Alan, captivated by the majestic sight of the Relic Castle, turned towards a secluded alley, seeking a better vantage point for his reconnaissance.
As he ventured further into the shadows, he hurriedly stowed his notebook back into his sack, inadvertently causing a few coins to spill onto the ground.
Startled by the clatter of the coins, Alan turned to retrieve them, only to find a hand darting in before him, snatching one of the coins from the ground.
"Ha Ha! Now this is mine!" a booming voice declared above him.
Raising his head, Alan found himself face to face with a burly figure—a bald man with a scarred face and a puffy countenance, clad in ragged armor.
"Excuse me, sir, but that coin belongs to—" Alan began, only to be cut off by the man's dismissive retort.
"Rubbish!" the man exclaimed, clutching the coin tightly in his fist. "It fell on the ground, and now it's mine." his voice dripped with arrogance as he held the coin aloft.
Alan, visibly irked by the man's stubbornness, attempted to reason with him. "But sir, I—" he began, only to be abruptly cut off once again.
"If you want it, you can duel me for it!!" the man bellowed, his voice booming with challenge as he clenched the coin tightly in his fist. Alan's eyes widened in astonishment as he beheld a curious sight—the middle of the man's fingers were coated in a mysterious black mark, resembling something of a pair of knuckles.
With a grunt, a bright green light enveloped the markings, and in an instant, real knuckles with a black tint materialized over the man's hands.
Alan watched in awe and apprehension, his eyes widening beneath his half-covered face. He had never witnessed such a display of power before, and though his curiosity was piqued, he couldn't shake the underlying sense of fear that gripped him.
The man gestured tauntingly, goading Alan to engage in battle. Despite knowing he could easily overpower the large man, Alan, against his better judgment, decided not to escalate the situation. With a swift turn, he began to walk away.
As Alan reached the threshold, the man, now reveling in his perceived victory, shouted after him with smug satisfaction.
"Yes! You better keep moving, for you can never hope to match the might of Ragnar th—"
"Please, no!"
But before he could finish his boastful declaration, Alan's attention was abruptly diverted from the man's smug declaration by a cry of distress echoing nearby.
Hearing a cry that sounded like a woman's distress, Alan swiftly dashed towards the source. Darting into a nearby alley, he executed a series of agile maneuvers, leaping onto a wall of brick and then onto the roof of a nearby house. From this vantage point, he scanned the area until he spotted the source of the distress.
There, on the ground below, lay a teenager—a boy with a bruised face, surrounded by three others who were larger in stature. They seemed to be teenagers as well, but their build far outweighed that of the frail-looking boy on the ground. In his right hand, the injured boy clutched a shield made of wood, a feeble defense against the impending onslaught.
As Alan leaned in to observe more closely, he heard one of the larger boys from the trio approaching the injured boy on the ground.
"You're worthless!" the bully spat, his voice dripping with contempt. "All defense wielders are worthless, but you're especially weak."
With a cruel display of force, the bully placed his foot on the left cheek of the frail-looking boy, exerting pressure with deliberate malice.
The frail boy reacted swiftly, seizing the leg of his assailant with his own feet and attempting to strike back with his wooden shield. But before he could retaliate, another of the larger boys charged forward, kicking the shield out of the frail boy's hand and pinning his arm to the ground with a heavy stomp.
As the shield dissolved into a green glow, disappearing into thin air, Alan observed with a mixture of surprise and intrigue. "So, kids can do that too," he muttered under his breath.
The bully, with his foot still pressing down on the frail boy's face, leaned in close, taunting him with cruel words.
"You're weak," he sneered. "And the weak always fall prey to the strong. How about I put an end to your suffering—"
"Get the hell away from my friend!" A voice thundered through the air, followed by the sound of heavy footsteps.
A boy with a slightly heavier build for his age dashed forward, forcefully kicking the two bullies away, sending them stumbling back several feet.
Positioning himself as a protective barrier between the frail boy and his tormentors, he raised his voice in defiance.
"Stay away from my friend! I won't let you harm him. You have no right to bully anyone. For I am the son of the great Goliath, the legendary swordwielder."
The other boys, aided by the third member of their group, rose to their feet with coughs and glares filled with rage. The first bully, seething with anger, bellowed,
"You weakling! Get him!"
Following his command, the two partners grunted with effort. One of them bore a mark on his arm that moments ago resembled a coiled rope, now emitting a dark-tinted green glow as it transformed into a whip made of leather, and the other boy's fingers, previously blackened, now glowed with the same green hue as they materialized into menacing claws of hardened wood.
Meanwhile, the third boy emitted a green glow from his back, concealed by the overall he wore. With a swift motion, he materialized a simple steel sword, ready to join his companions in their attack. Together, they lunged towards the new boy, who stood resolute in defense of his friends.
Witnessing the unfolding spectacle, Alan's eyes widened once again in curiosity, his whispered exclamation of
"Fascinating",
barely audible amidst the chaos. As the attackers closed in, Alan instinctively muttered under his breath,
"Dodge."
However, the new boy stood firm, his face obscured by his raised arms. With a low grunt, he summoned forth a chest plate made of steel, its emergence tearing through the fabric of his overall. Despite the imminent threat, the boy stood resolute, prepared to face their onslaught head-on.
