Son of a Legend, Heart of a Slacker
Part III!
“ARGH!!”
The three plant-animals were on him. Crono was lying beside him in a drunken faint, and Ainus didn’t know what to do.
The Shitakes snarled. The closest one to him, which happened to be about an inch from his face, slashed at him. Yelling, Ainus kicked it in the middle of its stomach and jumped up to his feet.
‘Hey, that was pretty easy,’ he thought.
Ainus then felt the first dash of what is fearfully known in the Adventurer’s Circle as Reckless Courage. This, as we all know, is extremely dangerous, even in small quantities. However, when contracted by amatuers or weaklings (or people named Ainus, with whom the terms were synonymous), Reckless Courage oftentimes turned out to be fatal. Unfortunately, Ainus did not know this.
“Eat this, ‘shroom-boys!” Ainus shouted heroically (at least, it would have been heroic if his voice hadn’t squeaked at that moment). Jumping into what resembled a fighting stance, he strained and lifted his sword from its sheath. Bringing the sword over his head, he prepared for his ultimate sword tech—the only one he knew. He’d developed and named it himself. He wasn’t sure what it all meant, but was sure it was impressive.
“ULTIMATE DEATH STRIKE AWESOME SWORD TECHNIQUE SKILL ABILITY LEVEL 1: QUASI-MONO-SUB-MINI-SLASH!!! AAAAAAAARGH!!!”
Ainus charged, his sword slicing through the air.
Unfortunately, he took so long with the name of the tech that the creature had dodged out of the way. Ainus charged past the monster, past Crono’s lying form, past the entire scuffle, and ended up with his sword buried halfway into the edge of a tree.
“Damn!”
He tugged as hard as he could, which wasn’t all that hard, but the sword would not budge. Giving up, he left it there and span around. The monsters were right in front of him.
Reckless Courage is very easy to contract, but also easy to cure: a healthy dose of Sobering Reality usually does the trick. It worked wonders on Ainus.
“Oh, I am screwed!! Help! Help! Heeeeeeeeeeelp!!”
Help was not coming, however, and Crono was not about to wake up. Ainus wondered what would happen to Crono if Ainus himself was eaten. He decided that he didn’t care. If Crono got eaten, at least he’d be in a drunken stupor; Ainus was awake and very, very sober at the moment. He watched one of the ‘shrooms open its mouth: It was a large, gaping, slobbery, well-fanged hole. It looked like an uncomfortable place to be in. Ainus was overcome.
“I don’t want to die!!!”
The monsters were so close, so close….
A flash. A flaming heat. A wetting of Ainus’s pants.
The monsters were suddenly far away. Actually, the scattered, charred parts of the monsters were far away.
Ainus breathed. “Gah!! Gah!! Wha…what happened? What’s this…ah, shit. Wet myself. AGAIN.”
“Really now.”
“Huh?!!”
Ainus turned around and looked into the sparkling eyes of the most beautiful girl he had ever seen. And he’d seen quite a few when he discovered his dad’s secret collection of nudie magazines. Royal Sluts, Guardia Gulpers…ooh, and The Truce Tumblers. Her eyes were bright blue, her hair was bright purple, tied up in a bright white bow, and her breasts were…showing. Quite a lot, actually. He felt something dimunitive stir in his pants.
“Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone.”
Ainus remembered where he was again. “What?! I mean, uh, hello, sweetums.” Sweetums. Damn. What a dumbass.
“Don’t call me that. Stupid way to pay me back for saving your life.”
“You—“
”Yeah. Quick fire spell finished them
off. You must be a wussus maximus if
you can’t even beat a Shit ‘Shroom.”
“Uh—“
“Yeah, that’s what I thought. You need some serious training.”
“Yeah, I—“
“Well, what’s your name, loser?”
“Um, it’s Ainus.”
She seemed like she was about to slap him at first. Then she looked at him again, saw he was serious, and started laughing like Magus had that time he flew in to see how Ainus was growing. It wasn’t pleasant laughter, and it wasn’t funny laughter. Not to him, anyway.
“What’s wrong with that?!” he demanded.
“Your name—“ she said between gasps of breaths, “—Is…Ainus! AINUS!! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!”
“Ainus happens to be a majestic name! In Old Guardian it means…well, I forget what it means. But there’s nothing wrong with it!!”
“Yeah, yeah, sure, kid.
Must’ve had some mean parents.”
”Well, what’s your name, then?”
“Ah, well…”
“Come on, let’s hear it!”
“It’s Ashtear. Mother kept her maiden name when she married my father, Fritz.”
“No,” he said, realizing that this was Lucca’s kid, the one he had met when he was four or so. He still didn’t remember her name, though. “Your first name.”
“Um…” The smartassed girl was finally silent.
“Come on!!”
“It’s Fruitz!!” she blurted. “There, are you happy now!? Go ahead, laugh at me!! After I saved your life.”
Ainus took her up on her offer.
>>IN THE NEXT EPISODE OF SON OF A LEGEND, HEART OF A SLACKER:
Ainus survived with the help of the mysterious girl Fruitz. Crono’s still in a faint, and Ainus still has to go to school…lucky for him, Fruitz is going too! But what will happen there? And will Ainus ever declare his attraction to her? Yeah. Right.
CREDITS: Thanx to Jalhar for a few ideas.
To Chapter Four