To Itahaya Iaiashin, this boy was the key.
She looked at Merun and saw his monstrous growth and potential. He was a freak of nature, a carrier of the boundless Tyrant Strength Body that would one day inevitably breach the Sage Realm.
And when he did, his Divine Arsenal would possess the power to reforge her partner into a legendary Sage-grade blade, allowing her to finally ascend and reclaim the long-lost glory of the Kinzoku Clan.
For that, she had to sacrifice the freedom of her daughter, Inyen, in marriage in order to secure their future for centuries.
Although, seeing his civilized character, political awareness, quick wit, kind heart, and care for his family... she was beginning to think that him becoming her future son-in-law wouldn't be too bad.
But first, she had to test the most important part of him. The files the Beggar Sect had compiled on him seemed to be outdated and riddled with gaps.
She needed to know exactly what kind of monster Merun was at the moment. Seeing as though he was but a powerful Martial Senior, she wanted to know what he was fully capable of.
...There was also that matter she wanted to confirm regarding his Martial Heart.
"Come," Itahaya repeated, her hand resting lightly on her sheathed hilt.
Merun didn't hesitate.
"HNNNNNNNNNGH..."
His muscles trembled.
"RRRRGGGGGHHHH..."
Ki bled from every pore.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!"
Sinking even further into his stance, he instantly charged up to the absolute peak of power he had displayed during the Steel Convergence.
A violent, golden-white aura exploded around him, his hair whipping wildly as the sheer density of his presence rattled the subterranean training hall.
But as the storm of his energy settled, Itahaya's eyes widened.
He... he's much stronger than he was just days ago?!
Her relaxed posture subtly tightened, her mind racing to comprehend where this power had come from. The sheer volume and density of his aura had spiked exponentially. She had kept him under close observation, and he hadn't done anything special, nor had he done anything forbidden.
He was perfectly healthy, his physical foundation bubbling with terrifying vitality, as if he had just unlocked something deep within himself.
She remained completely silent, her hand tightening around her sheathed hilt. Her gaze locked onto him, ready to see exactly where his limits lay.
All of a sudden, Merun vanished.
He reappeared directly in front of her, throwing a heavy right hook.
Relying on her immaculate timing, she shifted her shoulder by a fraction of an inch, letting the fist graze her collar.
WHOOSH!
The wind pressure from the miss tore past her head, but she countered instantly, driving the butt of her scabbard toward his sternum.
Merun didn't dodge. His body was already passively using Sanchin, permanently locking his muscles to absorb the blow.
CLANG!
"GUH!"
The impact rattled his ribs, pushing him back a step.
Still, Merun immediately lunged forward, only to be driven back again as Itahaya's sheathed blade struck him with a lightning-fast diagonal slash across his collarbone.
CLANG!
Merun gritted his teeth as the weight of her sheathed blade challenged his Sanchin. In his mind, he was already preparing himself to be cut apart like paper once the battle reached the point where she finally unsheathed her blade.
But first...
He had to push her to that point.
Iaiashin didn't allow him a moment's rest. She instantly followed with a vertical slash. Just before the scabbard connected with his head, Merun twisted his neck, allowing the strike to land on his shoulder instead while simultaneously launching a powerful counterblow aimed at her sword arm.
Itahaya released her blade mid-slash, narrowly avoiding Merun's strike. Yet somehow, the sheathed blade still carried the force of her attack, ringing violently through his shoulder.
Effortlessly catching the hilt again, she retreated. Her eyes gleamed with quiet appreciation at his persistence.
As she stepped back, Merun pursued relentlessly, transitioning into Tensho—the flow-redirection martial technique of the Vajra Tyrant Style.
He extended his open palms, trying to catch the trajectory of her sheathed blade and arm.
His first attempt was too slow. The scabbard slipped past his guiding hands, striking his shoulder and numbing his arm.
Yet seemingly unfazed, Merun immediately looped his arms, executing a second Tensho sweep from a lower angle, attempting to snare the momentum of her follow-up.
Again, she saw his intentions clearly, annoyingly slipping just beyond his reach.
On his third attempt, Merun adjusted his timing, anticipating her pivot. He reached out with both palms as if to seize her, but as she successfully pivoted away, his hands suddenly glowed with tremendous heat before firing hastily condensed ki blasts at point-blank range.
"Blossoming Blade: Sword Step."
Iaiashin smiled in surprise as she disappeared in less than a fraction of a second, using her specialized movement technique to reposition at an astonishing speed before reappearing several meters away.
The moment the ki blasts exploded harmlessly against the floor, Merun instantly flew toward her, dropping his weight into a low leg sweep before pivoting on his heel to launch a heavy rising palm strike.
Itahaya gracefully leapt over the sweep, her sheathed blade descending to parry the upward strike with a sharp—
CLANG!
Thinking of a change in strategy, Merun's tail snapped behind him. With a sudden burst of ki, he took to the air.
