"Get up... don't give up... you must master your instinct," Max asked Gouten, watching as his cousin collapsed to the ground, holding a hand to his stomach.
"I can't do it anymore, Max... it's almost noon... my breakfast is running into lunch..." Gouten murmured, his stomach growling loudly.
—Don't exaggerate... we can survive six weeks without eating. You're not going to die from skipping a meal.
"You playing the know-it-all," Gouten complained, looking at him from the ground in annoyance. "I bet it wasn't easy for you to master your instincts, huh?"
—You're right… Unlike you, I had to master my instinct at eight years old. It took me four months to do it… and during that time I received the worst beatings of my life. It was my first major achievement, and thanks to it, I established myself as a middle-class warrior.
Gouten remained silent in the face of his cousin's confession.
"Is it that complicated?" he asked, his voice a little more subdued.
"Low-class warriors never manage to control that power," Max replied firmly. "Many choose to cut off their tails so they don't have to deal with Gouron's form at night..."
"Don't focus on hierarchies, Terra's military system isn't there to judge you... just focus on yourself and the benefits it will bring you in combat... because I trust that Gorgo won't be the only threat we'll have to face..."
"Max..." Gouten blurts, standing up, still clutching his stomach. "How did the hierarchy system work?"
―because of the strength we're born with… and the mastery of instinct completely defines our status. If you master instinct in the first two months, you're upper class; if it took you more than six months, you're middle class; and if it took you longer or you cut your tail, you're lower class… but that doesn't matter here…
"Yes, it matters! I will master instinct in less than two weeks and define myself as a high-class Senkayne warrior! And you, a commoner, will kneel before me!"
Before he could finish speaking, Max gave him a gentle nudge with his foot, barely a soft kick, like someone tactfully waking up a friend.
"Stop bragging," he said, taking a step forward. "It's fine to set goals... but don't try to compare yourself to anyone. Not with me, not with Oliver, not with Hanabi."
"Hanabi's just getting started!" Gouten huffed as he sat up, writhing in pain in his stomach. "She'll never surpass me... or Oliver..."
Max frowned at this. He watched silently as his cousin struggled to stay on his feet. Then he let out a long sigh.
—That's enough for today. Go have breakfast… and join Baldur in training.
—Huh? Already?
-Go away.
"Well," Gouten snorted, turning around. He shuffled toward the main house, still holding his defiant air.
…
Oliver stood motionless, thinking about what Baldur had told him.
"Create something of your own…"
But his mind was blank. How could he imagine a technique that didn't exist? Everything he knew, he'd learned from others. Nothing was his own. Everything was Baldur's experience.
He raised his hand and manifested a small sphere of ki. It was the size of a baseball. At that instant, something ignited inside him.
He recalled a scene on television: Yu Darvish, the best pitcher of 2010, throwing a perfect fastball. That play had fascinated him. The pitcher twisted his body powerfully, his wrist snapped at the end, and the ball flew like an invisible bullet.
Almost without thinking, Oliver looked at a nearby tree.
He lifted his foot, gained momentum, twisted his hips with momentum, and threw the energy sphere like a baseball. Just before releasing it, his last two fingers brushed the edge of the sphere, giving it a sideways spin.
The sphere flew straight, but spinning strongly, like a drill.
The impact was clean. A round hole pierced three trees in a row, leaving a perfect line in the middle of the forest.
Oliver lowered his arm slowly, without saying a word. He stared at the holes in the trees, amazed.
"HOLY MOTHER!" he suddenly shouted, taking a step back.
"No! I didn't mean to! I didn't mean to do that!"
He moved closer, looking at the perfect circles carved into the trunks. The ki hadn't exploded. There was no smoke, no burns. Just a clean, precise… surgical path.
"But... it was just a normal sphere..." he muttered, confused. "How the hell did I do that?
Shouldn't it have exploded on impact?"
He stared at his own hand, as if he had just met it.
―Oh… What was that pitch called?...― he mutters thoughtfully ― Max said the 4-seam pitch was the most common… why the hell did I talk to him about baseball!?...
"A 4-seam shot..." he repeats analytically, only to see the perforated tree. "If that's what it did to a tree... I don't want to imagine what it'll do to a person... I should never use it..."
