The Way of the Warrior...

[Garoten Reklor]

Hot. The first thing he felt was a stifling, oppressive heat. As Garoten's senses slowly returned to him, he began to notice other impressions. The first was that he couldn't see, but he wasn't sure why. He may have been blindfolded, but he couldn't seem to find the strength to bring his hand to his face to check. Perhaps he had been restrained somehow...he couldn't remember anything. Even his mind was cloudy, completely unable to focus for a long time. He was wet, whether with his own sweat or something else he couldn't tell, but the boy was soaked to the bone. He also ached all over. It took several minutes before he felt both the will and the strength to attempt to move. First his left arm, then his right...evidently he was free, but moving just his arms hurt so badly that he didn't really care to do more. In fact, he found himself wishing to be unconscious again. Only then did he realize he wasn't alone. Somebody or something poked him in the ribs, hard. He grunted his disapproval, but still lacked the will to move. The poking continued, lightly at first, but increasing until finally the boy was compelled to respond.

He suddenly found he was able to open his eyes and see just fine. He hadn't been blindfolded, just too weak to open his eyes! He wasn't at all sure what to make of what he saw.

He was in a jungle. Vines, trees, and other plants surrounded him on every side, so thick that he couldn't even figure out how he got to wherever he was. As disconcerting as that was, the second thing he saw was even more so.

Sitting on a fallen log just a meter to his right was a man he recognized from somewhere...he had spiky blond hair and wore a long red trench coat/cloak sort of garment. And he was glaring at Garoten as if he had done something wrong. That was when he realized who the man was. He had been in the tournament...in fact, he had won the tournament...

It was Nishaio Shimato.

[Tidus Revok]

The kid had been out cold for two days. Plenty long enough to get over a little venom in the bloodstream, Nishaio thought. The Scartios seemed to pack quite a punch, but it was time to get this pathetic kid on his feet and into shape as a warrior. He began poking the boy with the tip of his still-sheathed sword, gently at first as Garoten’s eyes flitted open, the hard enough to knock him sideways when he didn’t respond. Finally the kid struggled to a sitting position and began taking in the world around him. Not that it would do him much good. True to the age-old methods of the Tenjou, Nishaio had dragged his new apprentice into the deepest jungle he could find to begin the training process. Even if the kid wanted to leave, which he certainly would before this training was over, he’d have nowhere to go. Cutting the student completely off from any outside support was the foundational step in the training it took to create the most skilled warriors in history. In the end, the boy would thank him for it.

The boy finally seemed to have adjusted to his surroundings and turned his attention to Nishaio. The look on his face told Nishaio everything he wanted to know:

First, the kid recognized him, probably from the tournament.

Second, the kid feared him.

Training began at that moment. In a sudden blur of motion, Nishaio leapt to his feet and aimed three sharp slaps at the boys face. That would wake him up enough to begin the process.

[Garoten Reklor]

Garoten was about to introduce himself and ask what was going on when, out of nowhere, Nishaio jumped up and slapped him across the face three times! As if the stiffness and pain that enveloped his entire body hadn't been enough, the sudden shock of Nishaio's unprovoked attack sent him reeling. What in the world was going on?

Before Garoten even had time to think, Nishaio was back on his perch, staring at him. Terror gripped Garoten's heart as the severity of his situation set in. Here he was in the middle of a jungle, sore from a battle, and completely alone with arguably the single most dangerous man on the planet...who evidently had some sort of problem with him...this was not good.

He staggered to his feet, head still swimming from the strikes, and made a sad attempt at a defensive posture. He knew there would be nothing he could do in the face of another attack, but it was better than sitting around waiting for whatever the stone-faced fighter across from him had planned. After a long silent moment, he felt a strange need to introduce himself.

"I...I'm Garoten Reklor...and I know who you are. You're Nishaio Shimato, the tournament champion...What do you want with me?"

To Garoten's knowledge, Nishaio Shimato hadn't spoken one word since he suddenly showed up on Dragonia, and he hardly expected him to start now, but he had to do something.

