บท 138: Spar
"You're a King, right?" Willow repeated, "I mean you have to be; the physical change when becoming Perfected isn't this—pronounced." Willow ran her hands along Emile's arms.
"And your eyes—" Willow leaned closer to Emile, he could feel her warm breath fluttering his eyelashes, "they're green now—bright, clear green, the color the world's forgotten."
Willow lingered, lost in the beauty of Emile's eyes.
The uncomfortable closeness, in addition to the awkward silence, suffocated Emile. He wanted to look around and break eye contact with Willow, but he was afraid she'd say something weirder if he did.
Watching this from the side, Blood rolled his eyes. He approached Emile and jabbed him in his side, forcing the immature young adult to snap out of his trance.
"I think Roy should go next—" Emile said, "now that I've ascended we need Roy too as well, so we can return to the Dead Trees forest."
Roy nodded in response then walked past the group, seemingly uninterested in Emile's transformation.
Meanwhile, while Roy was gone, Emile described his new ability to Blood and Willow. He also talked about how he ascended so quickly via hunting hundreds of slimes simultaneously.
After talking for about an hour, Willow confidently stood up. She turned to Emile with a devilish grin and grabbed Emile's hand, pulling him up as well.
"We should spar," she said.
"Why?" He asked.
"You've changed—" Willow insisted, "and you have to get used to that new size, don't you?"
Emile sighed. They've been doing nothing but fighting for the past few days and adding on top of that the fact that Emile just underwent excruciating physical and spiritual trauma, he was excited for a break.
Nevertheless though, Emile stood up and followed Willow. The two separated a ways away from the labyrinth's gate and prepared for their skirmish.
With Blood as the judge, the two readied themselves. Emile planted his feet firmly against the ground.
He lowered his center of gravity and slowed his breathing.
If he was going to fight Willow, he was going to give it his all. Especially since he had the power of surprise on his side.
Willow simply didn't know how much Emile's changed. Presumably she's thinking not much, he got bigger, so what?
Blood signaled the start of the spar and Emile exploded. He pushed all of his might into the stone, cracking it slightly beneath him, as he propelled forward with inhuman speed.
Not a second later, his enclosed fist slammed into Willow's forearm—she blocked his strike.
The ground beneath Willow sank from Emile's impact, creating an inch deep crater below them.
Willow grabbed Emile's wrist, his arm was overextended, and swung him above her. The next second, Willow bludgeoned Emile into the ground.
She let go of his wrist and watched Emile, wondering if she'd gone too far.
But that's when Emile pounced. He lunged towards Willow and ducked beneath her defensive punch.
With his head cradling her hips, Emile wrapped his arms around Willow and picked her up.
He raised her into the air and quickly brought her back down, although backwards. Emile and Willow came crashing down, both of them hitting the ground hard, Willow moreso.
Emile rolled over and collected himself first. Standing up, he rushed on top of Willow and released a fury of quick jabs.
Willow brought her arms together in front of her chest and tucked her head down in between. After a minute or so of unrelenting strikes, Emile stopped to observe Willow's condition.
But that moment of observation cost him the advantage.
Immediately, Willow slammed her tightly bound fist into Emile's jaw. For the first time in this match, Willow didn't hold back.
Emile's neck pulled and stretched, he felt the vertebra in his spinal cord weep in agony. Meanwhile, the sheer force of Willow's right hook transmitted so much power, so much velocity into Emile that he lifted off of the ground, off Willow, and soared through the air.
Emile hit the ground hard, rolling uncontrollably before he finally hit a larger stone that stopped him in his tracks. He cast his gaze across the wide open space and Willow was already on top of him.
Another fist cracked his nose and sent him spiraling once again, this time blood oozed out of him like a river; and since he was rolling across the ground like a tumbleweed, his blood did the same.
Like a sprinkler, blood erupted into the air and splattered all around them. Finally slowing down, Emile got a foot up and leaned against his knee.
Peeling his eyes open, Emile knew to prepare for the worst, but as he looked around he couldn't find Willow. All he could see was Blood standing in the distance, arms crossed, attitude dialed to the max.
Noticing his bewilderment, Blood nodded towards the ceiling. Emile began to raise his eyes, but before he could catch a glimpse of her, Willow's shoulder dug into his back, cracking his shoulder blade and pinning him to the ground.
Willow grabbed his hair and lifted his face off the searing floor:
"Do you concede?"
Emile painstakingly swallowed a mouthful of blood and dust and glared at the red-headed demon:
"There isn't a scratch on me!"
Willow slammed Emile's head into the ground not once, but four times consecutively.
His nose cracked the first time, shattered the second, then bent entirely across his face the third. The fourth must have been for good measure.
As the blood poured into Emile's mouth, hanging open from the repeated shocks to his jaw, he gathered a mouthful of blood and tried to spit it at Willow. Although he failed at dirtying her, it was enough to set himself free.
Willow stood up off of Emile's back and raised him into the air, still holding onto him by his hair. She wound her arm back and launched Emile into the air, sending him back towards the labyrinth's gates.
Emile landed on his feet and slid across the ground. After wiping the blood from his face and snapping his nose into place, Emile was ready for round two.
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