Kouka's Crowned Prince | oc insert

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Yu-Hon's PoV

On the other side of the dust cloud we saw Aric crouched slightly, holding his ground, only one katana pressed up against the sharp edge of Neguro's sword and the other katana skillfully placed through the gap between the other man's arms, the tip of the blade pressed up against the bottom of his chin.

"No way," someone exclaimed.

"He was so fast!"

"Yeah—insnae."

"He's not only smart but... he's strong too."

"He's definitely Prince Yu-Hon's nephew!"

Suddenly, the two began fighting properly, they pushed away from each other and began exchanging vicious blows. Each of them creating the sound of metal scraping off them at each hit. I say battle but by the states of the Xing soldier... it was probably more accurate to say that Aric was one-sidedly beating the man down. He shouldn't have picked a fight while his body was in that condition. Fool from the Xing Kingdom should be his real title.

Aric's movements were smooth, and his swordplay was near perfect. It looked too reluctant and shaky to be the sword of a master, but it was clearly effective. In a few years, when he's grown into them properly, I'm sure that he will be a master incomparable to those who came before him. Right now though, he's more of a performer. The ten-year-old looked like he was simply dancing, or I suppose creating a situation whereby the audience would enjoy it more. It feels orchestrated and fake. Whereas, Neguro was the total opposite. He was like an enraged beast, slashing and swinging with no end. His swordplay was perfect in the sense of a wild beast of some sort swinging it... his defence was ridiculously all over the place but I'll take that into his injuries account and the way he was fighting... it was filled with honest rage and desperation.

Aric was building a play. Neguro was simply fighting to live.

Disappointing on Aric's part.

I watched as Aric threw a kick into Neguro's stomach as the older man blocked his blades above his head after the younger one had begun to swing down with his katana. Aric pushed off Neguro's stomach, using his body as a wall and throwing himself away from him. He just seemed to watch Neguro with something similar to pity of sorts before glancing our way.

Those golden eyes of his...

"He's having fun," Geun-Tae hummed

"Seems so," Mundok nodded.

...they're filled with anything but happiness. I've never seen that on the boy before.

I see—it was too early.

I shook my head and sighed before crossing my arms.

"I want to get in on the action," Geun-Tae tapped his foot against the floor impatiently, a frown glued to his face, "the kid is a hundred times better than last year..."

"Tch—I'm not impressed," Soo-Jin looked off to the side.

"He would take you down in less than ten swings," Joon-Gi looked away from Soo-Jin with an irritated look, "stop acting like you're much better than the boy. Act your rank and age."

"Prince Yu-Hon," the messenger from earlier approached us, kneeling to the floor, "we have all the remaining survivors all tied up over there."

He pointed to the side where all the survivors were sat.

"How many is that?" I asked.

"I believe around two thousand," he replied, "the vast majority are injured rather bad."

"How many were there?" I asked.

"A little over ten thousand," Soo-Jin recalled from our previous scouting earlier in the week.