TBATE - Brother's Once More

Journey Part 2

I didn't know whether this guy's goal was to beat some sense into the kid's he assumed had gotten an inflated ego since he heard we were some sorts of geniuses or if he was genuinely trying to gauge our strength, but by the smug grin he had on his face while looking down at us, which was quite irritating, mind you, I assumed it might've been for the former reason.

Grabbing the dagger's from my back and Arthur's sword from his waist, we walked to the edge of the camp where Adam was waiting near a small clearing.

"You know how to reinforce your weapons right, geniuses?" he asked, clearly emphasizing that last word.

I really wanna beat your ass.

Around this time, Father had already sensed Adam was trying to put on a show of dominance into his little boys, but he just watched, knowing he wouldn't hurt us too much.

Because every father should think that.

Mother looked much more nervous compared to Father, glancing back and forth between me, Arthur, Adam, and Father, keeping a firm hold onto her husband's sleeve.

I mean, at least Mother will heal us if we get hurt, right?

I focused my gaze on the red-haired man roughly 5 meters away from my position, Arthur just a few feet to the right.

Images of my past life, dueling other representatives with my country and loved ones at stake, popped up into my head. My eyes narrowed, restricting my vision to only the man in front of me. He was the opponent now. It didn't take a genius to know Arthur was doing something similar.

Arthur willed mana into his legs first, and dashed forward with both hands gripped onto the sword on his right.

Adam prepared to block his horizontal slash when he feinted using a special footwork technique that seemed familiar.

I widened my eyes. No way... There was only one man in my past life that was able to execute that move on the first try. I knew who Arthur was.

Arthur near instantly blinked a foot diagonally to Adam's right. When I saw him trip, I figured his body couldn't perfectly execute the skill because of the height and weight difference.

So I moved. Willing mana into my legs, I advanced as well. Luckily, Adam had prepared to block Arthur's swing from the left, leaving his right unprotected, but Arthur was on the right, so I had to aim for the left.

Since Arthur used the feint step technique, an original, created by a special someone in my past life, I figured I should give Arthur some hints as to who I am.

His irritating smug look was replaced by a look of surprise when he saw Arthur almost instantly move to the right and me coming from the left, realizing what was about to happen.

Swinging his sword to his open ribcage, Arthur reinforced his sword with mana at the last moment to conserve his mana, since he knew we were against a veteran like Adam.

I was now in reach of them both, so when I saw Adam pivot his right foot with near inhuman speed, I directed the mana I originally willed into my legs up to my arms and parried the upward slash to the left, while Arthur switched from a thrust to a spinning swipe and landed a blow to his left ankle. With all the Arthur generated, Adam fell off balance, his ankle giving out.

Until I realized he actually did a full on split followed by a roundhouse sweep with his legs the moment he touched the ground.

Tricky bastard.

When Arthur jumped, I knew Adam would go for a swing while Arthur was in the air, so I was prepared for the swing coming from the right.

I went down below and went for a single reverse-grip spinning slash aimed at Adam's chest, followed by a combination of other strikes and slashes.

Caught off guard, Adam instead directed his right swing originally aimed at Arthur, to my strikes.

Arthur took the chance and jumped towards us, staying low on the ground. He swung his sword in a diagonal slash going upwards and transitioned into a downward slash.

Mother recovered first, rushing towards us and immediately mumbled a healing spell around our bodies.

I spotted Durden smacking Adam's head with enough force to make him stumble forward.

"Art, Jay, are you both okay? How do you feel?"

"We're just fine Mother," I reassured.

Adam's voice cut in "Haven't taught them how to fight my ass! How the hell did you train these little monster's?" He groaned, still rubbing the back of his head.

"I didn't teach them that," Father managed to mutter.

He shook himself out of the stupor and came next to us to ask if we were okay. we just nodded our heads.

Father picked Arthur and I up and gently lowered us back down where we were sitting before and squatted down in front of us so he was eye level.

"Art, Jay, where did you guys learn to fight like that?"

Deciding to feign ignorance, we said, putting on a nonchalant face, "I learned by reading books and watching you dad," in unintentional unison again.

I don't think Arthur saying, "Hey dad, I was the King Duelist representative of my country from a world where diplomatic and international issues are settled by battles. I just happened to be reincarnated as your son... Surprise."

And me saying "Father, I was his representative from the same world. I also just happened to be reincarnated as your son... Surprise," was a good idea.

"Sorry for roughing you up there little buddy. I didn't expect I would need to use that much strength to get you off me."

Seeing Adam apologize gave me, and probably Arthur as well, just a bit of a better impression of him. I guess he wasn't a total jerk.

I heard a faint voice from my side. "Your fighting style is... unique. How did you do that step after the feint?"

Wow! Two complete sentences! That was the longest string of words Jasmine said this entire trip by far.

I feel so honored.

"Thank you?" Arthur responded.

He reorganized his thoughts before he tried to explain in steps what he did.

"It's a simple technique really. Since I was feinting to Mr. Krensh's right side, I placed my right foot forward as the last step before the feint. There I instantly focused my mana into the right foot, pushing myself back, and at the same time I bring my left leg behind right, aimed at an angle towards where I wanted to go, focusing mana into my left foot this time, but with more power than when I used mana on my right so that I don't propel myself backwards instead of the direction I want to actually go to."

That was a mouthful.

I looked around to see Adam, Helen, and even my father head towards the clearing, trying to test out what he just explained, while I executed the move about as well as he did. He was quite impressed, just as much as the others were when they saw me. "I think that's how you do it?" I said.

Throughout the night, chaos and happiness filled the camp, Angela burying Arthur's face in her bosom once more, Durden who was much calmer, and the chaotic four idiots who spent most of the night trying to master the feint step technique.

I never had something like this in my past life. It felt good.

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Author's Note

Dark here. So, it turns out my update schedule is so horribly lined up with a large number of the discord member's.

Which means, I'm changing it to Saturday and Sunday at midnight.

Or at least around that relative time, it might be earlier, might be later, whatever I feel like.

In any case, I'll see yall tomorrow.