Douluo Dalu: 1st Cycle: Dancing Panda

"I…" Ma Fai really wanted to take him up on the offer, of course, in his mind, he might actually win. Karni being ten levels above him wasn't just twice the amount of soul power, it was close to three times the amount. But on the other hand, Karni was a control system.

He then looked at the teacher. He felt wronged after all. But the teacher didn't even notice the argument, she was simply preparing notes and waiting for the students to settle down.

He clenched his fists and lowered his head as he looked around Karni and Siduo to find a place to sit. Unfortunately for him, the other 4 spots behind Karni and Siduo were taken by the four class presidents of years 3 to 6.

When he looked at them, they all gave him wary looks. Neither of them liked the 2nd year class president, heck they were actually more familiar with the vice president of 2nd years, that was Tie Tiao. Ma Fai has always been prideful and a bit of a loner, a personality that was hard to go along with.

Frustrated at the result, he looked towards Tie Tiao again. "Fine. Have it. You'll never beat me without others' help anyway." Then sat down left of Tie Tiao, by the window. There were a total of 6 seats in the first row. This one was still free because Tie Tiao and Ma Fai were arguing.

Tie Tiao was clearly bothered by what Ma Fai said. He was even thinking of giving the seat back.

Karni talked to him before he could leave. "He's kind of right, you know? But who knows. You're here to become stronger right? Maybe you'll be able to beat him by the end of the semester."

Tie Tiao flinched when he heard this, and so did Ma Fai. Incredulity was in his eyes.

Ma Fai stood up and walked in front of Karni. "So what if you're rank 27. You think you're suddenly all wise? How about you don't put empty words on the table, and leave your nose out of each other's business. You're a control system, how are you going to teach someone how to fight better?"

Siduo now chuckled. "He's right, you know?" But it was aimed at Karni. "So how about you prove it to him? Show that you can teach someone how to fight. To show someone you can fight? It's gonna solve all of these problems. Ma Fai right? How about you two do, actually, try to beat the shit out of each other." Siduo showed a not so nice looking grin.

Ma Fai was about to comment, but Karni was faster. "Sure I'm up for some friendly sparring. But you're right. I might not be able to teach someone how to fight, but they can teach themselves by fighting someone stronger. So Ma Fai? What do you think? Let me show you what this control system can do."

Ma Fai was clearly a prideful person, and nobody liked that. But there also seemed to be some reason in there, so at least he wasn't the 'arrogant young master.' The best way to deal with such people, is to simply show them that you can, in fact, do the things they claim you can't.

Ma Fai was surprised for a second. Karni answered in a surprisingly normal manner. Should he really accept? It was the stronger one asking the weaker one to battle, but it was he himself who instigated this.

"Students who wish to spar may do so at any time. For the sake of the exchange I will referee, and students are allowed to use force, is that clear?" Teacher Ye was announcing to the whole class, but her reason was clear to everyone. Of course she listened to what Karni and Siduo were doing.

Ma Fai nodded to Karni. It was a confident nod. He was going to show them that actions have consequences.

"This class will mainly focus on combat. Cultivation can't increase fast, and we can't help you much with that, so the only thing we can offer is a suitable environment which is reserved for advanced academy students."

When the Green Tiger Academy students heard this they were all shocked. This was what a prestigious academy could afford! No wonder they kept their place as a top-notch academy. Cultivation environments were the number one thing that made advanced academies different.

Karni and Siduo weren't too surprised. They have been using the specialised cultivation spaces since they were given resources by the academy.

Karni typically cultivated in a bamboo type environment, which was well suited for his panda martial soul, even if it wasn't the main one right now, the increase was still substantial. On the other hand Siduo cultivated in a Soul Array which absorbed the energies of Yin in the night and Yang in the day. This was especially suited for her who had the two martial souls related to those elements.

Star Luo City Academy was one the big schools on the continent after all. Currently, they are even fighting to keep Karni and Siduo in the academy for the long run.

"I doubt you'll be having much time for personal spars when we'll be having so many of them in classes, so I suggest you use the classes and do both."

This was clearly aimed at a certain group of people.

After Teacher Ye explained the curriculum, she decided to introduce them to the school grounds and present the dorms they'll be staying at.

"Val Karni, you're… were you perhaps awakened in the Green Tiger Town?" Tie Tiao approached Karni while seeing the dorms. The two finally had some time to talk privately.

