Operation: Hunt the Maze Rat
"Finally. There you are, you scam-artist bastard! You Ponzi-rat piece of shit!!"
Mr. Ponzi, that specialist in pyramid schemes, would have found the comparison deeply unfair.
From the Maze Rat's point of view, though, Lupin was nothing more than a madwoman who had barged into someone else's home and started tearing the place apart.
"Well now. It has been some time since a friend of such spirit came calling."
"Of course it has. I'm here to rip this sewer rat into see, wer, and rat."
"It is Maze Rat, if you please."
"Oh, same difference!"
In any case, Lupin was in a state of absolute, maximum rage. He had fooled her with treasure chests eleven whole times. Under whatever special-fraud statute you cared to name, that was a death sentence—firing squad, hanging, the works. Grinding her teeth, she dropped into a low stance: the final preparation before unleashing Swift Advance. She had long since forgotten that the man in front of her was a former Swordmaster.
"Swift Advance, is it? I have seen that form a few times."
Sure enough, the Maze Rat read the technique the instant he saw her ready stance. Lupin answered with brazen confidence.
"It's not."
"No matter how I look at it, that is Swift Advance."
"I said it's not."
"Then show me. I shall judge for myself whether it is or not."
Even Lupin's brass face had its limits when it came to stupidly insisting otherwise. Her opponent was a master who had handled a sword for decades. Still—wasn't a wanted man being this shameless a bit much?
"Oh. So you can take my sword while you're sitting inside a treasure chest? Parked on your ass, pinging it away with your right hand, no problem?"
"And I am to receive the blade of one who is not even a Swordmaster by hopping about as if my feet were on fire?"
She was pissed. She was genuinely pissed. This vicious little scam-artist geezer.
As if he had read her feelings, the corner of the Maze Rat's mouth twitched. Against the whole of his face it was a tiny movement, but Lupin's Dynamic Vision was already past human.
"Did you just laugh at me?"
"Remarkable powers of observation. And yet—am I forbidden to laugh?"
"Keep it up and your head's going to part ways with your body."
"Kahaha!"
Roaring with laughter and clapping his hands, the Maze Rat rose. The instant Lupin saw the motion, her foot shot forward. Earlier, pushing off soft ground had cost her three steps to build speed. Lupin's Swift Advance, by nature, reached full velocity in a single step.
"Eek."
Clang!
The Maze Rat's upright sword turned Lupin's incoming blade aside. Expecting several more forms to follow, he planted his feet and locked both hands into a solid guard. But Lupin had already retreated a good distance and finished sheathing her sword. Feigning puzzlement, the Maze Rat adjusted his grip.
"What is it you do?"
What was the advantage of the Shadowless Sword Style? Speed. Each individual strike might not be strong, but denying the opponent even a single chance to counter—that was what the art pursued. By all rights, a flurry that looked as if it would never end should have followed. Instead she had thrown one spirited form and then fled off to watch him from a distance. A little girl, all sharp and spiteful: cute, and yet so petty that laughter came of its own accord.
But Lupin had a reason for pulling back. After she learned a single form and promptly became a one-move plaintiff of the sword, Tassili had given her one piece of instruction.
First, throw Swift Advance. If it fails, fall back and read your opponent. At your speed, even a Swordmaster has no choice but to block at least once. Their counterattack? Do not worry. It never reached me, so there is no way it reaches you, Miss Lupin.
In short: poke them once, and if it looks hopeless, just counter. Faithfully carrying out that lesson, Lupin crooked a finger in provocation.
"Ho. So that is how you would have it."
But the moment he saw it, the Maze Rat casually lowered his blade and withdrew his intent to strike first. A counter to the counter.
This isn't how it's supposed to go.
"What, you get so old you can't even get your sword up anymore?"
"There are certain things one ought not raise against a little brat."
"Bold words from the guy who attacked first."
"Some suspicious soul infiltrates my bedchamber. What else but strike first?"
That's fair, actually.
Lupin nodded along. Seizing the opening, the Maze Rat stepped one foot outside the treasure chest. In that instant the frayed hem of his worn-out trousers and a grimy bare foot emerged.
Clang!
Iron struck iron. Sparks flew, steel rang, and both blades returned to their owners' chests.
"Show an opening, and you will not leave it be."
"No, Grandpa. You can see this? How are you even blocking it?"
On the strength of that single exchange, the Maze Rat reassessed her.
"Your speed is certainly great. Used thus, however, you shall never strike me."
Simple, easy forms have clear weaknesses. The line is straight, the intent is obvious, and there is no room for variation. Swift Advance, which Lupin had been planning to milk for all it was worth, was the prime example. Unless one overwhelmed with speed or raw power, even a Swordmaster could read the sword-path from the draw stance alone and shut it down. If Lupin could have laid aura along her blade, she might have knocked him flat in the first exchange. Unfortunately, that was not her field.
"Tch. Standing here taking pointers from an old man who's about to drop dead..."
In Korea, an insult like that would have dragged one's parents and the entire extended family out for a beating. The Maze Rat answered as if it were nothing.
"I have no mind to die this instant, so I shall pretend I did not hear that."
