Chapter One Hundred and Six — Git Good
Chapter One Hundred and Six — Git GoodI kept my distance from Arugula while I studied him. He was quick on the charge, but not faster than I was. His flail gave him decent range and a lot of power to his strikes, but after the initial hit it was slow to come back and strike again. He was tough too, but that was physically. Mentally he seemed a bit... off. Which I realized was a very rude thing to think about someone and I’d have to apologize once I was done beating him up to teach him how to have fun.“Alright Broc,” I muttered to myself. “Just need to git gud.”I rolled forwards, ended on the balls of my feet, and shot straight up and out of the reach of Arugula’s falling flail. The man roared as he looked up to follow my path.It made it extra easy to land with my feet up on his shoulders.Strong he might have been, but he couldn’t handle all of my weight dragging him back and down. Just as he started to tip back, arms swinging around to try and bat me off, I swung myself backwards so that I was standing almost perpendicular to his chest. Then I fired a burst of stamina into a jump.I went up into the air.Arugula went in the opposite direction.He landed hard on his back, flail clattering to the ground next to him. “Ohh, the little bunny has some bite. Arugula, on his back, prone as can be! But Broccoli isn’t taking it. What is she waiting for?” Zac shouted from above. The crowd was eating it up. I just found it kind of grating.“See how I did that?” I asked. “I tried not to hurt you, and now you’ve learnt an important lesson! This is how sparring should be,” I said.“I’m going to kill you!” Arugula roared as he jumped to his feet. “And when I’m done with you, I’m going to pluck the wings off that bird you were with, and that little blonde one? Oh, I’m going to have fun with her!” My smile froze.Balling my hands into fists, I stomped over to the man. “Mister Arugula, you can’t just say things like that. You shouldn’t even be thinking about them,” I said as I side stepped a vertical swipe from his flail. I reached out and grabbed his wrist. He grabbed my arm with his other hand. “Got you,” he growled.I smiled back. “You sure did.” I bunched up my legs under me and, using his arm as a sort of pivot, spun around so that I was hanging sideways, feet towards his tummy. Then I kicked as hard as I could.Arugula sprayed me with spit as he bent over double. He let go of my arm and let me fall, but I wasn’t over with him yet. Twisting around in mid-air, I landed on my hands, then pushed stamina into them to throw myself back into the air, all while still spinning. When I reached the apex of my jump, I wrenched myself around and shot out with one foot in a sort of horizontal roundhouse that ended with the heel of my sneaker impacting Arugula's chin.The man crumpled.I landed and spun around to bleed off the excess energy from my jump. It ended with me standing above Arugula, both hands on my hips. “Are you okay?” I asked.Ding! For repeating a Special Action a sufficient number of times you have unlocked the general skill: Kicking Combat Proficiency!“Oh, that’s neat,” I said.Ding! Four of your current skills are eligible for Merging: Hopping, Kicking Combat Proficiency, Physical Manakinesis, Makeshift Weapons Proficiency. “World’s tit’s she knocked that man out cold! Arugula the bloodletter is out! And without so much as a drop of Broccoli’s blood spilled!” Zac shouted.The walls went down around the arena and the sound of the crowd, once muted, hit me like a battering ram. I winced, but smiled and waved all the same. It was a mistake, waving just made them cheer all the louder.I gave up on that and instead used a bit of cleaning magic to get rid of the sweat I’d built up and the bit of spit Arugula had sprayed when I’d hit him. I was about to check in the man when a team of sylphs jumped onto the stage and rushed over to his side. They pressed glowing hands into his side until one of them, the one with the fanciest hat, nodded. “He’s clear,” he said.“Ma’am, do you need assistance?” another sylph asked.I shook my head. “No, thanks, my hit points are full,” I said. He nodded and moved over to the others who were tapping Arugula on the cheeks and waking him up.I looked up to see Zac, still talking to the crowds and cheering them on into greater fervor. I needed to have a talk with him, and my friends. “Ma’am, this way,” clipboard guy said as he ran up to me. He none-too-gently started to push me towards the back of the arena. “Hey!” I said. “I wanted to go see my friends.” I pointed to the stands where my friends were cheering, Awen, surprisingly, loudest of them all. I could hear her ‘I love you Broccoli’ from all the way down where I was.“You’ll have the opportunity to see them during the intermission. We can’t allow you to wander until then.”I wanted to disagree, but it would have been impolite, and the next thing I knew I was being pushed into the large waiting room.