Quick battle

The first thing I woke up to this morning was the smell of burning rubber and red exclamation points floating in the air above my head. I turned on my side to see that two kids were using a flame spawning from their fingertips to burn the bottom of shoes, giggling like crazy.

"Hey! I need those!"

The kids were now laughing as they rushed out of the room. I looked down at my poor shoes, which were now a burnt black color around the rim of the shoes.

"Damn it! Now what am I gonna wear?"

I threw the shoes down at the ground and tapped one of the exclamation points that was hanging around in the air. The stat screen popped up, revealing two messages.

"Daily Quest complete. Would you like to level up?"

"Yeah. That would be nice," I replied to the device sarcastically.

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah yeah. Sure. Confirm or something, I dunno."

"Congratulations! You leveled up! Please choose one of the following rewards:

'5 stat points'

'New move: gravitational remover'

'Cosmetic: mini gun compartment'"

Everything was cool, but the new move made me curious. I searched around for something like 'items descriptions'.

" 'Gravitational Remover': Allows the user in effect 'Time Stop' to jump as high as they'd like. This effect includes reduced drag of speed.'"

Hmm... this could be a useful tool if I think about it. Then again, more chasm could also increase the duration of my power. Even though I still don't know the limits of my powers. I made my decision.

"Congrats! You just unlocked move: 'Gravitational Remover'!"

I couldn't wait to try this thing out. The hologram disappeared as I was putting on my half burnt shoes, which didn't feel too good since they were crispy.

As I was finishing up tying my shoes, the cloaked man came in. I still wasn't sure if his name was Bruce or not, but I sure as hell wasn't going to take the risk for mistaking his name for someone else's.

"Follow me Andrew. King Burcham and Lady Ziya would like to train and discuss more with you," Bruce said.

Every step I took didn't feel so good. Stepping on crunchy soles wasn't the best feeling ever. As we approached town, a girl instantly noticed my shoes.

"What happened to your shoes?" A young panda girl asked. "They look like they've been in the miujava."

"Miujava? Do you mean the volcano?"

"Yeah. Your shoes mister don't look very comfortable." Her face lit up even more than it was. "I know! I go get my brother!"

The little girl ran off into the crowd of tipis, huts, shops, mountains of tall clay buildings and fields of exotic vegetables.

We continued our walk to the training ring, where Burcham and Ziya were already there. It was a large dome that had chains covering it, having some windows of sunlight going through the gaps. Inside was what seemed to be concrete arena that led down 5 steps into the earth, surrounded by four copper pillars, one in each corner.

"Whoa. This place is where we are going to train with Burcham and Ziya?"

"Careful how you say their names Andrew. It's better to address him as 'King'."

"How come?"

"It'd be for the best."

The talk simply came to a halt right then and there. I spotted Ziya and Burcham with a boy that looked familiar.

"Hey, isn't that the kid from the feast yesterday?"

Bruce looked confused until he saw who I meant.

"Ah. You mean Jarun. A fine boy he is," Bruce answered my question. "His restoration powers are quite a help."

Restoration powers, huh? An idea came to mind.

"Hey, can he also restore objects? Like, broken or burnt things?"

"Well, he can, but it uses up most of his chasm. Why do you ask that?"

I pointed down at my shoes and his voice became more stern.

"He won't use his power on someone else's shoes if he can use it to heal people. Here," a portal opened up next to Bruce. He pulled out a pair of plain tan leather boots, with dark brown laces. They weren't that thick, but the boots looked pretty heavy. When Bruce handed them over, they were surprisingly light, and not only that. The texture of what I thought was leather was completely different. These boots felt more like the skin of an alligator, yet they had the look of leather.

"Keep these while you're here. They'll be better than those burnt things on your feet."

"Hey, how'd you do that?"

"What do you mean. Where did I get the boots? I got them from an old friend of mine."

"No not that. I meant how'd you open that portal?"

"Isn't it obvious? It's my chasm power."

Ziya, Burcham, and the boy ran up the steps to meet us, drenched in sweat. They must have been up pretty early to be that sweaty and tired.

"Good...morning...my dear...sir," King Burcham said between breaths.

"Lemme restore your health King," Jarun offered. He pulled out his purple crystal and a light aura started to surround Ziya and Burcham. He softly mumbled words, and after a few seconds, they were no longer breathing so heavily.

" Thank you Jarun," Ziya said.

Jarun blushed, which I didn't know how, considering the fact that he has fur covering his entire head.

"No problem. Anytime," He said.

"Now then, shall we get to training?"

We headed down into the arena, which had pairs of people fighting in various areas of the arena. The platform was at least as big two football fields.

Jarun, Bruce, Ziya and I headed over to an area that had a chain fence hung around it, about fifteen feet high. In it were multiple weapons that decorated the wall from end to end. It looked like a cage that was made by a gang, or one of those wrestling kinda of cages.

"An effect has removed all abilities in the ring. Powering off," the watch said. Wait, we couldn't use any powers? This was gonna be hard, considering that both Ziya and Burcham's fatigue were removed.

"Oh, I forgot to mention this, but, no one can use their powers in the arena, understand my good fellow? This is to focus on your fighting abilities. You will train with a weapon though, so please select one from the wall," Burcham said, gesturing to behind him. My eyes immediately went to a set of kunais that were on the wall. I felt them around, the sharp edges and its light design intrigued me.

"I'll be using this if its ok."

"A strange, but reasonable choice my go— Andrew. I thought you would want something similar as a blade or an axe, but they will do the job."

I grabbed about sixteen or seventeen of the kunai and hung them around my belt with a silver string that they came with.

"Your first opponent will be me Andr—"

"Father, I disagree with you. Let me fight him instead," Ziya interrupted.

Burcham didn't even care at this point. I think he had been ignored too many times.

He sighed. "Go ahead."

Ziya giggled to herself maniacally.

"This is gonna be fun."