Pride of a Generation [Emil, Nero]

An intriguing notification for him to come upon: a rather incredibly polite yet insistent request for practice from a name he recognized - Nero Arant. The last name in particular he was quite familiar with, though it was rather peculiar; he was under the impression their latest generation or two had been extinguished years ago amidst the war. He wondered if the old grouch knew about this... A topic for another time.

On the appointed day at the requested time, Emil stood in the lobby of one of the training facilities of the pristine white city, dressed appropriately for the activity in coming, smiling as kindly as can be when he caught sight of the young man.

"Good afternoon, you must be young man who requested my presence?" He'd greet the Sternritter calmly yet kindly. Who was he to be cruel or standoffish to such an earnest request? It was nothing like the brash newcomers who thought they could stomp him into the dirt merely because he put up the facade of a veteran, as far as he could tell there was no need to be disciplinary.

He'd offer a hand in continued greeting, "Formalities aside, what were you wishing to gain from this?"

"Yes. It's a pleasure to finally meet you in person, Mr.Holsen."

Polite and respectful in equal measure, there was a formal air to Nero's presence as he stood face to face with the taller man. There was nothing brash about him, to say nothing of the arrogance of an upstart looking to earn a victory against a veteran for approval. No, those magenta eyes displayed nothing but genuine respect for the man, and a soft hint of interest in learning from someone who had experienced far more than he had on the battlefield. Offering his hand to meet the man's own politely in a handshake, Nero bowed softly as he turned his gaze upward at the man.

"If it isn't at all inconvenient for you, I was hoping to be able to test my respective skills against an experienced veteran, a man whose likely known his fair share of combat beyond the scope of my own. As a proud member of the Vandenreich, I hope to learn as much as I can from those who know their way in this organization. Be it combat or learning instruction, I want to give it my all - leave no stone unturned, as the common adage goes. Would that be alright with you?" He ventured curiously.

He seemed like a proper young man, just as proper as his message. Didn't appear to be some ruffian pretender to the Arant name, not that he'd imagine many would have much motive to falsely claim it. The boy didn't resemble the old man terribly much, but at the same time he took more to a feminine look. Questions for another time, he supposed, right now he was entertaining a young man's pure desires.

"Quite the admirable wish. Reminds me of myself when I joined, though I certainly was far younger than you. Of course you can put your skills to the test with me," His hand fell with the handshake's return, his kind smile wide and endearing to the shorter man, "I am quite the rusty fossil, so I do apologize if I don't meet your expectations."

The pale giant led the two to an arena, and once they were in place, he'd face his opponent with the grin of a saint, "Alright Mr. Arant, I have but a single condition to this practice that I expect of you," He presented his ringed hand, rather, the ring was engraved with intricate designs typical of the Quincy, and fell a hand to his side to pat the sheathed sword on his hip, "Make me draw either of my weapons. You are granted first move, come at me any moment you'd like."

With that, he waited, and watched.

"I'm quite wary of my elders concerning combat, so I highly doubt you'll fail to meet my expectations, Mr.Holsen. If anything, I'm the one hoping I won't prove disappointing in our imminent bout. Underestimating any enemy in battle is a counterintuitive. Always expect the unexpected. That is the ideal way of combat I adhere to."

Voicing his thoughts in response to the tall man's playful words, Nero recalled the edicts of battle he ascertained from the wise sage of a man he held in high regard. Unless Emil was some frail, old emaciated individiual, which, as far as he could tell, was certainly far from the case, Nero deemed it necessary to keep his wits about him when regarding this lively man.

When they finally reached the arena, Emil turned to him, stating the conditions of their sparring practice. Force him to draw either of his weapons. Moreover, he was allowing him the first draw to their duel. A graceful smile lined the fair archer's lips as he offered a nod of acceptance to his conditions. With upraised hands, Nero exhaled softly, materializing his prized spirit weapon - Sol - into existence. The formation of the multicolored longbow concluded, Nero knocked his fingers against the bowstring with the poise of a studied bowman. If he offered him the first attack, it would be unbecoming of him not to take advantage of the opportunity presented before him. Therefore, he'd offer more than a preliminary attack to start their match.

"Arvakr!"

Almost instantaneously, five long arrows of heated reishi formed around his fingers. In a seamless flow of movement, he nocked all five of them against the bowstring, loosing five of them at such a speed that one without an ideal level of focus might well perceive them as imperceptible blurs whirling through the air. Charging forward alongside his own attack, Nero repeated the same technique, forming five more arrows in the wake of those prior. Ten arrows loosed in multidirectional succession, all converging on Emil at an alarmingly fast rate.

