//------------------------------// // Chapter forty-seven, Neighpon Nitwits: San. // Story: Airship Mauled // by Darkonshadows //------------------------------// -Neighpon Streets, Blade Bright- Where was he? I did not want Flamberge to be wandering around on his own! Scanning the skies and the streets I did not see a sign of him anywhere, but I was also keeping an eye out for Ryu. I only glimpsed him once, but I knew who I was looking for and that he was here somewhere in this city. “You are being quite paranoid about brother? He’ll be fine, he is strong and has a sword that’s always on fire… except when it sleeps.” Yes I know that Fortitude, but do you seriously not see the kind of trouble Flamberge could get into around here? “He may get into trouble, but he can just as easily get out of it.” There were a lot of places here in neighpon that he could absolutely get into a dangerous situation. So long as you didn’t attract attention to yourself like a verbally loud dragon, you’d be fine by staying out of the alleyways for the most part. There were random thugs, the Yakuza and even the police were a bit rough or sketchy at times in Neighpon. The average pony was wary of who they talk to and in what tone around, mostly because on some level all of them worked together in some capacity. The police did their job, but there were some things they were willing to overlook. The only thing they could really frown upon is anything beyond too much brutality. Who knows what danger Flamberge could have gotten himself into? -Neighpon Noodles, Flamberge- “The only reason you’re not dead, is because you’re a friend of Blur’s and you’re not doing this on purpose.” Never got the name of the red fox guy, but he was sure intimidating when he grew to twice his size. He growled at the various vixens sniffing at me or were playfully touching me with their tails. “Girls, he’s an honored customer, get off of him and get back to work!” The various vixens whined and their tails went limp and they all pouted at their father, but they eventually went back to doing their jobs of running the restaurant and left me alone. “Thank you, maybe now I can eat in peace!” Really don’t know what all the kitsune vixens saw in me, but it was obviously something all of them really liked. “No, thank you for not taking an interest in my daughters… all sixteen of them minus the one playing tour guide.” He narrowed his eyes and bared his teeth at me and here I sat just staring at him blandly. “If you come across a golden furred kitsune with blue tipped tails, you are not to give her the time of day dragon!” “Look, I get it, but what I want to know is why they all find me so interesting!” Not that I had anything against kitsune, but I was curious as to why me of all dragons. I was the most fascinating thing in the room for them. “Oh it’s some tale spoken of by word of mouth that is going around among the vixen in these lands, apparently dragons have impressive stamina and potential when it comes mating. They all like the idea of long lasting virility and given how long a kitsune can live for... you’re kind of attractive as an ideal mate in that respect. That and you’ll eventually grow to a large size.” The fox smiled as I felt my face flushing. “Well it wasn’t like you could get any more red, though turning pink is an interesting trick honored customer.” “I am Blur… of this round sphere… multiple ponies personally I hate…” A few drinks in him and the sword stallion wasn’t exactly coherent, but he was still mentally stable enough to eat his food. I should probably go back to the boat and make sure nobody has bothered it after I’m done here. “So… lazy…” -Streets, Skelly- Blade was apparently extremely paranoid about Flamberge being all on his own. I couldn’t see why she was so worried about him, Flamberge was a young and fairly strong dragon that had a good weapon on him. Anything that he couldn’t get himself out of with a sufficient enough force would spell trouble for all of us. As we searched the streets I saw an altercation about to begin down a side street, I grabbed one of Blade’s wings and she flinched. She looked to me and I pointed down the street. There were nine ponies and they were showing aggression towards a quiet looking blue scaled pony with a short black mane his calm orange eyes looked at the three ponies in front of him. He was wearing a golden chain and a strange clothing. They seemed to be talking about something, I turned to Blade who was staring at the scaled pony. Why did she look so surprised? She started to slowly edge into the street the confrontation was taking place on. “Ryu the blazing hoof, he’s dangerous