes, but his attempts were always neutralized by Kazuya's oncoming attacks that just kept coming.
Orihime struggled to stand up, shoving off all the broken pieces of wood from her body and dusting off the little splinters from her trousers. Then she felt blood pouring down from her head again, despite the several bandages covering it. She clicked her tongue before looking forward, surprised to see Kazuya holding his own against Kenpachi, the man who had knocked them down like children several times over the past few days.
From his facial expression, she could tell he was very mad. She had never seen him this mad before. It felt as if his rage was a physical reality and not just a feeling that was expressed by his behavior. The most stunning fact was that Kazuya was fighting against a master swordsman—one who wielded two swords!
Although Kenpachi was still standing his ground as their Sensei, he was getting frustrated. He had tried every method he could think of to bring the session to a close, but to no avail. It was like all of a sudden, Kazuya had become his equal, fuelled by a rage that strengthened him beyond all that Kenpachi had anticipated.
Kazuya's groans and cries were so loud that people from within the guild came around to find out what was going on. The windows of the building were now flocked with the faces of spectators, curious to see what was going on.
Kenpachi knew this wasn't going well for any of them, given the kind of attention that they were receiving. So he wanted to make quick work of this and bring this flared-up fight to a close, as it wasn't benefiting them anymore. The purpose of this session was for development, not to express spite.
So he quickly swung his sword with all his mind at Kazuya, hoping to knock him out from the sudden impact.
However, that didn't work. As the sword clashed against Kazuya's head, it didn't knock him out. Instead, the wooden sword shattered into pieces, sending splinters of wood flying in multiple directions. With one of the wooden swords destroyed and Kazuya being too close for Kenpachi to use the other, he was now open to attack, and Kazuya seized this opportunity, smashing his wooden sword on Kenpachi's face with all his might.
The hit was so great that it almost knocked him out, and he fell to the ground like a man in a trance, breathing heavily as blood poured down from his forehead, through his hair, and down to the ground, forming a small red puddle beneath it.
But everyone gasped when they saw this, and silence fell upon the environment the moment Kenpachi fell to the ground. Orihime did not know what to say. She was stunned by what she had just witnessed and wasn't even sure how to react to it. Kazuya was so clouded by anger that he barely noticed that Orihime was alright and was standing behind him, not far away.
Kazuya picked up Kenpachi's wooden sword, and Orihime rightfully anticipated the worst.
"Stop!" she screamed out, "It's over!"
Kazuya heard the sudden voice, and it stopped him, and it was at that moment that Kazuya turned back and saw Orihime standing there, wounded but fine. With a sigh of relief, his rage began to fizzle out, and his rational conscience slowly began to emerge.
He looked down at Kenpachi, who seemed dead save for his heavy breathing. He also looked around and could see all the people viewing from the windows of the building, watching in horror and disapproval over what he had just done. Among the people watching from within the building were Master Shizu and her apprentice, Genta. They had also heard the ruckus from inside and came out to take a look, and from the look on their faces, they weren't in line with what he had just done either.
Kazuya looked back at Orihime, who was now taking a few steps towards her, while she looked at him like he was a monster. Although she had seen him do extreme things before today, she never thought it would reach this extent—to the point of doing what he had just done out of sheer rage.
He didn't know what to say, but to his slight relief, he heard Kenpachi's voice from behind him.
"I believe this marks the end of our training sessions," he said to Kazuya before groaning in pain from the head injury.
Kazuya, at this point, realized he had just done something so uncalled for that it couldn't be justified by his anger. Without holding back, he chose to exercise some humility, knowing beyond all doubt that he was wrong. Slowly but surely, he began to mutter, "I'm..."
"Save it," Kenpachi said, interrupting Kazuya's apology, "it was my fault anyway."
"No, it was mine," Kazuya admitted. "Even though your training method is crude and unconventional, you weren't training us out of spite; you were doing so because you had our good interests at heart." But when I attacked you, I did so out of rage and distrusted your judgment. "That was inappropriate!"
Before Kenpachi could stop him from talking any further, Kazuya did the unexpected by bowing his head in humility and saying, "I apologise!" with his head bowed to the ground, "If you accept my apology, I look forward to learning more from you!"
This was shocking, to say the least, as everything coming from Kazuya's mouth at that moment felt out of character, yet genuine.
Kenpachi sighed with a slight smile. "You have a knack for overdoing things, don't you, Kazuya?" he asked.
Orihime was surprised by Kazuya's sudden show of genuine humility, and her heart was moved by it.
"Now get up quickly," Kenpachi instructed, not liking mushy situations like this, "nothing happened; you simply made a mistake and learned from it." "It's all part of what is expected from an average training session with me, nothing more."
Then Kazuya got up from his bow and stood erect in such a way that made Orihime wonder where this sudden stewardship towards Kenpachi came from.
Kenpachi noticed the blood was now pouring down his face, and he knew he couldn't go any further.
"I am not in the right shape to spar any further. So can we resume this tomorrow?" he asked the duo.
"Hai, Sensei!" chorused Kazuya and Orihime.
Kazuya had learned a lesson that, though it wasn't the one anticipated, would prove integral to his life moving forward.
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