An Heir for the Dragon

Chapter 10: Learning a Special Set of Skills

It was late in the afternoon when they decided to get the weapons for his fists started. He was impressed with what she had sketched out so far and made plans to start free-weight training carefully while she worked on them in the workshop. She was still doing the finishing touches to the sketches. What shocked him while she sketched was that she was using both her left and right hands. He was amazed and could only watch with fascination.

"What?" she asked while using one hand to draw the glove designs and the other to draw out the scythe daggers concepts.

"No one is ever like that. Using both hands to draw," he muttered.

"I got bored and challenged myself. Then I mastered it," she grinned. "You are the first one to see me do this. It's like...typing on a keyboard. You use both hands for that. You just need to know that you don't have to fully focus on one hand to sketch. I'm mainly right handed, but this lets me sketch far more effectively. And, if I want to, I can match both sides. Like this..."

Now he watched her with complete disbelief mirror a perfect circle by starting at the top, curve around and end at the bottom. At her beaming grin at him, he took the sketch pad and pencils away to tackle her laughing form.

"Aika...you really are the most amazing woman I've ever met," he said while gazing at her with a form of loving intensity. "You saved my life. Multiple times already. I'm just...feeling incredibly humbled that you found me when you did. That I impacted your life so much. I will never allow anyone to rip you away from my side."

"Kazuma..." she said softly and caressed his cheek. "You gave me meaning and hope in that ten minute span of freedom. You helped me recover a past that was ripped and stolen from me. You allowed me to know that I could be normal. To a point. I never...thought...that I'd be where I am today..."

"Aika..." he whispered and kissed her passionately. "This...right here...should have been our wedding vows. But I'm fine with the short and sweet versions of them."

"As am I," she whispered back and let him claim her with everything he had. Ten minutes into their afterglow, he heard his phone vibrate nearby. Sighing, he reached over to let her answer it. "Hello?"

"Ah..." a male voice started.

"Just tell me this. Are you with the Daidoji? Just be honest for once in your life," she asked and put the phone on speaker for Kiryu to listen in.

"Yes..." the voice said hesitantly.

"My husband is here with me. You want to talk? You have two minutes. The phone is on speaker. Start talking. We have too many things to do today to bother with the likes of traitors like you," she growled in warning.

"We wanted to formally apologize for what was done-"

"Not accepted. What else?" she said curtly.

"Wait! We want to wire you a million yen as part of the apology," the man said quickly. Now she looked at her husband. Even he was surprised by this.

"Why?" she asked warily.

"To pay you for a job that was not discussed in full. And to show we really do want to do further...business with you," the man said carefully.

"I will think carefully about this proposal. It is...a nice step in the correct direction to show you are trying to mean well. I'm sure you saw what I did to everyone you sent at me so far. The aftermath of such events. I have fully and completely trained myself in how to fight in any form of environment. I have weapons and means to get any job done no matter what is thrown at me. And it would be pathetically easy for me to find every single one of you," she said with a confident air in her tone.