_________________________________________________________

Suddenly, Hiroyuki disappeared on his spot, and the next thing that Toji knew, a fist was already inches away from smacking against his face.

*swoosh~*

Toji, being the top-tier fighter that he is, had no problem dodging the attack obviously. But the fact that he was almost caught off guard is still a surprise to him to an extent.

'This kid is unbelievably fast.'

As Hiroyuki started raining his attacks on him, Toji just kept dodging all of them by jumping around, while observing each of Hiroyuki's movements. Because as the fight started getting heated up, he noticed something.

Initially, he thought that despite being hailed as talented by many, Hiroyuki was just subpar when it came to basically 'fighting' in general. He may be talented amongst his peers, but there are just some things that can only be obtained through real experience. 

But now that he's seeing it beforehand...

*swiish~*

*swoosh~*

*woosh~*

'His speed is one thing, but the preciseness of his movements and positioning..."

Toji is having a hard time believing that he's facing a kid who supposedly hasn't been in the field or without experience yet. If he didn't know anything, he would've probably assumed that this kid was already being sent on some missions already.

He's that good.

"But, too bad. You could've been in a much better position given a couple more years. Right now, the difference between us is still just too big, so..." Toji thought to himself as a cunning smile appeared on his face.

He decided that his assessment was already complete and it was finally the time to make his move.

*swoosh!*

That's why, when Hiroyuki jumped midair and then threw a chop toward his neck, Toji dodged it again with ease but instead of backing off like he's been doing since the start of this fight, he now proceeded to make a slight maneuver that had easily put Hiroyuki in a pretty awkward position midair.

"Gotcha~"

After that, not waiting for Hiroyuki to make a recovery, with the intent of finishing this fun little fight as soon as possible, Toji sent a pretty strong kick towards him.

*woosh~!*

*Thud!*

'Huh??'

The kick landed and Hiroyuki... managed to block it, surprisingly enough. Given his awkward position, he still managed to precisely move his body in a way that would allow him to block the kick and reduce the impact as much as possible. Truly a surprising feat.

'What was that just now?' 

But apart from that, something else happened that made Toji more surprised and confused at the same time.

The kick that Toji sent was pretty strong, that's why even though Hiroyuki managed to block it and reduce the impact to some degree, he was still sent a couple of yards away rolling.

However, Toji doesn't want to cause massive injury to him and make this whole thing an issue. That's why he made it only strong enough to knock some air out and possibly end the fight. 

That didn't happen cause Hiroyuki managed to block the attack but still, Toji assumed that he would've gotten a bruise from that at least.

But Hiroyuki, apart from the dirt that got to him while stumbling on the ground, looks pretty fine right now and it seems that he didn't suffer any kind of injury at all.

Forget being kicked, it's as if he was just pushed away. 

"No, I didn't miscalculate and kick him that lightly..." Toji muttered to himself as he started using his mind to find out what could've possibly happened.

... Or he could just his fist instead and hit Hiroyuki again to find out more.

That's why, after deciding that he's too lazy to think in this situation and that physical violence is the only solution, Toji burst out of his position and rushed towards Hiroyuki.

He appeared in front of him in less than a second and immediately threw a fist. Hiroyuki saw this but unfortunately, he cannot dodge. That's why circulating and reinforcing both his hands with more CE, he decided to confront it and block the attack. 

"Oooh~ I knew you would be able to block that. Now here, have some more!" 

Giving off a pretty sadistic laughter, Toji started delivering more attacks. All of which carry a force strong enough that Hiroyuki surmised that if he was hit cleanly by it, then he would surely suffer some injury.

*swiish~*

*swoosh~*

*woosh~*

Fortunately, Hiroyuki managed to block and dodge it all. It's not easy given the disparity when it comes to their body size, but somehow, he's managing to make everything work.

"I understand everything now..."

Suddenly, while barraging Hiroyuki with a flurry of punches and kicks, Toji started talking out loud. 

"Now I understand why my attacks are less effective against you..." 

About to reply to what he had just said, Hiroyuki had to pause when Toji suddenly increased his speed and then disappeared from his sight, catching him a little off guard.

*woosh~!*

Instinctively pumping more CE to increase his senses, Hiroyuki immediately knew that Toji reappeared behind him. Unfortunately, before he could do anything about it...

*THUD!*

His back had already been hit by something. Thanks to that, he was immediately sent towards the group of trees in the distance...

*BOOM!*

... And crashed against it in a pretty aggressive manner. 

Toji then started walking towards Hiroyuki without even worrying about his condition, even though the punch he just gave to him was strong enough to probably kill a normal person. 

Well, for some reason, he just knows he will survive that level of attack.

"It seems that your Curse Energy possesses quite an annoying nature..." 

Looking down at the hand he had used just now, Toji started to remember the moment when it made contact with Hiroyuki's body. 

Now, if he can describe how it feels in a few words, then it would be like hitting a puddle of water.

Because throughout this entire fight, whenever Toji was about to land a hit on Hiroyuki, he always felt like there was something that was deliberately reducing the force of his attacks. He didn't know what it was but after getting a few more hits in on him, he now knew why.

Hiroyuki's Curse Energy is like water. That's the nature of his CE. And thanks to that, he developed a weird resistance towards all kinds of attacks he received. 

It's like how a person could survive gunfire while under the sea because the bullet loses its momentum the moment it hits the surface of the water. It's practically the same as that very fact.

"... basically, all attacks you received are automatically halved of their original force. All I had to do was to just increase the power behind my attacks to deal with it, but I could see how this could be pretty annoying in the future once you develop your Curse Energy even further." 

Toji said in a pretty weird tone as, midway, he realized that Hiroyuki was pretty much the same as the kids that the Elders back in his clan liked to compare him to when he was of this age. That's why he couldn't help but be slightly annoyed.

Anyway, after hearing all that ranting, Hiroyuki finally decided to move as he slowly stood up from his spot. He then made a couple of stretches, just to probably loosen his body which he had to stiffen in order to not get any damage from what he had just suffered.

"It seems that I successfully made you a little more serious huh?" Hiroyuki said to Toji in a sarcastic tone as he started walking back toward their 'fighting arena'... because he flew out of it thanks to someone.

"Yeah, my bad. I made up for it though, how was it now?"

"Well... I'm quite hurt, thanks a lot." 

"Haha. Does that mean we're done now?"

"Far from it actually. I'm not even sweating yet." Hiroyuki casually said as, after getting back to their fighting spot, quickly got into his fighting stance.

'Hmm?'

But this time, Toji felt something different compared to before. He couldn't describe what it was exactly, but as he stared at Hiroyuki's current form, he could feel an unexplainable flowing edge through it.

'This kid...'

A fact that made Toji smile as his blood started to boil as well.

"I see. So that's your way of telling me that you weren't also serious huh."

Even Toji is in his fighting stance now. It's just a basic stance but unlike before when he looks relaxed and simply stands still, this already tells a lot. 

Well, to some extent, he now recognized Hiroyuki as a full-fledged fighter and a kid no more. Due to that, he already earned the respect and rights needed for him to fight on equal ground.

That's why right now, as both fighters stand in front of each other, the air around them starts to get heavy. Given how their heels on the floor had started getting up, it hinted that they were about to start the round any moment by now.

Unfortunately, before they could even start...

*TUTUTUTUTUT!!!*

The timer that Hiroyuki had set before this whole fight started, rang loudly across the area. Making the two fighters pause.

Now for the alarm to go off like that, only means one thing. The initial time they had agreed upon, which is ten minutes, is now up.

To make the long story short, their fight is now officially over.

____ To be Continued... ____