Kiri La Kill - Chapter 33

I have changed my mind on the double update for today, instead going with a 2k word or thereabouts update… the last one we had was during the Gamagoori fight, wasn’t it? Let’s make up for that! Shall we?

Now further exams have been booked for next week, so that will undoubtedly into the lives for Chainsawman Quest and the Monday of next week, so don’t be surprised if I have to miss another update. I’ll apologize in advance, but consider that I’ll be making up for those with another update soon afterward anyway.

Also speaking of exams, sorry if this is a bit late to drop on the patreon, I had some lessons and studying to keep me busy before… and possibly an upcoming live on top of that to mess everything up.

17 more chapters to go, see you lads on the other side.

“So you’ve taken my lessons to heart.” Kiri spoke to the girl across from him, even as he regarded her with a cautious look.

“Don’t get so full of yourself, asshole.” Ryuko was quick to spit back, all too eager to engage in trash talk, even if she was still staring Kiri down with a calculating look, the scissor blade in her hand ready for anything. “Pointing out the obvious doesn’t make you smart!”

“But it does make you stupid.” Kiri finished, chuckling a little, as if patting himself on the back for his joke… even as Ryuko fumed and gnashed her teeth at him, just barely holding herself back from attacking the Hard Boy immediately. Kiri didn’t seem bothered either way. “So, are you going to talk more, or..?”

Ryuko’s scowl only deepend, before she schooled her expression into something calmer. Oh, she was still unmistakably pissed, as was her usual state whenever she approached combat, but the look on her face was… almost serene.

She simply scoffed.

“We’ll talk when I beat you into the ground.” She said, as simply as that… before brandishing her sword, and talking no more, and as for Kiri?

He laughed.

And unmistakably, he felt some thrill spread across his body in response to that as well… The uncertainty that he had been feeling for so long, the anxiety over his memories, the lack of direction and ideals, and the looming feeling that his old life was quickly becoming out of reach…

…He forgot all of it, and focused on the fight.

Maybe not a fight for survival, but a fight nevertheless. A fight that would help him forge another warrior for the battles to come. And those battles? They would be battles for survival, not just for them, but the entire world… who would either be saved, or be crushed underneath the tyranny of one woman, and her mad crusade.

And he responded with three simple words, words that had been ingrained into his head since before he had lost his memories. Words that defined the fate of all of the enemies who thought that they might bring the Adamant one low.

“You can try.”

And with that, he braced himself for combat, as Ryuko charged forward.

It had barely been a month or so since Honnouji Academy’s courtyard had been last repaired, alongside the rest of the school and a big chunk of surrounding infrastructure… the even that required that kind of renovation does not bear repeating.

After all, that had been a battle of Unstoppable Force versus Immovable Object, and has been recreated through numerous simulations, recordings, and has stayed in the memories of both those that had been around when it happened, and those that had been the centrepoint of it.

It should be said however, that the battle between Matoi Ryuko and Kirishima Eijiro could not be any more different compared to that.

Gamagoori Ira had been a walking tank that took his punishment, and dished out double the amount. He got stronger the more he was hurt, and was generally the perfect equal for Kiri… His only fault being that he was reliant on a uniform, and was largely unprepared for someone like himself to oppose him.

So in response, Kiri had been a walking tank right back. He had taken all of Gamagoori’s blows on the chin and had given as good as he got. He didn’t see the need to move all over the place when he could just focus on doing more damage, and had perhaps even been a bit overzealous in his usual approach to things.

In contrast to that, Ryuko was as fast as a bullet, and punched ten times as hard. Having finally gotten over her reservations about the source of her power, she zoomed about the battlefield in a barely perceptible blur, and struck with her weapon again and again and again and again. Left alone like that, she would drill through Kiri like he was nothing more than a piece of cement and the sword in her hand, a jackhammer.

Because of course, it should be noted that Kiri was rather experienced with taking blunt blows, but cutting attacks? Those were still a weak spot of his.

Gamagoori had exposed that flaw, Satsuki had laid him low with it. And now Ryuko was doing her best to exploit it… Without his Quirk, she would have ran him through ten times over, both through the front, and through the back.

But Kiri didn’t just lay down and take it, of course.

No, he resisted.

The same tactic that he employed against Gamagoori wouldn’t work? He simply adopted a new one, letting go of the idea of staying rooted in one place and just countering, instead moving--- not to go out and catch Ryuko, mind you, he knew that was impossible. The goal here was to imbalance Ryuko.

Because he was quick to realize that her charges toward him were strong but uncontrollable. She had to commit to every action, and either see it through, or risk considerable blowback while she reoriented herself to face him… either that, or just miss entirely while running herself through a tackle or a kick swung her way while Kiri avoided harm.

It all proved to be a rather funny call back to his confrontation with the Red Card.

