"Teach me, Suzuki-kun."
Shizuku didn't throw a tantrum. She didn't let her pride blind her. Instead, she slowly stood up, stepped forward, and bowed deeply—a gesture of profound, absolute respect from a dedicated Japanese martial artist.
"Thank you for waking me up to reality," she breathed out, her chest heaving slightly from the brief but intense exchange. "I realize how badly I need to grow stronger. So, let's do it. I want to learn that footwork."
She wasn't entirely surprised by her boyfriend's hidden lethality. Besides possessing a terrifying intellect that secured him a spot at Japan's top university, he was also a championship-level Judo scholar. It made perfect sense that he had mastered other arts in secret. And after feeling the cold wood of his dagger against her throat, she knew this ruthless martial art would be the only thing keeping her alive in the dungeon next week.
"Don't bow to me like that," Suzuki murmured.
He closed the distance between them, his hand reaching out to gently catch her chin. He tilted her face upward, his thumb lightly grazing her soft lower lip. "You are my girlfriend. It is my absolute responsibility to protect you and make you stronger. Come on, stand up straight. If you really want to repay me... you can just do it in other ways later."
"....."
Shizuku's entire face flushed a brilliant, burning crimson. Her breath hitched, and she instinctively squeezed her thighs together at the dark, deeply suggestive promise in his eyes. She nodded obediently, completely eager to "repay" him behind the locked doors of his penthouse.
"...." Kaori stood off to the side, her own face turning bright red as she watched the heavy, intoxicating tension completely swallow the couple.
Suzuki genuinely enjoyed teaching Shizuku. She was never a slacker; she absorbed knowledge with her entire body and soul. By secretly linking her to his [Manager] skill, he could actively optimize her muscle memory and correct her form in real-time. Under his direct, highly intimate guidance, she was growing exponentially faster than she ever could under Captain Meld's rigid, outdated knight training.
It made Suzuki realize he had been severely underutilizing the Manager AI. If he could forcefully optimize his girlfriend's combat growth, why hadn't he done it sooner?
Truthfully, he had simply been too busy playing the corporate mastermind, running the Ministry of Finance from the shadows and binding corrupt officials with his [Absolute Contract].
But his newest acquisition had changed everything. He was now an [Assassin].
Initially, he had wondered how to best utilize the class. Then he remembered his multiversal connection to the world of Naruto. What was a ninja, if not a hyper-lethal, magically enhanced Japanese assassin?
Using the combat memories of his ninja counterpart, Suzuki had begun secretly refining his new Job. However, he quickly realized that flashy ninjutsu wasn't perfectly suited for Tortus. The upcoming battles would take place deep within the Orcus Labyrinth—a dark, claustrophobic dungeon filled with tight corridors and unpredictable obstacles. He needed a style specifically engineered for lethal, extreme close-quarters combat.
Out of all the martial arts in human history, the absolute best fit for his Assassin class was Pencak Silat.
Some might have found it an obscure choice. But Silat was a soft, highly fluid martial art born in the jungles of Southeast Asia. It was designed specifically for surviving ambushes in tight spaces, allowing the user to remain incredibly flexible and use minimal effort to inflict maximum, devastating biomechanical damage.
How did a Japanese high school student learn it?
Once his Manager ability awakened on Earth, Suzuki had systematically absorbed massive databases of global martial arts. Initially, he just wanted the raw data to feed into his AI algorithms for predictive modeling. But now, that theoretical data was keeping them alive.
"Watch me closely," Suzuki instructed, taking a step back into the center of the moonlit courtyard.
He slowly unbuttoned his uniform jacket and tossed it aside, leaving him in a fitted black undershirt that clung perfectly to the dense, sculpted muscles of his chest and shoulders. He drew his twin training daggers, and in a fraction of a second, his posture shifted from a relaxed, lazy slouch to the terrifying tension of a coiled viper.
For Shizuku and Kaori, watching him practice Pencak Silat was completely mesmerizing. It was nothing like Kendo, which was loud, linear, and rigidly honorable.
Suzuki sank into a low, sweeping stance. His body swayed rhythmically, remaining completely, deceptively relaxed until the exact microsecond a strike was executed. To the untrained eye, his continuous, flowing hand movements and the hypnotic spinning of his daggers looked like a sensual, incredibly complex dance.