It was the boy who forcefully sat next to him and also happened to be the person he couldn't remember quite correctly. But now that the boy mentioned this, it suddenly clicked.

"Ah! You're the boy I met back then!" Karni immediately realised.

"I was right! You're the boy with…" Tie Tiao quieted down. "Twin Martial Souls right?"

Karni laughed. "Right. I am. Though don't go telling people about it." He grinned. "Your name was?"

"Ah my name is Tie Tiao. I… why's she looking at me like that?" Tie Tiao pointed at Siduo who was currently staring daggers into Tie Tiao.

"Erm… Sisi, Tie Tiao here, he helped me when I awakened my martial soul, and because he stayed around, he knows of my situation."

"Right." Tie Tiao began with a 'but of course' nod. "I was really excited for us to be classmates as well, but then you never showed up."

"Hmm. You." Siduo jumped into Tie Tiao's face. The boy, freezed for a bit. "What's your Soul Power?"

"Eh? Umm… It's currently at rank 15, why?" Tie Tiao said, embarrassed.

"Oh? That's quite fast! Sisi, this guy awakened at rank 2 you know?"

"Hmm, but to be hanging out with us, he's a bit too weak don't you think? Ouch!" She was hit on the head.

Karni was a bit annoyed. "What does Soul Power and talent have to do with them being able to hang out with us?"

"Uhh. No need to fight you two. I only managed to reach this level thanks to my family. We're merchants and none of them are soul master's so they've been putting a lot of resources into me."

Siduo sighed. "No, only resources won't make someone's speed double that much, especially if your family doesn't come from the soul master background. Your talent in cultivation is quite impressive, but… Ah Kiki, don't hit me, I didn't say anything yet!" Karni removed his hand that was threatening Siduo.

Siduo breathed out, relieved. "You can't beat that guy right? The Fiery Hawk kid."

Tie Tiao sighed. "No. His martial soul directly suppresses mine since his bloodline is more pure. Closer to the Phoenix Bloodline. Meanwhile, I'm just a bit fast."

Siduo pulled Karni aside and whispered to him. "How about making the kid our pet project."

"He's a person, Sisi."

"Yeah yeah, don't mind that. Well how about it? We teach him how to beat that annoying hawk boy."

Karni was a bit hesitant but when he looked at the confused Tie Tiao behind him and then glanced at the still moody Ma Fai. He sighed.

"Fine. But how do we go about it, there's no such thing that can defeat bloodline suppression at the same level."

"Well, I happen to know some things about fire type martial souls and also at our current level? Well… hehe… you can't suppress what you can't see."

"What do you mean?"

"He's an agility system soul master, who better to teach him than me, and who better to train him than you? Hey Tie Tiao." She turned back towards the boy.

"What's your martial soul?"

He wanted to question why she wanted to know, after being excluded from the conversation; but based on her previous reaction, she wasn't the type to answer him anyway.

"Little Swallow. Despite being quite lucky with cultivation, my martial soul isn't really that strong."

"That's perfect." Siduo's eyes shined.

"It is?" Tie Tiao was confused, he definitely wouldn't call his martial soul perfect. It was a Swallow, and a Little one at that, Swallows were already tiny, his was miniscule.

Karni was in thought when he heard Siduo's exclamation. He slowly started to piece things together. "I see." He smiled. "Can't suppress something one can't find huh."

… … …

"Wow, you get private rooms with that size? Just how important are you two?"

Karni had invited him into his dorm with Siduo, they wanted to tell him of their little scheme.

"Well, we are in the special class, so they gave us private rooms. If you want to, you can stay in mine, be a roommate."

"It's fine, we have to be in dorms based on classes in your academy and they're quite spacious. I'm not with Ma Fai, so I have no complaints.."

Karni shrugged. "Suit yourself." He turned to Siduo. "Sisi."

She nodded. "Listen up Tie Tiao. We'll make you beat the shit out of Ma Fai, how does that sound?"

"Language!"

"I'll give you language!"

"Ummm. Excuse me? How would that be possible?"

Karni looked at Tie Tiao, he could see himself in him. The boy was a nervous wreck in terms of his confidence in combat against Ma Fai. The fact he stood up to him in the classroom was probably thanks to other people's presence.

Karni wasn't a completely calm individual either when it comes to combat, but he was getting there, slowly but surely. He wanted to help Tie Tiao.

"I'm gonna teach you about how to be a strong agility system soul master and your training dummy will be Kiki." Siduo gave Tie Tiao a bright smile.

