Author's Note

Felt like typing up a chapter today. There might be some grammar errors, but don’t mind them. I’ll look over the chapter later on.

For now... enjoy!

Chapter 사

The reporters got all the info they needed and went on to talk with other people around the gym, trying to get some extra scoop on their newspapers. I’m pretty sure I’m going be on the headlines, smack dab on the front of the paper that will have uppercase letters and be heavily bolded to make it stand out. If I wasn’t stared at enough here, I’m pretty sure I’m going to be getting stared at and recognized more now. That’s what I want anyways. Got to put out my name and face somehow.

Once that was all done, I was about to go and hit up the speed bag but I’m stopped from a pair of black scaly arms wrapped across my chest. I feel a soft, yet firm pair of orbs push up against my back as a small moan rumbles in my right ear. I freeze in place as I feel my face flush a little. I look over my shoulder to find the reptilian eyes of Kayda staring back at me with lust.

“Did you just m-moan into my ear?” I stuttered a bit with shock. I feel Kayda press up against me more as her scaly hands start to rub around my chest and stomach.

“I sure damn did stud, but can you blame me? After what you did and said? Mmm, got me all excited!” She says with heated breath blowing against my ear, making me even more flustered than I already was. Before anything can be said or done, a low growl catches our attention as both I and Kayda tense up from how deep and low that growl sounded. Kayda let’s go of me and giggles into her hand.

“Chill Winter, I’m only teasing. Don’t get all growly on me girl.”

I shake my head to rid of the thoughts going through my head. I flick Kayda’s forehead for that little stunt she pulled. She yelps out and rubs her forehead and looks at me with confused anger.

“That was for the teasing. Can’t rub up on a dude you just met. The least you can do is buy me dinner first” I say with a disapproving shake of my head. I go on scolding Kayda about it and fail to notice Winter coming up behind me. I see Kayda look over my shoulder and find small smirk forming on her lips. I narrow my eyes at her.

“What are you looking a— what the?” Another pair arms wraps around behind me and another pair of orbs start to squish up against my back. Only these orbs felt a lot more bigger. Already knowing what they were, my face flushes up again. I look over my shoulder and find Winter hugging me as her icy blue eyes are narrowed in on Kayda.

Kayda holds her hands up and backs up. “He’s all yours...” she then pauses for a bit and looks back at Winter with the same look she’s was giving her, but with teasing smile, “for now.” she then walks off to another part of the gym with her gear in hand.

I feel Winter’s grip on me tighten around me possessively and hear her ’hmrph’ out in annoyance. I look on with bewilderment while my face still being flushed red. I scratch my cheek in awkwardness, trying to figure out what the hell just happened.

“Winter?” I call out to the white coated wolf. I feel Winter’s body tense up against me as I called out to her. Taking that as a sign that I have her attention, I continue. “Don’t wanna assume wrong, but judging from how your acting....” I pause for a bit and look over my shoulder to get a look at her and find her eyes averted from mine, shyly looking to the side as a blush can be seen through her white fur. “Do you have feelings for me?” Her hands grip around my stomach as she nods her head. She hides her blushing face against my back, my heart skipping a beat from how cute that was.

’That was fucking adorable!’

I let out a chuckle. “Love at first, eh?” I asked. She nods her head again. “You weren’t like this when we first met. What’s the sudden change?”

She shrugs her shoulders as her face is still hidden against my back. “You don’t know?” I chuckled again. “Maybe it’s just a little crush you have. You’ll get over it.” I grab hold of her arms to pull away from me to get back to a little bit of training, but her grip stays strong. “Ok Winter, come on, let go. I got to get back to some training. Can’t train if your still wrapped around me.” I try to pry her arms off me again, but to no avail. Now I’m starting to get annoyed. “This is getting ridiculous Winter, pl—“

“You don’t like me... do you?” She asked, almost sounding about ready to cry. My shoulders slump down as I let out a sigh. This caused Winter to loosen her grip on, but not let go. She started to softly shake as I felt my back start to feel damp.

’Damn, way to go you idiot! You made her cry.’

I rub the back of my head awkwardly trying to find the right words to say to her. “Look Winter, it’s not that I don’t like you it’s that—“

“It’s because I’m not pretty, right?” She says, cutting me off.

