The following day.
The First Unit's dojo was wrapped in a dense silence, broken only by the drag of feet across the tatami and the controlled rhythm of held breath.
Naoki and Riu stood facing each other in ready stances.
*WHOOSH!*
Without any signal, Riu surged forward. Her movement was entirely unpredictable, fluid as water and hard as steel at the same time. There was no wasted motion, only pure efficiency.
*SWISH!*
Naoki drove a straight punch toward her face. Riu tilted her head just enough to let the fist sweep past empty air.
*SWISH!!*
In one motion that was barely visible, she caught his wrist, twisted it, and used his own momentum to drag him into range.
"...!!!"
*BAM!*
Naoki reacted fast with a low kick aimed at her knee, but Riu had already lifted hers, meeting the attack with a shin that felt like striking a concrete pillar.
*BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!* *BAM!*
Riu dominated completely. Each time Naoki tried to establish any rhythm, she dismantled it with surgical precision. The old woman seemed capable of reading his intentions before his muscles had even begun to move.
The decisive moment came when Naoki attempted a low tackle to shift the range. Riu stepped to the side with unhurried elegance, slipped her arm beneath his armpit, locked his balance, and drove him into the floor with a crash that rang through the entire dojo.
*BUGH!*
Naoki lay flat on his back, staring up at the high ceiling while thin motes of dust drifted lazily through the lamplight above him. His breathing was ragged and his body felt like it weighed twice what it should.
Riu looked down at him with no particular urgency. Her breathing was completely even. Her face was still, carrying none of the smugness of someone who had just won.
"Your progress is quite good, Naoki. I'll admit your growth in pure technique hasn't matched the pace of Kyouka or Konomi, but there is something interesting about you."
She paused, her eyes narrowing slightly as she assessed him. "Do you know the real reason you were able to hold your own against Commander Yamashiro during that sparring session?"
Naoki pushed himself up slowly, sitting cross-legged on the mat and dragging his soaked sleeve across his forehead.
"I know. It was experience." He said calmly.
He drew a long breath and continued, his gaze drifting forward.
"Yamashiro Ren is a genius with extraordinary natural talent in everything she turns her hand to. She always achieves the best results, which means she has spent her entire career fighting people far weaker than herself. So when she faced me, someone who could actually close the gap her Peach Fruit Blessing was supposed to guarantee, our confrontation became a purely physical fight."
He looked down at his own hand, opening and closing it slowly.
"My martial technique is below hers, I'll admit that. But I covered that gap with my combat experience. She wasn't used to facing someone operating at the same level, someone who could push back with real pressure. That's what gave her trouble. She was thrown off the moment her power alone stopped being the deciding factor."
Riu gave a faint smile, a rare expression that signaled genuine recognition.
"A very accurate reading. You see past what's visible on the surface."
She folded her arms across her chest, her posture straight.
"What you said is correct. Commander Yamashiro represents the absolute peak of natural ability, but that is also where her blind spot lives. If you continue refining your empty-hand fighting skills until your technique is no longer a liability, your chances of winning become very significant."
She let a brief pause settle before continuing. "Especially considering that you hold ten Peach Fruit Blessings of varying types, more than she does. If you can combine a genuinely capable physical fighting style with that arsenal, you will become a threat that even Commander Yamashiro could not begin to imagine."
Riu straightened what little her training clothes had shifted during the session and held him with a calm, authoritative gaze.
"That's enough for today, Naoki. Do your independent training as usual once you've rested. I have other matters to attend to and can't stay any longer."
Without waiting for a response, she turned and walked out of the dojo, her footsteps echoing through the wide space until they faded into silence.
"Haaah..."
Naoki exhaled slowly and let his body go loose against the mat for a moment. Before long, the sound of small, hesitant footsteps approached.
"Naoki-kun... I brought you some water."
Bell was standing beside him, holding out a bottle of mineral water that was still cold. Her face carried a slight flush, and she kept her eyes from meeting his directly, her fingers turning the cap of the bottle over and over.
"Thank you, Bell. You're a lifesaver."
