The Ranch

Kane's discipl(in)e (1)

A couple days pass and Tih is confronted by a group of soldiers. They all look to be in their late teens, early twenties at most.

"You the newbie that did Nathan in?" One man asks.

Tih stares at the group of five silently.

"Answer the damn question." Another man threatens with a growl.

"Wait, didn't they say something about him being a mute." Someone in the back says.

"They did mention that." They finally remember with the soldier's reminder.

"Then he can't scream for help. Pick him up, we're bringing him back to the boys." The supposed leader declares.

One of the stronger looking teens picks Tih up and throws the child over his shoulder like a sack of flour. The group head to the training grounds with the compliant child.

Tih enjoys the feeling of walking backwards but not the hard shoulder pressing into his stomach. When the soldier sets him down, Tih rubs his tummy to help fade the sensation.

Tih was dropped in front of a larger group of teens, around the same age as the others. The group of about fifteen is standing in a corner of the third colosseum.

The group notice the five return with the child," That the kid?"

"Pretty sure." The leader nods.

"What do you mean "pretty sure"? You don't know who you goddamn took?" A soldier is irritated by their recklessness. If they took the wrong person and this kid has a backing, they'll be in trouble.

His friend understands his complaint," Don't worry, if anything happens, we can ask Instructor Kane for help."

The soldiers haven't done much research on Tih if they're unaware of the fact that he's acquainted with many high-ranking instructors, not that Tih would think to use them to his advantage. Even if their instructor, Kane, with his two silver stars was on their side, they'd still be outranked and Tih alone has the power to wipe out a bunch of teen, which they will soon discover.

Some instructors, like Instructor Henri feel the need to have some semblance of responsibility towards his students, even if they are not in an apprenticeship. Others, like Instructor Kane, do not like to involve themselves in their students issues.

As it's not required to take responsibility in a student's actions if they're not directly involved, most Instructor will only protect a few favored students with potential or a good personality.

It's a mystery as to where that teen got the idea of Instructor Kane protecting them. These teens are all taking Instructor Kane's sword fighting classes, so they are not his direct disciples. Kane has no reason to intervene and he's never really cared about what his students do, not restricting them unless they blatantly cross the line.

One of the teens is more realistic, "You know the Instructor doesn't like getting involved in our personal affairs. If he did, Nathan wouldn't have been able to mess around like that for so long."

"Nathan that idiot. We let him do whatever he wanted in his free time as long as he came to training, but he just had to go and lose to a newbie. Now our reputations in the dirt." Frustration can be heard in his voice.

"If he wasn't already in the hospital, I'd put him there myself." Someone isn't he crowd answers.

Someone else mumbles, "The other soldiers in our generation are looking down on us now."

"Shut up, don't you think we already know this." A couple people glare at the teen that was stating the obvious.

The conversation has started annoying a few people, "Let's just hurry up and get this over with."

"All of this because of a stupid groupie." The teen that speaks glares at someone specific. Those words provoke the others. Their eyes all land on a single person.

Realizing their anguish was directed towards him, he attempts to pacify the irritated teens, "Look look I know. I already kicked Nathan out of my team and punished the others. We'll be increasing training three-fold for the next month, myself included. Happy?" He was also frustrated by his team members and all the trouble it brought him as their leader. If only he was there at that time. He wouldn't have let this newbie make a mocking of his team.

So, in fact, Nathan is not even one of Instructor Kane's students, but a team member of a student, but his actions ended up directly affecting all of Kane's students.

With Nathan halfway in his grave, they decided to take their anger out on the other cause of this situation, Tih. They can also take this chance to regain some reputation. Or more like, return the favor.

They're reputation is already ash at this point, they can only hope to win an upcoming tournament or do something amazing that will earn them some rep.

If they tried to retaliate by fighting Tih and his team, they would be accused of beating weak newbies, so to make things even, the teens came up with a plan to humiliate Tih's team. Assuming Tih is their leader, they first kidnapped him. Now, it's time for the next step.

"Anyways, can we start already, before his teammates discover he's missing?"

"Right, let's hurry up!"

"Quickly strip him."

"On it."