Chapter 33
"Baji"
Millin Village Road — Early Morning
The twins leave before sunrise. The road is empty — the village not yet fully awake, only the earliest risers visible at windows or fences. The white kimono and the black one, swords at their hips, the Enhancement already running warm at their skin from the moment they stepped outside.
They walk. They talk in the low easy way of people who have been doing this together for two and a half years and no longer need full volume to communicate.
Neither of them notices the shadow that detaches itself from between two houses about fifty metres behind them and follows.
Baji. In the specific mood that ten-year-old boys get into when they have been thinking about something for several days, convincing themselves of the narrative and arriving at the training ground version of a grievance. He is wearing plain clothes and his earth magic is already active at his hands — not controlled, just the amber-brown shimmer of someone whose emotions are leaking into their element.
( (Baji) Last time — 'you're welcome to go find one yourself.' That was a dismissal. A mock. Ayato Sato looked at me and dismissed me and kept walking and I'm supposed to forget that. )
( I've been training since awakening. Every day. My earth magic is stronger than they think. I can take him. )
( I can take him. )
He follows them through the gate of Senri's training ground.
Senri's Training Ground — Morning
The twins are already in the middle of the special attack practice when the gate opens behind them. Ayato is at the near target rock with his katana, running the compression attempts. Hiruma is at the far end with both palms forward, working the two-hand fire channel.
Senri is at the edge of the training ground. Alice is at the fence with her tea.
They both see the gate open. They both see Baji come through.
They don't move.
( (Alice) Who is this. Young. Earth magic, not controlled — it's running loose at his hands. He's angry about something. Let's see. )
( (Senri) One of the village boys. Tall for the age. The earth magic is unrefined but it's present. He came in through the gate which means he knows this is a training ground and entered anyway. Interesting. )
Hiruma sees him first. He lowers his hands.
HIRUMA
(Under his breath.)
"What is he—"
Baji stops in the center of the training ground. He looks at Ayato — who has turned around from the target rock, katana in hand, with the expression of someone who recognised the footsteps before he turned.
BAJI
(Voice carrying the collected days of convincing himself.)
"Ayato Sato."
Ayato looks at him.
BAJI
"You mocked me. Last week. Told me to go find a goblin myself."
AYATO
(Level.)
"I said you were welcome to try the forest and compare results. That was accurate information, not a mock."
BAJI
"Same thing. You dismissed me."
AYATO
"I was walking away from an argument I hadn't started."
BAJI
(Stepping forward.)
"I'm not here to argue. I'm here to fight. Right now. I want to show you I'm not weak."
HIRUMA
(Starting to move.)
"Hey — you want a fight you go through me first—"
AYATO
(One hand out — the flat palm, stop.)
"Hiruma."
Hiruma stops. Looks at his brother's face.
Ayato is — smiling. Just slightly. The small version, the interior one, the one that doesn't get shown often.
AYATO
(To Hiruma.)
"Don't interfere."
He looks at Baji.
AYATO
"You're sure about this."
BAJI
(The earth magic at his hands brightening.)
"Shut up and fight me."
Ayato sheathes his katana.
Then immediately draws it again in the clean single motion — a signal, not a contradiction. He is taking this seriously enough to use his weapon. He is also completely calm.
He steps into stance.
Training Ground — Baji vs. Ayato
Baji charges first. No strategy, no setup — the direct approach of someone whose plan is their speed and their anger and the conviction that both are enough.
He is fast. Genuinely fast — Ayato notes this immediately, the speed a real thing rather than the impression of anger making itself look like speed. His earth magic gives his steps extra purchase, the ground responding to his movement and adding to his momentum.
CRACK—!! CRACK—!!
Two fast jabs. Ayato slips the first with a step offline — the footwork from two and a half years of Senri's training finding the angle without announcement. The second he deflects with his forearm, the flat pressing it aside.
He steps back. Looks at Baji.
AYATO
(Genuinely.)
"You're quick."
BAJI
(Pressing forward.)
"I don't want your compliments—"
CRACK—!! CRACK—!! CRACK—!!
Three more. High, low, high — switching levels, the combination of someone who has been practicing this specifically. Ayato slips all three, the movement slight and precise, never where the fist lands.
HIRUMA
(From the side, watching with arms crossed.)
"He's moving side to side but not closing distance. Come on, Baji."
BAJI
(Without looking at Hiruma.)
"SHUT UP—"
AYATO
(Stepping offline again, completely unhurried.)
"Is that all you have?"
RRMBLE—!!
Baji's temper reaches its limit. Both hands slam the ground. The earth responds — not the controlled projection of someone who has learned this properly, but the raw output of an element being given permission without direction. Large.