The response Nero gave added a slight tug of genuine satisfaction to his ever present, cool smile.

"Smart young man," He'd remark with a simple adjusting of his gloves before the fight commenced. Although Emil definitely wasn't the oldest of their brethren, he'd definitely put in a lifetime or two worth of work for their people and gracefully wound down from that service in this young man's perspective of him during the winding down of one of the world's largest wars. His lack of underestimation, mocking, or pity put him a mile or two ahead of the typical up and coming soldier with too much of a head on them. His heart may be still and unwavering to these prospects, but perhaps there was some hope in the youth of their race's stumble to stand tall with the odds stacked against their success.

The familiar flicker of a weapon drawn dotted Emil's vision, the signal of a battle's beginning. A possibility or two skirted the man's mind of what the Arant could have been planning apart from the obvious, his stance being little indication of how readied up he truly was, and as soon as the first set of arrows were even an inch away from the fingers of their user, the tall form of the man flickered, an afterimage left in his wake as his true body moved at a speed that the typical eye could not follow, abruptly meeting the boy in between his charge, a hand having lunged to tightly grab the wrist that wielded the weapon's body. The movement of the man wouldn't have made sense, at least for the fact that he was relatively unscathed, but he would make an idea of what occurred quite clear with a raised fist.

A good bundling of the arrows flung his way were tight in his palm, before his arm flung to the side to throw the reishi-hewn projectiles elsewhere, their form stabilized with their by nary a surface-level application of manipulation with the brief contact. His hand definitely felt the warmth, but it had but a kiss of it, nothing more. A Fire-user, mm? Unexpected of that man's lineage.

Within the same instance of a successful grab, he'd yank the boy's arm up, his weapon rising along with it as a flurry of darkness raced to slam Nero in the abdomen, the man having swiftly rose to knee him as to knock some wind out of the boy, perhaps give a rib or two a hairline fracture if he was on the fragile side. He had the means to cause far more damage, but this was a training session - not a bloodbath.

"!?"

Magenta eyes barely registered that Emil had vanished, wholly unaware of the imperceptible shift in speed that took place. His hawklike gaze was one of his most prized attributes, yet he might as well have been blind for what little good that did him in this instance. His ribs felt the full impact of a knee as he was yanked upward by his arm. He hadn't even been afforded the opportunity to activate his blut. It was certainly true that Nero wasn't particularly the symbol of durability regarding his frame, but what he lacked in that aspect, he more than made up for willpower.

Heedless of the hairline fractures that assaulted his ribs, Nero took time to quickly acknowledge the man's strengths. Lightning-quick reaction time. Was that Hirenkyaku or his natural speed at play? His physical strikes were nothing to scoff at, either. If he wanted to, he could have ended him with a devastating follow-up just now.

Assessing those factors, Nero quickly vanished from the man's grasp, reappearing at his rear with his bow poised for another attack. Doubling the count of his arrows, Nero fired the same number of arrows before, yet they were all launched in simultaneous union rather than separate sets, his body darting in unpredictable patterns to keep him guessing as to where he might fire from next.

It didn't show much in the form of creativity, but Nero erred on the side of feeling him out more. Besides, anything with a higher degree of firepower might well leave him susceptible to a flurry of that man's physical attacks. He could brave the storm well enough with his will and spirit, but the body told no lies. Remain in constant movement. That would be the approach.

Ah, he didn't flinch or cry out, good. He made certain that strike would at the very least cause some pain, but there he went, slipping from his grasp and already trying to shake it up with all those fast movements, circling him with arrows. But rather than burrow into the man's flesh, the projectiles striking him would be stopped short of his skin, before uselessly dropping with hardly a dent on him. A proper inspection of his skin revealed the pulsating, vein-like structures of Blut, Emil's smiling face unchanging as he hardly moved a muscle. He was putting pressure on Nero, this stance meant to both communicate an air of 'is that all you have?' as well as to possibly elicit some feeling of frustration. These little arrows were but splinters to him, and every moment his gaze seemed to follow Nero just fine, hardly taken aback - to his opponent, it did seem like a tease or mock.

He decided to give Nero a moment or two to feel as if he was doing something, only to fade into the dreaded realization that his tactic wasn't as efficient as he anticipated. And three, two, one...

