The battle between Nazuna and Goh had transformed the forest beside the highway into a blighted landscape by this point, as if several meteors had rained down on the terrain. All five Nazuna clones lay sprawled out on the ground battered and bruised while Goh stood over the wounded warriors and looked down at them, thoroughly annoyed at the trouble they’d caused him.
“I lost count how many times I had to beat you down, and how many arms and legs I had to break,” Goh muttered, groaning in disgust. “What really sucked is you’d always heal yourselves up and come back if I missed just one of you. But I finally managed to hit all five of you at once.”
Goh was a rugged-looking fighter who hated putting in more effort than he felt like, and that side of him was fully conveyed by his attitude. However, he was also able to emulate any martial arts technique, maneuver, or finishing move after witnessing it just once. This wasn’t due to his level, a skill, or a Gift; it was all a case of raw talent. Thanks to Goh’s innate abilities, he had been able to calmly counter the five Nazunas and the purposeful swings of their Prometheus swords armed with just his martial arts skills, his knowledge, and his sheer dexterity.
The Prometheus was a powerful weapon that was able to restore its wielders to full health, but it was useless if no enchantment was uttered. As soon as he realized this, Goh concentrated his efforts on knocking out all five Nazunas simultaneously, which he accomplished by kicking some of them on the sides of their heads while blasting the heads of the other Nazunas by focusing his internal kinetic energy into a thunderous hit using a technique known as fa jin.
Goh took a step toward the Nazunas. “Better put this to bed before you all wake up—”
“Ngaah!”
The Master was just about to put the Nazunas permanently out of commission when one of them unexpectedly regained consciousness before he could.
What the crap? he thought. This is insane! I know I just fa jin’d that kid directly through her skull! I felt her brains turn to mush! How the hell is she able to get up?!
The one conscious Nazuna rubbed her head while Goh stood and watched her, completely dumbfounded.
“You’re way stronger than I took ya for,” the Nazuna clone said. “And ya pulled off a whole buncha cool moves too!” She turned to Goh, smiling like a little girl who had just ridden a bunch of amusement park rides, and that wide grin caused more cold sweat to run down Goh’s spine.
“Prometheus, heal my reality!” Nazuna yelled, completely erasing the injuries that she and the four other clones had sustained. But instead of immediately engaging Goh again, Nazuna made her four duplicates disappear and stowed her Prometheus in her Item Box.
Goh let out the breath he’d been holding and blinked in bemusement. “What’re ya tryin’ to pull?” It was no wonder he was astonished by this move because not only did it mean that Nazuna had just reduced her fighting strength by four-fifths, she had also done the equivalent of tossing away her weapon. There was no good reason that he could see for her to purposely hand the advantage to him like this. But Nazuna ignored Goh’s question completely, raising her fists and performing a standing kick, before humming in thought.
“Is this how it’s done?” she said to herself. “No, I think it went more like ‘Shpah!’ then ‘Spah!’ if I remember right...”
Acting like Goh wasn’t standing right in front of her, Nazuna continued walking through a sequence of erratically choreographed moves accompanied by a string of enigmatic, muttered onomatopoeia. For Goh, Nazuna was completely vulnerable and open to an attack, meaning it would have taken very little effort from him to land a quick punch and turn her lights out for good. Yet he found himself unable to take a step forward as droplets of sweat formed on his increasingly agitated brow. After a full minute of twisting her body around every which way, Nazuna seemed happy enough to stop what she was doing and flash a smile as bright as a little girl’s at him.
“Okay! I think that’s how it should go,” she said. “Sorry for makin’ ya wait!”
Nazuna beamed at Goh again like a close friend excitedly showing up to a meetup after running late. Her devastating beauty combined with the guileless, sunny disposition presently on display would have made any man or woman fall captive to her charms. Yet that wasn’t the emotional response Goh was having. All he felt was uncontrollable dread.
As clueless as ever about the inner turmoil of her opponent, Nazuna once again assumed a fighting stance, but this time, it was the exact stance Goh had taken when engaging the five Nazunas in earnest.
“All righty, here I come!” Nazuna announced.
“You stupid midget!” Goh yelled angrily. “Ya really think ya can beat me using my own stance? That ain’t gonna—”
But before he could finish his sentence, Nazuna practically teleported into striking distance using his own shukuchi technique, then delivered a straight right jab. Goh managed to block the punch, but Nazuna quickly followed it up with a left-right combo and a kick for good measure. He reflexively blocked every blow, but because Nazuna outleveled him, her strikes left their mark, and her final kick broke through Goh’s guard and sent him flying backward. He landed on his feet, leaving ruts in the dirt, but Nazuna was already lunging forward at his face with her next attack.
“Back off, short stuff!” Goh yelled before proceeding to twist his arms this way and that in a circular, fanlike motion. It was the same technique he’d used to ward off Mera’s venom fire: the mawashi uke. He intended to parry Nazuna’s strike while simultaneously delivering a counter to her face, but this wasn’t how it worked out in the end. At the last second, Nazuna twisted her body in midair, causing Goh to miss her nose by a hair.
“You anticipated my move?!” he screamed.
“’Course I did! Don’t act so shocked,” Nazuna said proudly. “After getting clobbered so many times, I’ve got your reach down pat.”