Tie Tiao turned towards Karni as if asking if she's serious. He received a grin. "I'm gonna be quite the painful training dummy though, so you should prepare yourself."

"I… am not sure of this. I don't want to cause further discord between me and Ma Fai." Tie Tiao looked dejected.

Siduo was about to go off on him, about believing in yourself, before Karni stopped her. "How about this? You watch my match with Ma Fai tomorrow. You can decide afterwards."

Tie Tiao shaked his head. "Val Karni, you're a rank 27 soul master. Your chances are good to begin with, even if you don't have any true combat soul skills. Control is just as powerful."

"How about if I use only my soul power and my martial soul, but no soul skills whatsoever?" Karni smiled.

"Eh?"

… … …

"Today, we will have our first combat class. Since there was already a fight announced yesterday, we will begin with Val Karni versus Ma Fai. The two of them will be allowed to fight fully with their skills and I shall referee."

Karni turned towards the handsome, or perhaps he should say beautiful, boy with bright ginger hair that seemed to burn with fire. Ma Fai had an uncomfortable look on him at this time.

"Additionally, we have an announcement. One of you, who will most impress us in the classes, will, at the end of the exchange, be given a guaranteed entry into our advanced academy, even if you don't meet all of the requirements. If any of you is capable of defeating either Val Karni or Wu Siduo in a 1v1, they too, will get a guarantee into our advanced academy when they graduate from Green Tiger Academy."

Karni could feel a fire light in Ma Fai's eyes. He looked at Karni ferociously, there will be no holding back here.

Karni simply stayed calm. He wasn't going to underestimate Ma Fai, but he was absolutely confident in winning.

The two entered an arena while Teacher Ye stood in the centre.

"If I order you to stop, you must stop immediately. Is that understood? Failure to comply and intended injuries after the call will be punished severely." Teacher Ye said sternly. This was an announcement for the whole class. These were the rules.

Ma Fai huffed, he was feeling enraged at this moment. Everyone's been treating him like a nuisance since he came here. He was the leading genius of Green Tiger Academy!

"Three. Two. One. Begin!" Teacher Ye announced.

Ma Fai dashed forward as his body seemed to turn fiery. A single yellow soul ring showed below his body.

Karni wanted to whistle. The martial soul was quite impressive, even without a soul ring active, he could feel the heat. He summoned his Bo Staff, yet he didn't call out his soul rings.

"He's mocking me!" Thought Ma Fai.

His eyes glowed red as he released a fiery beam of light out of them into Karni.

It was a ranged attack, perfect for an assault system soul master that will likely be able to fly in the future. It was called the Fiery Hawk Gaze.

Karni put his staff in a horizontal position, just perfect for both beams of fire to hit his staff.

As it hit he seemed to lose balance and did a flip, his face even showed a bit of worry.

Tie Tiao was worried on the sidelines. "Maybe he should just use his soul ring abilities, is this really worth it?"

"Don't worry, just watch, Kiki is… Well, I wouldn't call him playful in battle but… Well you'll see. It's quite a simple but effective trick."

Ma Fai on the other hand had a single thought going through his head. 'Arrogant'. He found Karni's actions absurd and arrogant.

"Since you're running around, I'll come to you." Karni could easily stall out this fight, with his passive prediction he should be more than capable of intercepting attacks, and in terms of outlasting with soul power, there wasn't even a comparison.

But most of all. He wanted to show off to convince Tie Tiao.

Karni dashed towards the hawk soul master and when he was close enough, he jumped onto the Bo Staff and bounced off.

Fiery Hawk Gaze!

Ma Fai was raised well. He used the best timing to target Karni.

Karni, however, simply bounced over the attack, as if he knew where it was going to hit.

Ma Fai was a bit shaken at this, he tried to dash away, but the bo staff was long, he got a hit on the head and almost stumbled.

Before he could get back on his feet, Karni put the Bo Staff between the legs, Ma Fai now truly fell. Karni could feel the heat.

"That's eight." Thought Siduo out loud.

Karni spun his staff two more times, swiftly hitting the ground as if digging through it and then swung his staff, a humming noise suddenly appeared in front of Ma Fai who was about to answer with his Fiery Hawk Gaze.

The two hit each other, but the staff continued on a downwards trajectory.

"Stop!" Teacher Ye yelled.

Ma Fai could only hear a loud sound when the staff hit the ground next to his head. It didn't sound like a strong hit, just the sound itself was weird. He looked to the side, his head light and loud for some reason. The ground wasn't cracked or anything, but that area was constantly moving up and down, like someone was under it.

