Ounahara went and grabbed a round floor cushion, carried it over to the corridor, and sat down beside the low table, looking out at the training grounds.
The scene had gone completely quiet by now, every student having cleared space in the middle without being told.
They waited in silence for the fight between Moriyasu Tokoyo and Renji Abarai to begin.
Ounahara said quietly, “In Kidō class, Moriyasu showed real, undeniable talent, honestly the strongest I’ve seen in my hundred years of teaching.
But he’s got a lean, slight build, doesn’t look like someone who spends much time in the sun, and his spiritual power rank is still only nineteen.
Renji Abarai, on the other hand, just look at the calluses on his palms.
That kid’s clearly handled a blade plenty and has real combat experience.
This fight, Moriyasu’s going to lose.” Rangiku listened quietly to Ounahara’s analysis, her eyes sweeping back and forth between the two boys, then set her teacup down on the low table and said with a smile: “Why don’t we make a bet, then?
If I win, you’re covering my drinks tonight.
If I lose, you get to ask me for anything you want.” “What?” Ounahara did his best to keep his eyes from wandering.
His gaze stayed fixed on the two boys in the middle of the training grounds, veins standing out red across his eyes.
“Anything I want?” All sorts of images flashed through his mind at once, and his hands, resting on his thighs, clenched hard as he answered immediately.
“No problem at all.
I’m betting on Renji Abarai to win.” “Then I’ll take Moriyasu Tokoyo.” Rangiku answered with a bright smile.
That struck Ounahara as a little odd, and he asked, “You really think that highly of Moriyasu?” Rangiku didn’t answer.
She simply picked her teacup back up and took a sip.
Truthfully, she agreed with Ounahara’s read on the situation, that Moriyasu’s odds of winning were slim at best.
But if she actually lost the bet, worst case, she’d just weasel out of paying up.
And if she won, she’d get a night of free drinks out of it.
Either way, she wasn’t losing anything.
Ounahara had no idea the bet had been rigged in her favor from the start.
He kept his eyes locked on Renji, silently urging him on: Come on, you’ve got to win this.
At the center of the training grounds, Renji gripped his wooden sword’s hilt tight in his right hand and raised it high.
He looked across at Moriyasu, who was just holding his wooden sword loosely at his side, letting it hang naturally, and asked with a frown, “Are you even ready or not?” Moriyasu answered, sounding faintly surprised.
“Fighting you needs preparation?
Just come at me already, whenever you like.” As he said it, his body leaned ever so slightly to the right, his right foot shifting just a fraction.
“Caboose, you’re way too full of yourself!” Renji roared, charging in with his wooden sword.
He closed the distance in a few strides, planted his right foot hard, twisted his body sideways, drove power from his hips, and swung the wooden sword in a horizontal arc.
The blade cut the air with a sharp whoosh.
Moriyasu tapped his left foot lightly against the ground, hopped a couple of steps at a diagonal backward angle, and dodged the heavy blow with ease.
Right after, his body swayed slightly backward, as if he’d lost his footing a little.
Renji seized the opening at once, gripping the hilt with both hands, driving off his legs, and launching himself into the air at Moriyasu.
He raised the wooden sword high overhead, mouth wide open mid-air, letting out a roar.
“AAAAH!” Danger.
Every student watching came to the same conclusion instantly.
Up in the corridor, the corner of Ounahara’s mouth curled up at once.
Right now, Moriyasu was off balance in the middle of the training grounds, and Renji had wasted no time seizing the chance, going straight for a jumping strike.
There was no way this one would miss.
Ounahara’s mouth fell open with excitement, saliva pooling without him noticing and slipping down the corner of his lips.
He was already bracing himself to announce Renji’s victory.
But Moriyasu, who’d only looked unsteady, suddenly thrust his wooden sword straight up into the air.
The timing landed exactly at the peak of Renji’s jump, right as his body began to fall.
A dull thud rang out as the wooden sword struck squarely into Renji’s chest, mid-air.
It was a dangerous spot, less than a centimeter from Saketsu at the center of his chest.
A direct hit to Saketsu would have meant serious injury at the very least.
Renji’s pupils blew wide open as searing pain shot through his chest, and his grip nearly failed him.
But having grown up fighting since he was small, his tolerance for pain was high.
He gritted his teeth hard, forced the pain in his chest down, and swung the sword regardless.
At the same time, Moriyasu, whose stance had only looked shaky, pressed his right hand firmly against Renji’s chest, pivoted in place, and used the momentum to redirect him off to the side.
Renji’s downward swing missed its target entirely, and his body, thrown off by the redirected force, slammed into the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust.
“Cough, cough, cough!” Dust flooded his nose.
He braced himself against the ground with both hands, coughed hard a few times, and when he turned his head, a spray of red flew off it.
He wiped a hand across his nose, felt something sticky, and lifted the back of his hand to find it streaked red.
He pulled himself back up, gripped the hilt tight with both hands again, and said nothing, just stared at Moriyasu three meters away.
“Not bad.
You’ve got some grit to you, at least.” Moriyasu nodded, giving his wooden sword a couple of idle swings to the side.
“Come on, then.
I won’t dodge this time.” The words drew gasps from the students around them.
The fight so far had already left most of them struggling to follow what was even happening.
And now Moriyasu was openly declaring he wouldn’t dodge at all, that he’d take the next hit head-on.
Could that thin frame of his really withstand someone as feral as Renji?
“OOOOOH!” Renji roared, letting the Reishi inside him surge outward all at once, and the air over the training grounds instantly grew heavy.
Veins bulged across his forehead, the vessels in his forearms straining visibly against his skin, giving him a fearsome look.
His right foot slammed forward as he charged, the ground cracking into spiderweb patterns with each step.
He gripped the hilt with both hands and brought the sword down with everything he had.
Just as Renji reached him, sword raised, Moriyasu extended his right hand and drove the tip of his own sword straight into the flat of the falling blade.
A sharp crack-snap rang out.
A broken length of wooden blade spun off into the air, sailed over ten meters, and planted itself upright in the ground.
“Renji’s spiritual power just made the whole air feel heavy a second ago.
So why…?” “Did anyone actually see what happened there?” “That doesn’t make sense.
Why’d it end up like this?” The students called out in shock, at a result nowhere close to what any of them had expected.
Rukia stood frozen too, eyes wide, staring blankly at the two of them in the middle of the field, utterly speechless.
“Moriyasu really is amazing.” Momo murmured under her breath.
“Yeah, I have no idea how he pulled that off.” Kira Izuru said, looking over at Renji.
His gaze swept over Renji’s face, then settled on the broken sword still gripped tight in his hands.
The break was clean, almost surgically so, as if it had been sliced through with a real blade, not a single splinter out of place.
Kira felt a flicker of regret for not talking Renji out of this, and lifted his gaze.
Renji’s face had gone pale, mouth hanging open, sweat running steadily down his forehead and cheeks to drip onto the ground.
Kira let out a quiet sigh to himself: of course.
Moriyasu was strong at Zanjutsu too.