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Soul Arena and all it's characters and concepts are the property of wolfsilver and wolfsilver alone.  Any references to real culture, however, belong to the people who created them
Chapter 10:   (Insert super market intercom voice) Training and Explanations, Isle 1.

“So, this is where we’re training, huh?”
Shortly after selecting opponents, the gang had chosen and island, near the center of the Atlantic Ocean, to start their training.  Although, more accurately, the island was closer to the east coast than it was to the middle of the ocean, like halfway to the center. Anyway, the island itself was relatively uninhabited, with exception of one or two groups of sea turtles that were laying eggs. (The gang immediately voted to stay as far away them as possible)  The island was roughly 5, maybe 6 miles across, a perfect length for training.
“Yep, this is it.”  Replied Ken.  “Most teams pick a location in the wild or an island to train, especially since the buses can’t possibly hold all the training that goes on.”
“So,” asked Lance, “How does this work, exactly?  Do we pair up, or what?”
“Well, in normal circumstances, no.  But since you four are new…Alice, would you mind?”
Grinning, Alice said, “No problem!  Besides, these two need a few more things explained to them.”
Nodding, Ken told everyone to pick a part of the island and start training.
“Wait!” stated Lance, “How is it training without someone to spare with?  Don’t you need a challenge to get stronger?”
But Ken was already off, racing towards one side of the island, Jack on his shoulder. (Ken visibly jumped 7 feet when he realized this).
Suddenly, Lance and Toshiro were grabbed by the back of their shirts by Alice, who began to drag them towards another part of the island, Niko and Silver not far behind.  Then, after about 5 minutes of running and dragging, Alice threw Lance and Toshiro onto some makeshift benches (Logs washed up on shore and a huge rock)
“Attennnntion!” stated Alice.  Immediately, Lance and Toshiro jumped into sitting positions, both of them scared stiff, and visibly shaking.
“Man, I’ve always wanted to do that!” exclaimed Alice, grinning from ear to ear.
Weakly, Toshiro raised his hand.
“Yeah?” asked Alice.
Gulping Toshiro asked, “K-ken s-said that you had something you thought we n-needed to know, r-right?”
Nodding, Alice said “Yeah!  There are a couple of things we need to imprint in your skulls if you want to stand even a chance in this tournament.”
Picking up a long stick, Alice drew words into the sand.
“FIRST, we’re gonna talk a little about a thing called ‘limits’!” She said, gabbing at the word in the sand with her stick.
“By now, you to have probably realized that you can only do your strikes a certain number of times before you’re clean out, right?”
Seeing them nod, Alice continued, “Well, that is a limit.  You see, every time, you do a ‘strike’, your ‘Soul Drive’ is depleted.  And when you run out of it, the best you can hope for is fighting tooth and claw.”
“So, you can be limited to about 15 strikes total before you run out?” asked Niko.
“No.  While you are limited, it isn’t in terms of how many you can do total.  Each individual strike can be done several times.
“That’s easy to remember.  So, it’s like those old Poke-“
“No…Okay, it is similar, but you aren’t limited to a certain amount.  The harder you train on one individual strike, the more of that strike you can do.”
Seeing Toshiro nod, Alice turned to Lance and saw that he was staring blankly at her.
“…….What?” asked Lance.
Sighing, Alice tried explaining it to Lance.
“Think of it like this.  A fighter jet has a lot of ammunition, but only a handful of bombs.  Does that help?”
Seeing his expression change from ‘I don’t get it’, to ‘that sort of makes sense’, Alice continued, a small vein appearing on her head.
“Alright then…here.”
Running around and picking up a lot of shells and rocks, Alice plopped them down at Lances feet.
“Alright, how many rocks are there?”
“…9.”  Said Lance after counting them.
“And how man shells are there?”
“…16.” he said after counting them.
“So, if you were to throw the rocks and shells, which one would you run out of first?”
“The rocks, of course.”
“And if you collected them all again, then added addition shells to the pile, which would run out first then?”
“Well, it depends on how many extra shells you collected, but you wouldn’t run out of the as fast and you would have more ammu-Ohhhhh, I get it!”
Sighing in exasperation, Alice continued the lecture.
“Alright then, next topic:  The environment.”
“What’s the envir-!?”
Alice had hit the big stick hard against the log that Lance had been sitting on, not breaking the stick, but making a LARGE hole in the log.
“Did I SAY you could interrupt me?”, demanded/asked Alice, her face darkening with a  sickeningly sweet voice, a sinister and ticked off smile spreading across her face.  Her eyes were little more that glints, and the background seemed to take on a very darkish- purple color.
