"Teach me, Suzuki-kun."
Shizuku didn't get angry. Instead, she stood up, stepped forward, and bowed deeply, a gesture of profound respect from a Japanese martial artist.
"Thank you for waking me up, and I realize I need to grow stronger, so let's do it. I want to learn that footwork."
She asked him to teach her the footwork he used to break her guard.
Still, she wasn't surprised by how powerful her boyfriend was, since, besides being smart, he was accepted into the best university in their original world and was also a Judo champion scholarship recipient, so she felt it was normal if he could master another martial art. She knew this martial art would be vital for her on their dungeon trip a week later.
"Don't bow to me like that. You are my girlfriend, right? Naturally, it is my responsibility to protect you. Come on. Stand up. If you want to repay me, do it in other ways."
"....."
Shizuku's face reddened, but she nodded obediently, ready to repay him in his favorite ways~!
"...." Kaori.
Still, Suzuki didn't hate teaching Shizuku, especially when she wasn't a slacker and she learned wholeheartedly with everything, so in this moment, by using his Manager, to optimize her skill and form, he made her grow stronger, faster than having her to train for the past week despite being taught by Captain Meld, the strongest knight on the kingdom.
This also made him realize that he had been wasting his Manager ability, since if he could use it to help Shizuku grow stronger, why hadn't he used it?
If he had to say, he could only say it was because he had been busy, especially when managing. There were so many people under the Minister of Finance that he had to move around to get them to sign contracts under him.
At the same time, he was learning his Assassin job, the first job that he acquired by using his Absolute Contract.
In the beginning, he wondered whether he could use this job well, but he forgot that one of his came from the world of Naruto.
Yes, one of them was a ninja!
What is a ninja?
Isn't it just a Japanese assassin?
So, using Suzuki Naruto's memory, Suzuki had been training for his Assassin job, but as he trained, he realized that Suzuki Naruto's style wasn't suitable for him.
The battles that he would face would mostly be in the dungeon, where the space was tight and filled with many obstacles, so he needed to change his fighting style, which somehow fit the assassin, yet also adaptable as the environment of the dungeon was tight, and also unpredictable, so among all the choices of martial arts, the most suitable one was the Pencak Silat.
Some might say that it was weird, but frankly, while it might not be the most powerful, it suited him, as it was a soft martial art, fluid, which made him extremely flexible and able to use minimal effort to gain maximum results in a battle like his Judo.
Still, how did he learn the Pencak Silat?
It was because after he got his Manager ability, he had been absorbing all the knowledge of martial arts in his original world.
In the beginning, he had been focusing on economics because it was the future discipline he chose, especially after he was already accepted to the best university in his country and only needed to focus on learning. Still bored, he decided to learn other things, which led him to study martial arts.
Suzuki wasn't sure whether that knowledge was useless. Still, he knew that in the modern world, data and information were vital, especially with the development of AI, which required more detailed data, no matter what they were, so they could be fed into the AI and become part of the algorithm.
So, as he ran the theory, the most suitable martial art for his Assassin Job in the Tortus was the Pencak Silat.
Naturally, he had decided to teach this knowledge to Shizuku, especially when it had many elements that could be beneficial for Shizuku in the dungeon.
"Watch me, okay?"
To teach her, he had to demonstrate the flow of the movements. He drew his daggers, his posture shifting instantly from a slouching, lazy-like to a coiled spring.
For Shizuku and Kaori, watching him practice Pencak Silat was completely mesmerizing. It didn't look like Kendo, which was linear, loud, and rigid.
Suzuki moved into a low, sweeping stance. His body swayed rhythmically, completely relaxed until the exact fraction of a second a strike was executed. To the untrained eye, the continuous, flowing hand movements and the hypnotic spinning of the daggers looked exactly like a complex, beautiful dance.
He weaved around invisible opponents, executing techniques with terrifying fluidity. He parried an imaginary blade, snaked his arm around an unseen limb to break a joint, and stepped perfectly into a blind spot to deliver a lethal throat strike. Each motion looped seamlessly into the next. There was zero wasted energy.
"Amazing..."
"So, this is the Pencak Silat..."
Sitting on a stone bench, Kaori and Shizuku were completely captivated, but for very different reasons.
From Shizuku's perspective, someone who had practiced martial arts from childhood, she watched Suzuki's footwork (langkah) with intense focus. She realized that his "dance" was a masterclass in biomechanical manipulation. He never met force with force. He was constantly angling his body to destroy the opponent's balance before the weapon even connected.
For a girl who was taught to face her enemies head-on with honor, watching this hyper-efficient, utterly ruthless fighting style broke her rigid mindset. She realized that true survival isn't about honorable duels; it's about going home alive, and it was Suzuki, her boyfriend, who taught her that.
From Kaori's perspective, the healer and the one who held the Priest class, meaning she had an innate, high-level understanding of human anatomy, to cast her healing magic. As she watched Suzuki's dance, a chilling realization washed over her. She wasn't just seeing graceful movements; she was reading the anatomical targets. She saw exactly why he spun the dagger that way—it was designed to slip past a ribcage and puncture a lung. She saw that his sweeping kick was specifically aimed at permanently shattering a kneecap.
It was a cruel martial art, and it was also a terrifying contrast to his reliable image, yet Kaori knew that Suzuki showed all of them this because he thought they needed to live and go home.
While Kouki kept giving his heroic speeches, trying to make everyone follow him and defeat the demon king, since he was the main character and the rest were just side characters in his story, Suzuki told them to be cruel so they could stay alive in this world.
Still, if he didn't trust them, would he do this?
No, it was because he trusted them that he showed them this martial art, which showed he cared about them and wished them to be able to survive in this world.
"See? Come on, Shizuku."
After his demonstration, he stopped, barely out of breath, and gestured for Shizuku to step up. He didn't go easy on her. He corrected her rigid Kendo posture, forcing her to lower her center of gravity and loosen her grip. He was a harsh, blunt teacher, but entirely fair. He didn't coddle Shizuku, but when they entered the penthouse, she would be loved~!
"You, too, Kaori. I will teach you a simple strategy and what you need to watch out for."
"Ah, y-yes!'
Kaori smiled happily as she listened to him carefully and asked the things she didn't understand. As he taught her, she seemed so enthusiastic.
Did she want to grow stronger and protect everyone?
Or, was it something else?
Still, Shizuku just watched the interaction between her boyfriend and her best friend, as she could see her boyfriend, who appeared to be calmer and less tense, as her boyfriend was by Kaori's side.
Yet, over the past week, this secret midnight routine became a ritual.
For Shizuku, he became a mentor who strips away her naivety about combat. For Kaori, who usually fawned over Hajime's kindness, she made her see something different that attracted her. Because of this secret bond, everything changed when they finally entered the Orcus Labyrinth.
---
Finally, it's the time, boys!