Infinite Realm

Sato, Yato and Seiichi followed the group till they arrived at an isolated basketball court, quite some distance away from the dorms.

Though a lot had happened after the Great Reparation, with a lot of knowledge and info lost, a majority of knowledge and technology survived the war. This was because unlike the Medieval and Classical era where information and knowledge were stored in papers, information was stored in much advanced systems like hard-drives, cloud, flash drives and more. So even after the damage that wrecked the Earth, not all was lost except a few secluded and concealed ones[1]. Information regarding Sports was one such that wasn't lost and as the world settled down, apart from the inclusion of a few new ones, these 'old' sports were brought back. Basketball was one such activity and the Shinjuku School of Engineering and Mechanics adopted this sport into their curriculum.

The location was perfect since barely anyone would bother to come to the court especially at this time of the night. On one side, was Sato's group of three made up of him, Yato and Seiichi. On the other side was the young man from earlier alongside 7 other guys. It was a 3 on 8 face-off.

"Before we begin, I want you to tell me the name of your employer." Yato glared at the young man. He never recalled offending this party of gangsters and so he guessed that they must have been sent by someone. The problem is, he didn't remember offending someone so badly that they would hire a bunch of thugs to beat him.

"My employer? A loser like yourself doesn't have the right to know that and what was that you said, before we begin? There's no beginning or anything that 'we' would do. It's just me and my guys whooping your a**es till you can't walk again." The young man grinned. Though it was illegal to kill someone, it wasn't much of a problem to cripple them and that was his intention.

Yato was angered by the man's nonchalance and wanted to rush at him but seeing the number behind him, weakened his will a bit. He even began to wonder why they were here and didn't break for a run back then.

"Yato, is your conviction wavering?" Seiichi glanced at Yato. "Did your break-up really hurt you that badly?"

"What the hell are you saying?!" Yato barked.

"*Yawns*". The young man interrupted them. He then pointed at the trio.

"Enough of the child's play. I didn't come for such a terrible drama. Men, beat the hell out of them till they call me Grandpa."

A man who looked to be good at brown-nosing and puffery, said to the young man, "Boss, we don't need to fight them all together. Just send only 3 of us. That way these kids won't be able to complain once we beat them."

The man who spoke was actually a man, a middle aged one at that. He had a tough look and despite his boorish appearance, he was quite smart.

Seeing how respectful this man was to the young man, made Yato to be more anxious about his identity.

"Hmm. You do make a point. The three brothers, handle these boys for me." The young man waved behind.

3 men, or rather thugs, who looked to be of the same blood, as their faces had similarities with one another, walked from behind the young man, towards the trio. One could even mistake them as triplets since their age gap wasn't much. Despite so, they all looked older than Sato's crew.

The one who looked to be the oldest glanced at Yato once he was 5 metres away from him.

"Kiddo, kowtow and apologise and I might let you off with only a broken arm." Even as he spoke, he had an ugly grin on his face that was totally disregarded Yato's existence, making it seem like he was talking to an ant instead of a human being but he did have the liberties to act that way. Why? Because the man was quite tall, rivalling Katsuo in height. Together with his slightly muscular body, it looked like he wouldn't need to exert much force in other to beat Yato.

"Cause you're big doesn't mean anything. If you want to go then let's go." Yato snapped back.

"Hahaha. Alright." The man's eyes glinted as he punched out his right arm.

'He's fast.' Yato's eyes widened as he stared at the incoming fist. He barely reacted in time to tilt his head to the left, dodging the approaching fist. Yato wanted to counter back when he noticed an approaching shadow. He hurriedly applied force to his feet, propelling himself backwards. As he did so, Yato saw the middle aged man's sweeping left leg that he had luckily dodged.

"Hmm. You dodged it?" The man stared at Yato in surprise.

'That was close.' Yato thought as he looked at the man in a different light. He had thought that he was an average hoodlum who only depended on his huge frame to scare people but he turned out to be wrong. The man actually knew some martial arts. From his movement earlier, Yato knew that the huge man had practiced some special exercises to utilize his body's advantages properly. Despite having such a hefty phsyique, he was still fast with his punches and kicks.

"What's wrong kid? I admit you got some skills for dodging my attacks but you would still lose to me. So why don't you stop wasting time and come closer?" The man grinned seeing as Yato kept his distance away.

"Yato, can you handle him?" Sato finally spoke up for the first time since they came here.

"... I doubt it. " Yato sighed. As much as he didn't want to say so, he knew the truth better than others. Battling someone with such a huge frame and quick movements was quite hard, especially since it has been long since Yato took his martial art classes.

"Okay. Let me handle it." Sato said as he began to walk towards the huge man.

"Hohoho. Where do you think you're going to?" One of the other two brothers said to Sato as he blocked his path. "You're my target so you have to face me first."

"Move out of my way or you pay in a terrible way." Sato said flatly.

"Hahaha. Third brother, look how that fool is taking you. Don't tell me you would take this while standing?" The other brother laughed. If considering the first one's hefty figure and more matured look, one would guess that he was the First brother and this one laughing would be the second brother.

"Haha. Pay?! Me?!" The third brother laughed with a furious tone. "Let me show you how high the sky is little kid."

The man dashed at Sato quickly and punched out. At the same time, he charged up his left fist to be ready to punch again in case Sato dodges, blocks or gets hit.

'It would be over before you even know it.' He thought as he grinned evily.

"Too slow."

Those were the only words the man heard before he suddenly got knocked out. The last thing he saw however, was a fist in front of his face.

*Thud*

"How..?" Everyone stared wide eyed, well, not really everyone, but instead everyone from the enemy side.

"Kid. It looks like you've got some talent." The first brother said as he narrowed his eyes.

Seeing this, the second brother said "Elder brother, leave him to me. You don't need to bother yourself for this trif-"

"No." The burly man cut him short. "He's mine." A wide grin broke out from his lips as he stared at Sato like a lion mocking it's prey.

"I hope you can keep me entertained way more better than your friend."

Sato replied him, "You don't need to worry about that. All you have to focus on is lasting longer than the other one."

"Haha. Omoshiroi. Let's go."

The big guy suddenly stomped his right foot on the ground, applying an almost absurd amount of force to it, rocketing himself towards Sato.

"Prepare to die!" The first brother said as he directed his right fist at Sato.

"Better than the last one but still not good enough." Sato said as he easily dodged the fist strike before sending a fist of his own at him.

The burly man placed his left hand in front, right between his body and Sato's fist. Sato couldn't remove his hand in time and so, he got his fist clamped by the man's palm. However Sato didn't mind, instead, as if he expected it, he used the man's clutch as a fulcrum and together with the force he applied on his right foot, lifted himself up in the air and delivered a kick with his left foot, right at the man's face.

*Bang*

The burly man staggered 3 steps backwards while grabbing the right side of his face in pain. He slide his palm on his face, wiping his lips, and then bringing it in front of his eyes where he noticed a crimson coloured liquid on his palm.

"You...damn you! I will kill you, I swear. I will kill you, I will kill, I will kill you, I will kill you."

The burly first brother entered a rage mode and ripped his shirts, before dashing at Sato without care.

"Looks like little Mu has gotten angry." The young man smiled.

"It's from here on that the real show begins."