The Only Place You'll Find Me (Roy)

[Price]

Shaking his head and exhaling slowly, Price extended both hands out slowly in front of him, so that they were fully extended at the exact time he finished breathing out. A quick inhale, and his arms were brought in again, cocked at the elbow as he raised his right foot directly up at the knee, as if he were taking a large step. Quickly, he stepped down and to his right, turning his upper body ninety degrees in the direction he had stepped, bringing his left hand into a cocked 'ready' position and extending his right forcefully out, exhaling with a loud cry as he did so.

"KI-YAI!"

And so it went, on and on for a while, as Price gracefully went through the various katas of both his Kung Fu and Karate styles. They were simple to him now, after all his practice and years of experience, yet they did still calm him, and helped to keep himself in shape. Thus, he still performed them every day, as often as possible, at least, whenever he had a few spare moments to spend at the training grounds.

Finishing the current kata, Price let out a little breath. In all honesty, today he was looking for something a little more than just memorized patterns. The best way to test your skills was against another opponent, one who you would have to react to and defend against. Thus, Price began to pace, looking for anyone who may be up for a little challenge. Finding someone, Price's eyebrows raised as he pointed out towards him.

"Hey you! With the ears!" Price said, about as subtly as a bathtub. "I'm itchin' for a good fight, and you look like you'd go down fast. I don't know what you do for magic, but you wanna see if you can use it to take me out?"

[Roy Atenwood]

Well, it ws Roy's second day here at the Academy. He had already gotten on the bad side of a vampire, and had his ass whupped by a cool looking lizard-girl. What was next?

He had walked into the training grounds to practice his acrobatics, when he hard someone yell about a guy with ears. Roy looked around, and he was the only person with funny ears around. Hell, he was the only other person around.

"Sure....why not? You make the first move, then." He said, as he unhooked his retractable staff from his belt, and extended it to its full length.

[Price]

The boy didn't bother responding to the 'ears' comment, and simply accepted the battle for what it was, asking Price to make the first move and, more importantly, busting out his weapon of choice. Hooked to the student's belt was a short metal pole, but once he took it from its hanging place, the boy extended it to full staff length. Price's eyebrows raised and an excited grin crept up on his face, completely negating his earlier intentions at bad-assery. That staff-thing was...

"COOL!" Price exclaimed with a grin. "I'll make the first move here now, but, after this is over, you've GOT to tell me where I can find one of those!"

Price laughed, and shook his head, and in that instant, all vestiges of playfulness and even cockiness were gone for the moment. Replacing them instead were the deadset eyes and calm determination of a skilled martial artist. "I've no intention of using my sword against you in this battle. However, that in no way requires you to put away your own weapon. Give me a moment."

Price quietly closed his eyes and began to enter a rhythmic breathing pattern, raising his hands up to his chin with each inhale, and lowering them back his sides with every exhale. As he did this, a change, unnoticable to the human eye, was taking place. Using these meditating moments, Price was focusing his chi into various other aspects of his mentality, improving his speed and strength somewhat, in order to match his own body against the staff. A few moments later, with Roy likely simply watching in confusion for the time, Price's eyes opened again, that same calm exterior shining through yet again.

"Now, we may begin."

Slowly, Price began to walk forward, carefully and calculatingly, eyeing the staff in Roy's hand and trying to guage its distance and attack range. Finally, stopping about four feet from the boy with the elven ears, Price dashed forward, hoping to startle the boy with the sudden burst of speed, lowering his upper body in a sort of forward lunge before coming up, just in front of Roy, if he managed to get that far, with a swinging forearm strike to the gut.


Price has focused both Strength and Speed!

+2 to STR, +3 to DEX!

New Stats:
STR: 13
DEX: 18
CHI: 10

[Roy Atenwood]

Something Roy had was cool? That never happened back home. Oh well...for now, a fight was a fight. He had learned from his fight with Darah not to take anything as friendly sparring, and he needed every advantage he could get. He would try to end this quickly.

Suffice it to say, Roy was startled when the young man burst toward him, but his reflexes were different from most peoples. Instead of flinching, and staying still, as most humans would have, the young half-elf launched into a high-jump, straight over his opponent. He turned in the air, and threw his staff like a javelin, aimed at the young man's back.

