Life Review Ch. 04

"Ready as I'll ever be. What are we starting with?" Shawn let go of Denza. She gave him one final squeeze and wished him luck before joining Cassidy who squealed and hugged her.

"Brawler exam. In essence, you are going to try and beat the crap out of me. I'm going to grade how well you do it," Edwin rolled his broad shoulders and set himself into a ready stance, his feet shoulder width apart.

Shawn looked at him wearily. His instincts warned him that this wasn't going to be a walk in the park, "Should I try and separate my fighting styles?"

"Can you?" Edwin asked.

Shawn thought for a moment before deciding he probably couldn't. His fighting style seemed to be ingrained into him, "I don't think so."

"Just give me everything you've got. Keep the magic out of this until Nessa joins me, understood?" Edwin instructed him.

Shawn nodded his agreement and set himself into a low crouch. The two of them circled each other, watching for any opening that could be exploited. Edwin slid his foot out too far and overbalanced, so Shawn capitalized on the opportunity to strike quickly. He lashed out with right hook aimed to smash into Edwin's chin, a knockout punch.

Shawn's eyes followed Edwin as he moved his body a fraction of an inch backwards, speaking to the level of control the man held over his body. To the crowd watching, this movement would look like an accident, but Shawn knew better. His hook left his side open, which Edwin was quick to punish him for with a quick jab.

His knee jerked up to intercept the lightning fast jab. Shawn rotated on his supporting leg and followed his momentum down to the ground and tried to roll behind Edwin and strike out with a low kick to knock Edwin off his feet. Edwin saw through this tactic and deftly avoided the movement by meeting the sweeping kick with one of his own.

Their dance continued in this fashion for ten minutes. Attack, counter attack. Edwin remained on defence the entire time while Shawn was on the offence. Eventually Edwin called their bout to a halt. They both straightened and bowed.

"Very good, Shawn," Edwin complimented. "I can see you weren't kidding about training as a monk, your moves were flawless if not predictable. Have you put any time into sparring?"

"No," Shawn admitted. He had only had these skills for a little over a week and only used them for a few hours in total. "We are self-taught, like we said. I can see what you mean about predictability, following the same set of ingrained sequences."

"I can grant you third rank in Brawler, but I cannot in good faith let you graduate until you break the habits you've formed. Spend some time experimenting and changing things up. The next part of your exam with be the three of us fighting in tandem against you," Edwin motioned for the others to join him.

Nessa handed Edwin a shield and a training sword. Roark had his bow and was standing down field, while Nessa stood about twenty feet behind Edwin with her wand ready. Edwin adjusted to the added weight of his equipment and nodded, "You are allowed to use your full arsenal. Do you have a weapon preference besides your fists?"

"A spear, I think," Shawn thought back to the notification he had gotten about a spear fighting style back in the tomb and his fight with Beatrice's troupe.

Edwin jogged off the field and pulled a dulled spear from the rack. Instead of jogging back he hefted the spear in hand and hurled it at Shawn with all of his might. Shawn's body reacted on it's own and spurred him into action before his rational brain accepted the fact that Edwin had just hurled a spear at him.

He caught the spear with both hands and rode the momentum of the throw into a shallow flip that used the torsion of his hips and the weapon's inertia for rotation. He landed in a low crouch, resting his weight on his dominant leg with the supporting leg positioned outward to stabilize him. The spear was braced against the length of his arms with Shawn gripping the shaft a foot from the head of the weapon.

There was a smattering of applause from the crowd, but Shawn ignored them. He felt a surge of admiration tickle at his mind from across the bond from Denza, which he pushed away too. His magical senses picked up a building pressure coming from Nessa who was pointing at him with her wand, the light around the tip was warping in dizzingy ways. A rapid series of low whumps told him a volley of arrows was incoming, all whilst Edwin charged at him from the side.

Shawn felt his mind pull away from him and rapidly take stock of the area around him and the incoming danger. His spacial awareness seemed to have been cast out like a net, like he could sense everything around him. It was a similar sensation he had when fighting Beatrice, but considerably more intense. A plan formed in his mind that seemed to be the only logical method of thwarting all three simultaneous attacks.