Shaking like a leaf, and scared as a kitten to an attack dog, Lance stammered, “N-n-n-no, M-m-mam.”
“I thought so!” stated Alice, sending both of them a warning glare, in case they thought about interrupting her again.
“Now, the environment plays a two sided role in the tournament.  One:  gaining an advantage, and Two: Unfortunately, getting a disadvantage.  In the case of something like a whale soul partner VS a, oh…an elephant soul partner, with the battle field being surrounded by something like the ocean or the sea, the whale would have the obvious advantage, as the elephant would have limited mobility.  In addition, if the whale had the ability to- Yes?”
Toshiro, having raised his hand, asked “Um, not to be rude or anything, but why are you telling us this?  Shouldn’t we figure it out on our own?”
“While that’s the case in a lot of situation, that’s isn’t how it works in this case.  You four are rookies at this, and you’re gonna need as much help as possible to even stand a chance against some of the competitors.  Especially after the S. rounds….”
“Huh?”
“Nothing, nothing.  Anyway, if the whale the ability to control or manipulate water as a strike, the elephant would gain an even greater disadvantage.  The same applies for hiding. The whale could just as easily disappear from view beneath the water.  This is why the environment plays a key role in the battle you’ll face.  Examine the environment before you fight, and you might stand more of a chance.”
Taking a breather, Alice continued.
“Now, the third and final thing you have to know is- Yes, Toshiro?”
“Um, this is something I’ve been curious about.  What does the armor do?”
“The armor?  That’s something that I’ll have to tell you about later.  Now-!”
Multiple explosions suddenly rattled the island. Whipping their head in the directions of the explosions, Lance, Toshiro, Niko, and Silver saw several trees in the forest behind them explode into pieces.  Alice, however, knew what was going on.
“Don’t worry, you four.  It’s nothing to be concerned about.  That is, unless your fighting Warren, or Ariel or something.   Then, you should be worried.”
Stating his own thoughts out loud, Lance stated, “…Either they’re trying and failing to make smoke signals, or their training is blowing up trees.”
After a moment of silence, Lance finished his thought, saying, “…I’m gonna go with the first option.”
Toshiro smacked himself on the forehead, wondering why he would even guess that option.
“Alright then.  Any questions?”
“I do have on thing I think we should be informed of.”  Stated Toshiro
“ What?”
“About the spirit strikes.  Is there any chance you could tell us what kind of strike you or our teammates have?”
Grinning, Alice said “Sorry, but your going to have to wait for the actual battles to find that out, although I don’t see what harm there could be from telling you guy’s what kind of strike Roy and Warren have.  Besides, those guys spoiled something for me last winter, so I think I’ll just return the favor by telling you four what kind of strike type he and Warren have.”
Leaning in, Alice said “Now remember, when Warren and Roy show off their moves in battle, act surprised so he won’t know you four already figured it out, got it?”
Seeing their heads nod, Alice quietly said “Roy and Warren spirit strike type is…Impact.”
“Impact?”
“Yep, Impact.  You see, Warren, when Roy calls out his strikes, can increase the impact of his charge, making one direct head-butt from his horns as powerful as 100 charging bulls.  He can leave a crater in the ground if he wanted to.  That’s just his first strike, though.  His other strikes are basically he same, except his is second strike uses the feet to give him one heck of a jump by letting the impact of the hooves on the ground launch him into the air.  His third and final strike involves his horn again, but in a different matter than the first.”
Standing up straight, Alice then said  “That’s about everything you two need, or want, to know, for now anyways.”
Walking towards another part of the beach, Laura in tow, Alice waved goodbye.
“Wait!” shouted Lance to her.  “How do you expect us to train without instructions?!”
“Uhh, Lance?”
“Yeah?”
“Look down.”
Looking down at the sand, Lance say that Alice had wrote in the sand some instructions for training.
“’Here are the things you guys should do for training.’” Lance read.  “’There’s a projector in the RV.  Use it for long-range target practice.  As for hand to hand, the projector will take care of that too.
-Alice’”
“I’ll go get that projector.”  Stated Toshiro.
“No need!” state Silver, dragging the thing towards them with his teeth.
“How did you-?”
“Don’t ask, and don’t look in the supply closet for at least a month.”
Shuddering, Lance looked down at the machine and read the instructions on it.
“’To start, stop being an idiot and press the yellow button on the side’! Hmmmm…THIS yellow button?”
“That’s the only yellow button there, Lance.”
Pushing the button, Lance read the rest of the instructions and programmed the machine.
“Ready, Silver?”
“Ready!”
Silver had transformed into his wolf form, Lance into his armor.