Hovering a dozen feet above the star-iron floor, he unleashed a rapid barrage of condensed ki blasts.
The golden spheres rained down.
Because the floor was forged from indestructible Master-grade Kinzoku steel, the blasts kicked up neither dust nor debris. Instead, they detonated flat against the dark metal, creating a blinding storm of flashing light and shimmering heat distortion.
With her vision temporarily obscured by the strobing flashes, Merun descended at blinding speed, using ki flight to accelerate his momentum.
Halfway down, he brought both hands to his temples.
A brilliant flash erupted.
"TAIYOKEN!"
The entire chamber was swallowed by white-hot light.
Bracing his entire body, Merun threw a devastating, ki-infused punch straight through the blinding glare toward her position.
But even within the overwhelming light, Itahaya moved effortlessly.
She sensed the subtle shift in air pressure.
Her sheathed blade rose.
It met his descending fist in a deafening collision that echoed throughout the indestructible chamber.
BOOOOM!
The impact blasted the heat distortion away.
Merun's eyes widened.
His fist was locked against her sheathed blade as though he had struck an immovable wall.
Still, he wanted to push further.
Using the recoil from the collision, he sprang backward, hovering once more in midair.
He cupped his hands at his side, drawing upon what remained of his ki.
The golden-white aura surrounding him condensed violently, spiraling inward until it formed a brilliant sphere of blue-white light between his palms.
"KA..."
"ME..."
But Itahaya was no training dummy.
The instant his hands drew back to his hip, she crossed the distance like a phantom, her sheathed blade already descending to strike before he could complete the technique.
Merun's eyes widened.
He had no time to finish charging.
To prevent her from shutting him down completely, he was forced to abort the charge, violently releasing the unstable, incomplete energy wave directly toward her face.
"HA!"
The blue torrent erupted prematurely, wild and unfocused.
Without the careful compression of a fully charged Kamehameha, the beam rapidly destabilized, fizzling apart before it could generate any meaningful force.
"Fuck—"
Itahaya laughed.
She slipped through his collapsing attack in an instant, her movements fluid and merciless, before driving the tip of her sheathed blade directly into his exposed solar plexus.
This time, Merun hadn't activated Sanchin.
His concentration had been entirely devoted to the Kamehameha.
OOF!
The concentrated kinetic strike bypassed his incomplete defense entirely.
The physical shockwave blasted the breath from his lungs, launching him backward across the vast chamber.
BOOOOM!
Merun slammed hard into the reinforced Master-grade steel wall.
He slid down until his boots found the floor, chest heaving violently as his golden-white aura finally flickered and died.
Leaning heavily against the wall, he rested both hands on his knees and coughed, desperately trying to catch his breath.
"I knew..." cough "...that was a bad idea..." cough.
Itahaya stood several paces away, her sword still firmly sheathed, the sleeves of her pristine white kimono settling gently back into place.
She studied him in silence.
Her calm gaze held a deep, almost unsettling intensity.
Finally, she spoke, her voice echoing crisply through the pristine metal chamber.
"You are leagues ahead of the 'Moretsuna' who fought Sakuma during the tournament," she said, narrowing her eyes as she slowly approached.
"Your strength has increased to an absurd degree in just a few nights, and your adaptability under pressure is remarkable."
She paused.
"At your current level... you could have genuinely defeated Sakuma."
She stopped a few steps away, resting one hand lightly upon her hilt.
"Such a blessed body..."
A faint laugh escaped her lips.
"It's frightening."
After a brief moment, she continued.
"Now, use your Divine Arsenal... and if you can, use your Martial Heart."
Merun awkwardly scratched the back of his head as he leaned against the cavern wall.
"...I can't."
He answered truthfully, though it was obvious he was still trying to figure out how to explain why.
To his surprise, Master Itahaya simply nodded.
She recalled a few lines from the Beggar Sect's reports explaining why Merun refused to use his Martial Heart. According to the files, it had something to do with his body.
Could it be that the Tyrant Strength Body rejected the latent power of a Martial Heart?
If so... it made sense.
If one treated his physique as though he were permanently using a Martial Heart in a passive state, the limitation fit. Extraordinary power almost always demanded an equally extraordinary price.
"Understood." She gave a small nod. "Then use your Divine Arsenal instead... and show me everything you've got."
Merun remained where he was, still panting as he recovered from the fight.
His brows furrowed.
Even now, his mind instinctively searched for ways to defeat her... despite knowing that wasn't the purpose of this spar.
"Is this all you have?" Itahaya prodded, a faint, mocking smile playing across her lips as she tapped her sheathed blade against her palm. "You are fighting with frustration, boy, not fire. Where is the unbridled anger you showed at the end of the tournament? Use that to fuel your Divine Arsenal! Why are you holding your true self back from me?"
"Fuck, I dunno!" Merun snapped, his jaw tightening as his tail lashed violently behind him.
He looked down at his hands, his thoughts spiraling into a chaotic knot of emotions.
