The Ranch

Newcomers Tournament p.II (3)

The audience watches as Tih stands deathly still. Seeing as how he's not planning to make the first move, Pierre closes in on Tih, aiming for a single leg takedown. He reaches to grab the totally unguarded Tih's leg, when...he's gone. Tih disappears from in front of Pierre's vision.

Pierre has no idea where the boy went, but the audience, who has a different perspective, watches as Tih silently stands in Pierre's blind spot in a relaxed pose.

A move that was almost invisible to the naked eye and entirely silent. Most of the audience believes it was some sort of trick, or due to the fact that they weren't paying enough attention.

Tih recalls Kai words and takes them literally. The audience watches closely to see Tih start swinging Pierre around by his leg. Lightly gripping his foot, Tih spins Pierre around until his body is parallel to the floor before he lets go. Pierre's body shoots off the stage, landing outside of bounds with some mild bruises, but worse than his physical condition is his mental condition.

Pierre and Tih's match only lasted a minute, with most of it contributing to the time they used to communicate. In conclusion, Pierre, one of the five aces, lost to an unknown newbie in seven seconds.

Most of the audience is stunned. The only audible noise is the grunts from the other fighters, who don't have time to pay attention to their surrounding.

Instructor Kane has a large smirk covering his face. Major Jax is trying to hold back his laughter. Phillip is stunned like the other, it is also the first time he's seen Tih fight. He was not expecting the child to be so talented. He knew he managed to cut someone's part off before he went into the coma, but that and this are completely different situations.

Tih doesn't know what to do now, he decides to go back to the resting area to find Kai. A confused silence permeates the colosseum as Tih calmly walks out. He finds a brightly giggling Kai. Kai's eyes shine when he sees him," Tih! Haha!" He runs over and hugs the child.

Kai wraps his arm around Tih's neck and pulls him over to a shocked Sherlock and Lucien," I told you! I told you, didn't I!"

"I...really never expected he'd be this strong." Sherlock scratches his face in embarrassment," Sorry for doubting you."

"No problem, no problem." Kai puffs his chest out in second-hand pride. "But now you understand just how strong Tih is!"

Victor, Basile, Theodore, and Abel, who were watching Pierre's performance, watch the interaction between Tih and the others from a distance. Basile pulls out graham crackers from somewhere.

Abel comments," Seems a little strong."

"I think it was a fluke. He was looking down on his opponent too much and let victory slip by" Theodore looks at Tih with mild curiosity.

"Pierre's definitely above average among the new recruits, but within the group, he's probably the weakest."

No matter what anyone believes, the show must go on. The group wraps up their fights and one last group goes up before they move on to the second round.

Kai and the other look to the board to see the results of the second raffle. Kai, Sherlock, and Lucien managed to pass the first round, but this round won't be as easy. Although it's not impossible, their opponents are slightly stronger than before, making them a much larger challenge to overcome. Tih, on the other hand, continues his string of "bad" luck and ends up paired with Abel.

This time, Tih is a part of the first group out of two group to go up. Following behind Abel like a baby duck, they climb on a stage.

With a couple feet of distance, Abel looks through his black hair to observe Tih. After glancing up and down, he turns to the empty air next to him and murmurs something most people wouldn't be able to hear.

Tih, with keen hearing, listens to his murmured conversation with the empty space,"Hm? ... What? Of course not. ... You think?" Abel talks to the air, but he looks at a very specific direction, like he's making eye contact with someone, like he's interacting with something not visible to the naked eye.

Abel finishes his conversation with," Okay, don't worry. I'll be careful." He turns to Tih and puts up his guard, getting into a basic Jeet Kune Do stance.

Unlike Pierre, who immediately made a move after seeing a Tih wasn't planning on doing so, Abel keeps his stance, planning to play the waiting game. He was confident in his patience, but after one minute passed, then two, it started to wear thin.

If he was older and more mature, he would be able to wait longer, but the current Abel is a child full of vitality. After standing still for a couple minutes, he loses his patience and moves in. From a bai-jong stance, he closes the distance and aims a single direction jab towards Tih, but this is actually a fake. He plans to wait for Tih to dodge before attacking with a side kick.

Abel trains his eyes on Tih every move, confident that he won't make the same mistake as Pierre. But weirdly enough, his opponent doesn't try to dodge the fake jab, which confuses him.

Tih, who doesn't feel any killing intent in the jab, grabs hold of the arm flying towards him, before spinning Abel's body and tossing him off the stage.

This round took about as long as the first round, with them standing still for most of it. The fight itself only lasted five seconds this time, due to the fact that Abel's attack was faster than Pierre's. The confused audience and even more confused Abel watch as Tih expressionlessly walks back to the resting area.

Now, instructors and other powerful people in the audience really start to take note of Tih. Before, it was simple interest, but now, all eyes are on this dark horse that brought down two of the five aces.

On his path to Kai, Tih sees the other four aces, including a frustrated looking Pierre. Looking closer into his eyes, Tih can see pity towards Abel. Moving on, Tih meets back up with Kai and Lucien by the holographic live stream. The other recruits stare at him and whisper among themselves.

Kai flashes a proud grin," Good job!" He then turns back to the screen. Tih moves his gaze there as well to see Sherlock struggling at the edge of his stage. His opponent managed to corner him and continues to put more pressure on Sherlock.