“Huh,” the large amazon I’d spoken to before was the first to speak. “You made it. And you’re not even covered in blood.”I tried on a smile, if only to hide my bit of annoyance. “I have Cleaning,” I explained before stepping deeper into the room. I was soon ignored by all the other fighters again. After the fight I just had, that suited me just fine. Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.Stepping deeper into the building and past the armory, I found a little kitchenette area at the back. It was a little rude to just use someone else’s kettle, but I had a bag of tea on me still and I could really use a moment to calm down. So I set some water to boil atop a little rune-powered stove in one corner and sat down to think.First, the fight. For all that it had been violent, and a little scary, it was also fun. Was I becoming some sort of adrenaline junkie? Nah, that couldn’t be. It was just some normal fun, like sports but a bit more physical. I shook my head and looked at my notifications. You have two Merge Skills available. Way of the Killer Bun — Hopping, Kicking Combat Proficiency, Makeshift Weapon’s ProficiencyWay of the Mystic Bun — Hopping, Kicking Combat Proficiency, Physical ManakinesisThose... both sounded kind of cool. I frowned and tried to bring up more information about them, but got nothing for my efforts. The kettle started to whistle so I pulled it off and poured the tea into a cup I’d snatched from a cupboard. It tasted pretty good once I’d blown it cool.So, two merge skills. And I could only pick the one? I’d be losing some skills, but Amaryllis had said that merged skills generally retained a bit of their earlier skills... skillness. I needed more words for skill related stuff. HoppingRank C — 100%The Ability to hop. Your reflexes and timing for hops has increased. You can now hop higher and farther. You may now expend Stamina to increase the power of your hops.Was it worth it? I thought so. Picking from the two was also easy as pie. Ding! You have Merged the following skills:HoppingKicking Combat ProficiencyPhysical ManakinesisYou have unlocked the skill:Way of the Mystic Bun1 Cinnamon Bun Bun Class Skill Point Refunded!Do you wish to place this skill as a Class Skill or General Skill?That was an easy choice too. Into the class slot freed by Hopping it went. I downed the rest of my tea then eyed the results. Way of the Mystic BunRank F — 00%You have discovered the path of the Mystic Bun, combining devastating magic-laced physical attacks with incredible mobility. “Okay?” I wondered. That wasn’t helpful at all. The cheering from the crowds outside were a good reminder that I was going to be fighting again, and soon. I... I needed to prepare. I downed the rest of my tea, cleaned up my kettle and cup-because I wasn’t some barbarian that didn’t do the dishes-and placed everything back where I’d found it. Stepping back into the main room, I looked around, then walked over to the two guards standing next to the armory. “Ah, hello,” I said.The older of the two nodded to me. “Ma’am,” he said.“Um. If I want a weapon, do I need to do something?”He nodded. “You’re only allowed weapons from this armory in the ring. You need to sign them off with one of us, and return them at the end of the day, or when you’re eliminated. They’re all enchanted to do reduced damage against living tissue. Tricky bit of enchantment that.”“Oh, neat,” I said. “So can I just... go in?” He stepped to the side. “Enjoy yourself.”Grinning, I stepped into the room and took it all in. There were racks and racks of swords, shields, spears and axes. There were stranger weapons too. Whips and flails and tridents. None of them caught my eye as much as the one thing sitting in the corner of the room and collecting dust. It was perfect. A little square, but with plenty of handholds. There was a H-bar at its base acting as reinforcement, and the back had a bunch of straight ribs that looked nice and tough. It was only about waist high, and lifting it showed that it was on the heavier side, but that was okay.I set it against my shoulder and walked out of the door. “I’ll use this,” I said.The guard blinked. “Ma’am, that is a chair.”“Yeah,” I confirmed. “So do I need to sign something?” “That’s a chair,” he repeated.I nodded. “Yep. I haven’t actually tried sitting on it yet, but I’m sure it works just fine.”The guard scratched at his head, looked to his buddy, and after sharing some shrugs back and forth, he pulled a clipboard off of a nail holding it to the wall behind him. “Just sign here, I guess,” he said.I looked over the document, skimmed it real fast, then took the pencil next to it and signed my name in and wrote ‘a chair’ in the right box. “Thank you,” I said before I stepped back. I took my new chair and sat off to one side of the room. I would have to be careful in my next fight. No hopping meant way less mobility. Still, I was pretty sure I could move the same way by pushing stamina into my limbs, I just didn’t have a skill to make it easy for me anymore. I hopped on the spot a few times to test it out, and it seemed... okay?A bit annoying, but I would give it my all nonetheless! I shifted on my seat, then jumped to my feet. If I was going to be bored, I might as well grind some skills while I was at it.It was time for another cup of tea.