He gripped his spear tightly in his hands and broke into a run towards Roark. Nessa had her wand trained on him and Edwin was closing in while Roark was quickly backpedaling, notching more arrows. Shawn jammed his spear into the ground with all of his strength mid run and leapt into the air, taking a quick propelling step off the butt of his spear to intercept the volley of arrows mid-flight. His hands, acting with a mind of their own, used his fingers to redirect the missiles as they passed him. He split the salvo between Nessa and Edwin who were forced to take cover. Nessa had to abandon her spell to hastily erect an azure barrier to protect herself while Edwin simply used his shield as an umbrella.

The crowd roared their approval at Shawn's sudden display of dexterity and acrobatics, but little did they know that Shawn had next to no conscious control over these feats. When he landed he quickly recovered his spear, and as sorely as he wanted to close in on Roark, his gut said he needed to pressure Nessa before Edwin could cover her.

Shawn set his fists alight using his elemental fists fighting style and ramped up the juice. He sprinted over to where Nessa was busy channeling her next spell and hammered away at the barrier. Nessa looked up at him in shock as his fists sent shockwaves through the shield that forced it to flex. Two more strikes shattered the barrier, but he had no time to assail the surprised witch. Another volley of arrows were streaking their way towards him and Edwin was closing fast, his powerful arms and legs pumping.

Shawn had to decide his next angle of attack. It would be a short fight if he was engaged with Edwin while being attacked by both Nessa and Roark. Nessa was reeling from having her barrier shattered, and he still had a itch to deck Roark. He weighed his options and chose Roark. He turned in place and sprinted full force towards the fleeing figure of the ranger. Shawn's eye caught odd ridges in the sand that immediately set of alarm bells. He cursed himself for not being able to watch Denza's trap exam properly.

Shawn played it safe and used his spear as a pole vault to clear the line of traps and rolled out into a dead sprint. He quickly caught up with Roark in time to quickly dodge to the side as his magical senses picked up a bolt a lighting streaking towards him from behind. A plan formed in a split second in the back of his mind and he gave the ranger an evil smile. He dodged the first bolt of lighting, spun in place and dropped his spear. He summoned the fireblast spell in both hands and drew heavily on the ember of power in his mind to set both to critical levels and set his hands in such a way that the second and third bolts of electrical energy glanced off each tightly condensed ball of energy in the palm of his hand to strike Roark midstep.

Roark let out a scream of pain as he was sent reeling. Shawn sensed Edwin mere feet from him, so he turned and unleashed the energy in his hands in a thunderous detonation meant to blast Edwin backwards. He prepared himself for the sudden rush of light and noise, so he set his actions in motion so that his body performed them without direct input. He scooped up his weapon and ran forward a few steps, lept into the air to get a good angle on Nessa and hurled his spear at her. He assumed she was in the same place she had been when she was sending bolts of lighting at him.

Shawn felt Edwin's large hand wrap around both of his ankles and hurl him into the ground with a force that sent all the air out of his lungs and his bones creaking. He was then pinned to the ground where he lay by Edwin's knee on his thigh, solar plexus, and both hands securing his wrists. When his sight and hearing returned to him, the roaring in his ears turned out to be the crowd. He could feel Denza's delight, pride, and arousal come flooding down the bond.

He was hauled into a sitting position by Edwin. The large man slapped him on the back and was shaking his head, "Where did all of that come from? I don't think I've ever seen anyone fight like that!"

"Well, you did say be unpredictable," Shawn said joking.

"That I did," Edwin chuckled.

Nessa's shadow passed over Shawn, he glanced up to see her hands on hips with a frown on her face, "Are you and Cassidy trying to give me a heart attack? First Cassidy almost blows the roof off the building, then you shatter my barrier with your blasted fists and almost skewer me with a blunt spear!" she pulled at a hole in the fabric by her feet. "You owe me a new dress!"

"Nice going with redirecting her spells. You can't hit a master of the guild, unless it's during an exam," Edwin shook his head again. "You are full of surprises."

"Is Roark alright?" Shawn ask disingenuously.

"I was only using low power, the lightning I used with Cassidy was a few magnitudes stronger," Nessa waved him off.

"I'm sure Cassidy would love to hear that," Shawn got to his feet with Edwin's help. He was still trying to get his lungs to stop feeling like pancakes.

"Oh, she knows," Nessa looked back to the cheering Cassidy. "Wanna know what she said?"

