Chapter 22
I CAN'T WAIT FOR THE TRAINING TO BE OVER!!!
"STOP DAYDREAMING, YOU LITTLE BRAT, AND FOCUS ON YOUR TRAINING!!" Garp shouts while flinging another rolled-up empty cracker packet at me, which I try my hardest to dodge, yet fate does not seem to be on my side.
"Ouch!"
I can hardly dodge the bloody things, and even when I do, I only manage to do it by a thin margin, and the speed these things are thrown is just as dangerous as the force, regularly making tiny cuts on my body as I just skirt by them.
How the hell are these things so goddamn hard, not to mention that he is just rolling empty packets up into a ball and chucking them at me? By all rights, these things should start to unfold as they fly through the air, but they stay solid as a rock and just as hard as a rock. They really hurt.
He must be using some unholy type of magic to harden these packets because the things go against the rules of reality. I really, really hate the things and how much they hurt, but much more than that, I want to learn how to do such a thing myself. I need to know ho-
"ARGHHH!"
"I TOLD YOU TO PAY ATTENTION, YOU DUMB BRAT!!"
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"ARGGGGHH!" I scream as I try to hold up the massive rock over my head that threatens to fall down on me and crush my head to pieces, straining my arms to their utmost.
"Come on, shrimp. Put some effort into it. It is just a little rock. Are you really that weak?" Garp berates me from the side, still snacking on his stupid blasted crackers. All the while, I am holding a massive rock, barring on a boulder, over my head.
The only thing really keeping it from crushing my head right now is George, that is holding the rock over my head and spotting me, but he is holding it lightly enough that it is still falling on me, and so I have to push it up, but even that much is proving too difficult for me.
"Alright, clearly, this isn't working. You clearly need some more motivation. So, George, let the rock go."
"NO, GEORGE! DON'T YOU DARE LET IT GO!"
"Guh?"
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"Alright, George, you see all these fruits here. I went out and collected them all for you." Garp says as he points at a ginormous pile of fruits he has laid out on the beach, to which George greedily salivates and lunges at the mound, trying to take some.
*Smack* "GRAAH!?"
George ends up lying on the ground with a big bump growing out of his forehead, Garp having smacked him down to the ground before he could even touch one of the fruits.
"GRAAHHH!" Undeterred, George gets back to his feet and gets into a fighting stance, determined to get those fruits, but knowing that the only way is through Garp, and so he runs at him, ready to punch him out of his way.
*Smack* "GRAAH!?"
Again George lays on the ground with another bump growing on top of the other one, and George gets up again, this time but much more cautiously and this time, he looks at Garp before making another move.
"Are you finally listening, you dumb monkey? Good, now back to what I was saying before. You can have all of these fruits, but only if you win. You and the shrimp are going to play one hundred games of tag, you will have five minutes to catch the brat, and for every game you win, you can have a fruit. If you win more than eighty of the games, then you can have all of these fruits, but if not, I will throw them all into the sea. Got, good, go!" Garp explains and then suddenly says go, expecting us to just hop to the skip of his tune.
"Garp, you seriously can't expect us to just start like that-"
"GRAAAAH!" I have to jump out of the way to avoid the fist that drops down into my previous position and gouges out a chunk of land from the land, George having leapt straight at me. I don't have time to rest, though, since George is immediately upon me again and trying to get me, so all I can do is run around, which is pretty hard to do on the sand.
"WHAT THE HELL? THIS ISN'T TAG. HE JUST STRAIGHT-UP TRIED TO PUNCH ME. HELP GARP-SAN!" I scream once more, having to jump out of the way of George barreling towards me, and I quickly make a break towards the forest, hoping to find some reprieve in there.
"Hm, ah, well, the rules of tag state that all he has to do is touch you. Whether that is a poke or a punch doesn't matter, so it is fine, and he isn't strong enough to hurt you much. Also, the forest is off-limits. So you must stay on the beach, brat. If you don't, then I will kick you back into the forest again and this time without your gorilla buddy." Immediately I jump to the side, letting George barrel straight past me and into the forest while I turn around and start to sprint away down the beach. I don't want to go back into the woods again.
"GRAAAAAAH!" At the roar behind me, I chance a glance behind me to spot George pursuing me like a gorilla possessed with flames in his eyes. he truly wants those fruits.