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Cinnamon Bun Art Contest!
Welcome, one and all, to the first ever Cinnamon Bun Art Contest! (This chapter will soon exist as a repository for official art as well as a place to show off all the pretty fanart!)Let’s start with the fun part! The winners of this contest will receive the following:First Place: A signed paperback copy of Cinnamon Bun Volumes One and Two!Second Place: Your choice between a signed copy of Volumes One or Two! Third Place: Your choice between a signed copy of Volumes One or Two! This contest will run from Today (October 8th), to the 1st of November!How do you participate? Send your incredible artwork to me via PM on Royal Road or on Space Battles (please use a linkable site like Imgur to post your image) and it will be stored until the 1st of next month! On the 1st, all the artwork will be unveiled to my patrons who will be able to vote on the pieces they like the most, with yours truly acting as a tie-breaker. (Of note: you retain rights over your own art, I have no intention of using any of it for advertising, though the artwork will be posted on this very chapter for the world to see!)Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.A few small rules:
No lewds or overly suggestive images. Keep it PG13. Kissing and hugging and cuddles are fine, but... keep in mind that Broccoli and friends are all still teens.
There is a 2 piece-per-artist rule in place. I know some of you are insanely talented and could probably take all three places. (Basically: One prize per person)
By entering you consent to having your art posted on Royal Road, Space Battles and ScribbleHub for display.
If you do win, then I’ll contact you and ask for a P.O Box or mailing address to send the books to. (I regularly send signed copies to Europe and Asia and North America, so I don’t foresee any difficulties in reaching most participants, but if there is an issue with postage, we’ll figure it out!)
Super low-effort posts, or those wildly off-topic, will be ignored. Good memes will be shared on my Discord.
Winners will be determined by the 5th of November!
Keep warm! And may the bun be with you!
Chapter One Hundred and Seven — Bringing a Knife to a Chair Fight
Chapter One Hundred and Seven — Bringing a Knife to a Chair Fight When I got called up a second time, some of the nervousness from the first outing had left already. I followed a new clipboard person as he led me to the edge of the stage, then stood there while taking in all the crowds. The people were just as excited as before. And If anything, it seemed as if there were even more people packed in together in the stands. Sellers were running around, hawking big mugs of frothy beer and bits of meat on sticks. Copper and silver flashed in the bright sunlight and the entire area smelled like sweat and the sticky-sweet odour of carnival food. A band had set up next to the stage where they began to play a rumbly, growing fanfare with lots of brass and heavy drum beats that made the ground thrum with excited energy. I felt swept up by it. It made me feel lighter, and the weight of my chair on my shoulder was suddenly not a concern. “Got your snacks? Got your drinks? Well hang onto them because we are about to begin the second rounds of our single-elimination tournament!” Zac shouted from atop his floating platform. “On the right, we have the intrepid, the adorable, the absolutely brutal... Broccoli Bunch!” The first time he’d introduced me, the cheering had been lukewarm compared to Arugula’s. Now it was a whole bunch louder and I felt my ears drooping down in embarrassment even as my cheeks warmed. “Aww, would you look at that, the poor little miss is flushing! Good work lads, you finally got a maiden to blush!” Zac said. Laughter rolled across the entire stadium, followed by catcalls and whistles. I was going to have words with Zac. Big, rude words. Objectifying women was wrong. “Annnnd on the left, hailing from the distant Kingdom of the Endless Swells, the sneakiest blade in the night, we have Whispersteel the Sanguine-Eyed.”The cheers were a little weird this time, more roars of approval and claps than the happy sounds they’d been making earlier. Across from me, on his on side of the platform, was a shorter boy dressed all in black. He nodded to the crowd, his cowl bobbing up and down and shifting