—Although… if I managed to do that by throwing like a baseball slider … what would it be like with other throws…? —he thought quietly, looking back at the perforated trees.
He stopped. He shook his head, regretful.
"No, better not..." she whispered, trotting over to where Baldur, Hanabi, and Gouten were, who was eating bread with jam.
"Where were you?" Gouten asked, his mouth full.
—Practicing… —Oliver answered, shifting his gaze towards Hanabi.
He froze. A small, vibrant, stable sphere of energy floated between the girl's hands.
"No..." he denied internally. "On his first day, he already manifested his ki?! It took me a week! What the hell problem do I have with my strength?"
His lips pressed tightly together. He couldn't let his thoughts escape in the form of words. He sighed and turned his head in sadness.
"I did it, Grandpa!" Hanabi exclaimed happily, being congratulated by Baldur, who was quite surprised by it.
"I must admit that all this was very fast... it was only 4 hours..." Baldur murmurs, completely disoriented. "I think we can move on to the next training plan after lunch."
Baldur walked towards the house, passing by Oliver, without avoiding running his hand through the boy's hair, disheveled and causing him to laugh a little.
The three of them watched as the teacher walked away toward his home. "What did you learn?" Gouten asked Oliver curiously.
―I have nothing… Master Baldur told me that he wouldn't teach me anything if you weren't present… ―
―oh… well… lucky me, huh?
―I guess… How did it go?...
―no progress so far…
"Do you already know how to do what I did?" Hanabi interrupts them curiously.
Gouten responds by raising his hand and manifesting a small sphere of energy, more stable and perfect than the one manifested by Hanabi.
"Wow! That's so cool!" Hanabi exclaimed excitedly, clasping her hands together in excitement.
"She learned to manifest her ki pretty quickly, didn't she?" Gouten commented, dissolving his sphere. "Well… I'm speaking for yourself. I already had control naturally…" "It took me a week… and I only got it after fighting Gorgo," Oliver replied, scratching his head and looking at his sister in surprise. "I don't believe it…"
Between Hanabi's hands floated a perfectly stable sphere of ki, round and bright like a tiny moon.
"It can't be!" Gouten exclaimed, approaching with wide eyes. At that moment, the sphere flew past Hanabi and shot toward Oliver, who reflexively swatted it away... right at Gouten's face.
The explosion hit both boys. A cloud of dust covered them completely.
Hanabi was silent for a second… and then burst out laughing. "Hahahaha! Their faces!" She doubled over with laughter, unable to contain herself.
Gouten slowly turned to see Oliver, his expression serious, who shrugged apologetically. "Let's just go to lunch," he suggested awkwardly, starting to walk home.
They both start walking, leaving Hanabi behind with her laughter .
"It's going to be frustrating to train every day on an empty stomach... but..." Gouten confesses as he walks behind Oliver, his words causing his cousin to pause, waiting for Gouten to catch up with him, and they can walk together.
―but what?...
―I forgot what I was going to say…
"What's the training about?" Oliver asks.
―Try to meditate and concentrate on hunger to find a red sphere stuck in my mind… yeah, it sounds stupid… ― Gouten mentions, stretching his pants to let his tail out, proceeding to stretch it ― I have to ask Max how he does to keep it under his pants… it cramps me a lot the way I do it…
"Gouten, put that away!" Oliver yells, panicking at the sight and looking back. He notices Hanabi from afar, completely still in surprise.
Oliver and Gouten glanced at each other when they noticed Hanabi standing completely still, not saying a word. Slowly, Gouten tucked her tail and began walking as if nothing had happened. Oliver followed suit, both of them quickening their pace.
"He's going to kill me, he's going to kill me, he's going to kill me..." Gouten muttered, drenched in sweat.
"Who's going to kill you?" Oliver asked, equally sweaty, walking beside her.
"Max is going to kill me!" he screamed, terrified. "He told me Hanabi shouldn't see her!"
—If our dialogues were part of a novel, they'd be taken out of context! Speak well!
"Hanabi wasn't supposed to see Senkayne's tail! My secret only lasted two days!" she cried, clutching her head.
"What will she think?"
"I don't know... but I hope she doesn't tell anyone." "In that case, we must convince her not to say anything." "I agree," Gouten replied.
They both stopped and slowly turned towards Hanabi, who was still frozen in amazement at the strange revelation.