“T-man! Pull!”
THUK!  Went the machine as it launched a metal object into the air.
“Spirit Strike One:  Howling Rush!” Shouted Lance.
The blast went surging towards the metal object, getting closer and closer, thinner and thinner.
‘Come on, make it!’ thought Lance as the blast came within inches of the object, almost ready to dissipate, only for the metal object to dodge it.  The metal object then zoomed towards the ground and stayed there.
“W-what just happened?” exclaimed Lance
Looking at the metal object, they saw it appeared to be really a metal sphere, with several plates meeting at different places.  The word “B.I.C” was printed on the side of it.
“ ‘B.I.C’?  What’s that mean?”
“Heck with what it means, look at what it’s doing!”
The ‘B.I.C’ was uncurling, with several plates sliding and allowing 4 mechanical legs to come out, each one of them rather long, yet stubby.  Slowly, the plates spread out, revealing it’s full name.
“Hmmmm, ‘Battle Imitation Computor’?  Wonder what it does-!?”
No sooner had Toshiro finished his sentence then the ‘B.I.C’ suddenly launched forward, soaring right towards Silver and Niko.
Quickly jumping out of the way, Silver and Niko both landed about 20 feet each from the machine, it between them respectively.
“Spirit Cycle!”, shouted Toshiro transforming himself and his partner.
“Toshiro?” asked Lacne when Toshiro was done.
“Yeah, Lance?”
“I think I know what this things for now.”
“So do I Lance, so do I.”
Silver and Niko circled the machine, neither taking their eyes off it.
The machine’s plates started up again, this time sliding to reveal two sets of eyes, each looking at a different opponent.
“Spirit strike one: Howling Rush!”
Immediately, Silver wiped head at the machine, sending out the blast from his mouth.  Seconds before it hit the machine, the blast had decreased in size by about 1-4 by the time it got to it, the machine leapt into the air, and, using rockets that slide into view from it’s shifting plates, surged towards Silver, who immediately dodged to the left.  The ‘B.I.C’, however, immediately recovered and sent a laser blast from its body right into Silver.
“Man, what level is this thing at?!”, exclaimed Lance, not expecting this level of fighting from a machine.
“Two versus one.” replied the B.I.C, informing them of what programming level it was currently at.  “ Analyzing opponents skill… ‘Lance and Silver Schimmer’; Current training level:  Level 2.  …Now engaging Toshiro and Niko Schimmer.”
Almost the instant the B.I.C finished talking, it turned around and leapt at Niko.
Taken by surprise, Toshiro barely shouted “S-spirit Strike one:  Saber Fang!”, in time.  Immediately, the machine clashed with Niko’s now energy-filled and extended fangs.  The B.I.C started pushing Niko back with a surprising amount of force considering it’s small size. Niko, realizing that he was begin pushed back, pushed forward and threw the machine into the air, only fro the B.I.C to, while spinning in midair, stop in mid-spin and fire a laser at Niko, hitting dead center on the side.
“Processing…analyzing current skill level…Level: 2.  Shifting to appropriate gear.”
Immediately, the machine landed on the sand, all four of its mechanical legs sticking out.  A plate slide over and a screen popped out of it, with an image slowly coming into focus.
“What the…?”, asked/exclaimed Lance, wondering out loud what was on Silver, Niko and Toshiro’s minds as well. The image of a hand, doing the ‘bring it, sucker!’ gesture appeared on the screen, a smirking smiley appearing as well.
“T-man?”
“Yeah, Lance?”
“I think I like this training!” Lance stated, grinning.
(4 days of training, with breaks and sleep, later)  (Not gonna bother with the rest, it’s not that interesting, trust me)
It was near dawn, and the team was calling it quits for the night, too tired to train.  Well, that, and a storm was brewing, which had already nearly fried Lance.
“So the match isn’t going to be for a while?”
“Nope.”
Everyone was back in the RV, relaxing the day night away while Ken spoke to someone on the laptop.
“Anyone seen Roy?”  Asked Lance.  “He’s been in his par of the RV for the past (checks watch) hour or two, and we’re due for an arm wrestling rematch.”
“He said something about doing some research upstairs.  Well, that or he’s planning some new prank to pull.”
“Not ‘to pull’.  Pulled.”  Stated Roy as he popped up next to Lance and Katie.
Suspicious, Lance asked, “What do ya mean, ‘pulled’?”
Grinning, Roy said, “You’ll see soon enough, city-slicker.”
“…I’ve got my eyes on you. Straw-brain.”  Stated Lance, his eyes glaring suspiciously at Roy.
