Chapter 94: 093 Punchuation

Rize's heart was still racing by the time Titanyana knocked Bije out. His eyes never left her for the duration of the fight, yet still he felt as if he hadn't actually seen her do anything of note. Perhaps it was because his thoughts were drowned out by his beating heart or because her movements seemed to defy his understanding of the body's limitations so effortlessly, but he simply could not piece together how she had beaten Bije with such ease. As she sheathed her sword once again, his attention returned to his surroundings.

His mother still held him tightly to her body, covering him in an attempt to protect him from Bije's scimitar. He could feel her tension, still expecting a searing pain to cross her back. He could not see her face, but he could guess her eyes were closed. There was little doubt she was thinking these to be her final moments. He could not see how, but it would appear his mother did not hear the duel that had just taken place.

To assuage his mother's fears, he wrapped his arms around her in a tight hug. Perhaps the sensation of her embrace being returned would bring her back to the present.

As his heart slowed down to a more natural pace, the cacophony of sounds now happening around him began to clear up. His sister crying and screaming in the distance. His mother lightly sobbing. The gasps and shouts of nearby patrons and passerby. The gasping and squealing of Lord Kelly.

All at once, Rize's rage returned. Gently breaking free of his mother's embrace, he stomped on over to the paralyzed pile of lard.

For the most part, Rize considered him a fairly temperate person. He could remain calm in a stressful situation, and was likely to forgive most slights against him on the assumption they were usually just little mistakes. He was patient with others and always open to cooperation, traits viewed as important in merchants. His mother had always encouraged him to be this sort of kind and compassionate individual, and he tended to take his mother's advice over his father's.

Right now it was his father's voice speaking to him.

With a scream of rage, he planted a right hook squarely on the jaw of the animal who had attacked him and his family. Rize didn't knock him out, the fat providing a cushioning effect against the still immature boy's best punch, but it was still enough to plant him squarely on his ass. He could vaguely make out some words amidst the squealing that came out of its mouth, but Rize couldn't find a single part of him that cared. 

As far as Rize was concerned, Kelly should just up and die. Pestering him was one thing, blackmail attempts could be brushed off, but direct threats of violence against him and his family should be met with the same level of intensity. It was one of his father's core philosophies, one that he had considered stupid up until this point.

Screaming in rage, Rize hopped atop the squirming blob of fat and began attacking him with the only weapons he knew how to use, his fists.

- - - - -

Diana watched the scene develop in silence for a few seconds before beginning to make a move. Her first order of business, Titanyana.

The woman she viewed as naught but vulnerable girl only minutes ago casually returned to her side. She was back to her reserved self, silently awaiting orders. Diana gingerly moved aside the hair on her forehead to look at her injury. Unsurprisingly for such a small cut, it had already scabbed over, though the bruise had grown a bit more ugly in the intervening time.

"Are you okay?"

Titanyana nodded. Given her performance Diana had no reason to think she was lying, but her understanding of injuries suggested that she shouldn't be so eager to accept her at her word. Lack of words, rather.

"You had me worried there, you know?" Diana made sure Titanyana was looking her in the eyes, just to be sure her emotions were conveyed. "I thought you might have died for a second."

Titanyana's eyes shot to look at the ground, her ears following in shame. Clearly she was embarrassed she took that hit. Diana decided that now was not the time to pry further. She was curious as to how she only got off with a scratch, but addressing the source of the sound of fist on flesh was a more pressing matter.

"What are the chances of that man, Bije, waking up anytime soon?" Titanyana just shook her head. Diana decided to interpret that as a 'not any time soon' as opposed to the possibility it meant he was dead. She hit him with a sword after all. "Keep an eye on him while I deal with Rize, okay?"

Leaving the unconscious assailant to her bodyguard, Diana moved to subdue Rize. She had given him some time to let his anger off, but at a certain point he really just needed to stop. Hopefully she would have the leverage to peel him off of the lump of blubber, it shouldn't be too hard considering his geometry.

"Rize." Before committing to a physical approach, she was trying to calm him with words. "Time to stop it."

"... stupid, arrogant, idiotic, greedy..."

Her words didn't reach him, his descriptions punctuated by punches. Punchuation, if you would.

"Do you want me to..?" Titanyana offered her assistance, though Diana was quick to refuse.

Coming to a position by his side, Diana grabbed hold of Rize's collar before yanking him off of his assailant-cum-victim. After making certain Rize was completely detached, she placed herself between the two of them, creating the time needed for Rize to calm down. Rize, still very much a bundle of rage, did not take kindly to being removed from his sputtering and gasping target, but was successfully prevented from making any advances towards him through a monumental effort on Diana's part

"Cool it, Rize."

- - - - -

Diana's words forced the rage Rize felt to subside somewhat. He still made moves to attack Lord Kelly, namely in the form of kicks from far beyond his ability to reach, but he had calmed down enough that he could allow himself to be restrained. He knew it was reflecting poorly on his character, but he couldn't stop himself.

"Come on, Rize." Diana tried to calm him while dragging him away. "You have to leave this one to the Sanctum."

His anger further subsided at the mention of the Sanctum. Surely they would be better at dealing with this piece of inhuman shit than he was. At the very least, Kelly would not be able to retaliate against them the same way he could come after Rize's family. Faintly, he could hear approaching footfalls.

For his own sake, he needed to calm himself down.

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"You can," Rize adjusted his shirt a little with his free hand, "you can let go now, Lady Diana." To be honest, it was a little embarrassing for a boy in puberty to be held close by a woman as pretty as Diana. He wouldn't say he would ever pursue her romantically, Donovan was clearly her sweetheart, but he wanted to avoid those types of thoughts in her presence. "I'm not going to attack him any more. I've gotten it out of my system."