His body and hand moved to where he predicted the young man would be, having quickly studied his kick offs and movements; to an untrained observer it would seem random, but there was a level of consistency in his trajectory and path. There was only so many directions one possessing conventional movement could take, especially one whom needed a clear shot and had little in the way of hiding. Lunging for the young man's least dominant arm, if he managed to grab hold he would do a similar movement as before, however there was far more focus and suddenness on both yanking the arm up, and also twisting it - a jarring motion as to either harm or dislocate the shoulder, a placid expression on the larger man's face as he did so and quickly parted from him.

"Do you think me to be a lame soldier? I suggest you push harder before you entirely lose use of your arms." His calm warning came to Nero, spoken kindly but with an air of threat and clarity of what he intended on doing if Nero didn't kick it up a few notches, "I'd hate to tell any kin of yours that you couldn't manage to force me to arms. What would they think?"

There was a mocking aspect about this man's entire posture that Nero's hawklike gaze did not fail to notice during each arrow's collision. It was as if he was voicelessly expressing his dissatisfaction with his attacks. For one who took great pride in his skill, Nero would be remiss to say that didn't leave him visibly agitated. He recognized that he wasn't intending to approach things without properly feeling the man out, but any arrow that did not pierce and force him on the backfoot was disgraceful enough.

As his whole approach had been telegraphed, the same result followed. A yank of the arm and merciless knee to the stomach. Another crunch of bone accompanied the collision. The twisting of his arm had indeed threatened to dislocate his shoulder, that tugging motion a telltale sign of the man's intent if he didn't offer something worth his attention. When he released his grip, Nero took a moment to gather himself as he listened to the man's words.

He had intended to reply respectfully, of course, but Emil's words gave him pause. To someone else, perhaps his actions would've meant little in the grand scheme, but Nero was a prideful spirit concerning his family's name. If the mocking disposition had threatened the floodgates, those words broke through the dam holding his composure. Magenta eyes rose upward, bearing a ferocity that needed no words. Fiery reiryoku expanded around his form, setting his legs and arms aflame with luminous reishi.

Propelling his body forward, he tapped into his own specialized form of blut - Alvsior - using the momentum he gathered from his charge to shoot his body forward like a flaming bullet, creating a trail of fire as he charged in toward Emil.

"Sonneschein!"

In that moment, a few meters before he reached him, his body released an blindingly overwhelming pulse of light to cloud the man's vision. Yet, he was no fool to believe that alone would give the man pause. He was wholly prepared now to offer everything at his disposal, even if that meant entering his Letz Stil. Until he was a collection of broken bones, he would make this man recognize him as a warrior.

"Tilt the goblet to the west!"

Dispersing his bow, he pointed at the man with an upraised finger, releasing a ball of energy in his atmosphere with the intent of releasing a cloud of reiryoku to slow his movement. And even that was far from the end. Relentlessly, he continued, his eyes wholly set on forcing this man to remain in place. Two attacks wouldn't work, so he maintained the assault, maintained the charge.

"A silver rod strikes the five-fingered stone bed!"

From his opposite hand, another generated ball of spirit power was released, launched forward with the intent of expanding rapidly to trap the man in place. And he did not stop. Did not pause. Even if he managed to evade all of that, moments before Nero would reach him, his body would simply vanish. From above, Sol rematerialized within his hands. The fair archer pulled his string back with unrestrained ferocity, targeting his entire radius with his next attack, increasing the temperature of his reiryoku to a point where the flesh from his fingers were gruesomely burning now. Even if his hands became bone, he would strike. He would impose his will.

"Sonnenlicht Regen!!"

Generating a mass of reishi around his long bow, Nero descended downward, releasing a numerous rain of blazing holy arrows from above. Even in the midst of that unending volley, Nero surveyed the battlefield with his hawklike gaze. He would not escape. He would chase him down. Hunt him down until he forced him to draw his weapon. A rain of hellfire might solve his issue, but he was prepared to go even further than that. For a moment, his fingers graced his Sanrei glove, but he kept the thought at the back of his mind. It all depended on how far that wave of attacks would take him. Wherever he appeared, he would follow suit.

That's right. Any man who's pride was threatened would fall to indignance, and in that state would do anything to prevail. That anger, that disturbance in thought, that single-mindedness to achieving a goal - that was what he wanted Nero to fixate on. This was no simple spar, he wanted the boy to come at him as if he wanted him dead, with all he had, no matter how many bones he had to break or esteem he had to crush in to encourage him.