"It's hard to find something to be angry about right now! My family is safe. My parents are happy. But my mind is a fucking mess."
He clenched his fists.
"Sometimes I'm content..." He shook his head. "Sometimes I feel like I'm not doing enough. Like I'm running out of time."
His voice grew quieter.
"I'd only just gotten over losing to Sakuma, too..."
He looked up again.
"My old master Bankei told me to live in the present while preparing for the future..." He let out a frustrated laugh. "But how the hell is that actually supposed to work?"
Itahaya remained silent for a moment, watching the turmoil raging inside the young warrior.
Then she let out a soft, knowing laugh.
"This Bankei... your master is a wise person, Moretsuna," she said, her voice settling into the calm authority of a Martial Master, "but they do not possess the mindset of a martial artist."
She took a slow step forward.
"Here is the first lesson I will impart to you as a Martial Master."
"You can do anything in this world—you can live in the present, protect your family, and rewrite the very stars—so long as you have the power to back it up."
She took a slow, deliberate step forward, her aura flaring with a majestic, crushing pressure that made the very air in the cavern freeze.
"If you are anxious, it is because you are weak. If you are afraid of the future, it is because you lack the strength to bend it to your will. So do not waste your breath weeping over your ever-changing heart."
Her eyes locked onto his.
"Grow stronger."
Her speech concluded, and she smiled to herself.
Grow... stronger?
The words struck a hidden psychological anchor deep within his subconscious mind.
Grow stronger.
A sharp, icy chill rippled from the base of his skull all the way down his spine to the tip of his tail. The warm air of the training hall suddenly felt freezing, thin, and hollow.
The voice echoed.
Grow stronger.
It bounced off the walls of his mind, growing louder, heavier, and deeper with every repetition, until the voice of the beautiful matriarch began to distort, morphing and overlapping with a completely different voice.
A voice that carried the weight of collapsing stars.
A voice that had shaken his very soul.
"G̶̺̥̎̄͌͑͂̔̏̓̂́̈́͜͝͝͝͝ͅr̵̡͕͈͚͍͍̼͕̍̀̈́̽̎̍͗̍́̏̚͜͠ŏ̸̡̼̺̫̥̻͈̞̍͆̏̓́͜͝ͅẃ̸̝̝̰͋͒ s̴̹̀̎̇͗̍͗̾̋̏̈͐͒̕͠͠ͅt̸̫̫̤͕̳̻̰̣̭́̌̉͝ͅr̵̡͕͈͚͍͍̼͕̍̀̈́̽̎̍͗̍́̏̚͜͠ŏ̸̡̼̺̫̥̻͈̞̍͆̏̓́͜͝ͅǹ̷̨͍̮̥̹̘͙̗̻̬̬̜̥̮̃̒̈́̽͗̿̍̄̂̏͆͠͝ǧ̷̡̟̲̹̩̱͉̮̭͇͚̮̖̟̽̓͊̔̓̕ë̸͓̮͉͈͇͍̖͎́́́̋̇̾͋̈́̾͆͑͘͘͜͠͝r̵̡͕͈͚͍͍̼͕̍̀̈́̽̎̍͗̍́̏̚͜͠."
Merun's eyes flew wide open.
A catastrophic flood of memories and existential dread crashed into his consciousness.
The shattered glass dome of the sky.
The colossal being fused with the universe itself.
The endless, perfectly flat world stretching beyond the horizon.
The ancient eyes opening within the frozen void beyond the true stars.
But above all else...
He saw the lone speck of light.
The man who had single-handedly held back the approaching apocalypse.
The man who slowly disappeared into nothingness as he stared back at Merun with hollow, pitch-black eyes.
The memory of that cosmic terror struck his soul like a hammer.
He couldn't bear it.
His heartbeat exploded into a frantic rhythm.
His breathing collapsed into ragged, uneven gasps.
His ki erupted violently, surging out of control as wild arcs of golden electricity crackled around his body.
His Saiyan blood answered instinctively.
It rejected fear.
It prepared for battle.
For a fight to the death.
Merun's consciousness faded.
Yet his body continued to move.
"GRRRRRRRRRRRR..."
The low growl reverberated through the cavern.
Veins bulged across his neck as golden lightning danced across his muscles.
His aura climbed.
Higher.
Higher.
Higher.
"RRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAGGGHHHHHH!!"
The master-level training arena trembled.
Steel creaked beneath his feet.
Dust rained from the ceiling.
His power continued to rise.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!"
Itahaya froze.
For the first time since the duel had begun...
...she unsheathed her weapon.
The ornate crimson blade, Nanatsusaya, slid free with a metallic hiss.
Its edge trembled.
The atmosphere inside the cavern grew unbearably heavy.
"Nanatsusaya..." she whispered, instinctively calling her partner's name.
A sinking feeling settled into her chest.
Her sharp eyes widened in utter disbelief.
What on earth...
Were my teachings truly that bad?!