"Do I even want to know?" Edwin groaned, already catching on that Cassidy was more than a handful.

"Oh, yes. She said I should have hit her harder," Nessa sighed. "That girl is really something. Most of the acolytes that I test usually piss themselves well before I try to electrocute them, then we have that crazy woman who acts as if I were threatening to tickle her with a feather!"

Edwin and Nessa had walked a ways away when Shawn felt a gloved hand grip his shoulder and spin him around, "Test isn't over, you whoreson. I will not be humiliated by the likes of you or that Elf slut! Cadder warned me about your three, I just didn't put it together until you showed up here like a cock strutting his stuff."

Shawn felt searing pain and cold burst inside of him. He tasted blood in the back of his throat as he looked down to see Roark's gloved fist around the hilt of a blade that was buried up to the the hilt against the quivering muscles of his abdomen. His body felt cold and his world collapsed until it encompassed just the two of them. He could distantly feel the bond between him and Denza explode into fear and anguish, and he could of sworn he heard Denza scream like a wounded animal inside his head.

"We'll just chalk this up to a training accident, no matter what anyone says. Cadder will take your gold, and we'll make a pretty penny selling off your little friends. Edwin thinks he's got friends in high places? He forgets where we are," Roark gloated, twisting the knife in his gut.

The fresh infusion of pain cleansed his mind of the numbing fog that had begun to creep in. The intense emotion flooding from Denza stirred his deep rooted instincts to survive. He gripped Roark wrist tightly and pulled madly at the flickering ember of power that threatened to fade into nothing.

"Stop struggling, you're only postponing the inevitable," Roark tried to shake off Shawn grip, but found it vicelike.

"Test isn't over," Shawn mumbled drunkenly.

"What did you say?" Roark tried once more to jerk his hand out of Shawn's grasp.

"You said the test isn't over," Shawn said with more strength. He looked into the ranger's smug face and gave him a bloody grin.

"What are you doing, let go of me!" Roark's face turned anxious when he couldn't free himself and he didn't know what Shawn planned to do.

Shawn pulled all he could from the ember before it could give him no more. In the back of his mind, his magical instincts screamed at him that his next action was completely insane. He raised his fist, already encased in blistering heat and a pressure that made his hand feel like it was being crushed on a molecular level. Roark let out a scream of terror as Shawn pulled back his fist slowly and deliberately.

"Stop, you'll kill us both!" Roark violently yanked him arm to no avail.

"I'll see you in hell!" Shawn roared at the top of his lungs, driving his fist forward with all of the force his body could muster.

Shawn's world went white and silent, the last image he saw was the moment his fist connected with Roark's mouth and the look of abject terror on his face.

He lay there floating in a white abyss until he noticed something was wrong. He still felt pain. His insides still felt like they were burning with cold fire and his extremities felt the opposite. The white nothingness around him faded to black and ever so slowly into color.

Shapes began to form from amorphous blobs that turned into the blank face of Cassidy who was staring at nothing. He glanced down to see Denza's green tinted silver hair resting on his chest. She was sleep, but the bond was filled with a cold emptiness that mirrored the pain of being run through.

"Cass," He croaked.

Cassidy's attention snapped back to reality and relief flood her face, "Oh god, Shawn! You're awake!" She held a hand over her heart and let out a large shuddering sigh of relief.

"What happened?" Shawn was forced to talk in a whisper because talking hurt is damaged throat.

"You happened, you dummy," Cassidy sniffed, her eyes beginning to water. "Roark stabbed you and then before anyone could get to you, you ashed the fucker."

"I did what?" Shawn tried to sit up, but the combination of his own weakness, Denza's sleeping form, and Cassidy's hand kept him where he was.

"From what I saw and from what Nessa explain to me, you pumped every ounce of juice you had into a point blank spell pushed way past critical mass. Do you know what a fireblast spell is supposed to do, Shawn?" Cassidy struggled to contain her emotions and her voice. "It's supposed to release a detonation of heat and pressure to knock the target backwards."

"I figured that," Shawn tried to see where she was going with that line of questioning.

"Well, to put it in terms you'll probably understand, you nuked the fucker. What you did in the arena made your stunt with Saoirse look like a cherry bomb. The force of the blast was so powerful that it completely vaporized Roark and left a crater in the middle of the field and completely overloaded the protective barriers. You are lucky the force was directional because we would have lost you if it wasn't" Cassidy wiped her face and smiled tightly. "What possessed you to put M.A.D into practice?"

