NOVEL NEXT WORLD Chapter 32: Third Coin Toss
Regardless of being illusions, they weren't entirely harmless. They made it so I could barely see. They were so bright and obscuring. The flames and the kitsune got within five feet of me.
Four knives stabbed at me through the wall of flames from different directions. This time, instead of trying to block any of the knives, I swung my sword horizontally through the flames in the directions the knives were coming from.
I figured if I could hit all four kitsune at once, I would hit the real one eventually. To my surprise, my swing cut through all four of the kitsune behind the flames and the arms and the knives they were holding disappeared.
Then, after I had swung my sword, a knife came at me through the flames again, this one straight in front of me. It stabbed me through the right side of my chest, puncturing my lung.
I struggled to breathe as my right lung collapsed. I grabbed the wrist of the kitsune and tugged its wrist and the knife out of my chest. Instead of directing Vi to my lung to heal it faster, I directed Vi to my hand holding the kitsune's wrist to strengthen my grip.
I couldn't let it go. This was my one chance and I couldn't let it get away. My breathing was weakened and I could feel that I wasn't getting enough oxygen, but I held on as tight as I could.
I tightened my grip on its wrist until I heard bones crack and break. And then I kept tightening my grip until I couldn't tighten it anymore. The kitsune dropped its knife.
The flames disappeared one by one because the kitsune hadn't sent any out for several seconds. The flames only seemed to last a limited number of seconds before they dissipated. And with my hand on its wrist, it couldn't whip its tail around to send them out anymore.
Just as the flames in front of me obscuring my view of the kitsune other than its one arm that I was holding dissipated, my eyes caught a flash of metal. I barely had enough time to drop my katana and grab its other hand, before it stabbed me in the heart with its second dagger.
Its knife stabbed me in the chest through my pectoral muscle, in between the ribs in my rib cage. I was able to stop it from going any further in. With my Vi based control and awareness of my body, I was able to tell that the knife was a few millimeters away from piercing my heart.
It leaned into the stab and pushed with all its might. The knife closed the gap and barely touched my heart. It was only a millimeter deep puncture so it didn't debilitate me, but any further and I was done.
I carefully let go of its other wrist and transferred my right hand to its forearm of the arm that was holding the knife. With the combined might of both of my arms, I slowly pushed the knife out of my chest.
Once I had safely removed the knife from my chest, I broke its forearm with my hands. It dropped its second dagger. It angled it so the dagger landed point down on my foot, stabbing through it and surprising me into letting go of its forearm.
It jumped back and I leaned down to remove the dagger from my foot.
"Ladies and gentlemen! The third coin toss!" The announcer said. "This will determine if we add a rotating turret or fire geysers!"
The kitsune angled its now limp hand and forearm towards the announcer.
"It's heads! That means rotating turret!" The announcer said. "Man, we're really getting heads a lot tonight. That was the third heads in a row!"
It was definitely manipulating the coin tosses, but I didn't know what I could do about it other than rush and attack it when the coin toss happens. Actually, that might work. I couldn't do it in this case because I was pulling a knife out of my foot, but next time I would make sure to do that.
A large machine gun turret popped out of a hole in the center of the arena. It had two guns mounted to it. One at chest height and one at leg height. The pole it was attached to had a hole for the lower laser to travel through that didn't change its angle as the guns started to turn.
The machine guns started to fire as they turned. The fire rate wasn't extremely fast and neither was the turn rate. It fired about four rounds per second which was about half the normal fire rate for a machine gun.
You might question why I know that, but you have to remember, I was raised by the mafia. I know a thing or two about guns. I'm by no means an expert, but I know some things.
The turn rate of the turret was about two miles per hour or three feet per second in the middle of its radius. This was going to add a lot of pressure to the duel, but it was manageable.
The only major downside I was looking at was that it was turning clockwise, so it would hit me before it hit the kitsune, which meant I was backed into a corner. I needed to move towards the kitsune and push it back if I was going to avoid getting shot.
I tried to run past the kitsune so I could put some distance between me and the turret, and so I could switch places with it and have it backed into a corner.
My plan was foiled when the kitsune landed a middle kick to my midsection, sending me tumbling backwards towards the oncoming fire of the machine guns. The machine gun fire was about a foot away from me and I had to do something quick or I was going to be riddled with bullets.