Can't

28

Chapter 28 – Crossing the Kizel Canyon! Part 2

“A-a match?”

“Yeah~, I want to have a duel.”

“But, if you die…”

“You can do that to me?”

The smile disappeared from Seigel’s face.

“We don’t have to be serious, we can use these.”

Saying that, Seigel picked up two branches that fell down from a nearby tree.

“Just stop before you make contact and it should be fine. First person to say “I give up” loses the match.”

Seigel was dangling the branch towards me, gesturing for me to take it. I want to sleep already and this is just bothersome…but he has a pretty serious expression and atmosphere. I don’t think he’ll let me sleep until I do what he wants.

“If it’s just a little then it should be fine.”

“Okay~, so then how about going over there?”

We moved away from where Roel and Cynthia were sleeping, readied our stances, and faced each other.

“You can come at me whenever you want.”

Seigel provoked me with his arm. I could try to stop just before I hit him, but what if the wind pressure does something?
While I was contemplating that, Seigel ran out of patience and attacked first.
He thrust his branch at my chest. I can’t think of his weapon as just a wood branch with this much intensity.
I evaded the thrust from Seigel’s stick by pulling back, and as the distance closed I thrust my stick at him.
I didn’t plan on putting much strength into it but the wind pressure still ended up crushing his windpipe.

“*cough**cough*…*cough*…”

“I-I’m very sorry!”

“*cough*…don’t apologize, it’s fine. I give up.”

Seigel brought up both of his arms signalling his surrender.

“That katana-bastard also defeated me.”

Seigel was scratching his head when he said that. We looked at the cliff and spoke to each other, shrouded by the darkness of the night.

“Ryua, that was really amazing. With that much strength you can do anything you want. But I have a warning for you.”

Seigel paused for a while and took a deep breath.

“Losing at least once is something you should experience. There are some people that never know that frustration and when they finally experience it, they break. This world is wide, and you should experience all it has to offer. Take a journey, observe things.”

“It didn’t only happen once, you know.”

Even I was surprised about the anger welling up in me. I wasn’t about to forgive Seigel’s insensitive speech. I quickly faced him and saw him looking at me, fear in his eyes.

“The <Cave Rabbit> in the <Caves of Hell> beat me over and over and I cried many times. Just when I thought I finally won against it I was attacked by a bat and lost. I was defeated over and over and over until I could win, and then I was ambushed by a large spider who spun his web around me and I barely escaped only to run into a large dog with 4 heads. I can’t even remember how many times I lost. It was mortifying and I cried a lot of times without anyone to comfort me. I was alone that whole time. Fighting and fighting even though I was constantly beaten. I never want to lose anymore. This power that I have, I will keep using it to win. Are you still going to say, after hearing all of that, that I should lose to experience it?”