A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor

"Kaya!" Oliver shouted, filling his voice with command, speaking as if he was ordering an army.

Kaya stiffened, expecting admonishment. The voice lashed at his back like a whip.

What followed, though, was a command of the most unexpected sort. "Drop your spear!" Oliver commanded. "You need it not. It's holding you back!"

So connected they were, that Kaya had dropped his spear before he even realized the stupidity of what he'd just been asked to do. If not his fist, then what were his weapons? He only had the sturdy armour on his chest and hands that his father had sent his way, but they were merely for the purposes of defence. They weren't weapons.

As soon as that spear fell and hit the snow, the goblins lost their tension. The only thing making them pause their assault was the vicious tip on the end of that spear keeping them at range. Now their own spears had the range.

The goblin that Kaya had briefly knocked unconscious surged its way to its feet. Kaya surveyed the encirclement that he'd ended up in again with gritted teeth. Merely on habit, he raised his hands up to confront them like a boxer. He didn't realize what he was doing, he simply did it. His body adopted the best position it could to defend itself in response to the overwhelming threat.

The first goblin dash in. It jabbed at Kaya with its flint spear, the sharp point glancing off his armour. It shrieked in irritation at being repelled, but that didn't stop it from throwing more into the attack. Seeing the spear didn't work, it did what all goblins did, and fell to use its teeth, throwing itself right up towards Kaya's face with its fangs sharp and deadly.

It came near enough to bite his nose off. Oliver willed Kaya to move. The boy seemed to be frozen up in terror now that he could see an enemy so close. When they were on his back, he hadn't had to face them directly like this.

Just when Oliver thought that he'd made the wrong decision, the golden lights returned, brighter now, more abundant. They rushed towards his heart, a whole wave of them. This time, when they arrived, they didn't shift. They distracted Oliver from the battle, enough that he didn't see Kaya's extended fist until the moment that it clattered right into the side of the goblin's skull.

It was a crisp hook, from a massive hand covered in tough metal. There was no doubt that the goblin would be left reeling from it. Yet, Kaya's fist went beyond that. There was a weight to their size, combined with his explosive body, that lent it them an incredible power.

It didn't merely collide with the goblin's head, his fist ran straight in through the side of the skull, shattering it on impact, spilling its brains across the floor.

"Holy hell!" Karesh gasped, the first amongst them to react. He knew his younger cousin better than any of them, after all. He'd known there were times when Kaya would get angry, and send the neighbouring kids tumbling, but he'd never attributed the qualities of true toughness. Recently, he'd been even starting to think that he was too soft for soldiers.

Even Kaya himself was surprised. He felt the blood and brains spill over his fist. It was a feeling of the utmost perfection. It almost made his mind white as he absorbed the profundity of the moment. Numerous dots connected all at once. He tasted a fraction of what Oliver had felt for weeks – that zone of terrifying potential, when progress flowed so smoothly.

This was a zone of his own kind, though, related to his own understandings. The very beginning of an idea was forming inside Kaya, and the golden light rushed to congratulate him on it.

Oliver didn't need to do any more. The integration wasn't complete, but it had begun. The slight energy that it needed to get started had been provided. He stepped away, contended, trusting that Kaya would be able to handle the rest.

The next goblin came in, not in the least put off by the execution of the first. Its spear slipped towards Kaya. This time, he didn't allow it to hit. He pivoted on his foot, moving at a speed normally foreign to him, and he allowed the spear to slide straight past him.

Before the goblin could draw it back, Kaya grabbed it with its huge fist, using the goblin grip on the spear to pull the creature in closer to him.

It yelped, startled by the sudden jerk. But by now the attack had already been set in motion. There it was again, another hook, this time from Kaya's left arm, with the same explosive potential as the first. He collided with the goblin's lower jaw, and shattered through it, sending it off into the snow, choking on blood and bone.

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The remaining two were coming towards his back. Kaya turned to confront them with his fists. Without his spear, he was beginning to feel far freer. It was not just that the spear had been inhibiting him, and that it had been a waste of time to train it – it was the opposite. All the training that he'd done had coalesced towards this. He couldn't have achieved it without the training.

The perspective the spear had given him, with the weight that it put on his feet, and the way it begged for his body to twist, it all lent towards his natural talent for his fists.

These two goblins threw themselves at Kaya at once. A proper test. One sprang towards his legs, the other dove towards his face. It demanded a speed that likely only Blackthorn in their group could currently match. Karesh certainly couldn't have done it with his great sword, and Jorah's spear skill didn't yet seem to be at the point where it could deliver such swift strikes.

He hit the two of them with a vicious combination. The first he met with a stiff jab, straight to its wide nose, breaking it instantly. For the second he had enough time to twist his body for a sharp left hook, right to the side of its head, the same weapon that had killed the last two. He finished the sequence off with a crushing stomp to finish off what his jab on the goblin had already started.