When that light stung his eyes from the boy's rush toward him, his grin grew the slightest bit more intense in satisfaction. Though his recovery from the flash was quick, the cloud of Wolke struck him. Though he could have done what he instinctively was intent on doing, he allowed a brief enough pause for Nero to deploy his second trap. Ah, so he wasn't able to use shortened verses yet. How darling.

As Nero disappeared, Emil had already gotten to work unraveling the foundations of both spells intent on pinning him down, enslaving some of the Reishi to weaken their bearings,

"Mourning Wail," The slow inhale of particles followed the change of his tongue's language, lifting his head to meet the colored gaze of the boy crafting a rain of hellfire, his lips abruptly parting with the rigidity in his shoulders increasing, arms outstretched as a violent screech erupted from him, Reishi pounding away the remnants of his prison and pushing the rain of fire out and away from him with the force of sound and power, the very ground trembling, the lights overhead flickering from the violent vibrations until the spell subsided, a soft layer of debris particles obscuring clear sight of the grounds.

"Is that all the might you have?" His voice called from the obscure, hand tightening into a fist as he injected passion into his voice, carrying a sense of insult, "Have your forefathers taught you nothing? What is your pride as a Quincy, boy? Your attacks are as wavering and unfocused as your will!"

Push it, push more, he wanted to see the depths and heights of Nero's will, he wanted the boy to be so willful as to wish to gouge his heart out, he wanted to taste that will,

"Be Furious," The melodic, ancient tongue spoke, "Fight me, boy. Come at me as if I am to spell the doom of everything you love!"

The tones of Wüten were cleverly intermingled with his normal speaking voice, typical ears unable to tell he had cast this spell in the first place. Nonetheless, the young man before him should be feeling far more interested in spilling blood by his prediction as things go on, "Well?!"

"Shut up."

This was unfamiliar territory. Nero did not commonly revel into giving into his emotion on the battlefield. He was no veteran like his sparring partner, but he was a man raised on the edicts of battle. Composure was always an ideal step to mastering the battlefield. Yes, that was what he had been taught. Naturally, he had always operated with a fine-tuned state of mind, moderating his emotions like a machine. He recognized that he was being roused into action by his words, and yet... he paid no heed to the voice calling out from the void to control himself as he normally would. His fury was the only thing that mattered right now. His will was the only thing he intended to impose. No matter who or what they were, those who challenged his pride inevitably invoked a great deal of emotion in the boy's spirit.

Arant blood did not run through his veins, but his spirit burned with their ethos. He was once a human who worked himself to the bone to mold himself into a proper quincy. Of course he took pride in it. He took pride in everything. No one could trample it on it. No one was allowed to disrespect it. Veteran. Neophyte. Rookie. Old. Young. Nobody. His attacks were properly brushed away in the tumult of the man's superior spellcraft. Frustrating. Useless. It wasn't enough.

His face should have furrowed into one of disappointment at his own failures, but he felt a smile warping across those fair features. Excitement? Preposterous. Was he a sparring partner? Or an enemy to hunt down? Right now, Nero held no other intent but to treat him as a target that ought to feel the weight of his attacks. His mind remained heedless of the burning flesh on his fingers, focused wholly on the sole locus of his ire. Each word drove him even further into that unfamiliar place. He was no enemy of his, so why? Why was he so furiously invested in the idea of eliminating him? His mind was lost in a sea of fury, composure overwritten with ferocity. It was truly as if something had taken over him without notice, but he didn't bother to acknowledge it.

Channeling the blinding energy of everglow and his own spirit power, he formed another one arrow in lieu of multiple. That was purposeful on his part since a wave of arrows simply wouldn't cut it. If thousands of arrows would not earn the result he desired, he intended to fire one so potent that the man would have to devote a greater measure of energy to survive. He didn't even care about the futility of his attacks. He only wanted to see him burning under the weight of his arrows, the true symbols of his will.

"My pride and will as a quincy is boundless! I'll show you the extent of it, right here and now!!"

Expanding the large arrow until no more reishi could be feasibly created, Nero targeted the man below him from the air, firing the enormous holy arrow at him from the skies above as though releasing a bombarding strike onto the ground, executing it with enough force that it would explode on impact. And if that failed? Well, Nero chuckled softly as he looked his Sanrei glove. He knew exactly what he'd do next. Even if that meant it would drive him further to his limit. And even if that happened, he'd still find a way. He wanted to pierce through it. Break through that mocking spirit of a man on the ground, acts of futility be damned.