Treasure Town ~ Marowak Dojo

[Namohysip]

Several years ago, Marowak Dojo had collapsed under its own structure. Since then, it had been reinforced and rebuilt to take care of potential structural collapse. As a result, even the tremors from the Magikarp are not enough to take down the building--not yet, at least. The floor was a sort of compacted dirt which made for easy replacement but a fine battleground, and to the right of the entryway, across the room, was a hallway that led to several training rooms.

To the left was a small pond of fresh and often-replaced water. To the right were several cut logs for target practice and training dummies, though these logs had not yet been fashioned into anything workable. The sculpted skull of a Marowak loomed over them on the far wall, along with other bone-like carvings along the edges of the room. Marowak himself was not present; perhaps he, too, had evacuated.​

 

[kyeugh]

Lauchs walked into the empty room, his footfalls echoing off the sturdy walls. He gave the area a quick survey. It wasn't totally dissimilar from the places he'd trained in at home, though those areas had been built by and for men or fetch'd, so they were quite a lot larger than this. Still, given his diminutive form, the facility would serve him well despite its size.

The training area was strewn with unworked wood and not much in else the way of training equipment, but it seemed the marowak who ran the place had spared no expense decorating it in a fabulously narcissistic manner. No training equipment simply meant no solo training, so he'd have to find a sparring partner to drill with. No problems there, Lauchs thought, so long as he could find someone...

"Hello?" he called, his voice echoing just as his footfalls had. "Anyone around?"

 

[NebulaDreams]

Curio walked into the dojo, immediately drawn to the Marowak sculpture inside. She couldn't help but reminisce on those events years back, the ones that hurt her friends and also forced her to dive into someone's memories with her aura. At least as a Riolu, she didn't have to relive anyone's trauma vicariously through her empath powers... except--

"Anyone around?" That onion bird called. Admittedly, making fun of him was, well, quite fun, but she had to admit, he had a sense of honour to him that separated him from some of the ilk in the other group. She held her paw up, making her presence known.

"Here. 'sup?"

 

[unrepentantAuthor]

Brisa followed Curio inside, head buzzing with information intake, overplanning, sensory overload and anxiety to make a good impression with this riolu. A good sparring match should help clear her head while being a productive way to prepare for her coming combat duties.

"Good day," she called. "Perhaps we could take turns refereeing?"

 

[NebulaDreams]

"Yeah, sure, how should we split it up first?"

 

[Tanuki]

Zane didn’t know where he was, what to do, and had no particular direction calling to him any more than another. No other option he could think of first, he decided to follow the one semi-familiar face that didn’t have amnesia.

Of course, being obvious about that would be weird, and he couldn’t just ask to tag along because that would imply things, so he kept a respectable, not creepy distance. He even made sure to wait a minute or two after they’d entered to go in himself.

Maybe he was overcompensating, but experience told him people tended to assume the worst thanks to his appearance. An appearance he didn’t have anymore. He should’ve overthought this more.

“Oh, hey. Fancy seeing you gals here,” he said as he stepped in. He did his very best to look casual, which was terrible, but his effort was at least apparent.

 

[NebulaDreams]

"Oh hey, Blueberry. Up for some sparring as well?"

 

[Tanuki]

"Oh hey, Blueberry. Up for some sparring as well?"

Oh God, no. “Definitely!” He didn’t even know what a move was, let alone how to fight. “I’m pretty experienced, though,” he said with the alien confidence of someone who had any semblance of a chance. Pride put on a smug grin while his despair prayed for his death.

“You two gals—” why was he calling them gals? Where the hell was he from?—, “can warm up on each other, though. I’m pretty patient.” That should give him enough time to figure out how to get out of this.

 

[unrepentantAuthor]

@NebulaDreams

Brisa's whiskers twitched. She had fewer than a dozen spoken words left before she would have to scream from social overstimulation.

"Curio. Standard rules. Best of three. Farfetch'd fella to referee. Now, please."

She took her place at one end of a suitably marked out patch of dirt, claws sparking.