[Tidus Revok]

((OOC: Falkan and I have agreed to let us control each other a bit, or else this will last forever.))

Nishaio watched the boy stagger to his feet with a scowl. This kid really was clueless. Part of him was tempted to call the whole thing off and dump him back in the desert to fend for himself. Still, the fact that the kid got up showed he had at least some potential. Full-grown Falcome men had dropped out of the training process in the first ten seconds. At least Garoten, as he was now introducing himself, had gotten farther than that.

"I...I'm Garoten Reklor...and I know who you are. You're Nishaio Shimato, the tournament champion...What do you want with me?"

Nishaio simply stared at his new charge, then without warning boxed both of Garoten's ears and thumped him in the chest. The kid stumbled backwards. To his credit, he had nearly managed to get a block up in time for the chest shot, but he just wasn't fast enough. Nishaio still felt no need whatsoever to speak to Garoten. The boy probably felt his life was in imminent danger by now, and that was well and good. Tenjou training back in Civea was often hampered by the student's mentality that since it was only training, he wouldn't be seriously injured or killed. A lot of students had been killed because of that mentality, but most simply slowed the process down until they finally took it seriously. If Garoten sincerely believed he was going to die, he would absorb the techniques much faster...

That or he would die anyway. At this point, it didn't really matter to him which.

Only a moment passed for Garoten to regain his balance before Nishaio was at him again, this time with a barrage of a dozen different kicks that lasted just over two seconds. Painfully slow for a Falcome.

[Garoten Reklor]

Garoten was on guard this time, but he still only barely managed to block the first of twelve kicks from Nishaio...he was jst so fast, and from the tournament Garoten knew the silent warrior was only just scratching the surface of his true capabilities. As the last of the kicks connected with his head, the boy was overwhelmed by both understanding and confusion...

Understanding that he was lost alone in a jungle with a lethally dangerous man who evidently had every intention of killing him.

Confusion as to why. He had never even met Nishaio Shimato before, never given him an reason to do this...but then, maybe he didn't need a reason. Power could be hard to control, and someone as powerful as this could most certainly be teetering on the edge of sanity. Maybe Garoten was just the victim he stumbled across first.

More confusion...if Nishaio had found him, it had to have been in the fight with the monsters in the desert! Garoten doubted there were many people alive who could have gotten him out of there, and the only thing preventig it from being a reasonable assumption that Nishaio had saved him was the fact that he was now beating him senseless.

Finally, as another blistering assault, this time a combination of kicks and punches, came in, Garoten decided that understanding was irrelevant. Nishaio could have killed him in one blow if that was his only intention. It wasn't much, but there was a little glimmer of hope in that. For some reason, Shimato was playing with him...that meant Garoten had a short window in which to learn to defend himself and possibly even escape. Suddenly a spark ignited inside him, and a determination arose to at least give Nishaio the fight of his life on the way down.

Nishaio came barreling in with a roundhouse kick. Forcing his body to react faster than he ever had before, Reklor threw his forearm up and actually managed to slow the kick down enough to prevent it from knocking him out cold. The second and third kicks from that round hit hard, however, but he hit the ground this time with a smile. After all, everyone had to start somewhere.

As was becoming a pattern, Nishaio backed down after the assault, and up to this point Garoten had been using the time to catch his breath and brace for the next attack. Sometimes it had been seconds in between, once over an hour...this time was different. As his captor slid to a stop five meters away, Garoten focused his energy as one would for a beam, but kept his posture normal, only when the energy was ready to explode from his hands did he raise them and let fly a massive blast.

Nishaios eyes jerked open in surprise for a split second, but then he casually opened his right palm and effortlessly knocked the beam off course. He stood for a moment longer, simply staring at the boy, then assaulted again.

The rest of the day passed quickly for Garoten, fading from desperate attempts to defend himself to unconsciousness and back, until finally it grew dark and Nishaio disappeared into the jungle. Minutes later he returned and built a fire, then settled in next to it. The development only further confused Garoten, but his battered and exhausted body would not allow him to dwell on the matter. He collapsed into a dreamless sleep within seconds.

