CHAPTER 86: THE FINAL WEAPON OF KARATE
Weapons smuggling is a trade where one keeps their life in a permanent state of escrow.
The dozen IDEAL mercenaries on the deck weren't exhausted refugees; they were cold-blooded professionals pushed into a corner. They were playing for keeps, and they were ready to die to take a hostage.
Faced with such a squad, a man was stepping forward to meet them with nothing but his bare hands.
Kaiji Itou couldn't comprehend it. He looked at the monsters standing around him—men who could crush stone and vanish in shadows—and saw that none of them looked worried.
"Oi! Why are you just standing there?!" Kaiji hissed, his voice cracking with panic. "This is dangerous! Those guys have knives... they might even have guns!"
The warriors didn't answer. They were focused on the ring-side view of a master at work, unwilling to miss a single frame of the data.
"No matter how many times I see it," Madarame Baku whispered, his eyes wide with a rare, honest admiration, "the sight of pure, unadorned 'Might'... it's breathtaking."
"But is a Karateka really going to charge a squad of soldiers with his bare hands?"
Beside him, Yagyo Hikoichi, standing as a pillar of "Might" himself, offered his perspective.
"There is a common consensus among martial artists, Baku-dono: there is a 'High Wall' between the unarmed and the armed."
Yagyo's eyes twinkled with a hint of a smile. "However, that consensus has a second half."
"What is it?" Baku asked.
Ren Shiroki answered for him. "If your 'Might' is absolute, you don't climb the wall. You leap over it. Or you smash it. Or you simply walk through it as if it were a shadow."
Baku blinked. The Lie Eater was a genius of the mind, but "Meat-head Logic" was a language he was still learning. He let out a dry laugh. "You and the Referee are far too poetic for my tastes."
The dozen mercenaries had regrouped into a tight tactical wedge. Katsumi Orochi continued his slow, relaxed stroll until he was standing directly in front of the lead trio.
"F-fuck off!"
One mercenary snarled, his combat knife held in a low, aggressive stance. He tried to intimidate Katsumi, signaling for him to back away.
But Katsumi didn't back off. He didn't even take a combat stance. He simply reached out with his right hand.
The movement was so slow, so casual, that it didn't even look like an attack. It looked like he was reaching out to pat an old friend on the shoulder. The mercenary didn't even feel the need to dodge.
Suddenly, Katsumi's hand blurred. He thrust his fingers into the mercenary's open mouth, clamping his thumb and index finger onto the man's two front teeth.
"!?"
Before the soldier could process the intrusion, Katsumi gave a sharp, violent yank.
SNAP-CRUNCH!
He ripped the teeth clean out of the gums, roots and all.
Agony flooded the mercenary's nervous system. He collapsed to his knees, clutching his face as blood poured over his fingers.
"Why are you telling me to go away?" Katsumi asked, his voice light and conversational. "Wouldn't it be better to take me hostage?"
Katsumi threw his arms wide, inviting the entire squad.
"I'm Kakerou's representative tonight. If you catch me, you hold the keys to the ship. Are you telling me you aren't even tempted?"
The flanking mercenaries didn't wait for a second invitation. They lunged. Three men tackled him from the front while two more moved to pin his arms from the sides.
Katsumi didn't stop. He didn't even break his stride. He kept walking forward as if the men hanging off him were made of air.
SHING!
With six grown men using their entire weight to anchor him, Katsumi simply continued his stroll, dragging the entire group across the deck.
"You... you monster!"
A mercenary behind him screamed, drawing a knife and plunging it toward Katsumi's spine.
Katsumi didn't look back. He lashed out with a reverse low-kick, his heel catching the man's thigh.
CRACK!
The femur snapped like a dry branch. White bone shards pierced the skin, and the mercenary's leg was bent at a gruesome, impossible angle.
"GAHHH!"
The scream sent a shiver through Kaiji's soul.
Simultaneously, another mercenary lunged for Katsumi's throat with a jagged blade. Katsumi's hand blurred again, slapping the man's wrist joint with enough force to dislocate it instantly. Before the knife hit the deck, Katsumi grabbed the man by the shoulder and the groin.
He heaved.