his dark cloak about. I kind of recognized him as one of the people who stayed in the shadows in the waiting room. “Will our bright and cheerful Bun be able to stand against the bloodthirsty Whispersteel? Let’s find out!” Clipboard guy gestured me forward and I hopped onto the stage. My landing wasn’t quite as stable as I was used to and I almost stumbled a step. I was still able to jump and hop, the muscle memory was there, but the fine precision that the Hopping skill gave me was missing, and I wasn’t sure if I could use stamina to jump super high anymore. Maybe I could, and I just needed to practice? I shook my head and set those concerns aside. I had a fight to win. “Are you ready to die?” Whispersteel shouted as he pointed a very large knife my way.“No, not really,” I said. “You’re very loud for someone called Whisper.”“Oh hoh, the pre-fight banter is starting already and Miss Bunch isn’t pulling her punches!” Zac said.Could the whole crowd hear me? Oh no. “I’m so sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to humiliate you!” Laughter rained down around us and I saw Whisper’s knuckles going white around the handle of his knife. “I am Whispersteel the Sanguine-Eyed. I have slaughtered and assassinated my way through entire dungeons. Fools fear my very name. Who are you to mock me?”I blinked as I parsed that. “Okay, so I have two questions. One, your eyes are actually a very pretty shade of brown, not sanguine. I... guess that’s not really a question, more of an observation. Um. Okay, an actual question then. If fools fear you, does that mean that smart people... don’t?”Whispersteel poofed away. “Oh, and the fight has begun!” Zac yelled. Four mages set near the crowd raised staves and walls appeared all around the stage. I spun, looking not so much at the walls, but rather for Whisper who has yet to reappear. “Die!” Came a scream from behind me. I ducked and swept into a low kick.A hot line sliced itself across my cheek, barely missing my eye.Whispersteel reappeared mid-jump, arm extended in a lunge that had been meant for my neck. Had he not screamed... Whisper landed and aimed another stab down at me, knife glinting as it reflected the bluish walls surrounding us. I landed on my back and rolled away from Whisper’s wild stabs. “Think you’re clever, huh?” he asked as he began to stomp towards me. I skipped up to my feet and spun to face Whisper only to find that he’d gone invisible again. That... was really annoying. A slight shift from below told me he was a lot closer than I wanted. I hopped back, eying the mostly-empty battlefield while bringing a hand up towards my cheek. The cut there was shallow, but it still stung. A bit of cleaning magic would keep it clean. Which also gave me an idea. I punched forwards, hitting empty air, but also launching a tiny ball of cleaning magic that shot across the arena and booped the far wall. “Oh! The Bun has some tricks in her sleeves! Was the chair merely a distraction? Was she a little wizard all along?” Zac wondered.I ignored him and started firing off more and more little balls of cleaning magic, interspersed with flame-thrower like gouts of glowing cleanliness.I didn’t take long to catch Whisper in the effect, the magic splashing harmlessly off of his side. He was running towards me.This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.Eyes wide, I rolled to the side, then sprung to my feet, brandishing my chair. With both hands holding onto the seat and back of the chair, I thrust it toward where I thought Whisper would be.A knife's point thudded through the seat.Whisper appeared before me, a wide grin on his face. “Think you’ll last forever?” he asked.“I last as long as I last,” I said. “This would be a lot easier if we were friendly.”Whispersteel Desired Quality: Someone to fawn over how cool he is.Dream: To make his Mama proud.“Oh my gosh,” I said. “You’re here to make your mom proud?”Whisper’s smile turned a little strange. “What?”“That’s so cute!” I would have clapped, but my hands were busy with the chair. “Is she in the crowd?” “Leave my mother out of this!” he said. I spun the chair, a quick twisting jerk that tore the knife out of Whisper’s hand and sent it clattering off to the side. Lowering the seat, I reached out and grabbed Whisper by the wrist and tugged him towards me while shoving the chair forward.The dull ‘thunk’ of the edge of the seat hitting the boy in the shin made me wince in sympathy. Whisper pulled his arm back, then hopped back on one leg, his face going all sorts of interesting shades. “I’m going to stab you so hard,” he gasped.I smiled back. “Do you want to sit until that stops hurting?” I asked. “We can ask Zac for a time-out.”