Then Takai Geki pulled his fist back out of the beetle's abdomen. The beetle's vision went black, and it collapsed.
After a brief silence, the crowd below erupted all at once.
"...Whoa! Spirit! Spirit! Spirit!..."
One blow! Takai Geki had thrown only a single punch, and he had knocked the beetle down. The people below no longer looked at the boy onstage the same way. Strong! There was only one word for it: strong!
"He... he... he..." Clearly, that punch from Takai Geki had shaken Kuryu Tenkeiji far too deeply. He stammered for ages without managing to get a single sentence out.
"Not bad."
Senba Gari folded his arms, a smile on his lips as he watched Takai Geki on the stage turn his back to him and give a thumbs-up. As for what it meant, only Senba Gari and Takai Geki knew.
"Let's go." Senba Gari turned and said quietly to Kuryu Tenkeiji.
"Huh?! But he..."
Kuryu Tenkeiji had only just spoken when Senba Gari cut him off.
"He can handle it on his own. If we don't even have that much trust in him, then who would dare feel at ease leaving their back to someone else? So, try believing in us."
Senba Gari's words echoed in Kuryu Tenkeiji's heart for a long, long time.
A feast of slaughter!
"Hmm?"
As Kuryu Tenkeiji led Senba Gari quietly away through the dense crowd, the corner of his eye inadvertently caught sight of a well-built man with a ferocious lobster tattoo on his left arm. The man stood with his arms folded, head raised, staring fixedly at the battle onstage between Takai Geki and the new challenger.
What's he doing here?!
Kuryu Tenkeiji was somewhat astonished to see the other man here. He began to worry about Takai Geki, because