He took a few deep breaths and closed his eyes, an attempt to calm himself further while also conveying his intentions to Diana physically. Upon feeling the pressure leave his arm, he promptly turned around and headed towards his luggage, moving everything back to where it was before taking a seat on the trunk. He avoided looking at the source of his anger while he regulated his emotions.

- - - - -

Despite his rage, Diana thought Rize was a good kid. She did not approve of such vengeful action, she could never see that as the ideal way to handle a bested opponent, but she could very much understand the sentiment behind it. To Rize, this man (she had reservations on calling him that) was most likely a kidnapper and a murderer, one who threatened him and his family.

Her focus shifted to the newcomers.

"Greetings, officers, if that is indeed how you are addressed." A slight curtsy to the new arrivals, followed by a smile as genuine as she could manage. "I take it you are here to deal with this situation?"

"That is the reason we have been called, yes, though it would appear you have gotten a handle on it." The man who responded was likely the superior of the other two, their faces hidden by painted leather masks. "I will need to ask you about what happened here, as your testimony will count as evidence. You two, gather bystander testimonies."

A quick affirmation from his subordinates freed him to once again turn his attention to Diana.

"Hm, well I wasn't here for the entirety of the show, but I can recount what I have seen. Before we start, though, do you have any method of restraining the two sprawled out on the ground? I fear they run the risk of becoming violent should they wake up." Diana gestured to the unconscious bodies.

"I understand. You believe these persons to be the perpetrators here. Are there any other belligerents you know of?" He pulled a pair of cords from the satchel on his rear, bending down to Kelly to roll him over and tie his hands together.

"Hmm. While I am reluctant to call them belligerents given the context, that boy there and the woman over there participated in the fight. My bodyguard, the woman standing watch over the other man, protected those two from being attacked by him. They are mother and son, and this is their tavern."

"Tavern? Was there any alcohol involved?"

"While I cannot say, I would assume it to be unlikely. From what I gathered, the family who owns the tavern does not sort a positive relationship with that man. In fact, part of the reason they assented to having him work for us as something of a servant at the Barracks was because they were concerned of a situation such as this."

"I see. In your opinion, which do you think was more likely responsible for starting the conflict."

"Without a doubt Lord Kelly, the man you just tied up. You will have to ask those two for the specifics, but I understand that he had been attempting to coerce the boy, Rize, to marry into his family. He seems to have been pestering them for a long time."

"How annoying. Might I ask for your name and where you are currently residing? If need be, we will need to call upon you for your testimony at the trial." This man almost certainly had experience in dealing with arrogant noblemen. "We will allow you to leave with the boy free of detainment should you so please in deference to your status and willingness to comply, however you must understand that you may need to be detained should information come to light."

"That will not be an issue, sir."

- - - - -

The Arboreal Maiden sat in the middle of a vast room, parchment strewn about on various tables as she looked towards the ceiling. She was exhausted, mentally, from the process of deriving what Donovan, Diana, and most importantly ARC, needed to prosper. Split was not the type of tool they were expecting, nor was it similar to one they had any experience with. The primary issue was that split was not consistent, at least not the way they wanted it to be.

Split was primarily 'intent' driven, something not easy to quantify and replicate. It followed that defining its reaction in terms of equations as ARC requested was an extremely difficult process. It was possible, she had only just finished the basic 'principle' calculations for initiating, maintaining, and safely halting interstellar travel including instructions on how to have inorganic controls to regulate these processes. In theory it was all they would need for this specific action, ARC would have the capability to make designs and derivations of this system for any ship they would have to produce.

What she had spent her time calculating depended on a great many variables. Mass, volume, and the resulting speed (NOT velocity) for a certain input were obvious requirements, but the effects of secondary variables such as the specific geometry of the transported area, split flow relative to the axis of travel, internal to external split concentration ratios, proximity to split and gravitational wells, effects of interdicting objects during travel, and the 'friction' generated upon dropping from interstellar travel also needed to be provided. Even tertiary and quaternary inputs had been given, like the effects of radial matter imbalance and encapsulated electron flow, needed to be provided in the scenario they might create something that requires that information as a factor in performance and safety concerns.

As she let her hand drop down onto the head of the silent Mercedes, the Arboreal Maiden realized that she was having fun.

True, she had figured all of this out long ago, but writing it down on paper was a completely different matter. She needed to learn their notation for calculus as well as provide in-depth explanations and formula for phenomena not already covered by what they understood. For the first time in ages she had learned something genuinely new to her, a few innocuous little phenomena she had paid no mind to before assuming it was just something that happened.

Who would have thought that 'light' confined to a series of points through the use of split was the catalyst for interstellar travel? She never could have expected that a significant angular velocity in the proper orientation to the intended direction of travel would result in shorter travel times either.

The arrival of a Skwiven interrupted her bask in the afterglow of her discoveries. She had made it clear that she should not be disturbed unless there was either an emergency requiring her attention or her charges found themselves in trouble.

Given the fact that the Great Csillacra wasn't pushing her to do anything, this was undoubtedly related to Donovan and Diana. As she accepted the slip of paper from its hands, the Skwiven turned to give Mercedes a belly rub. This specific Skwiven had yet to interact with the dog, yet Mercedes acted as if she already knew it, much to the Arboreal Maiden's amusement. Given that Mercedes was significantly more massive than the average Skwiven at this point, watching one of them flounder in her fur was quite amusing.

Her mood was somewhat ruined by the note, however, raising an eyebrow as she reached the end.

"Somehow, in some way, they got themselves into trouble much faster than I had expected."

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