Shawn tried to remember his feelings at the time and found only fragments. He remembered Roark's threat, but everything after that was fuzzy, "He said something about being buddies with Cadder and that he was going to do...something to you both, I can't really remember what."

Cassidy let out a laugh that could have passed as a sob, "And you say I'm the impulsive one?"

"I figured I was already dead, so I figured it would be a good idea to have some company, ya'know?" Shawn joked, grimacing at the pain wracking his whole body.

"You can't die unless I say so," Cassidy whispered, lovingly stroking his raw cheek. She moved her fingers down to his arms to trace the knot tattooed on his skin, "You aren't allowed to leave me, remember?"

"I remember, and I won't" Shawn murmured softly.

"It's not just me anymore, just so you know," Cassidy ran her fingers through Denza's hair, the sleeping Elf let out a small sigh.

"What do you mean?" Shawn frowned in puzzlement.

Cassidy flicked the tip of his nose, causing him to hiss is pain, "If you died, Denza would be devastated. She was the first person to rush to your side when Roark stabbed you, screaming like the world was ending. She was halfway to you when you decided Nagasaki needed to be remembered here too."

Shawn looked at Denza's sleeping form resting on his chest in alarm, "Is she okay?"

"She's fine," Cassidy continued her gentle stroking of Denza's hair, "Nessa was quick on the uptake and was able to throw up a barrier in front of her that absorbed most of the blast. The worst she got was getting knocked on her butt. You on the other hand were not only run through, but you almost lost your entire right arm as it was burned that badly. You seared the rest of your body, too. Ironically, the blast saved you from bleeding out because it cauterized it by superheating the knife stuck in your lower intestine."

"How am I even alive?" He glanced at his right arm which was heavily wrapped in bandages. He could still feel everything through the constant throbbing. He could still move his fingers, but his nerves screamed at him to stop.

"Luck? Magic? A combination of the two?" Cassidy shook her head. "Nessa said if you didn't have such a resilient body you would have been turned to ash as well."

"Shawn..." Denza's murmured in her sleep.

They both looked at her and smiled. Cassidy opened her mouth to continue talking when Denza shot up, looking panicked and screamed his name once more. Cassidy put her hands on Denza's shoulders and shushed her, telling her he was fine and to calm down. Once she lost the wild look in her eyes she was able to comprehend that Shawn was in fact, alive and conscious.

Her eyes welled up with tears and she berated him between her wracking sobs, "You. Idiot. Don't. Ever. Do. Again. Can't. Die. On. Never. Forgive. Couldn't. Stand."

Given the first and second hand information presented to him through both her words and the bond, Shawn pieced together she had said: "You idiot! Don't ever do that again! You can't die on me! I'd never forgive you if you did. I couldn't stand it."

Shawn groaned as he shifted his good arm, his left, to rest gingerly around her shoulders, "I'm sorry." He said gently. "If it makes you feel any better, I didn't intend to do any of it."

"Yes you did! I felt it!" Denza moaned, beating her fist on his chest weakly. It still hurt.

"Well, look. That's true, but I thought I was dead anyway. Roark was talking along the lines of hurting you and Cassidy and I didn't want to give him the chance," Shawn said soothingly. As soothing as one could be when describing grave intentions.

There was a knock at their door, and Shawn suddenly realised that he was resting in the bed in their room. The door opened and Nessa walked in followed by Edwin. The two of them had changed their clothes. Edwin had swapped his grey shirt for a green one and a loose pair of casual trousers tucked into his boots, Nessa had replaced her cream colored sundress with a white blouse and cherry red skirt that was set off nicely with a wide black leather belt around her waist. Nessa was carrying a tray holding glasses and a pitcher. She set it down on the table and plucked one of the glasses from the tray along with a vial of foggy amethyst liquid.

Shawn's mind immediately remembered the taste of raw potatoes and unripened bananas, a rejuvenation potion. Nessa poured it into the glass then diluted it with water from the pitcher. She sat down next to Denza on the side of the bed, holding the glass to his lips. Shawn reluctantly drank the diluted potion, and immediately spit it out. The taste was horrid, like the witch had mixed sour mayonnaise with moldy cheese.