“Ohh, and the taunting continues! This bun is savage!” Zac said from above.“That wasn’t meant to be a taunt!” I shouted back. “I was worried about Mister Steel. Shins hurt a lot when you bang them.”“Oh, the poor lad! She’s just adding insult to injury!” “I don’t mean to! He’s just easy to accidentally insult!” I screamed back, then I slapped a hand over my mouth.Whisper was glaring so hard his eyes were twitching. With a roar, he charged at me while pulling out a pair of foot-long knives from somewhere under his cloak. I ‘eeped’ and stepped back, dragging my chair with me to make distance between us. Whisper planted a foot on the seat of my chair, halting it in place, then he vaulted over it, both knives held in icepick grips aiming for my head. I dove forwards, tipping the chair to make more room as I slipped between it and Whisper, then rolled onto my feet on the other side. A quick turn later and I kicked the chair back up to standing. I held onto it in both hands, moving it from side to side as if fending off a lion while Whisper moved from side to side and tried to flank me. It couldn’t last. At some point he’d remember he could go invisible, or he'd pull out another assassin-y trick and I’d be in a whole heap of trouble. So I jumped forwards, chair spearing ahead so that all four legs poked towards Whisper. Whisper spun around the blow and stabbed out with one arm. I pulled the chair back and twisted it so that his arm passed between the bars at the back. Twisting it more had his arm pulling up at an awkward angle, and just like that, Whisper was open.I slapped him.The sound echoed out across the arena.Whisper touched his cheek, then looked up to me with a look between anger and confusion. “You slapped me?”“Sorry?” I said.Tears started to appear in his eyes even though he was trying hard to blink them away. I swallowed. Was, was I a bully now? “I’m so, so sorry,” I said. I carefully helped him move his hand out from the bars of the chair, then pulled Whisper into a hug. “It’ll be okay, don’t worry. I, I didn’t mean to hurt you.”“Don’t, don’t hug me!” he said.“Shush now, I’m sorry. I’ll make it up to you. Um. I can forfeit and you’ll win. Would that make you feel better?” “No, no it wouldn’t.” I tsked. “Look, we can end this, and we’ll find your mom. I’ll tell her that you were super cool, okay?” I pulled back a little and set the chair to one side, then plopped myself down on it before patting my lap. “Did you want to sit and talk about it?” “World almighty!” Zac said in a whisper that carried across the arena. “She’s not just taking the boy out, she’s destroying him!”I huffed and pouted up at Zac. “I’m not destroying anyone. I’m not a bully. I’m not! I said I was sorry already, and I’ll make up for it!” “I don’t need your help!” Whisper shouted.“... Are you sure?” I asked.Whisper tossed his knives to the ground and stalked off towards the edge of the stage in a huff. “I’m done,” he said. “I can’t do this.”I raised a hand reaching out to try and grab him, but my attempt was cut short when the shields went down around the arena and the crowd broke out into confused cheers.“She did it! She did it! The bun completely broke that man’s will to fight! How on Dirt did she do that? And will she be able to repeat it? We’ll have to find out in the next round, because she is moving on!” I slumped a little, even as the crowd’s fervour grew louder. Sighing, I picked up my chair and walked off the stage. “Here,” I said as I pushed it into the clipboard guy’s hands. “I’m going to go see my friends,” I said.I could really use a pick-me-up. Some banter with Amaryllis, some smiling with Awen. Maybe a hug or two. Oh, and a cup of tea. Yeah, I needed a pick-me-up, and I knew that after this part of the tournament there would be some puppetry shows and fireworks and other spectacles to watch. That would certainly work to get my mind off of fighting for a bit.I think I decided that tournaments just weren’t for me. They were too emotionally draining.
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