as aloof, watch out for fire spouts.” Oh… well Sweetcakes just explained it entirely. So that’s what a longma looks like, I’ve never met one before. They didn’t exist near where I lived, but it’s fairly obvious to me that dragons and ponies could make hybrids. “So you’re Ryu, you don’t look so tough.” The speaker was an earth pony. That guy didn’t look so tough with two other earth ponies, three pegasus ponies and three unicorns all coming together against one longma. In fact things seemed to be a bit lopsided, I took in Fortitude’s grim frown, Blade’s narrowed eyes and Sweetcakes insufferable grin about something. Blade was about to approach when a golden tail moved into her path and pushed her back. “Don’t interfere with this. He will be completely fine. They will not win this.” It’s nine against one, so that’s some confidence in the guy Sweetcakes. Considering we need to talk with him. “You are making a mistake with accosting me, are you sure you don’t have somewhere else to be? Fair warning, you won’t be able to walk this altercation off if you’re trying to kill me.” This Ryu had a heavy timbered voice, but it was gentle. I think I saw that warning meant that he could take them all by himself. “If you’re trying to scrounge up money, I suggest you go elsewhere and leave me alone.” “Like you could really take us all on!” The earth pony was either brave because of the numbers or really foolish, he raised his left hoof and charged forward to swing it for Ryu’s head. I’d find out if the pony was foolish or not in a minute. Ryu smoothly ducked to the right and walked few steps forward before turning around to face the stumbling hooligan that tried to attack him, he had dodged that attack with relative ease. He tilted his head making a sharp crack and then he rotated it and, after a little hop, he stomped down all four of his hooves and an orange haze built up around him. I could feel a lot of heat wafting down the street and it buffeted us, it was pleasantly warm and it looked like Ryu was on fire. I’m going to go with foolish, numbers didn’t exactly mean instant victory and I had a hunch Ryu was walking away from this without a scratch. One of the unicorns launched a spell and Ryu seemed to blur out of the way and towards the unicorn in a single motion, he brought his left hoof down on the unicorn’s skull and dazed the poor girl. He grabbed the unicorn’s horn with his right hoof and she froze up. With an amazing show of strength Ryu lifted her off the ground by her horn and then spun around in a circle, he used her body as a bludgeoning instrument on the other earth and unicorn ponies. The rear legs of the unicorn sent all the others on the ground sprawling, The last thing he did to the unfortunate unicorn was release her, he sent her flying into one of the winged ponies smashing them against the nearby building’s brick wall in a painful manner. The back of the unicorns head hit the wall hard enough to make it start bleeding and the pegasus took a nasty blow from the impact. In those few actions alone, he had bloodied seven of his nine opponents and the unicorn flail wasn’t going to get up from that and the pegasus he hit with a unicorn body wasn’t fairing any better. The pegasus tried to stand up and Ryu just slammed his left rear leg into the ponies face knocking him out with the blow and now had his back to the wall. Seven on one. The earth pony that started the altercation ran forward and tried hit him, the blow never connecting and his hoof never even came close to hitting Ryu who had already planted his right hoof into the poor ponies face. The next blow went to the pony’s chin forcing him to rear up and then Ryu backed his rear up under him and wrapped his hooves around the pony’s barrel to lift him off the ground above his head. With a leap Ryu raised the dazed earth pony up with his forelegs and drove his face down into the pavement with a sickening crunch resulting in a broken nose and a street covered in red. Ryu then moved toward the remaining four ground bound ponies his eyes darting upwards, he was certainly keeping the pegasus ponies in mind. I noted that while he did seriously injure three ponies, they were still alive and in no condition to fight whatsoever. The two unicorns started to fire magic bolt after magic bolt and Ryu just swiftly leapt forward to the left and right until he grappled both the two unicorns’ horns and then crossed his legs smashing their skulls together. The graphic display of both a female and a male unicorn having their faces bashed together wasn’t enough, as Ryu raised both his hooves and slammed them down on the two hapless unicorns. A burst