“Hey, Toshiro!  That cat of yours better not try to eat Laura, alright?”  Stated Alice, crossing her arms and frowning at Niko.  Toshiro and Niko were currently with Ken, giving him some help with something.
“Oh, please.  Tell that fish not to flatter itself.”  Stated Niko, rolling his eyes.  “I only eat the finest fish, not cheap goldfish that you can buy at a seedy pet store for less than 2 bucks.”
“Did you just call me ‘Cheap’, whiskers?!”, shouted Laura from her bowl, a rather large twitch mark appearing on her forehead.
“Be lucky that I am, or else you would be on a dinner plate by now, madam fin!”
Before things got ugly between Niko and Laura, Ken and Toshiro joined the group, with Toshiro sitting down.  Ken remained standing.
“Alright, everyone, listen up.  Toshiro and I just ended our chat with the leader of the British team.  We’ve come to an agreement about the specifics of the matches.  The first match will be between him and Charles, and Alice and Laura.  The location of the match will be around an island, not too far off the coast of Britain.. And from what the weather says, the storm will let up soon and after that the sky will be as clear as water for a bout 4 days or so, with light amounts of wind and minimal roughness from the ocean.  In short, we should get there in about….2 days, 2 and a half tops.”
“So what’ll we do until then?” Asked Lance, getting out of his seat.
SPLAT!  Another water balloon had hit face, coating him with whipped cream.
Roy couldn’t take it any longer and burst into hysterical laughter
Lance proceeded to chase Roy around the RV.
“…Anyone wanna watch some movies?”, asked Ken.
Everyone said yes.
(2 days later)
“Is that the island?”
“Yes, that’s it.  That’s where our first match is going to be.”
The island had finally come into view after 2 days of training, seasickness (courtesy of Warren), and relaxing.
“Man, I can’t believe this!” exclaimed Lance, excitement written on his face.  “It’s the first match for our team!  Albeit, I’m not the one participating, but man, will it be awesome to watch!”
“Yeah, Alice is gonna kick this guys butt, but the match will probably last long enough for it to be pretty entertaining at the least.” Replied Ken, a small smile of knowing on his mouth.
“Say, Ken?”
“Yeah, Schimmer?”
“Is there going to be an arena for this, you know, because of the ‘out of bounds’ thing?”
“Unfortunately, the ‘out of bounds’ rule doesn’t apply outside of the stadiums.”
“Cool, but how’s that bad news?”
“Because then it will take us longer to get to the wounded, and by the time we get there….”
Realization dawning of what Ken meant, Lance gulped and became a little more worried about the battle.
Upon arriving at the island, the team was greeted by the English team.
“So, you lot are our opponent’s?  I must say, I was expecting a little more…experienced group.”  Stated the leader, Harold Wickerson.
Nodding, Ken turned to Alice.
“Good luck out there.  Try to be careful.” Stated Ken, worried about his girlfriend.
Sending Ken a wink, Alice said “Ah, don’t worry about me.  I’ll kick this old geezers butt to kingdom-come.”
After receiving everyone’s support, Alice and Laura walked up to meet their opponents.
“Ready to lose, old timer?”
Charles beside him, Wickerson stated, “Don’t be so blooming cocky, you tart!  The skirmish ‘as jus’ started!”
“Whatever!  Bring it on, gramps!”
Holding out their wrists, they both shouted “Spirit Cycle!”, the familiar beam of light engulfing them both.  As Laura started to glow she leapt of her bowl of water, just before she became too large for it.
“Say, Ken?  Mind if I ask you something?”
“Hm?  Oh, sure.  Shoot, Toshiro.”
“It’s just that when Laura and Alice fought Niko and me, Laura seemed to be able to have the ability to make her fins as sharp as swords, possibly sharper.”
“Uh huh.”
“Yet, some of the things that she did were inconsistent with the way she traveled. It was like she could control when her fin became as sharp as sword or two/”
“Yeah?”
“It’s just…it doesn’t make sense, because it that were true, then she would have sent debris flying everywhere when she traveled, as well as suffered great injury to her fin.”
“Uh huh.”
“So how come she didn’t?”
Chuckling and grinning, Ken said “Because while she can make her fins as sharp as a sword, or sharper, as you put it, she doesn’t really have the ability to, per say.”
Confused, Lance interjected “Wait, then what does she do?”
Smiling even more, Ken replied, “She doesn’t make her fins as sharp as a sword…her strikes, she has 2 or three, by the way, enable her to manipulate one thing.”, just as Laura and Alice had finished transforming.
“What?”
Laura now high in the air, Ken stated: “Friction.”