Naoki accepted it, twisted it open, and drank deeply until about half of it was gone. The cold water worked its way down his dry throat and he felt like himself again.
The two of them made their way to the edge of the dojo and sat down on the wooden veranda overlooking a small inner garden for some fresh air. A gentle breeze carried with it the calming scent of earth.
Bell laced her fingers together in her lap, visibly hesitating before finally working up the nerve to speak.
"Naoki-kun... congratulations on your progress. Watching you train with Riu-sensei just now... you really are remarkable. You're growing so quickly."
Her voice was small, threaded through with admiration and something that ached.
"Compared to me, moving so slowly and making so many mistakes... I feel like I'm completely useless as a Captain."
Naoki turned to look at her, taking in the quiet sadness written across the face of the blue-haired girl. Without making much of it, he reached over and placed his hand on top of her head, giving her hair a gentle, affectionate ruffle.
"Don't say things like that, Bell." His tone easy and warm. "Everyone moves at their own pace. Growing isn't a race. I might look fast right now, but you have strengths no one else has. Don't go comparing your first chapter to someone else's tenth, all right?"
Bell gave a small start, feeling the warmth of his hand on her head. She looked up, meeting the quiet steadiness in Naoki's brown eyes, and a small, genuine smile slowly found its way onto her face.
The tightness that had been sitting in her chest seemed to lift entirely with just those few words from the person beside her.
Something overcame her then, and she dropped her gaze again, her fingers knotting anxiously together, her head bowing until the blue curtain of her hair half-covered her flushed face.
"Naoki-kun..." Her voice had dropped to almost a whisper, trembling with uncertainty. "I... I'm tired of being such a coward. As a Captain, I feel like I'm nothing but a burden to Ren-chan and the others. You always have such brilliant ideas... is there anything I can do to build the kind of confidence everyone else seems to have?"
"..."
Naoki went quiet for a moment, watching her with an expression that was difficult to read. A very faint smile, barely there at all, settled at the corner of his mouth. He shifted closer, entering the space around her, crossing the line of personal distance with a subtlety she wouldn't notice.
How could he possibly let an opportunity like this slip past him, with a girl as guileless as Bell?
"Do you know why you feel inferior, Bell?" he asked, letting his voice drop into something deliberate and persuasive.
Bell lifted her head slightly, her eyes bright and full of hope. "Wh-why?"
"Because you're too afraid of what other people think. Your confidence will never be stable as long as you still have this 'sense of shame' holding you back." Naoki placed his hand on her shoulder, feeling her flinch lightly at the unexpected contact. "The only real solution is exposure therapy. You need to put yourself in the most embarrassing situation imaginable, in front of someone you trust, until that shame shatters and becomes your strength instead."
Bell blinked, looking confused and curious at the same time, her lashes fluttering. "An embarrassing situation? What kind?"
Naoki brought his voice down low, close to her ear, his breath just barely grazing the skin of her neck. "We start with the most fundamental thing. Take your clothes off right now. You need to let me see every part of you without fear. If you can endure the embarrassment of being like that in front of me, then facing a Shuuki in the Mato will feel effortless by comparison."
Bell's face went instantly, deeply red all the way to her ears. Her eyes went wide. "Eh? Ta-taking my clothes off? But... isn't that...?"
"This is mental training, Bell. You want to become stronger for Yamashiro Ren, don't you?" Naoki cut in, his tone landing with a firmness that short-circuited Bell's logic and pressed directly against the most vulnerable part of her. "Or do you want to spend the rest of your life being someone who runs away?"
Bell swallowed, her throat dry. Her innocence left her completely blind to the predatory gleam sitting quietly in Naoki's eyes. She bit down on her lower lip, caught between shame and her desperate wish to change.
"O-okay... if it's for the sake of becoming stronger... please guide me, Naoki-kun."
"Good girl."
Watching how easily she had walked into it, Naoki felt a flicker of genuine concern that Bell might be the type who couldn't say no if some unsavory man stopped her on the street and led her somewhere she shouldn't go. For the time being, though, he kept that concern tucked safely away from view.
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