The territory went into preparation mode. The war naturally scared the heck out of everyone, but then they remembered they had strong soldiers in the midst.
Even before the war, in fact, there was a training area built, started by Ryan's father. It was like the seed form of a budding barracks.
With the arrival of Minko and the others, this had been polished and now, half a day before the war, they were training the guards and the citizens to be able to defend themselves well.
"May I join?" Gwen asked, looking gorgeous and fortunately without a spear. Gwen stood next to Ryan, looking pretty and petite.
In fact, Gwen was not even 5'3" in height, which was below average even for women in Terran. People just tended to forget because of her high heels and massive personality.
Her appearance made Ryan blush a bit, but her words made him pale. His eyebrows furrowed and he looked at her with disapproval. "Gwen? You—"
"I want to fight too."
After their first encounter, they entered a texting/online dating phase for the next few months. Ryan was always on missions after all and oftentimes could not be contacted at all.
There were times when Gwen offered to go to him, but their schedules just never seemed to meet. This went on until that fateful mission where they believed they would never see each other again.
Sometime during this correspondence, Gwen vaguely told him her brother taught her some moves, but he didn't have the impression she could fight.
Gwen could see this. In fact, she relished people's faces when they get shocked at what she could do. Of course, it didn't happen often, and she was particularly curious of Ryan's face.
"I can! Really, let me spar with someone my level."
"What level are you?"
"I'm peak of level 9."
"Oh? That's really impressive!" It was Orz, who wrapped his arms around the very reluctant Ryan. "Well, that's great! I'm sure our men here would wanna see the techniques from another land!"
They knew Gwen was from Eden, a country east of where their countries were.
"Peak of level 9, then…" Orz grinned, looking at the guards with varying expressions on their faces.
"You're also level 9, go spar with her."
"Don't underestimate people, idiot. It could kill you."
After a few words, the two entered the makeshift sparring ring.
In Calming Village, they couldn't really detail the rules and regulations so they could only go with the cheaper 'no killing' policy. There was no problem with placing a sparring ring here, or anywhere else for that matter.
The news of the fight quickly spread around (the territory was small, so it spread faster).
Besides, in the last few hours, there had been dozens of people looking for reassurance in the barracks. After all, they were already told the strongest soldiers couldn't participate directly—something about everyone going through the array couldn't be attacked by them—so much of the burden was still on the locals.
Anyway, the civilians training as well as the civilians who came for reassurance had heard of the fight and stayed to watch, some even pulling over some friends.
So by the time the fight started, there was a large audience, filling up the space around the arena with several rows of people.
Mart felt a little shy, while Gwen stood with poise a few meters away from him. Her arms were crossed, unbothered by all the attention.
The people couldn't help but worry about the small woman, especially compared to her enemy who was probably above 6 feet in height.
This included the 6 feet man himself. "Are you sure about this?" Mart asked for the nth time the past 10 minutes.
Mart was a relatively mild-mannered man, but he wasn't weak. He even worked harder than others because he was still young—still a cadet when the disaster happened.
Gwen nodded with a smile. "Don't hold back," she said, "I sparred with special forces."
This made a few eyebrows rise, and—realizing she seemed serious—Mart really didn't dare let down his guard lest he humiliate himself.
Both fighters start with their stances on defensive. Neither of them moving, just circling each other.
After a while, Gwen still didn't move. "You should go and attack me, instead," she said. After a moment of thought, Mart decided to follow her whims, thinking to get this over with.
However, a very swift kick kept him at bay, and he barely blocked it with his arm. It was a clean kick and had he been slower, it'd have connected with his stomach.
The audience let out a few whistles. Orz elbowed Ryan, who was watching in worry as if ready to shield her before she got hit.
"Yow. Stop worrying too much. She survived this long and reached such a level, she probably wasn't lying about sparring with special forces."
At this, Minko's eyes narrowed, some thoughts brewing in his mind. "Where did you say she was from?" he asked Orz, who blinked at him.
Ryan recalled their conversations, "She said her brother's a soldier." There was no mention that he was special forces though.
"So… special forces from Eden."
Sean waved his hands at them, asking them to shut up and watch the fight.
The fight continued and so far their forces seemed equal. Both were sweating a bit as they threw repeated attacks with accuracy and expertise, at least compared to most of the fighters there.
Mart adopted a defensive style while Gwen sent continuous spinning kicks, much like dancing in ballet, but with the force of a hammer.
To Ryan and the others, it also felt very, very, familiar.
"This fighting style…" Minko mumbled, trying to place it. An image of a particular soldier superimposed with the woman, and the realization hit them all at the same time.
They looked at each other, eyes wide. "Boss Gill!?!"