He weaved around invisible monsters, his body gliding with terrifying fluidity. He parried an imaginary claw, snaked his arm around an unseen limb to shatter a joint, and stepped perfectly into a blind spot to deliver a lethal throat strike. Every single motion looped seamlessly into the next. There was absolutely zero wasted energy.
"Amazing..." Shizuku whispered.
"So, this is Pencak Silat..." Kaori breathed out, completely spellbound.
Sitting on the cold stone bench, the two girls were entirely captivated, but for drastically different reasons.
From Shizuku's perspective as a lifelong martial artist, she was obsessed with his langkah (footwork). She realized his "dance" was a terrifying masterclass in biomechanical manipulation. He never, ever met force with force. He constantly angled his hips and shoulders to completely destroy an opponent's center of gravity before a weapon even connected.
For a girl conditioned to face her enemies head-on with samurai honor, watching this hyper-efficient, utterly dirty fighting style shattered her rigid mindset. Suzuki was teaching her that true survival wasn't about scoring points in a duel; it was about making sure the other guy never breathed again so you could go home to the people you loved.
From Kaori's perspective, it was something entirely different.
As a Priest, Kaori possessed a high-level, innate understanding of human anatomy required to cast her healing magic. Because of that knowledge, watching Suzuki's dance sent a deep, chilling thrill straight to her core.
She wasn't just seeing graceful movements; she was reading the catastrophic anatomical damage. She saw exactly why he twisted the dagger at that specific angle—it was designed to slip cleanly past a ribcage and puncture a lung. She saw that his sweeping low kick wasn't just to trip an enemy; the kinetic force was calculated to permanently shatter a kneecap.
It was an incredibly cruel, violent martial art. It was a terrifying contrast to his usual gentle, reliable persona.
Yet, Kaori knew exactly why Suzuki was showing them this dark side of himself. He wanted them to survive.
While Kouki stood in the sunlight, giving loud, naive speeches about being heroes and saving the world—treating the rest of the class like disposable side characters in his personal RPG—Suzuki was pulling them into the shadows, teaching them how to be ruthless so they wouldn't end up as corpses.
If he didn't deeply care about us... he wouldn't share this, Kaori realized, her heart fluttering wildly.
"See? It's all about flow. Come here, Shizuku."
Suzuki stopped his demonstration, barely breaking a sweat. He gestured for Shizuku to step up, and the moment she raised her wooden sword, he didn't go easy on her.
"Your center of gravity is entirely too high," Suzuki corrected her. He stepped directly behind her, his chest pressing warmly against her back.
He placed his large, strong hands firmly on her waist, physically forcing her hips down into a lower, wider stance. Shizuku gasped softly at the sudden, intensely dominating contact, a fresh wave of heat washing over her skin. He was a harsh, blunt teacher, refusing to coddle her in the dirt. But the friction of his body against hers, and the dark, husky commands whispered directly into her ear, made it impossible for her to forget the "rewards" waiting for her in the penthouse later.
"You too, Kaori," Suzuki said, finally stepping back from a panting, flushed Shizuku. "Come here. I need to teach you basic evasive strategy and where to aim if a monster breaches the vanguard."
"A-Ah! Y-Yes!"
Kaori scrambled off the bench, her heart pounding furiously against her ribs. She practically bounced over to him, leaning in entirely too close as he began pointing out the lethal pressure points on the human body. As she listened to his deep, rumbling voice, she could smell his intoxicating, clean scent mixed with a faint trace of sweat. She was overwhelmingly enthusiastic, asking a dozen questions just to keep his full attention on her.
Did she really just want to grow stronger to protect the party? Or was it something else entirely?
Shizuku leaned on her wooden sword, wiping the sweat from her brow as she quietly watched the interaction. She couldn't help but notice how the tension bled out of Suzuki's shoulders whenever Kaori smiled at him. Her boyfriend seemed genuinely calmer and significantly less stressed when Kaori was by his side.
Over the next week, this secret midnight training became their sacred ritual.
For Shizuku, Suzuki became the harsh, intoxicating mentor who forcefully stripped away her lethal naivety. And for Kaori—who had previously fawned over Hajime's quiet kindness on Earth—she was rapidly realizing that Suzuki's dark, overwhelming, and ruthless practicality was a vastly more seductive form of protection.
Because of this deeply intimate, secret bond forged in the moonlight, everything would change when the three of them finally stepped into the suffocating darkness of the Orcus Labyrinth.
---
Finally, it's the time, boys!