Capítulo 16: Challenge
"I present to you!..... The legend! Takeo the almighty!!!!"
A muscular man with short black hair gets on stage, topless, with his head held high and his chest puffed. "Takeo the almighty" starts flexing his muscles for all the ladies to see, which seems to do the job with all the girls screaming like teenagers and all the mans looking at him with hatred in their eyes.
While he is flexing for all the thirsty wives to see, the showman continues speaking.
"Now ladies and gentlemen, we present to you the opportunity of a lifetime.
We encourage the gentlemen in the public to face a tough challenge. Sow to your sons what a real man is! remind your wives why they fell in love with you and make your daughters admire you!"
By his words and tone, it was clear that the showman had talent, his words were softer than oil and caught everyone's attention.
The crowd, especially the men, driven by their desires to make their wives look at them as they were doing with Takeo, were listening very closely to what the showman was saying, not daring to miss one single word from his mouth.
"We challenge you to come up here on stage and face this legendary warrior, the only thing that you have to do is touch Takeo, nothing more, nothing less...Just. One. Touch."
The man raises his index finger slowly while emphasizing those last words. The crowd was entirely bought on the idea of facing the challenge at this point, but the showman didn't stop there.
"But beware!! This samurai has faced hundreds of battles and has bathed his sword in the blood of his enemies! His presence alone made bandits cower in fear! But any of you that manages to accomplish this titanic task will be received with this pouch filled to the brim with gold coins! So... will any of you be brave enough to face this man?"
At the same time he was speaking, his hand which previously had his index raised, was swinging around accompanying every word he said with strength behind every gesture while his other was grabbing a pouch from his waist and showing it to the people.
The men didn't care about the warning, they were already sold on the idea long before the warning.
Whishing to be the first to succeed, they all quickly lined up before the stairs of the stage, arguing with each other about who would go first.
"Get out of my way!"
"I was first!"
"Pfffff! As if you were able to do it!"
"Come on Honey! you can do it!"
"You better win! I want a new dress!"
They all had their wives and family cheering for them in the crowd which made them even more motivated.
Behind all that gathering there is a white haired boy with two children, both on his shoulders.
"Come on Yasu!, you could win so much gold if you tried!" Momonosuke is pulling Yasu's hair begging him to participate but Yasu doesn't seem faced at all.
"I already told you I won't" Yasu responds in an unamused tone, but even though he says he won't participate he's still curious about what this whole deal of the presence of the samurai is about.
'Oden said that conqueror's Haki is very rare, and still, there is someone here that claims he has it' He couldn't comprehend it, how can something so rare pop up so casually?.
By the time Momonosuke stops pleading for Yau to try, the first contestant already got up on stage, Takeo only looked in his direction with crossed arms, the challenger was nervous, sweat runs down his face, and you could see a light shaking in his hands.
"I will make it easier for you all, I won't move in the slightest and the only thing that you have to do is touch me, sounds easy right?" You could taste the smugness in Takeo's tone, clearly, he was very confident in his abilities.
The other man didn't say a word in response but his posture relaxed just a little knowing that he would have it easier than he thought to win all those gold coins.
"Ahhh!" With a scream, the man launched himself toward the samurai as fast as he could
Getting close to the samurai, the man raised his right hand aiming to punch Takeo's face, there wasn't any technique but at least there was intent behind the punch.
"What!?" The man couldn't believe what was happening, his hand stopped just centimeters from the samurai's face, in fact, it wasn't only his hand, his entire body froze in his punching stance.
"What are you doing!? Hit him! I want new things!" The sound of a woman rang out from the crowd demanding the man win that sweet prize money, but the man still didn't budge an inch.
"AGH! What have you done!" The man still struggled but to no avail, there was no way of moving just a bit.
Takeo only smiled smugly and didn't say anything.
"It seems our first contestant can't withstand the pressure of Takeo the almighty! He started strong but in a moment ended up as countless before him! Will any of the other challengers fall to the same fate!?" The showman screamed as if his life depended on it, commenting on the events that just occurred.
"Wow! He wasn't lying about the power of this samurai! Maybe we could ask Father to take him with us to the castle with the rest!"
Momonosuke was very excited but Yasu didn't say a word, he just stared at Takeo.
'I can't feel anything, it may not be directed at me but at least I should be able to detect traces of Haki. Tch! What is going on with my Observation? Why is it failing me now!?"
Yasu was trying to decipher the secret of the legendary warrior but only ended up blaming his own Haki.
"Now ladies and gentlemen! who's next!?
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Ok, were back on track
As always thanks for reading
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