 

[Tanuki]

Ref? They needed a ref? What’s the ref supposed to do? It’s pretty easy to tell when someone’s knocked out—wait, he was going to get beaten by a girl if Curio fought him next. He couldn’t get beaten by a girl!

“I’ll take the winner,” he said with a smirk. This infinitely increased his chances of fighting a guy. Obviously a dude would have a better chance in a fight, and there’d be no shame in losing to a dude!

He watched on with pride saved. No way he’d have to fight a girl if he fought the winner... of a fight between two girls.

 

[NebulaDreams]

Now this was something she lived for. Curio positioned herself opposite Brisa, getting into a fighting stance as she lifted one foot in front of her, arms stretched forward. Just like bro taught her.

On closer inspection, Brisa seemed rather nervous, though Curio didn't know why. She had a hunch, though. Or maybe that was from past experiences with Shinx.

She took another glance at Zane. Even if she didn't have her aura on her, something told her that Zane was being rather smug about something. He just had that vibe.

"So... who's gonna start the match?"

 

[Tanuki]

"So... who's gonna start the match?"

Zane raised a brow. “Start? What do you mean?” He asked. “Don’t you both kinda just,” he raised his claws and jabbed their intersections together like two scissors meeting at the base. “Go at each other?”

 

[unrepentantAuthor]

More mon were approaching the dojo, and people were talking instead of sparring. Brisa growled, and darted forward, hackles raised.

She was a shinx again. This one was a lucario-turned-riolu. This world was a different world. She would do well to play this safe.

She leapt at Curio, claws extended, ready to swipe. (...or to sink her teeth into an incoming fist.)

 

[NebulaDreams]

Curio backed away from Brisa's swipes. So she attacked first. Definitely more aggressive than Shine was. She didn't want to get too close, or else be shocked, but her fists were all she had without her aura powers. Oh well. She settled for a quick attack, running into Brisa to give her a swift kick to the jaw.

 

[unrepentantAuthor]

Brisa's mouth hung open, drinking in every scent, ready to bite.

But electric energy did not come rushing from her jaw for a thunder fang attack. Nor dark energy for a crunch.

She'd lost her moves.

In a brief moment of panic as Curio came dashing towards her, Brisa resorted to the only staple combat trick she had which needed no elemental energy at all. She flung herself forwards and to the side, and put out her tail to catch and trip the riolu by the ankle.

 

[NebulaDreams]

In the midst of her kick, Brisa's tail wrapped around Curio's foot and knocked her to the ground.

Crap, talk about deja vu. She fell for the exact same trick as she did with that Aipom a while back. But no matter, she'd get back up if she could've avoided Brisa's next attack, whatever that was. Or she could've duped her where she stood.

Still lying on the floor, Curio aimed a punch at Brisa's belly.

 

[unrepentantAuthor]

Brisa tried to roll with the incoming punch, but she still took a winding blow to the gut. She yowled, and let out a burst of electricity as Curio's fist connected. So she still had something, whatever that was! She pulled herself to her feet, suddenly as fatigued as if they'd been fighting for an hour. Whether it was from taking that last attack or making whatever attack that was, she couldn't afford to keep that up. She fixed her gaze on Curio, ready to take advantage of whatever state she was in after that last exchange.

 

[Tanuki]

Zane silently watched the exchange of blows, slowly realizing that he was completely and utterly screwed.

 

[NebulaDreams]

Curio drew her hand back as soon as the recoil shocked her. Damn, that stung! She quickly got to her feet and jumped back. She had to be more careful around Brisa's electricity, however weak it seemed at the moment. If she was aiming for another hit, which she had to make contact to be able to do, she could've used this move to boost her attack.

Curio bounced on the balls of her feet and did a little shimmy as she anticipated Brisa's next move. She felt kind of different in that her body had more energy to it, but she didn't know how that was achieved through dancing or whatever Swords Dance was supposed to be. No matter. She'd make sure her next attack would hit twice as hard.

 

[Tanuki]

Zane squinted at Curio’s curious battling. Dancing? Why did it look like she was dancing? Are you playing a song in her head? he asked Diyem.