“Well... pretty is an understatement. You’re actually beautiful” I nervously say as I felt my face heat up embarrassingly. “Look, it’s not that I don’t want to date you, it’s just this is happening to quickly. At least let’s get to know each other first, maybe go on a few dates. Then, see where it goes from there, yeah?” I wait for a response, but feel her unwrap her arms from me. I turn around to look at her but I wasn’t prepared. Her icy blue eyes didn’t hold that look of seriousness anymore but was replaced with with teary puppy dog eyes. Her eyes looked up at me and then glanced away every few seconds as she played with a strand of her white hair. My heart stopped every time she glance up at me. It was painstakingly cute that I had an urge to hug and pet her head. But I held myself back and held strong. This was going to be tough.

I didn’t know she had this side to her. She looked so stoic and serious when I met her, and so quite. Never would have I thought that she’d have a side like this. I’m not complaining though, it’s was fucking adorable.

“S-So, what’s your answer?”

She starts to fiddle with her hands as her ears splay back against her head. She nods her head slowly, agreeing to my terms. Before I can say anything else, she speaks up.

“You won’t let Kayda get to you, right?” she asks, glancing up at me, eyes begging me to say no.

“Nah. Kayda’s pretty cute too, but she’s really not my type” i lightly chuckle. “So don’t worry about her” I say, reassuring her. She nods her head, a small smile forming on her muzzle as a small ‘okay’ escapes her lips. I then see her tail start to lightly swish side to side happily. I shake my head and unconsciously put my hand on her head, lightly petting her. “Geez, never would have thought you’d have a side like this Winter. Not that I’m complaining though. It’s very adorable.”

Winter’s face flushes a deep red. Her hands cover her face as the starts to further spread to the tip of her ears. Her tail then starting to happily swish faster behind her.

“Hey, new guy!” I turn to the voice that shouted out towards me and find the old stallion waving me down. “Come over here to show you your sparring partner!”

I nod head towards him as excitement starts to build up within me. “Come on, let’s go see who I’ll be going up against.” I feel Winter grip onto my compressed shirt as she nods her head, quietly following behind me.

Me and Winter stand next to the old stallion as he points up at the guy that I’ll be going up against. “Aight kid, that there is Steel Dawn. He’s an earth pony, which we call grounded fighters an—“

“Yeah yeah, I know all about that already” I wave that off as I look at the silvery coated stallion with a two toned mohawk mane. The old stallion huffs out in annoyance and looks up at his guy. The guy is currently shadow boxing in the ring and he’s a hefty looking dude for being a lightweight. He was slightly taller than me, which meant he had a longer reach than me. No biggie though. But what caught my attention was that he was pretty fast for having a long reach. You don’t find many guys who are fast that have long arms. But as I watched him shadow box for a couple rounds I spotted some things that only a rookie would do. The main one being his hands dropping for a few seconds after finishing a combination. I already knew how I was going to win this sparring match, which in turn made me sigh in annoyance. The old stallion heard me sighing as I can hear a smirk forming on his face.

“What? Getting cold hooves on me kid? Was that all talk that you were spewing out?” he cackles out, further adding to my annoyance.

“Do you coach these guys? Cause if you do, you’re pretty bad at coaching. Not terrible, but just bad.” I honestly said with an unamused look.

The stallion’s eyes narrow in on me as his chuckling stops. “Don’t get me wrong, this guy s’good, but I already know I’m gonna win this sparring match.”

“Pfft, your all talk now! Steel Dawn is one the best I have. His record is 20 to 1 in the lightweight division. He’s goin to—“

The silvery stallion stops what he’s doing and leans against the ropes as his arms dangle down lazily. The stallion looks down at me with eyes that said ‘this is a waste of my time’. Once he’s done looking me over, he looks towards his coach and points a thumb towards me. “This the newbie I’m sparring with?” The old stallion nods his head. The silvery stallion looks back at me and spits down at my feet. This got Winter to growl at the disrespectful action. I look over Winter with a calm smile, which in return to got to relax. He then continues.

“You better be able take more than three hits, if not, don’t waste my time” he cockily says with a lazy look.