of flames shot off of his hooves as they connected and the two painfully singed unicorns went down, they were knocked out cold and their skulls were slightly burning. “What is this guy?” One of the pegasus ponies stated with horror. “Someone you shouldn’t be messing with.” Ryu stated coldly. The two earth ponies tried their luck by coming at Ryu from both his left and right. “You should have just let me be.” “That doesn’t, matter get him!” The earth pony was a complete package of the idiot variety. Ryu dodged the earth pony on his right and moved to his left side, he grabbed the stallion and then pulled him into the other earth pony’s attack. While the other earth pony was giving the one Ryu moved a black eye, Ryu slammed his left hoof into that ponies chest and the sound of a rib breaking could be heard as the pony staggered away. Ryu bucked out and caught the earth pony with a fresh black eye in the throat and the pony went tumbling to the ground choking for air before finally falling unconscious. Ryu then grabbed a derelict rusty bicycle and slammed it across the broken ribbed earth pony’s face knocking them to the ground, he then brought the bicycle down on the brute and jumped to stomp down on it with all four hooves. The bicycle broke apart and the earth pony underneath wasn’t going to get up, Ryu at least used the bicycle to blunt the force of that traumatic blow. Ryu’s head snapped the side his eye focused on something and he ducked as a metal pipe swung through the space his head used to occupy. His right hoof rose up taking the pegasus in the belly, winding them and knocked them to the ground. That fiery aura was both off-putting and frightening, the other pegasus had fled and this one chose to attack him anyway? I knew some ancient Viking words to describe the winged pony’s bravery, they would be something along the lines of ‘crossing the river and having the boat sink when you get to the other side, only to be faced with an entire army’. Ryu’s orange haze turned blue as he stalked over to the pegasus clutching his belly, he grabbed the pegasus by the mane with his right hoof and dragged him over to the nearby brick wall. He slammed the pony’s face into the wall three times in a display of brutality and then let them fall to the ground groaning. He grabbed the pony’s left wing, then stood up on his rear hooves and kicked with his left leg. Having a firm grip on the pony’s wing, the body flew outwards and then stopped suddenly with a painful snapping noise. Ryu let the wing go and the pony laid on the ground with his mouth wide open and his pupils shrunk down to pinpricks. “Don’t challenge the blazing hoof of Neighpon unless you have a good reason to.” Turning his back to the carnage, he looked like he was about to go on his way. We started to move towards him as Sweetcakes moved her tail out of the way. “You’ll get burned.” As we got closer to him, I looked up and saw the final pegasus return. He pulled a long sword from a sheath and held it in such a way that he planned to ram it through Ryu’s back. The cowardly attack from high above struck a nerve in me. I charged forward and jumped into the sword’s path and found myself rammed to the ground with the blade sticking out of my chest through my ribs. Ryu had moved backwards when he noticed me coming at him and was surprised to see me pinned to the ground. “Nani?!” Ryu stated as he realized that what happened to me could have been him, only Ryu would have been grievously injured. I was just mildly inconvenienced by having a sword rammed straight through me. I reached up to my back with my right hoof while the confused pony with silver hair and red eyes looked at me with shock. Grabbing my axe, I brought it around and met his skull with the flat side of my weapons blade. The pony went sprawling from my blow, but that wasn't the end of it. Ryu apparently didn’t like that I’ve been run through with a sword, given he grabbed one of the pony’s rear legs and heaved him up into the air to slam his entire body down behind him. Swinging the pony around, Ryu sent him flying belly first into a wall five feet away. The limp form fell to the ground without a whimper. “Separate Cloth… I should have known. I’ll tell my boys to send a strong message to their group.” He turned to me. “Miss are you alright?” I rolled my eyes as I put my axe back on my back and pointed at the ground below me. “Nani?! You do not bleed?” Ryu seemed surprised by that. “Are you Oni?” “She is not an oni. I am not sure what she is. Still, she saved your life.” Sweetcakes walked up to me and one of her tails yanked the sword out. I felt an immeasurable amount of pain.