"Honestly, you set all these traps because you're old and sick, right?"
The Maze Rat shrugged, as if to say, go on, try me.
"You are not wrong. Would that those drawn by the bounty came but one or two at a time. I, too, have no wish for a short life."
"Quit living so shabbily and go while the going's good. Who knows? Maybe the underworld's register slips up and escorts you off as a noble guest."
"I am here precisely to avoid that death."
"Oh, for crying out loud. Anyone listening would think you've got the herb of immortality stashed under this floor."
"No herb of immortality. There is, however, a way to live without aging."
"You got dementia? At least say something that makes sense."
"Why would it not— no."
The Maze Rat, who had not reacted to a single provocation, grew grave.
"How is it you do not know? Are you not an Aura User? I felt no aura upon you, and so I doubted."
Lupin's ignorance was only natural. Tassili had never taught her what a Grandmaster was.
Become a Grandmaster, and one slipped the constraints of the world's laws to become something close to a demigod. And what comes to mind when one thinks of a god? Infinite lifespan. A Grandmaster's body was rebuilt into the form most suited to their aura, and the aging of the human body stopped. The reason a fugitive like the Maze Rat dug traps, bought time, and trained without end was entirely for this remaking of flesh and bone—to change his appearance and shake off pursuit.
Lupin, however, did not really know any of that. She was just thoroughly annoyed. If she hadn't been scammed by that music box, she would already be an Aura User.
"Thanks to a certain someone, yeah, I'm not an Aura User right now."
That ignorance struck the Maze Rat—unmoved by any family insult or provocation—harder than anything else.
"Right now? No. That is not what matters. Your words cannot stand. That was a speed no ordinary person could ever produce."
Master had told her to watch for the moment an opponent lost control of the conversation. That was the chance to drive them into a mental corner.
"Ahh~. Is it like, what? A great Swordmaster like me, struggling against the speed of a mere ordinary person! Something like that?"
"Amusing. Remain where you are. I shall confirm it with my own hands."
"H-hey? Huh? What are you trying to do? You're not getting weird ideas about a little kid, are you? You lolicon. Wait, do they even have the word lolicon here? Anyway, you deviant!"
The attempt landed perfectly. At last the Maze Rat reached toward Lupin first.
"I mean only to take your pulse! Remain still, and you shall not be hurt!"
"Pulse diagnosis from the guy who was swinging a sword a second ago? I'd sooner trust a northern pig begging for reunification!"
"You speak what I cannot comprehend!"
"Domhwangcha!"
In truth, a normal person ought to have harbored one question by this point. Why can I fight on equal terms with an Aura Master when I don't even have aura? But Lupin knew nothing but treasure chests, and as for growing stronger, so long as she felt strong enough by gut instinct, that was plenty. She had no idea how far outside the standard the bonus parameters called Growth Values, granted to an Apostle of the Star, truly were.
To the people of Elysium, aura was the source of power. To surpass human limits, they naturally had to train aura first, and only after securing a generous store of it did one gradually strengthen body and sword. That was the proper order. Lupin, by contrast, had thrown herself into the world at once and adventured for five years without a single day of rest. Her mindset was that even without aura, Growth Values would sort it out—and so she ran, and ran. While others melted aura into mental imagery and forged weapons of their own, Lupin had simply bulked up her raw physical measure by a ridiculous amount.
The result was the absurdity of facing an Aura Master with no aura at all. Tassili understood this as the mystery of an irregular Aura User, but to the Maze Rat, who had heard no such explanation, it was nothing short of a divine miracle. That was why he meant to read her pulse. If he could scan her body and awaken to some wondrous principle, perhaps he could seize even a single clue toward becoming a Grandmaster.
"Huff... huff... You play the imp rather well."
However.
"Old man's about to breathe his last."
It was not easy.
"Ghk... you little wretch. The pulse. Let me read your pulse!!"
The hand the Maze Rat thrust out missed Lupin every time. Even her hair, hardly something one controls with ease, whipped about like a lash, so that catching a single strand was difficult. Only after an hour of tag inside the narrow room did he realize it: this was nothing but a waste of time and a waste of aura.
The Maze Rat made a great resolution.
"Ahem!!!"
"Christ, you scared me."
"Very well. I apologize."
"...Out of nowhere? For what?"
"I shall apologize for every discourtesy I have offered you!"
An apology was the last thing on her mind, but Lupin thought that right now she could grip this man even more viciously and shake him—and that if she kept at it, a gap would open eventually. In that instant a great bolt of lightning struck Lupin's small brain, meaning the extremely small portion not devoted to treasure chests.
Sorry. It was all my fault.
What exactly did you do wrong?
Making you angry. That was my fault.
So what exactly did you do wrong?
The lightning showed her a fitting example, and so this would be called her ultimate technique: So What Exactly Did You Do Wrong.
"And what discourtesy did you commit?"
"Hm?"
Seeing the Maze Rat's bafflement, Lupin felt a pointless swell of smug satisfaction.
Ah. This feeling? Only half of humanity ever got to do something this good?
"Tell me exactly what discourtesy you committed against me, Grandpa. Not one syllable out of place."