I shrug my shoulders. “We won’t know if we just stand here looking at each other” I said with a smile. The stallion ’tsks’ and goes to put on his gloves, headgear, and mouth piece.

Fury grabs a clean mouth piece for me and pops it into my mouth. He goes to put the headgear on but I stop him. I push it away from me and tell him that I won’t be needing it.

“It’s cool, this fight will end in the second round.” Fury looks at me with shock and horror at my nonchalant attitude.

“Are you sure? How can you be so sure?” He starts to worry about me again as a flurry of worried questions start flying out of his mouth. I lightly punch him in the chest to stop him.

“Have a little faith me bro. I’ll be fine, I promise.”

Third-Person P.O.V

A small crowd started to form around the ring, bets being betted on which boxer was going to win. So far, their money was going to Steel Dawn. No bets were being placed on Tatsuo. Many of the different races surrounding the ring were laughing at how over confident Tatsuo was being. Many voiced their opinions, trying to under Tatsuo’s skin.

“Who in hell does this guy think he is? Psssh, I bet this guy will be knocked out in the first round.”

“He probably won’t even last a round. He’d probably get tired first and then get knocked out.”

“This guy doesn’t know what he’s getting into.”

No one was on Tatsuo’s side, expect for the three friends he had. Both Fury and Kayda were loudly cheering Tatsuo on, while Winter silently looked on, a bit worried for Tatsuo. She didn’t want him getting hurt.

“You guys are actually going for that guy? Do you even know who he’s going up against?” A pegasus stallion says to the trio.

Kayda looks at the stallion with a toothy grin. “We know who that is, but that guy has noooo chance up against that stud.”

A dragon snorts out arrogantly which catches their attention. “Doubt it. Steel Dawn has a farther reach than that friend of yours. He’s also faster than some who have long arms like him. Sorry to say, but your friend has no chance.”

Winter has had enough of the bantering and sends a glare towards the ones against Tatsuo. They freeze in place at the icy stare of the wolf and away from her. “Just shut up and watch” she growls out threateningly. Her sweet and shy aura vanishing and a dark icy one replacing it.

Her two friends look at her with fear and new found respect for her as they silently watch their friend’s sparring match about to start. The two boxers stand at one corner of the ring waiting for the bell to go off. Steel Dawn stands in his corner throwing some flashy combinations which started to rile up the small crowd. Flashes then started to go off, catching the combinations. Tatsuo in the other corner lazily hobs from one foot to the other, his arms lazily dangling at his sides. His eyes then suddenly widen as he looks down at his compression shirt. He grips the shirt with his gloves and pulls it over his head and throws out the ring and on a bench where his stuff was at. He sighs out in relief from the tight shirt feeling more freely without it on. Many flashes went off as soon his shirt came off. Many didn’t expect to see what Tatsuo was hiding under that shirt. His body had many markings on him that looked so alien to them. Many thought they were some sort of cutie marks, but how wrong they were. The markings on him were very eye catching, but the three large grizzly looking claw marks that ran across his chest had the crowd talking. Every reporter around the ring started to write what they saw as more clicks go off from their cameras.

Tatsuo impatiently pounds his gloves together, making everyone in the room jump in fright from how loud it echoed around the gym. “Yo come on, sound the damn bell already! Let’s get ball the rolling, yeah?” Once that was said, a the old stallion walks into the middle of the ring. He points two the fighters with open hands and points them to the middle of the ring where he stands, signaling to us to come forward. The two boxers do as instructed and both meet in the middle. The old stallions arms blocks the two from coming any further towards each other. Flashes of cameras go off again as two stare down. Their eyes never leaving each other. The old stallion starts up.

“Alright you two, I want a clean fight. I want you both to protect yourselves at all time. Listen to my every instruction I give you. Lastly, I want a clean fight. Touch gloves!”

Tatsuo sticks his gloves out to touch with Steel Dawn, but he the silvery stallion walks back to his corner. Many ‘ooo’s’ go around the gym as other cheer loudly at the stunt. Tatsuo back peddles back to his corner as he stares down the stallion, nodding his head on his way back. “Aight, keep that same energy!” Tatsuo is riled up now, and ready to rock.

Few seconds go by as the stallion in the middle looks at both fighters. He then backs out from the middle and as he steps away the bell rang.

DING DING DING