The massive mercenary was hoisted over Katsumi's head and hurled into the dark water of the harbor like a sack of garbage.
"Hoo..."
Katsumi took a deep breath, looking around at the remaining mercs. He let out a sharp, hungry roar.
"IS THAT ALL?! COME ON!!"
Suedo watched his "General" with a pride that bordered on worship. He turned to Ren and the others.
"Look at him. Height: 185cm. Weight: 116kg. Near-zero body fat."
"Leg strength? He can clear a hundred meters in under ten seconds."
"Bench press? He toys with 300kg (660 lbs) for reps. His physical stats alone are beyond anything the Olympic committee has ever seen."
"A man who possesses all of those gifts..." Suedo's voice dropped to a low, reverent rumble. "...and then spends twenty years mastering the world's most violent Karate."
"The mercenaries aren't fighting a man. They're fighting a natural disaster."
The IDEAL operatives realized their mistake. They stopped the mindless charge and retreated into a semi-circle, pulling out every piece of hardware they had left.
Knives. Folding shovels. Trench spikes. And one 9mm sidearm.
The last merc, having no weapon, scooped up a heavy glass bourbon bottle from the wreckage of the festival racks.
But as they looked back, Katsumi Orochi was gone.
"Where is he?!"
The mercs frantically scanned the deck. One pointed a trembling finger. "BEHIND YOU!"
The mercenary with the gun turned, only to find his vision blocked by a white gi.
Katsumi had used the darkness and his supernatural speed to close the gap in a heartbeat. He grabbed the merc's collar and hurled him into his partner, then used a high-line kick to bat the gun into the sea.
Another merc lunged with a knife. Katsumi pivoted.
"SEI-YAH!"
A front-kick caught the man's jaw. The sound of the mandible shattering was audible even over the wind.
The last mercenary—the one with the bourbon bottle—stood frozen. He was trembling so hard the glass was rattling against his palm.
"Haha. You don't look like a genius," Katsumi noted. He reached out and gently took the bottle from the man's hand, placing it on top of the mercenary's head.
"Don't move."
SHING!
Katsumi's hand blurred in a horizontal strike.
[SHINSHINKAI: BOTTLE-SHAVE]!
The glass didn't shatter. The hand-blade (Shutou) was so fast and so sharp that it "cut" the air into a vacuum. The top half of the bottle was sliced clean away, leaving a perfectly level, mirror-smooth edge.
Cold bourbon poured over the mercenary's head, soaking his gear. He stood like a statue, too terrified to blink.
Katsumi followed up with a casual front-kick that launched the man over the railing.
"Bottle cutting," Suedo whispered. "It's the ultimate proof of Karate mastery. Turning the limbs into blades."
"Master Doppo mastered that move at thirty. Katsumi-san perfected it at twenty."
Kaede Akiyama stared at the deck. She had seen "Monsters" in the Kengan ring, but Katsumi Orochi was something different. He was the "Perfect Product."
Suddenly, one mercenary who had been playing dead scrambled toward Kaede. He was clutching a heavy trench shovel, intending to take her hostage as a last resort.
WHOOSH!
[DRIVE RUSH: IRON MOUNTAIN]!
Ren Shiroki exploded into action. He used a shoulder-check that combined his 97kg mass with the momentum of his dash. He slammed into the mercenary's side, launching him across the deck.
THUD!
The merc was thrown right into Katsumi's waiting arms.
"Oh! Thanks for the assist, Ren-kun!"
Katsumi pinned the man to the deck and slowly raised a massive right fist.
The mercenary, frantic, held the heavy steel shovel over his head as a shield. Katsumi just grinned.
"Listen well, comrade."
"My downward strike can pulverize three layers of structural concrete. Do you really think a piece of sheet metal is going to stop me?"
The mercenary didn't even have time to scream.
BOOM!
A heavy, muffled sound echoed through the ship. Katsumi pulled his fist back. The steel shovel was now "molded" to the mercenary's face. The metal was bent into the shape of the man's features, with blood squeezed out from the edges. Katsumi's knuckle print was embossed deep into the steel.
Suedo took a deep breath.
"Ren. Look closely."
"That is the Final Weapon of Modern Karate... Katsumi Orochi!"