New Dream Adventures of Raven Knight

2017, 07-07

Beaten by a Girl

I am on the streets of what looks like a medieval town or something out of an RPG. It is raining rather hard and I can’t see the buildings too well. I walk for a short ways and then I see what looks like an inn. I go over to it and walk inside to get out of the rain. I am now in the pub part of an inn and it is very quiet. I look around and I see only one or two customers in the room. The innkeeper comes over and asks what he can get for me. Since I feel like I should buy something if I am going to take advantage of his roof to keep me dry I ask if he has anything sweet since I don’t like regular alcohol. He says he has just the thing. He disappears and returns with a mug of something. I taste it and it is delicious. I reach into the pockets of my Assassin’s robes and find a silver piece. The man says it’s too much. I say I’ll be staying here until the rain lets up, so just keep my mug full of this stuff for as long as the silver will pay for. He agrees and leaves as I sit down at a table in the corner.

I haven’t been sitting here for long when the outside door opens and a rowdy group of men crowd through the door. They look like they might be soldiers of some kind, no doubt glad to get out of the rain. They crowd around the tables closest to the bar and order a round of drinks. The innkeeper seems glad of them because he hasn’t had much business. I sit there and drink my drink and watch the men. One of them is huge and cranky looking. All of the men clearly know to leave him alone when he’s like that. I notice that there is also a young woman helping to keep all of those men in drinks. The rowdy men keep trying to grab a feel when she’s not looking… how rude. Finally someone goes too far and she cries out then runs into the back as the men laugh. The innkeeper comes back out and addresses the big man respectfully and asks that he get his men to stop harassing his daughter. The big man says to bring the daughter out. The innkeeper does, perhaps expecting an apology. Instead the big man grabs the daughter and rips her dress half off and starts assaulting her in front of her shocked father!

I get up from my table and call out to him, “Hey, double ugly! If you like picking on girls, why don’t you try me?” The big man looks over at me, his men are staring at me in dumb shock. The man is holding the girl by the arm. I go up to him. I am looking up at him since he stands over a foot taller than me, but I look him straight in the eye with no fear. I tell him to let go of the girl. He asks who’s going to make him. I say I don’t care how big, ugly, and stupid he is, he will not get away with that behavior while I’m around. I take hold of his hand that is holding the girl and use my enhanced strength to twist it until he releases the girl’s arm. The girl runs to her father and they back away. The big man looks shocked by my strength and also pissed off to the point where I expect steam to come from his ears. A perfect target for Ranma Saotome’s Hyru Shouten Ha attack! He starts attacking me and I dodge to the side. He’s faster than he looks, but still easy to read. I insult him. “Your head is too thick, you’re built like a brick, your face makes me sick, you’re dumb as a stick, you ain’t got a dick…” He keeps coming at me, getting angrier and angrier, building up his hot aura of anger. I remain completely calm as I dodge his attacks and lead him in a spiral. We are nearing the center of the spiral… “You’re as dumb as an ox and smell twice as bad!” As his hot aura and my cold one mix I land one uppercut punch that sends him crashing right through the ceiling.

I look around the room as the rain starts falling in through the hole in the ceiling that the big man made. Everyone is staring at me in total shock. I hear a crash as the big man lands outside, his armor making quite a racket as he lands. I tell the men they might want to go check on their asshole leader… They quickly hurry from the pub. I look up at the hole in the ceiling… oops… I hadn’t intended to trash the man’s pub. He and the girl are both still stunned. I say I’m sorry about his roof and I pull out some more silver coins to give him. Both of them seem to have lost the capacity for speech. I ask the girl if she’s ok. A young man comes up from a cellar and looks around, confused. The girl finally says she is unharmed… but how did I do that? I tell her it’s a secret fighting move from the Anything Goes School of Martial Arts. She just has time to ask what that is before I wake up.