CRACK—!! CRACK—!! CRACK—!! CRACK—!!
Rock spikes. Multiple, fast, coming from multiple angles — the ground fragmenting upward in sharp columns aimed at the space Ayato occupies and the spaces he might move to. Uncontrolled, but covering a wide area. The training ground's packed earth splitting.
Ayato moves. Fast — the footwork now paired with the wind Integration running the katana, the blade tracking the rock spikes as they come up.
SLASH—!! SLASH—!! SLASH—!! SLASH—!!
Four rock spikes. Four cuts. The wind-integrated blade meeting each one at the angle that breaks rather than deflects — the shear point where a spike's upward momentum has nothing left to do but break when the blade finds its weakness. Clean, clean, clean, clean.
The spikes fall as rubble. Ayato lands. Looks at Baji through the settling dust.
Baji is breathing hard. His hands are still on the ground — the earth magic spent in the burst, the reserves of someone who has been training for a month considerably more limited than someone who has been training for two and a half years.
Ayato moves.
Two steps. Not fast — deliberate. He reads Baji's posture, the weight distribution, the shoulder alignment. The specific coordinates of what two years of Sting Style study has catalogued in the human body.
His katana taps Baji's right shoulder. Flat — not a cut. Precise pressure at the joint, the nerve cluster where the rotator meets the deltoid, the point where temporary disruption is straightforward and the blade doesn't need to bite.
CRACK—!!
Baji's right arm drops. The nerve responding, the muscle going slack for several seconds — long enough.
He stumbles. One knee hits the ground.
Ayato steps back. Sheathes his katana. Waits.
...
Baji kneels on the training ground. His right arm beginning to return to function — the tingling of circulation resuming. The earth magic exhausted. The fight over.
BAJI
(Through his teeth, the frustration and the loss together.)
"I'll get stronger than you. I swear it. No matter how long it takes — I'll get stronger than both of you."
He says it at the ground. Then he looks up. The anger still there but underneath it — the specific quality of someone who has just been shown a gap they didn't know was this large and is now measuring it honestly.
Footsteps. Senri crosses the training ground and stops beside Baji. He looks down at him.
SENRI
(Steady. Not unkind but not gentle.)
"You would need to be significantly stronger than you are to take down any of my students. That is not an insult — it is where you currently are. Work from there."
He extends his hand. Baji looks at it for a moment. Then takes it and stands.
SENRI
"This is a private training ground. Don't trespass on it again."
He releases Baji's hand and returns to the fence. Baji stands in the training ground, right arm working its way back, looking at the twins.
Ayato meets his eyes. No taunt, no dismissal — the same level look he gives everything that deserves to be assessed honestly.
HIRUMA
(Clapping — three deliberate claps, the genuine version.)
"Not bad, Ayato."
AYATO
(Already turning back to the target rock.)
"He's fast. If he trained properly he'd be harder to read."
This is also not a taunt. Baji hears it as the accurate assessment it is.
He turns. Walks through the gate. Goes.
Millin Village Road — Baji Walking Home
The road. The morning that kept going while the fight happened. Baji walks through it with his right arm still tingling at the shoulder joint, the earth magic gone, the anger doing what anger does when you've spent it and found out it wasn't enough.
He thinks about Senri Kako standing at the fence and watching the entire fight without intervening. Not because he didn't care — because he trusted his student completely. The student didn't need help. That matters.
He thinks about the way Ayato moved. The way he cut four rock spikes without adjusting his pace. The way he found the shoulder joint in two steps.
He thinks about the training ground he just left — the marks of work on every surface, the target rocks with their impact patterns, the ground worn down by feet that have been there before his were. Years of it. Before he even had his element.
( They started at eight. I started at ten. They have two and a half years on me. )
( That's the gap. )
( But the gap is just time. Time is something I can spend. )
His hand closes at his side. The earth magic is gone for now — spent in the burst, the reserve needing time to rebuild. But it will come back. It always comes back.
He stops on the road. Looks back in the direction of the training ground.
( Senri Kako trains them. Someone like that — someone who could stop my attack with one student and tell me to leave without even raising his voice — that's what a teacher is supposed to be. )
( There has to be someone for me. Someone who can show me what I actually am and make it into what I want to be. )
( I don't care how long it takes. )
He turns back toward home. His jaw is set. The anger from this morning has changed into something that will be more useful for longer.
Baji. Ten years old. Earth magic. No teacher. No training ground with marks on the floor. No early morning routine.
No goals, until right now.
He is going home to figure out how to change every one of those things.
The twins and their training ground and their special attacks and their tournament are the direction.
He has a long way to go.
He has decided he doesn't care how far it is.
— * —
End of Chapter 33