Flawless [Neteyam x Ao'nung ]

Chapter 9: I'm Sorry

"No, not like that - Well, almost -"

Ao'nung is slammed to the ground, being held in a brutal hold with Neteyam's fist seconds away from reaching his eye - but he stops midway before making impact. Right now, Ao'nung is the only one who's panting in his breath, exhausted, meanwhile Neteyam has not managed to struggle so intensively as Ao'nung has been, reflecting it by how calming expression.

No, he never struggles when he's with Ao'nung during these session, which makes Ao'nung feel like useless piece of shit because he's not challenging Neteyam as much as he is. To be fair, they're in his territory, his accustoms, no doubt he'd be an except in his own field.

Undoubtably, everyday during training Ao'nung always sees how Neteyam upholds the reputation of being a skilled fighter, and that's not a bluff. Despite his smaller body compared to Ao'nung, he has put him down several times throughout this new training they're doing. The thing with Neteyam is that he's already familiarized with his own body proportion and strength, he knows how to handle himself well, unlike someone who wouldn't know.

And he also knows Ao'nung's weak points in his body due to their training.

So putting him down hasn't been so hard.

One thing for sure is that Lo'ak sure is having a grand time witnessing it though, laughing to himself in howls whenever Neteyam succeeds in doing just that, "Bro, Neteyam is literally right there, how can you not put him down?"

As if it's that easy, whether he's right there or not.

Lo'ak is here as an outside witness, more so to give Ao'nung pointers as he goes against Neteyam. He was useful at first, which worked, but then he began to enjoy it as a show.

Now he's just being plain annoying.

"He is fast and sneaky!" Ao'nung huffs back to him, sitting up when Neteyam gets to his feet and moves away, "Besides I'm not used to this! You guys fight differently from how we do."

"I know, it's obvious," Neteyam signs, eyeing his tail, "You were aiming to drag me most of the time and slap me with your tail, which to be fair may be useful in water to drown your opponent but our father taught us differently out here. We use everything in our body against our opponent, it's survival."

That Ao'nung has noticed - their differences in fighting, and honestly their fighting skills are useful here on ground; not just to hurt someone, but to kill. They use their hands, feet, knees, elbows and lots of locks in order to take someone down. It works obviously since Ao'nung keep being thrown to the ground by Neteyam's skills. 

This session technically is not part of their training, since Ao'nung pretty much has gone through every stage needed to go through, it's for the sake of practicing to be better.

The more he knows and learns as a warrior, the better he can be protecting himself and his clan.

Lo'ak has told him it's all about repetition, the more he repeats, the easier it'll be for him to remember these moves and use it. It has been proven to be true because Ao'nung does stand his own ground better now, but with Neteyam it's just difficult to get hands on him.

And that's exactly what he needs practice on.

"Alright, well while you figure it out, I'm going with dad on gun training," Lo'ak sighs as he gets off the tree branch he was sitting on, waving at them as he leaves, "Good luck!"

Well that didn't sound so enthusiastic.

Maybe some part of Ao'nung really wanted him to leave, and it's not because of him being irritating to his failures, but because it adds too much pressure to Ao'nung and it makes him fail.