If it made contact, or even if he missed, he would use a simple spell to retrieve it.

(Spell used: Telekenisis: Energy used: 2 Remaining energy: 13)

[Price]

Whoosh, one minute he was there, and the next he wasn't. Instead of taking the hit, Roy had opted to make a high jump, much quicker and faster than Price suspected that any human could do. He, for example, without his Chi-assisted abilities, would not have been able to pull it off, and he sure as hell knew that he'd never seen anyone back on Earth make such an impressive leap. Mentally, Price grinned. This might not be as bad as he thought.

With his eyes and head, Price followed Roy's movements, eyeing him as he sailed through the air, turning mid-leap and tossing the staff toward him suddenly. Price wondered at the wisdom of this move, considering the options available. Priceopted to simply pivot on his left foot, raising his right one high as he turned around with an arcing back roundhouse kick, the side of his foot impacting against the closest end of the staff, sending it spinning off course. Its forward momentum, however, still brought it on towards Price, but now, it came at him sideways instead of dead-on: Much easier to catch.

His right foot landed on the ground and his left hand came up in conjunction with the spin, fingers opening as he extended his hand and caught the staff, gripping it tightly at the middle. With a grin, Price quickly cocked his arm back and gave Roy a taste of his own medicine, gauging the timing as best he could and throwing the staff so that as Roy would land from his jump, he'd not only have to deal with centering himself after turning a half-circle mid-leap, but with a flying staff coming straight for him as well.

[Roy Atenwood]

"Holy CRAP!" Roy said, as he caught the staff, his own spell adding momentum to it. It his his chest, and bounced, and he caught it before it hit the ground. That was going to leave a mark. A large, round, mark.


"That worked at non-magic schools. Guess I need to think a bit more thuroughly here." He said, with a small laugh. It was time to do something unusual, and he knew what he would do. For this, a head on sprint would be needed.

Roy sprinted at his opponent, easily breaking average human speed, and held his hand toward him. "SOANATES!" Roy screamed. A wall of force shot from his hand, and rushed straight toward the other young man. As the wall of telekenisis rushed at him, Roy fell into step behind it, and would follow it with a blow to the chest of his own.

(Spell used: Soanates. Remaining Energy: 10.)

[Price]

"Soa-what? OOF!"

Price's initial attack may have worked, but the next sudden series of attacks definitely caught him off guard. Roy rushed the martial artist at top speed, coming up a damned sight faster than anyone Price had ever seen run, extended his hand, and yelled out some funky s-word. This brought about the aforementioned verbalized curiosity, until the wall of telekinetic force hit Price full on, catching him completely by surprise and knocking him backwards. However, seeing Roy rushing up as well, Price decided to improvise. Instead of fighting to control his balance as he reeled from the wall of force, Price instantly gave in to gravity, falling backwards towards the ground. This wasn't going to feel good, but a controlled fall would hurt a lot less than whatever Roy was planning, Price reckoned.

Crossing his arms across his chest, Price fell back, aiming to land at the shoulder blades. As he did, he released his arms, their purpose in nullifying the shock performed, and pushed himself off from the ground. Using his backwards momentum, Price turned the fall backwards into a roll-turned-back handspring, his legs coming up and kicking the bottom of the pole, knocking it up and off it's trajectory as Price landed nimbly on his feet. While Roy was dealing with the deflection of his attack, Price inhaled quickly, then exhaled sharply, thrusting his hand out towards Roy, index and middle fingers together and pointing straight up, the others curled along the second knuckle. As he did this, the air seemed to pulsate down his arm, from the shoulder to his hand. As it reached the hand, the pulsating energy gathered into it before pulsing quickly out of his palm, a concentrated Chi blast that appeared as a wave of pulsing air. The concussive blast was aimed, again, for Roy's chest, where the pole had struck earlier.

[Roy Atenwood]

Well, this wouldn't end well, and Roy knew it. First his own staff got thrown back at him, and now this burst of air hit him in the chest? Ow. Very, very ow.

Roy went flying, and barely managed to right himself before he hit the ground. He landed in a crouch, and stood up straight. He couldn't win this fight, and he hadn't even hurt his opponent at all. His self esteem, what little he had, had been nearly crushed. He decided to fight until he could no longer move, however, simply out of spite.