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"Why the hell am I doing this, Garp-san? I am sure I have gotten as good as I can. Can we do something else?" I ask, trying to kick multiple times as fast as I can, but it is proving to be very hard to reach the level Garp wants me to perform at.
Garp has me doing this training quite a bit, and no doubt my kicking speed has gotten a lot quicker, and I can kick my leg out very fast. I could probably kick someone three times in one kick which is very remarkable, but I think I have reached the limits of this training.
"Stop complaining, brat! You are nowhere near as good as you think. You haven't even begun to master this move. In fact, go get on the sand and start doing it, and you better be faster before the sun goes down, or you don't get dinner." Garp commands in annoyance, and I reluctantly move over to the sand since I actually do want dinner.
Garp goes into the forest and comes back with a wild animal which he roasts over a fire for us to eat. It is not the best meal by far, and the taste isn't the best either, but it is edible and filling. So nowadays, Garp is the one that does the hunting, and I end up cooking the meat he brings back, and I have been managing to actually cook it to a better degree lately.
"Argh!" I cry as I fall face-first into the sand, having started to do my kicks and failing straightaway. Confused, I got up and tried again, only to have the same results, which didn't make sense. When I was doing it on the grass- Oh right, the ground stayed in one place, and I used all my power on it, but the sand shifted at the slightest bit of force.
So not only do I have to kick the sand multiple times very fast, but I also have to have an insane level of control to stop my foot at the very surface of the sand and not shift any of it. Wow, this is unbelievably hard training, but it will be worth it by the end. After that, my kicks will be on a whole other level, strong, fast and precise.
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"GARP-SAN, I UNDERSTOOD- OW- BEFORE WHEN YOU WERE- OW- WANTING ME TO- OW- DODGE, BUT WHY- OW- AM I JUST STANDING- OW- HERE!!?" I shout in question. All the while, Garp pelts me with more rolled-up solid cracker packets, except unlike before, I am not dodging at all.
Garp has instructed me to stand still in the same spot and tense my body up as much as possible while he pellets me with the empty packs, and I have to take them.
"It is all well and good being strong and knowing how to fight, but you also have to know how to take a beating and keep going. So brace yourself and tense all your muscles, and don't move at all." Garp says before launching another projectile straight at my face, and all I can do is close my eyes and prepare myself.
"OW!"
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"Keep going, shrimp. You are actually doing well. I am surprised!" Garp yells out as I contort and move my body, constantly trying to evade all the things he is rocketing towards me. This training was the complete opposite of the last one in that I had to avoid all of the cracker packets, except Garp had drawn out a small circle on the sand in which I was to stay.
Again I am threatened with dinner, but what makes this training so much more challenging is that Garp isn't throwing a single one at a time. Instead, Garp is throwing multiple different packs at several other points forcing me to bend and move in weird ways to avoid them, even having to fully spin in the air at one point.
"Come on, brat, all you have to do is stop thinking and go with the flow. Just let yourself relax and let your body be free." Garp says, trying to advise me on this training, which doesn't really help as it just frustrates me more since I can't relax in the least with this man throwing trash of death at me.
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"ROAGGGH!" I roar out as I continue to wail on this tree in front of me, psyching myself up as I constantly hit the bark with my left and then my right. I had been doing this training for quite a while, and while the first time it was excruciating, and I did hardly any damage to the bark, now bark flies away with each extension of my fist, and I can ignore any pain.
"Alright, stop. It is time for the next stage." Garp says to which I immediately stop, looking towards him for further instructions.
"Next, position your fists like this and then start punching the tree again. Remember to keep your whole hand tense and primed." Garp showcases this as he makes a weird fist where he points out the part of his finger between the two joints in his fingers and hits the tree like that, blasting it apart.
"You see, Detoro, you have already become quite good with punching with the area between your knuckle and the first joint of your finger. So now, you must focus on using the area between the first and second joints. After that, it will, of course, be the area between the second joint in your fingers and the tips of your fingers. Finally, when all of these can smash this tree apart, then you can start to try using the very tips of your fingers on the trees. Understood?" I rapidly nod my head and get to work on a brand-new tree.
Just imagine it, me being able to bring a tree down with a swift chop of my palm or drilling holes into the wood with the tip of my fingers. Indeed, I could not have chosen a better person to train under. I am loving this training, even if it hurts- actually, I like it more because it hurts, and I can feel myself getting stronger.