Chapter 41: Ass Whooped
Chapter 41: Ass Whooped
~Albus POV~
As we shook our hands ended Pietro glanced up to see Maria as she waves her black hair as spoke to us, "My, oh my Maria. Guess you weren't kidding that you have your age again. Even your eyes are back. Truly miraculous."
She nods at that as she points her weapon Life and Death.
Quite ironic really.
Life and Death were Maria Calavera's signature weapons. It consisted of a pair of kamas that she used for close-quarters and ranged combat.
Her weapons could connect at the tip to form a twin-bladed staff. After she lost her eyes, she now uses her single remaining kama as a walking stick and only activates its kama if she needs to fight.
As she points her cane at me she began to ask Pietro for some favors for help as she spoke respectfully, "Right. The kid here helped me return to my state but don't know-how. But that wasn't the reason for the call good friend. Was wondering if you can help me out forging some I.D. for me and create a second weapon to form my staff. Please…?"
"Haha…"
"I heard that kid."
"Oh boy this again."
Seems like Maria heard my obvious laugh as Pietro took a look at Maria's weapon before asking me the obvious question, "Hmm… it should take no more than a few hours friend for the weapon. As for I.D. give or take minutes but now then Albus was it? I have to ask how you returned Maria to her prime?"
Hearing that I only played along with a sheepish choice of my words to him keeping it a secret with my finger shushing him, "Now, now Pietro. As a fellow researcher, I prefer to keep my work a secret. That goes along with the process of how it was done. Sorry but I'm keeping it shut."
Pietro sighs at this but at least backs off the topic about it.
Going around I began to gloss over some of Pietro's books as I turn my head around and responded with a green light nod for me to read the books containing medical knowledge.
Reading through one of his books of this world auto mails I'm very impressed with the work as Pietro began to work on Maria's Life and Death weapon again as she turns on the news of Atlas newscast.
*Bzzt*
"… Now on Channel Kingdom Atlas News, we have more reports of our Great Kingdom Technological Marvels of the soon-to-be state-of-the-art new and improved Robots to replace human soldiers. The Atlas droid old models by the estimates of some Research Scientist speaks about in 4 years' time the newest models to help the Kingdoms –"
"Rubbish."
Hearing the word coming off from Maria's mouth she sighs as she mumbles to herself as I began to continue reading more of the books on prosthetics but in reality, I'm going over the info I got from Pietro History using Ultimate Eye to glance at him.
Using Mana to help speed the process along I was amazed by his work and got to thinking of some ideas to help modify Menagerie when I have the chance to visit or get the Green Light from Ghira.
Plus add the fact with some ideas of Tony Stark and Rimuru Tempest's past life character learning about construction was needed what I plan to do.
That was perhaps trying to persuade Ghira to build their own Huntsman Academy within their small land of the island to help get better support for the Faunus.
As well as possibly creating the first-ever Satellite across the globe with some normal human ingenuity on my part to create the whole process possible.
Ah…
I can't wait for the day to happen.
Still, though that's very far away from where I'm at currently as my level won't allow me to do what I please easily unless I have the backing or the funding possible.
Sigh…
Such wishful thinking on my part.
/////
Hearing the clanking sounds from Pietro coming out of his work office he came out with Maria old fashion Weapons Life and Death as well as a new Scroll for her as she obtained it.
Pietro makes a hardy laugh as well as mentions how easy it was for a genius like him, "Haha. Man, it has been a while since I have done hacking like this. Just don't call me this often for this Maria. Also Maria your new Scroll contains your I.D. and everything with the same name and all but under the guise of being a family relative."
Maria nods at this as she shows her thanks and raises her weapons Life and Death with an appreciated expression on her face, "Thanks, Pietro. It really means a lot. Also, thanks for returning and creating my Weapons Life and Death. Feels like forever I held the two like this."
She hugs her weapons tightly as Pietro began to talk to her about the improvements, "Ah yes. Took a while but I made sure to modify them to be stronger than your originals. Luckily, we have some Gravity Dust lying around. So, what exactly are you going to be doing Maria."
She grins at this and glances her eyes at me with a twinkle –
TWINKLE!
I know this troupe and I already don't like where this is going!
She began to talk to the both of us as I felt a chill rand down my spine as she talked way too happy about it, "Oh Pietro. I'm going to train Albus to be my student as promised that I train him how to master Aura and be capable in a fight. Now let the lessons begin!"
/////
*SWOOSH*
"Shit!"
*Woosh*
*SWOOSH*
"Not fast enough kiddo."
"Damn – "
*BAM*
"Cough!"
Damn it all to hell!
When Maria and I were done talking to Pietro she dragged me to the ice lands outside of Mantle to properly get me a good reading of my training.
All I have to say fuck her and her semblance.
Apparently, when the 'fight' started she started to move around before I could use my Ult. Sword out as she was already on my ass with her Kama's out ready to bash my head but thankfully my Ult. Eye managed to follow this and avoided a few times.
Key word being 'if' she actually tried.
This right now?
*Swoosh*
Narrowly avoiding a strike to my face on the skull side of her Kama she was going easy on me holding back a lot as I didn't give much credit to Huntsman and Huntresses at the time thinking I can follow them.
Wrong.
So, so, so dead wrong.
When the fight started Maria used her aura to enhance her legs to leave like a blur no more like those flash steps in Anime as the show never showed how reality played over to here but I got the front row seats to one.
And I really regret it.
*Bam*
"Ah…!"
"Come one kid you can do better than that."
Easy for you to say as you have one of the most hack semblances in the series that makes you untouchable even on the same level as my Ult. Eye Precognition.
Preflexes is Maria Semblance a Defensive Type reaction-based one.
A stupidly overpowered one at that.
Maria's Semblance allows her to sense everything around her better than most people and react to attacks almost before they happen. She can even react to attacks that are outside her field of vision, such as people shooting her from behind.
Combined with her fighting prowess, Maria is a formidable opponent even in her elderly age, as she was able to combine her old muscle memory with her Semblance to hold her own against Neopolitan using simple blocks and parries.
However, her old age and lack of energy are still a major disadvantage, and she still didn't have a chance of winning her fight against Neo anyway but still managed to achieve her actual goal of stalling her.
In her youth and prime, Maria was able to single-handedly fight and kill a group of mercenaries led by Tock, although she underestimated Tock's skills and ferocity, costing Maria her Silver Eyes.
Regardless, her Semblance and weapons saved her life when she was able to sense Tock's position and use her weapon to kill Tock while she was distracted and vulnerable.
And right now I'm facing a very prime Maria with the power of her youth behind her.
Dancing around changing her weapon Life and Death as she changed it into her staff mode as the two kama can connect at the tip to form a staff with a blade on each end.
She makes a smug grin on her face as she opens her palms waving her hands motioning it at me in a challenging manner, "Come on kid. From what I heard of your travels you seem to be a long-range fighter. Bad type against someone like me. Come one try to fight back harder."
Damn it!
I'm getting my ass whooped over here!
"Heads up kid!"
Wait I can't -
"AHHH!"
Oh right on the nuts...
"Ehh... whoops...?"