ppgzxrrbz dragons Maiden

the girl who fights

After being thrown for the umpteenth time this week across a dirt field, Buttercup was beginning to wonder if she had miscalculated her own strength. It was true, she could beat all the boys in the village at a one on one battle. She'd even won sparring matches against multiple boys at the same time. She had staved off men trying to kidnap her or assault her and had begun to think she could really fight anything and win.

Perhaps her hubris really was an issue, like Rose said.

"My lady, are you alright? Shall we stop?"

"It's not right for females to be on the battlefield, after all," those irritating words came from the group of ogre soldiers that Butch apparently had for his own personal army. As the months rolled by, Buttercup was seeing more and more of Butch's household and vassals, no longer hiding them while their lord went through a tumultuously harsh courtship. While this meant that the castle was finally less quiet, something Buttercup enjoyed immensely, the vassals had no clue of her personality and her desires as a warrior and that it was downright cruel of their lord to force his "new, beautiful, fragile little wife" to learn to fight.

Buttercup wasn't sure what irked her more: the fact that they were going easy on her or the fact that she was still losing despite them going easy on her.

And Butch wouldn't let her use her own sword, stating that it was a crutch at this point and she needed to learn to fight without such a powerful weapon. He couldn't physically take it, so he bribed Bliss to do it with the promise of being allowed to skip her lessons while she watched over Buttercup's most prized possession.

"I'm fine," she snapped. Standing up, her bones ached and her muscles throbbed. The three ogres that she was sparring with were several times her size and weighed several tons in fat and muscle. One was named Ota and he had thinning hair tied into a tight chonmage*. His tusks stuck out of his mouth, one had been broken from a battle fought long ago. The second ogre was called Rotan and he was the largest out of the three. He had a sweet disposition, but he was adamant against Buttercup sparring with them, arguing with Butch that such a "fragile lady like our new Lady Buttercup" should be settled safely inside the palace, embroidering and such.

Buttercup wanted to hate him, she really did, but Butch pulled her to the side and said Rotan knew nothing of her own warrior background and simply didn't want her to get hurt.

She was still going to hit him over the head once she got the chance, though.

The last was Hinata, the youngest of the three. Buttercup liked him the most, since he seemed to be more aware of her skills and was taking her a little bit more seriously. She could feel him pulling his punches less when he hit her. Ota and Rotan noticed it too and kept pulling him to the side to reprimand him until she snapped and screamed at them to take this seriously or sleep outside instead of their rooms tonight.

Finally, they started actually working (all three of them) and Buttercup was tossed about like a rag doll for hours until she finally landed a solid hit with her bokkan* on Rotan when he leaned down to help her again after she had stumbled.

Right across his face.

The dazed look in his eyes as he fell to the side in shock was satisfaction to her soul. The loud crack against his skull as she used her full strength in that blow was music to her tired ears. Ota and Hinata cackled loudly, their sharp teeth and tusks glistening with saliva as they laughed at their comrade misfortune. The match was finally over, as the terms were it would continue until either Buttercup cried defeat or she got at least one hit on one of them. The sun was high in the sky, working on warming away the winter into spring. The birds were beginning to return, the rivers were teeming with fish again, and all was quiet for now. Buttercup collapsed on the ground, sighing in relief as the tension in her body relaxed now that her sparring match was over. She ached in places that she didn't know could. She had been knocked around and dislocated joints. She probably had a concussion, from the way a part of her head was throbbing. Her jaw would probably swell later, too.