The Scumbag's Guide To Heroism novel Chapter 338

Chapter 338: 338 | A Mutually Unspoken Agreement

He went down with a grunt of surprise that might have been the most genuine sound I’d heard him make all day. I was on him before he hit the grass, scrambling for top position, trying to convert the dirty move into something that looked like a victory condition.

Hiro rolled. I followed. We ended up in a tangle of limbs that neither of us could convert into anything decisive, grappling across the field like we had personal grudges against the concept of standing combat.

He got an arm under my chin. I postured up before he could sink the choke. I tried to pass his guard. He retained with hip movement that suggested he’d done this a few thousand times. He swept me with a technique I’d never seen. I bridged out of the pin before he could consolidate.

Somewhere in the exchange I caught him with an elbow that split his lip. Somewhere in the same exchange he caught me with a headbutt that might have been accidental and definitely made my nose start bleeding.

We separated by mutual unspoken agreement. Both breathing in ragged gasps. Both covered in grass stains and sweat and the evidence of having given more than either of us had planned to give.

I sat up. My everything hurt. The specific kind of hurt that came from pushing past limits and discovering that limits pushed back.

Hiro sat up across from me, maybe ten feet away, blood running down his chin from the split lip. His hair was completely destroyed. His training gear looked like something a stray dog had used as a chew toy. His dark eyes found mine across the space between us.

Neither of us said anything for a long moment.

"Draw," he finally offered.

I wanted to argue. Wanted to point out that I’d landed more clean shots, that my damage output had exceeded his, that in a fight to unconsciousness the accumulation would have favored me eventually.

But I knew it wasn’t true. In a real fight, with stakes, with consequences, with the need to finish things before backup arrived or civilians got hurt or any of the thousand other pressures that actual combat included, Hiro would have beaten me. His technique would have found the opening eventually. His experience would have read my patterns before I finished developing them.

I was faster. I was maybe slightly stronger. I had raw physical gifts that exceeded what any registered mid-tier telekinetic should have possessed.

And none of it mattered against someone who actually knew how to fight.

"Draw," I agreed.

Hiro nodded. Something in his expression shifted. Not softening, exactly. More like recalibration. Like he was filing away information that didn’t fit his previous model of who I was.

"Your speed is legitimate," he said. "Not Aspect-assisted, or if it is, not in any way I could detect. Just raw physical capability that shouldn’t be possible for someone your size."

"Thanks. Your technique is legitimate too. All those hours your coaches put in really paid off."

He ignored the dig. "You fight like you’re still learning. Like every exchange is teaching you something you didn’t know before. That’s either going to make you very dangerous eventually or get you killed before you figure out the lesson."

"Bold words from the guy who just got elbowed in the face by someone who’s still learning."

Hiro touched his lip. Looked at the blood on his fingers. "Fair."

We sat there in the failing light, bleeding and exhausted and apparently having reached some kind of understanding that neither of us had expected to find.

"Same time tomorrow?" The question came out before I’d decided to ask it.

Hiro’s eyebrows rose. "You want to do this again."

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