One thing that Red Card Jozu did not have however, was a Godrobe that gave him as much strength as ‘Senketsu’ had given to Ryuko. Something that made it so that Ryuko was able to match Kiri in a show of strength, and if given the proper leverage, even overpower him momentarily.

He’d found that out the hard way when he’d tried to grapple her out of the hair, only for her to pry herself off of him, and reward Kiri with a knee to his chin… something that didn’t hurt much owing to his Hardening, but a rather thorough chastisement all the same.

Still, that ‘proper leverage’ was something difficult for Ryuko to achieve, as subsequent attempts from a stubborn Kiri proved.

He was simply too wide and too tall compared to her, his muscular frame dwarfing hers by a wide margin, and force her on the backfoot on every grapple by allowing Kiri to put all of his weight into subduing her.

More than once, it had allowed him to throw Ryuko around the courtyard, delivering as much damage as he got by slamming her against this wall, suplexing her against the ground, or spiking her on the ground like a volleyball, tearing chunks out of the concrete, bending the steel frames of walls, shattering windows and collapsing building as he went.

And, well…

“WHERE ARE YOU TOUCHING?!”

“Tactical Areas.”

“THAT’S A WEIRD WAY TO TALK ABOUT MY TITS!”

Just because Ryuko wasn’t concerned about people looking at her anymore, she still very much believed that she was still rather… opposed, to people touching her. Combat though this may be, there was a line to be drawn about wandering hands!

Even if Kiri was blushing just as radiant of a red for having gotten to cop an accidental feel, because he’d rather gotten used to fighting a certain way, and having to go out of his way to change up tactics against Ryuko was really not helping his case!

One could even call her a handful! Though Kiri resolutely avoided saying that, for fear that his words may be misunderstood by her, and get him embroiled in yet another face-off against someone going berserk.

After Gamagoori, he really didn’t want to push his luck.

R-regardless, the battle continued.

Or well, it continued for as long as it could.

It continued until the both of them were covered in cuts and bruises. Broken ribs and bleeding wounds, loss of blood because of a perpetually hungry Godrobe, and pieces of skin flayed because how else would one explain chunks being torn off of a hardened body?

It was a painful battle for both Ryuko and Kiri, and they both certainly felt the agony. Gritted teeth and willpower could only hide so much, when both of them were panting so heavily, clutching this or that, and so visibly shaking after almost an hour of fighting.

And what a prodigious time that was.

If only both of them hadn’t lost all semblance of rationality to see that it had gone on for long enough. If only they hadn’t both forgotten that this wasn’t a battle to the death, and instead meant to test the character, the strength of the other.

If only they weren’t so stubborn.

Really now, did someone really have to interfere and tell the two to stop acting like idiots?

Yes, Mankanshoku Mako thought, someone did.

And it was going to be her.

And just to hammer home how bad things had gotten due to a lack of rationality, it should be noted that her preferred method of interference was to put herself right in the middle of a charge between Kiri and Ryuko, forcing both of them to slide to a stop, only to collide right into each other and fall down in a tangle of limbs.

This did not deter the girl, who immediately stepped on the two of them to prevent them from getting up, before launching an explanation, her hands raised in an ‘X’ in the air, as she suddenly brought down two godly combatants by sheer presence alone.

Truly terrifying.

“Stoooop!” She called. “Do you idiots want to kill each other?! Do you? I don’t want that, you shouldn’t either, especially because you’re fighting for no reason at all!” Ryuko made to groan out something about protecting her honor, but Mako just stopped that by sticking her shoe into her friend’s mouth. “You two are stopping this instant, and that’s the end of it.”

She resolutely stopped herself from doing the same to Kiri, of course, those teeth looked way too painful for her poor feet.

And of course, that reminded her!

“Oh, by the way! Mr. Kirishima!” Kiri flinched. “As much as I’m grateful for you saving me, I must break off the engagement between us!” Mako said. “You were very kind to take responsibility, but we barely just met, and you seem to be interested in other people! I would not want to get in the way of the relationships you want to pursue with them!”

And with that, Mako turned around and skipped home, only turning around at the last second to remind a startled and confused Ryuko that her mother would be making those croquettes that she liked, so she shouldn’t be late.

Ryuko couldn’t even begin to understand what that meant.

“W-what just happened?” Kiri rasped, laying there, still in that tangle of limbs with Ryuko, even as Senketsu receded back into his usual style.

“I have no idea.” Ryuko could only say that back at him, similarly flabbergasted.

One bright side for her though, she no longer had a reason to be mad at the guy… so that was… nice? One less enemy for her, right? And he seemed like a pleasant dude, if he’d only did all of that to protect Mako, and hold himself back from actually smooching on that Queen Bitch…

If only she knew how the future would make her relationship with him develop…