"Alright then.......I'll try something different!" He decided to use his wind magic, for the first time since he arrived at Arcane Academy. He took off half-heartedly toward his opponent, as the air attack had knocked quite far away, and the suddenly jumped higher than any human could, nearly twenty feet in the air. As he neared Price, he prepared himself, as this would be a difficult manuver.

As he moved Directly over the young man, he turned himself in the air so that he was upside-down, and once again said "Soanates.". This time, his voice was nearly inaudible. The force from the spell sent him upward, slightly, so he corrected his trajectory, and moved into a position to attack with his staff as he fell, a full 18 feet, back to the ground. Hopefully, his spell would stun Price long enough for him to attack.

(Spells used: Jump, 1 mana, Soanates, 3 mana.
Remaining energy: 6)

[Price]

"... whoa."

Price had never seen a leap that high before in his life, and was a little flustered as a result. As such, instead of doing anything like any good martial artist would do, Price could only stop and watch as Roy took to the air like a bird of prey, inverting himself midair. Roy's arm outstretched, and Price immediately, judging from the boy's acrobatics of earlier, presumed it to be a setup for a landing. However, this was not the case, as the sudden wall of force again came down at him, and, yet again, took him completely by surprise. Price buckled under the 'weight' of the telekinetic wall, losing his legs and falling to the ground again. Making a mental note to keep an eye out for future walls of force, even if they were invisible, Price looked up at the boy, still a bit dazed, simply watching as he came down with a high dropping staff stab. From that height, if Roy connected, Price would be down for the count. Blinking a few times, Price tried to shake off his dazed state, and Roy continued on his downward path.

Finally, Roy was just about upon him, when Price's reasonings failed, and his martial artist instincts took him over. Kicking his legs up from the ground, Price moved to roll backwards, yet again, but this time swinging his legs gracefully out as he did, then back in, weaving them around each side of the pole as it dropped down, causing the new landing point of the staff the ground just behind Price's form. With Price legs in the air, however, Roy's body, following the pole, would be caught in the upper chest area as Price's hands went to the ground and he kicked up, kicking into Roy's chest as he tried to pull an acrobatic trick of his own to get back to his feet.

[Roy Atenwood]

"Gaah!" Was the only sound Roy could make, as the air rushed from his lungs. he flew backward, about two feet, and landed in a crouch, panting. That had hurt like hell, and he knew he couldn't go on.

"D-damn...that hurt like hell. I knew that jump was a crappy idea." Roy said, as he caught his breath. No permanent damage had been done, and he had honestly had the time of his life in that fight.

"W-what's your name?" Roy aked, with a smail on his face.

(Edited for spelling)

[Price]

After his kip-up, Price had landed rather catlike in a crouch, awaiting to see if Roy would continue. It would seem that he wasn't going to, slowly remaining in his crouch after losing the air due to Price's kick, and casually remarked on the move once his oxygen was returned to him. Upon hearing that the jump was a bad idea, Price just shook his head, about to comment, but before he could, the boy spoke again, asking the name of the one who had beaten him.

"Just call me Price. By the way, I've never seen such an amazing leap, so I wouldn't count it out entirely. While a mid-air move will often leave you open, they can also be used as a method of surprise, especially when you can take to the air like that. A double-edged sword, really, so just utilize 'em wisely."

Price cocked an eyebrow, regarding the other student for a moment himself.

"How 'bout yourself, kid? You got a name?"

[Roy Atenwood]

"My name's Roy." He said, still trying to catch his breath fully. He still stayed in that crouch, until he fell backward, laughing. Amazing leap? Was it really that big a deal? He just went with his insticts, and they told him, Hey! Use wind magic, asshole!

"Really, I'm pretty damn useless. I couldn't even hit you. That was still fun as hell, though. We'll have to do it again some time."

Roy had come to see sparring as a new hobby. Sure, he had lost both fights at this school, so far, but he had still seen some of the coolest stuff you could ever see in life, and for that, he was gratefull.

Suddenly, he plopped onto his back, and started laughing his head off. "Man, I love this place!"

(Edited for spelling)