Despite the staff missing him, his mind was feeling light, and he could somehow relate the ringing in his head with the vibrating ground. If this were to hit him, he might've been heavily injured. The head was the weak point of all humans.

"Val Karni wins." There was silence among the crowd of exchange students. Karni didn't even utilise his soul rings, yet defeated the usually arrogant and confident genius in a matter of seconds.

"You should learn from Karni." Teacher Ye said. "This is the difference between using your abilities and utilising them to their fullest potential. This is the difference of combat experience, and it is what we will focus on for the rest of the semester."

Karni walked towards Tie Tiao and inquired. "So, what do you think? Convinced?"

Tie Tiao clenched his fists and gulped. "Yes. I'll trust the two of you."

Karni and Siduo smiled at each other.

"Out of curiosity, which one of you is the stronger one?"

"Him." "Her."

"Sisi. I've never once managed to defeat you, you know?"

"Kiki. I've not defeated you for two months now, you know? You're bound to overtake me at some point."

"You didn't panic when we fought with that Yellow Leaf Fox though."

"And you…"

Tie Tiao stopped listening. He couldn't even get an answer out of them. He looked toward Ma Fai, took a big breath and walked towards him.

Siduo and Karni quietened down and watched.

"At the end of the semester I will challenge you. I will defeat you and you will apologise." Tie Tiao looked at the person who was still sitting and grasping at what happened earlier.

"And why should I? Why should I fight you? Why shouldn't I just beat you up now so that you shut up?" Ma Fai was angry. He lost in such an unsightly manner. And now the cause of all this shows up.

"You… Are you telling me you're scared?"

"No. It's just that there's no gain in it for me. I don't think I'll ever lose to you." Ma Fai finally stood up and stared into Tie Tiao's eyes.

Tie Tiao's eyes wavered. Then he remembered Karni's fight just now. "What do you want for me to bet on?"

"Your family business. If I win, you and your family will work for us, belong to us. Our family. Then we can put all of the things behind us." Ma Fai wore a serious look.

"This… Is it so hard for you two apologise." Tie Tiao questioned.

To this question, a tinge of guilt passed through Ma Fai's eyes, before regaining clarity. "I… have nothing to apologise for."

"You!" Tie Tiao actually got angry. "Fine. Family business huh?"

"Hey, that's unfair!" Siduo came rushing in from behind. This conversation wasn't going in a good direction. Children shouldn't be deciding such things. Both of them were being reckless right now.

"Forget it, Tie Tiao, it's not worth it with such an unreasonable bet." Despite Siduo wanting to show it up to Ma Fai, she wasn't willing to endanger Tie Tiao's livelihood for her fun.

"Stop." Said Tie Tiao. His breathing became a bit ragged. "Siduo. If I am to fight him at the end of the semester. How confident are you that I'll win with your teaching?"

"Tie Tiao no, this isn't-"

"Just, please… Tell me." Tie Tiao really had that begging look in his eyes.

She looked towards Karni who also just got here after hearing everything. "Absolutely confident." She answered seriously to him. "However, we'll put you through hell."

Tie Tiao nodded, then turned back towards Ma Fai. "I accept your condition, however if I win, not only do you have to apologise, reveal your lies and fix your mistakes, your family will have to do this too."

Ma Fai looked at him weirdly. "All of this, is it really worth your family business?"

"Wait Tie Tiao." Karni wanted to interrupt.

"Stay out of this. This is between me and him." Warned Tie Tiao, a bit of madness seemed to have overtaken him.

"Is it really worth it? I already apologised once, what would she thin- " Ma Fai was interrupted.

"Yes or no." Tie Tiao looked him straight in the eyes.

Ma Fai was frustrated. He scratched his head so hard that it became even redder than normal. "Fine, you bastard, fine. You have your goddamn bet. You better not regret this."

Ma Fai left. He was clearly disturbed. Whatever incident they had seemed to cause quite a bit of a problem between the two of them.

"Tie Tiao. I think you should explain a little." Karni warned.

"I will. Everything will be explained if I win. I legally can't say anything so I can only apologise."

Karni sighed. "Nothing you can tell us?"

"Ma Fai wishes to forget something he shouldn't and I won't let him do that. Not after what happened with my big sister." If gazes could kill, Tie Tiao would definitely put a hole through Ma Fai.