The Cost of Vengeance

Chapter 20

Gon prepared for the attack that he was sure was coming.  He watched her charge towards him and was ready to use a basic counter attack.  He hadn't expected that when he tried to move, his arm would be pulled forward.  She had used her nen stitches while he was distracted with the new position.  He didn't have enough time to try to break the stitch so he flipped backwards and off to side, arm staying in place.  He heard it crack and felt a movement.  He looked at it before working on breaking her stitches.  

It's just moved out of socket.  Easy enough.

He jumped back, turned, and slammed his shoulder into the wall.  It moved back into place and Gon ignored the slight pain as he ran up the wall and flipped to avoid Machi's next attack.  Machi did a backbend and kicked over, almost hitting her opponent.  Gon was impressed to say the least.  It had only been a week since he had given her that advise and she had already put it to good use.  

He still had much more ability than her but he did end up deciding that he would increase his power to 21% during their next spar.  He dodged for as long as he could without making it obvious.  He wanted her to get as much training in as she could.  They were leaving in a week so they wouldn't be able to do this for a while.  He was also very excited for his next fight.  He had a feeling that fighting Chrollo properly would be much more challenging than their usual sessions.  He didn't use jan ken rock for any of these fights.  He didn't need to, it wouldn't do them any good.  That attack was a bit too powerful for training even if it was lowered.  

They continued, Gon moving faster than he normally would.  That's something that needed definite work for her.  Her stamina was not great, she was adept at short battles that didn't involve much movement for long.  She was good at long lasting fights so long as she didn't do much moving.  This would be good training to start her on and it would prolong the battle more.  Typically his and Machi's spars would last one, one and a half hours.  He didn't expect this one to last that long.  In a real battle Machi could use more stamina than she actually had and end up more tired than necessary.  In a training fight, she would not do the same.  He wouldn't make her keep going too far past her limits either.  

Gon bounced around the room as if he was weightless.  He made it look so easy and Nobunaga was getting irked by it again.

"Come on Machi!  Show the stupid twerp what you're made of!"

Machi shot him a quick glare before turning back to the fight she was certain to lose.  She knew exactly what he was going to tell her when they finished and she could tell he was going faster than normal.  She was never able to fully keep up but now it was all she could do to counter his attacks at all.  Gon noticed her struggling and slowed down slightly.  He jumped around her stitches and kicks for a good 57 minutes before he slapped her back lightly.  

"Gotcha.  Okay so, stamina.  That's my only concern for you, you need to increase your stamina."

She nodded while catching her breath.  She didn't seem mad by any extremes but she definitely wasn't excited about having to do stamina training.  Gon took another drink of his water, not out of breath yet, but getting dehydrated.  Chrollo stepped up to the platform and tossed his coat to the side.  He summoned his book and flipped through the pages, looking for an ability that could prove useful against Gon.  Gon was examining Chrollo and still couldn't decide on a level of power that would be appropriate.  

"Hey Chrollo, what power level do you want me at for this?"

Chrollo seemingly ignored the question for a few seconds before he tapped his page and looked up, smirking.

"Go no higher than 80% Gon.  That's an order."

Gon looked worried but warily nodded.  That was not what he thought Chrollo would say.  In past battles he had used 50-60% but he hadn't used over 70% on any of them.  Even the others looked surprised.  Gon despite not being sure this was a good idea, was not going to deny the request.  They all left him in charge during these training sessions.  If he thought it was enough he would end it quickly.  Gon was well aware that Chrollo was undeniably the strongest one of the phantom troupe members, the only difference was nobody had ever seen Gon fight Chrollo at this level.  They had also never seen Chrollo use his nen whilst fighting Gon.