Sapphire eyes

§14§

Me: updating really really late and also so very unscheduled

Also me: Heyyy... maybe I should make a shitty illustration of the flag and some scene in the book.

"So... where do we start from?"

To say that they were unprepared was an understatement. Many days out of the sea and Karma could almost tangibly see their productiveness drop below sea level. Maybe Hazama, Muramatsu and Yoshida could be excluded, maybe even Toka as she was learning new magic from Miss Bitch, but the rest -Terasaka and Karma- had had their skills go unpolished, so one could quite confidently say that they were firstly going to train themselves.

Karma might be slightly out of shape but a few or more fights and his body would once again be reminded of the way it needed to move to strike enemies down. Not that Karma expected to meet enemies when going in search of Nagisa, but just in case.

Terasaka staggered at a particularly hard punch and Karma smirked, "Oh, c'mon. Don't say that's all you've got, Terasaka. Where's the power you promised the maids you had~?"

"Shut up! Why were you even eavesdropping!? You asshole!" Terasaka threw a flurry of punches which would've definitely hurt if Karma hadn't dodged in time.

It was a perfect setting for both of them. They'd fight against each other to regain enough of their previous skills, it was an advantage to both, and it also gave Karma enough time and opportunity to observe Terasaka's style of fighting. Not that Karma already didn't know that Terasaka preferred attacks that needed raw brute force. If only he could mould that power into something more strategic...

This time, Karma got hit, right at the cheek, but he grinned through the pulsing pain, "You finally managed to land a clear hit. What do you want now~? A trophy, perhaps? Or a personal maid-"

"Why do you keep mentioning maids in this fight?!" Terasaka charged like an unleashed bull, a vein popping on his forehead.

Karma could only bite his tongue and grin crookedly. It wasn't long that he'd discovered Terasaka gasconading and making himself look much better in front of the maids during his stay at the king's palace, and that had been perfect blackmail material. What could be better than seeing one of your gruffest friend trying to impress a bunch of maids? The bribing opportunities it brought. Karma would never fail to mention maid in each of his conversation with Terasaka.

Hazama did snidely comment that Terasaka would probably drool all over Miss Bitch if she were to ever cosplay as a maid, but then they'd never gotten a response, not a verbal one at least. His square face pinkened and blotched with a hot blush after a few minutes was enough response.

Speaking of the woman, Irina had decided to leave early after the decision was made. Whatever negotiations with the king must've gone good because she was unusually happy as she announced her departure. She did promise them that she'd try to search more of their crew, and took off for some sort of 'business'.

"Good grief," Hazama muttered, casting some healing charm as her eyes drooped half-lidded in exasperation, "that was wild."

"Wouldn't 'ave happened if someone didn't keep irritating me," Terasaka pointedly glared at Karma, and grumbled.

He stuck a tongue out, "Hey, I'm not the one who's gotten more bruises,"

The past few days had been like a steady lull of practices, research and more practice. Toka had learned what she could from Irina as a mage and as a woman (as Irina said), Muramatsu and Yoshida had been improving their swordmanship skills, and Hazama with her spells. It had been such an advantage for the lot of them because Knight Karasuma helped them with their training too, expressing his own grievance at not being to go along. What better training than to be taught by the best of the swordsmen of the isle himself?