[Tidus Revok]

Nearly two months had passed since Nishaio Shimato had rescued young Garoten Reklor from the desert and begun his Tenju training. The boy had seemes only mildly promising at first, but his progress had been incredible after those first days. Once Nishaio had managed to force the boy into defending himself, the training had gone extremely well.

Tenju training was a brutal process, but every brutality had a cause. The unwarranted, unpredictable attacks that began the process were intended to force the trainee into two actions:

First, he had to lose his inhibitions. Most beginning warriors had an unconscious limit in their minds that was as real to them as anything. Being forced to fight a vastly superior opponent meant the student would either force himself past his limit, or die. About half of all beginning Tenjus died. Garoten had figured it out, allbeit slowly. Without his mixed heritage, he certainly would have died first. Only the fact that he healed almost before Nishaio even finished causing an injury had gotten the boy that far. But from there the kid had exploded into a giant ball of potential. Endurance training had taken only two days - mostly because Garoten's unbelievably rapid healing powers made endurance a non-issue. Strength training had been a little harder, but beneath the burden of several ons of weight, the choice was simple for the kid - be crushed to death, or find a way to lift the weight. Interestingly enough, that particular section of training had sparked a transformation that gave Reklor more than enough strength to survive. Nishaio had been pleased, although his constant silence made it hard to tell. Speed training had taken three weeks. Again, only the combined healing abilities of V'alcan and Dragonian had kept Garoten alive through days of being bombarded by exploding arrows, fired as quickly as Nishaio could in his base state...meaning fasted than the blink of an eye. Still, the kid had eventually managed. He would never be as fast as Nishaio - the speed and reaction time of his V'alcan ancestors were amazing, but still paled in comparison to that of a Falcome - but he was already fast enough to contend with Falkan Reval...and that was the whole point.

Now was the last major step of Basic Training, then would come a few days of rest before focusing on a specialty. Nishaio already knew with this one it would be ki powers. Garoten seemed able to manipulate ki almost without thinking about it. It was natural to him. BUt that would come after this step - precision training. While Garoten had caught a much-needed three hours of rest, Nishai had been busily setting up the field. Finally, he sat down to await the daylight himself.

((Okay, Garoten, finish up for now...saga time!))

[Garoten Reklor]

Garoten snapped awake at the slight sound of a low whistle. His old habit of waking up slowly in the morning had been undone within a few days of training. That whistle was the only sound he had ever heard his teacher make...there was something comforting about it, even though it always led to days of what any sane being would classify as torture. To Garoten, it was the training he had always longed for. With his condition cured, this was heaven.

As he sat up in the growing light of dawn, his senses were confused for a moment by the scene around him. Everywhere he looked, blue lines obscured his view. Finally his mind sorted out the scene. During the night, Nishaio had turned the jungle into a giant web of blue cord. The stuff was everywhere, crisscrossed in intricate patterns that Garoten had no doubt were planned down to the very centimeter. And right in the middle of it all was Nishaio Shimato - one sword drawn. Probably not a good sign.

The red-coated warrior motioned for Garoten to join him, then made one imperceptibly fast movement with the sword. For a moment, nothing happened, then one of the cords unraveled, thread by thread, revealing one single white thread in the center of all the blue. Nishiao sheated his sword, handed Garoten a dagger, and made a sweeping gesture at the rest of the web before sitting on a stump and flipping over a glass that Garoten knew from many hard lessons measured aout a half hour. Simple enough. He was expected to cut every cord to the center within tht time...and failure would have a consequence.

Fiften minutes later, he was tearing through the jungle faster than he had ever moved before, yet more carefully than ever also. He'd cut all the way through one cord and tripped ove another, and both times received a shattering blow to his skull as reminders to avoid that particular mistake. He was feeling a certain pride in his accomplishments when something hit him like a wall...his last conscious sight was that of his master, Nishaio Shimato, collapsing in a heap. Then he lost consciousness as well.