"W-what are you doing?"
Karma painfully rose back to his feet.
Bernard slowly pulled his sleeves all the way to his elbows and then stretched his arms out in front of him.
"I had a thought last night. A crazy thought. All of this is Kiernan's fault, isn't it? He destroyed my school. I was losing students and teachers because they wanted to join a winning school.
"Without Kiernan, Irio High would've won the representation match. We would've participated in the nationals, probably losing in the first or second round.
"But that would've been fine. My school would've still been the best school in Irio, and I was fine with it, even if our success in nationals was mediocre.
"When Karuza High won the representation match and participated in the nationals, I wanted them to lose. So badly!
"But no, they won, match after match. It was all because of your fucking son. They reached quarterfinals. Fucking quarterfinals. It was clear as sky that every new student would rather go to Karuza High after that.
"They're winning contenders, people say. Winning contenders. That word was foreign in Irio. We never dreamed of winning the nationals in this day and age because it is impossible!"
Bernard took a deep breath and swiped his hair back. He almost lost control of himself.
"Well, Kiernan will be gone in like 2 years. Karuza High will regress back to Irio High's shadow, but as long as they win the nationals, that shadow will follow my school.
"I can't allow them to win."
Bernard tossed the couch out of his way and made his way over to Karma, cracking his knuckles and grinning menacingly.
"Maybe the death of his father takes away his focus from the nationals!"
"You've lost your mind…"
Karma said and moved to his fighting stance. A fighting stance from his youth. However, his aged bones didn't move as quickly as they used to.
His Age of Growth had already ended. His martial soul was shelled. He was no longer the powerful warrior he once was.
Bernard grabbed Karma by his collar, lifted him off the ground, and smashed him into the dry wall. The dent turned bigger.
Karma coughed in pain and tried to remove Bernard's hand from his collar, but it was like he was trying to yank a tree out of the ground.
"A fire is a fickle thing. Poor Karma died in a house fire at the age of 53. The fire burned his flesh and charred his bones, leaving nothing but ashes behind!"
Bernard tossed Karma all around the room. Smashing him from wall to wall, then at the ceiling, and finally at the floor.
Karma coughed out blood, trying to crawl away, but then Bernard stomped on his hand, crushing it below his boot.
Then he proceeded to kick Karma repeatedly until he was motionless on the ground.
Bernard pulled out a matchstick from his pocket. Scratched it against his thumb and made it catch fire.
"Burning that school was much harder than this. I wasn't caught then, and I won't be caught now."
Karma's eyes twitched open.
He heard it all and suddenly kicked Bernard away, then jumped to his feet and rushed out of the back door.
Bernard screamed hoarsely and ran after him, but when he arrived at the backyard, he couldn't see Karma anywhere.
He screamed angrily as he tried to use the energy detection method, but Karma was basically unranked because of his shelled martial soul.
Therefore, he couldn't use it to find him!
'Wait, calm down. He couldn't have possibly left this quickly.'
Bernard looked around the backyard. It was pretty much empty, except for one tree and the fence that surrounded the yard.
He turned his gaze to the tree and approached it slowly. Then he reeled back his fist, and punched at the tree!
The tree got smashed to pieces, but no one was behind the tree.
Karma jumped off the roof and smashed his fist into Bernard's back.
Bernard stumbled forward, his eyes turned red, and he swung his arm at Karma as if it were a whip, but he swiftly ducked under it and hook punched him in the liver.
The hook punch rocked his organs and sent a searing pain through his body.
'This strength… this is not unranked strength!'
Karma looked at his right fist. It was bruised. Those Iron Style techniques were even too much for his body.
After his martial arts career ended, he stopped caring about keeping his body at its peak condition.
He had started training again, but it would take time for him to be able to use Iron Style techniques even remotely well.
At that moment, a loud knocking sounded from the front door.
Karma and Bernard both turned to the door in surprise.
As Karma was about to scream for help, something hard suddenly touched the back of his head. When he turned around, he saw Bernard holding a revolver.
"If you make a single sound, I'll splatter the walls with your brains."
'A gun? He came here with the intention to kill me…'
Karma gritted his teeth.
"I also have friends, y'know. If you tell what happened here to even one person, I'll make sure that one of my friends will go visit your son and kill him in his bed."
Karma whispered hatefully.
At that moment, Bernard jumped over the fence and disappeared into the setting darkness of the night.
Karma quickly went to the door and opened it.
"Hello, sir, would you like to hear about our lord and savior?"
A devotee of the church said with a smile.
Karma shut the door right in the devotee's face and then pulled out his phone. He looked at his son's phone number and dialed it.
After a few rings, he answered.
Kiernan's voice came from the other side of the phone.
"I… nothing. I just wanted to hear your voice."
Karma let out a deep breath and sat down on the floor, his back against the door.
"Be careful, aye? That's all."
"…Is everything alright?"
Karma said, then stopped the call and put his phone away.
'I don't want to risk telling my son what happened here. He is a smart boy. If Bernard talks with him, I believe he won't fall for his lies. However…'
Karma stood up, went to his garage, and looked at the punching bag with hatred in his eyes.
'It is father's duty to protect his children!'
With a powerful punch, the punching bag rocked back and forth.