The Dancer & The Magician (Hisoka Romance)

Chapter 19: Shots Fired

"I avoid you because you're a self-serving asshole."

"That might be true, but it doesn't change the fact that none of what you got going on matters. Your beauty, talent, intelligence. All the people who desire you. It doesn't change how empty and broken you or your relationships are."

Fuck this. Maybe some of what he said before was true, but this is just spiteful. I go to punch Ging in the face, but he jumps up and out of the way. When I look around, he's nowhere to be found. Suddenly an insane amount of pressure knocks me against my back and off my feet. It's been a while since I've seen Ging use his nen. To this day I still don't know what his ability is, yet his nen has always been strong and beaten me. But not today. I refuse to lose to this asshole ever again.

I get up and see him standing calmly in my doorway. Hands in his pockets. Determined to knock him down, I run at him so fast the ground disappears. Only a few inches from his face, an invisible wall of nen knocks against me. I try to push through it, but that only strengthens it and makes it press back harder. That's fine. The harder he blocks, the harder I'll punch. My hits send ripples through the wall, but little else. I rev up my nen to Ko, concentrating 70% of my aura into my left fist. The rest of my body will be vulnerable, but that's a chance I'm willing to take.

My nen flares up to a purple flame. Cracks begin to form in his wall, but all he does is smirk. He takes out one of his hands, draws it back and thrusts it forward. The force blows me out the backdoor into the grass field and digs my body into the ground like a shovel. Just to think a few minutes ago I felt so soft, delicate, and feminine in Hisoka's arms. Now I'm a crater that's been burrowed into the earth, leaving everything around me in pieces. Birds fly away from all the commotion above me, covering the stars on their way. I watch in a haze as I force my eyes to focus and my body to get up.

"Since you think you've grown so much, why don't you show me?" The force of nen I felt before suddenly wraps around me, picks me up and flings me back into the ground. "Come on, show me." Again and again, up and down, like a ragdoll, breaking me a little more with each blow.

"You think you've gotten stronger without me and you can't even get out of my grasp," Ging says.

He's right, this is pitiful. I look around trying to find him only to see more of the night sky.

"Shame. I thought you could do better. I'm actually getting bored."

Dizzy and nauseous, I try to center myself remembering the flowers' aura I took earlier to repair Hisoka's nose. I wonder if instead of taking the aura, I can move it. What condition will I set for myself? I'll gradually lose sight every five minutes it takes to beat my opponent, and if I lose I'll go blind for a day. That should be high stakes enough.

I look down at the grass rustling in the wind beneath me then close my eyes and open the pores of my hands and try to lift a section of dirt and rock. My hand feels heavy at first, like it'll fall off, but then I try to imagine the earth as an extension of myself and it becomes lighter. I can feel it begin to lift in a whirlwind. I shape the wind between my palms like clay, form a circle. I can feel each stone like they're each one of my fingers.

I twitch my ring finger and one of the stone shoots into the nen wall and its grasp weakens around me. I shoot three more rocks, feel a few dents in the wall and hear Ging grimace. Does that mean whatever harm I cause his nen wall, he himself feels? Good. Hopefully the pain will teach him not to screw with me anymore.

I ball my fingers into a fist and feel the stones close in on me and the nen wall, yet somehow I know the rocks won't hurt me. I feel the nen wall crush and dissipate like bones to dust. I shape the stones into several steps for me to climb down. I can see Ging leaning against a tree nearby and walk over to him.