While Lucas and Scarlett were busy registering their team for the tournament. Novis had invited Ashley over to his grandfather's dojo at the request of George. The two of them were holding wooden kendo swords and stood opposite from each other. Ashley had brought her own sword from home, while Novis was using the one that George had originally emerged from. Novis had just told Ashley that George was the one who actually invited her.
"You're telling me, that this Ghost that my father was talking about wants to teach me? I thought you said it couldn't go inside my body?" Ashley asked.
"It can't, instead I'm going to let George use my body and teach you."
"He can do that?" Ashley said still sceptical about the whole ghost thing being real.
Novis thought it was pointless trying to explain and better to just show her. He closed his eyes and went into a sleep-like state, while doing so George started to take over Novis's body.
"Are you George now?"
Although Ashley couldn't see anything happening, the air felt slightly different around Novis's body.
"Why don't we spar a little and you find out?"
Novis or George it didn't matter to Ashley. The person right in front of her was annoying her with their cocky attitude. She didn't believe this crazy ghost thing in the first place and thought Novis might just be playing a trick on her right now.
As she went in for the attack George stepped out of the away and countered back, hitting her three times.
Ashley didn't see what happened but she clearly had three faint marks on her leather armour piece.
"Do you believe me now?" George said.
"Yeah right, you were just holding back last time, weren't you?" Ashley said as she went in for another attack.
This time, when Ashley went in to attack, before she could even see anything happen, her bamboo sword was snapped in half.
"It looks like your senses still aren't good enough, what I just used there was sword energy."
Ashley was at a loss for words. Clearly, the fifteen-year-old boy stood in front of her was no longer Novis. It was a grandmaster.
"What are we meant to do now?" Ashley shouted noticing that the only sword she brought with her had been snapped in half.
George laughed.
"Don't worry you can just use a regular sword."
Ashley followed George's words but didn't understand what George was going to do. With the use of sword energy, he could actually make his wooden blade harder. Or more precisely the wooden sword would be covered with energy, meaning when the two swords touched, her blade wouldn't actually be touching his wooden sword, just his energy.
Novis was watching the spar between the two of them and he was starting to get excited. "So, it's called sword energy?" Novis thought to himself. Arthur was a good teacher but he wasn't the best at explaining things. His way of teaching was by showing.
Suddenly, while Novis was outside watching the match in spirit form. He felt someone grab his arm and pull him back into Novis's body. When Novis got the time to look around he noticed he was in the dream world.
The person who had dragged him there was Arthur himself.
"You didn't think you would get some rest now, did you? While there training outside, we shall train in here."
****
Dan was currently in a rough part of town. The south side of downtown near the harbour. The area had gotten so bad that the police had decided to give up on it and give the territory to the local gangs. As long as they didn't disturb the public and left things between themselves, then they wouldn't have any problems. They had an understanding.
As Dan walked through the streets there were graffiti markings of the local gangs on the walls, side of buildings, everywhere. People couldn't stop eyeballing Dan as he walked past. Dan looked fresh compared to everyone there and was clearly a person out of place.
Eventually, Dan had reached the outside of an abandoned warehouse. He was stood just outside two big metal doors, on the doors was a graffiti mark of a black wolf. They were two people stood just outside wearing a bandana covering their mouths and holding metal pipes in their hands.
"I'm here to see Kyle?"
The man looked him up and down.
"Go away kid, this place is for Noir members only."
Dan then lifted up his shirt to reveal a black wolf tattoo just above his crotch. The two members looked at each other and then opened the door.
As Dan entered the abandoned warehouse there were around 40 people inside. in the centre of the warehouse was a crowd of people who had formed a circle. As Dan got closer, he could see two people fighting.
Both of the men were topless and had a tattoo mark of a black wolf on their body. One of the men was bald while the other had long blonde hair up to his waist. Each man looked in top condition with their abs and muscles bulging.
The bald man went for a wild swing, but the blonde man dodged and gave three uppercuts lightning fast to the bald man's stomach. The bald man had spit coming out of his mouth as he was trying to gasp in for air. While the bald man was frozen still, the blonde man pulled his arm back and smashed the bald man's face, blood went flying out from the man's nose onto some of the audience members
Before the bald man's body collapsed to the floor a few of the audience members managed to catch him and take him away. The rest started to chant and cheer.
"Kyle! Kyle! Kyle!"
Dan was currently in the black wolf gang's territory known as Noir. Noir was a well-known gang in the area but not because of their brutality or anything like that. They were known for running the biggest underground fighting ring.
Bare-knuckle fighting. No padded equipment, no nothing. There was just one rule, to win with just your fist.
When Dan was playing the VSW game he hated using the character's skills. Dan had always relied on his body for sporting events and he wanted to do the same in the game. But after watching Ashley and Novis fight he knew he had a lot of catching up to do.
A lot of people thought Dan was naturally gifted at everything, and all though that may be true for his body that wasn't the reason why he always performed better than others. Whenever he tried something new or was interested in something, he went at it at a 100%. This time was no different.
If Dan wanted to avoid using his skills in the game, he needed to become a better fighter and he knew just the right person to ask.
The blonde man Kyle, was currently wiping the sweat off from his face. The crowd quickly collected the earnings from bets and started to disperse. As they did one person stood there still, staring at Kyle. It was Dan.
The blond man's eyes opened wide when he saw Dan standing there.
"Well, well, it's been a long time, hasn't it? What brought you here, Brother?"
Kyle suddenly smiled.