But before he could brace himself, the boy with the whip seized his neck, wrenching him forward and disrupting his balance.
The boy with claws followed suit, scratching hard against the steel chest plate, leaving marks and nicking his chin in the process. Finally, the boy with the sword delivered a powerful blow to the chest plate, sending the new boy crashing to the ground with a resounding thud.
As the dust settled, the three boys grunted as again with similar green light they dematerialized their weapons, returning them to their marks, before resuming their assault on both the new boy and the frail one, kicking them in the guts and face until they were battered and bruised.
Alan observed this with a mixture of fascination and a slight cringe at the biased beating. However, he knew better than to interfere, aware that doing so would only draw unwanted attention to himself.
After the merciless beating, the boys finally ceased their assault. Their leader spat on the face of the new boy, whose chestplate, having endured the onslaught, had dematerialized.
With sarcasm and mockery dripping from his voice, the leader taunted him as he sat near his face, "You're weak too, Armis. Just like your friend here, the bottom-feeding scum. You can't even dream of matching the strength of us offense wielders. You're a fraud, just like your father Goliath."
The leader moved near an inch of the boy as he continued "He boasted about opening the 50th gate and bringing back treasures unseen, but we all realized what a fraud he was when he never returned."
Before the bully could finish his tirade, Armis struggled to his feet, suddenly delivering a powerful punch to the bully's face, sending him hurtling several feet away.
Armis slowly rose to his feet, his voice a low but enraged mutter, "My father was not a fraud..." With his eyes bloodshot and pupils as though vanished, he erupted with anger, shouting,
"HE WAS A HERO!!!"
With a swift motion, Armis jumped on a nearby bully, delivering a knee to his face with such force that it broke his nose, blood splattering from his face.
Next, Armis seized the neck of another nearby bully, forcefully shoving his face into the ground, blood splattering everywhere, including where the frail boy lay unconscious.
Without hesitation, Armis grabbed the bully whose nose he had just broken and pressed his face onto the head of the other bully, unleashing a barrage of kicks so fierce that blood flew everywhere, mingling with the muffled cries of the boys as their faces were pounded into each other and the ground.
Armis continued stomping relentlessly until the head of the bully beneath was buried a foot deep in the ground.
He then swiftly turned his attention to the boy who had just recovered from the earlier punch, witnessing the gruesome scene.
Alan, witnessing such a horrifying turn of events, was held in shock, sensing the overwhelming aura of rage emanating from Armis.
As Armis approached the bully, he unleashed a swift and forceful knee strike that sent the bully crashing to the ground, eliciting a cry so piercing that it made Alan blink. Alan scanned the surroundings, expecting someone else to intervene upon hearing the distressing sound, but to his shock, there was no one around.
Undeterred by the bully's cries, Armis continued his assault with even greater force, relentlessly stomping on the bully's face until blood splattered up to his thigh.
Through gritted teeth, Armis muttered,
"My father was a hero," as he continued his onslaught, refusing to stop until nothing but a mangled mess remained of the bully's features.
With a triumphant roar, Armis announced his victory like a beast, his battle cry echoing through the air. The sound jolted the frail boy, who trembled as he began to rise from the ground, shaken by the brutal scene unfolding before him.
Alan was shaken to the core by what he witnessed next. As hard chills ran down his spine, goosebumps prickled his skin. The bullies' bodies began to emit a crimson glow, and a broad black line on Armis's chest mirrored the eerie illumination. One by one, the bullies' forms disintegrated, consumed by Armis's mark.
Standing tall, Armis let out another fierce battle cry as the bodies vanished into red glowing specks, absorbed by the mark on his chest. The mark transformed into an armored plate that extended down to his abdomen. With a look of rage and disorientation, Armis turned towards the frail boy, who watched in terror, his face flushed with fear and with what looked like disgust as he trembled uncontrollably.
Armis attempted to move towards the frail boy but before taking a single step ahead, he collapsed to the ground.
Driven by instinct or fear, unsure Alan watched as the frail boy quickly gathered himself and dashed away without uttering a word.
Observing all this from the rooftop of a nearby house, Alan somewhat shared the same terror reflected with his widened eyes and parched lips.
Panting heavily, he hastily concealed himself, his eyes still refusing to close. The horror he had just witnessed making even someone like him question his dangers surrounding his mission.
But as the moment of shock passed, Alan composed himself and lifted his head to find Armis lying unconscious on the ground. His fascination grew as he noticed that the blood stains and splatters on the ground, as well as the marks on Armis's feet, had vanished, leaving no trace of the recent altercation. Within moments, Armis began to stir, struggling to rise to his feet and surveying his surroundings with a rasping voice.
"What happened? Where did they go?" Armis muttered, scratching at his chest and noticing the change in his marking.
With one arm stretched wide and the other touching his mark, his emotion made full circle as he exclaimed,
"Yes! My mark evolved because I defeated those bullies and saved my friend."
Bringing his eyes back to the surroundings he noted, "But where did they go?"
Finding nothing but his own presence, Armis gathered himself, his lips no longer holding any curves of happiness or curiosity, he started walking out of the alley, his mind probably buzzing with unanswered questions.
Alan's mind struggled between curiosity and shock with each passing moment as he struggled to comprehend what he had just witnessed.
Without pausing to think, his eyes instinctively followed Armis, moving along with his feet.