Ultimate Cocky Fighter: A LitRPG Wuxia Comedy Adventure, page 1
Ultimate Cocky Fighter
A LitRPG Wuxia Comedy Adventure
Konrad Ryan
Copyright © 2024 by Konrad Ryan
All rights reserved.
No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.
Fair Use and Originality Disclaimer
This work is a product of the author's creativity, intended for entertainment and parody. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or real events is purely coincidental and should not be taken seriously. The characters, settings, and storyline are original and not derived from any other works in any meaningful capacity—any similarities are purely for humor.
I don’t make enough money; please don’t sue me.
Any references to existing works, brands, or entities are made in the spirit of parody, without any intent to infringe on rights.
Contents
Chapter 1 - Nuclear Beginnings
Chapter 2 - World 422, Fighterth
Chapter 3 - The Duel
Chapter 4 - The Lawman
Chapter 5 - Wuxia Cores
Chapter 6 - Lawmen and Robbers
Chapter 7 - The Mosquito God and the Hidden Fist
Chapter 8 - Bling Kong
Chapter 9 - Cultivating Ki
Chapter 10 - The Wild Bull
Chapter 11 - Goblin King Squelch
Chapter 12 - Snares
Chapter 13 - Esmerelda
Chapter 14 - The Momma Maker
Chapter 15 - The Cove of Masters
Chapter 16 - Masters and Pensions
Chapter 17 - The Heroes of Ages
Chapter 18 - The Side-Chick of Ages
Chapter 19 - Paperwork and Codpieces
Chapter 20 - The Ultimate Cocky Fighter
Chapter 21 - Sir Weston Flex
Chapter 22 - Tar Dragon and the Hidden Lord
Chapter 23 - The Tournament of Brandons
Chapter 24 - The Stolen Fight
Chapter 25 - Loot, Gratitude, and Grand Finals
Chapter 26 - Knights and Swords
Chapter 27 - Storming the Castle
Chapter 28 - Sir LanceOccasionally
Chapter 29 - Excalibur Awakened
Chapter 30 - Seven Intelligence
Chapter 31 - Darkscalibur
Chapter 32 - Checkboxes
Chapter 33 - The Power of a Scream
Chapter 34 - Mechanics
Chapter 35 - The Calendar Knights
Chapter 36 - Dark Brandon
Chapter 37 - Codpiece
Chapter 38 - The Double Class President
Epilogue
About the Author
Also by Konrad Ryan
Chapter 1 - Nuclear Beginnings
Dick Tater sat in his enormous office behind his miniature, minuscule desk. He was surrounded by giant marble statues of himself, placed and posed exactly for the purpose of this photo shoot. The desk was so small that his feet barely fit beneath it. His knees seemed gangly and monstrous as they jutted over the top.
The desk itself had been a gag coronation gift from the President of the United States of America after Tater’s successful coup of the small country You’veneverheardofitstan.
The original inscription might have been sanded away, but it was still seared on his soul.
“A tiny desk, for a tiny Dick-Tater.”
Everyone at the coronation had had a great, big laugh at his expense. His pride pricked with every scornful sneer. The inscription was long gone, sanded off within minutes of being alone with the desk. But now…. Now everything was ready.
He’d had the desk modified.
He sat giggling darkly, in the dark, all by his-
“Your darkness!” His butler-photographer said, alarmed, “Are you really going to press it?”
Dick Tater might only be five-foot two, but there was nothing tiny about the giant red button that he’d installed right where the sanded-off inscription had been. There was nothing tiny about the massive array of nuclear warheads, forty-four thousand, four-hundred and forty-two of them, to be exact.
He’d wanted the number of warheads to be all fours, and in the official transcripts it was, but they’d under ordered the plutonium they needed by two. If pressed, every single missile would launch with the tiniest twitch of his finger.
The pleasure of controlling the very fate of the world rolled through him. “No, I’m not going to press it. We’re just going to make the president sweat!” Dick Tater said condescendingly, turning his chin, setting his face. “We’ll teach him to mock Dick Tater!”
“Take a few more from this angle. Then post them! And be sure to tag the president! After that we’ll go on live, and we’ll make him rue the… the… Achoo!”
Wooop, Wooop, Wooop! Red light flashed all around.
“Sir!”
Dick Tater looked down in horror and shock.
The button was depressed.
In the background, he could hear the missiles firing. A constant barrage of endless rocket sounds.
“Umm…” Dick Tater laughed nervously. “Oops!”
Zane Shields sat in 7th period, near the end of a hot and sweltering day.
“Zane Shields, would you report to the gymnasium? Zane shields, report to the gymnasium.” He gave Mr. Kawasaki a questioning look, who only shooed him out the door with the wave of his hand, not meeting his eye.
What on Earth was this about? Zane thought as he made his way through the empty school halls. The doors to the gymnasium stood closed, but they blasted open off their hinges as he approached, smoke hissing from the blast. He flung his arms up to block any shrapnel and then stood, heart pounding. What was going on?
He crept into the gymnasium, where he saw three silhouettes looming in the darkness, arms folded.
Bright white lights blazed on, and there stood three figures. The first was the principal of the highschool, standing tall and proud in his tweed suit, bald head and glasses both shone in reflected light. “Zane Shields, we’ve been waiting for you.” He stood behind Bosco, the school janitor, who had his mop at the side of his waist, one hand rested on his utility belt, the other hand on the mop-hilt, like he was about to draw it like a sword. And behind the two, stood a third figure. Mr. Kawasaki himself. He’d somehow beaten Zane down here. No wonder he hadn’t met his eye.
“It’s an ambush!” Zane leapt forward, pointing at the three of them.
Mr. Kawasaki chuckled darkly. “We’re tired of your antics, Zane. Tired of your constant fights and trips to the principal's office. Tired of you wasting all of our time. Tired of that stupid fist-shaped birthmark next to your right eye.”
Zane gasped, touching the very spot. “That’s my third fist! My best feature!”
The principal ignored him. “We got together, us three, and decided we’re going to squish you once and for all!”
Zane cocked his head and then laughed. “Really? You’re going to fight me? The principal, a teacher, and a janitor?” He couldn’t believe it. His hand drew up of their own accord, balling into fists.
In a surprise move, the principal threw his arms down by his side and screamed for all he was worth. Zane cocked his head, paying close attention. His tweed suit rippled, a visible aura of wind swirling around the Principal. His scream heightened and his jacket exploded off his form, revealing towering and rippling muscles. His eyebrows grew longer, down and down, across his face, stretching to the floor like curtains.
“You’ve been working out!” Zane yelled.
The janitor leapt forward. “You’re mine!” With the twist of his wrist, he free’d the hidden blade within his mop, and slashed to cut Zane in half.
Zane did a back-handspring to dodge and started laughing like mad. “Mop swords!” He laughed, sprinting forward. He slid on his knees, leaning all the way back, sliding just beneath Bosco’s next lightning strike, the metal edge of the blade shaving off some of Zane’s spiky red hair. Springing up, Zane leapt, smashing his forehead into Bosco’s nose, sending him reeling. Zane spun on his toes, in a 360 spin, a motion of perfect grace, his most-practiced and signature attack. His heel caught Bosco’s temple. Bosco shot to the side of the gymnasium, smashing into and crumpling the bleachers.
His heart thumped in his chest like mad as he looked at his foot, still hanging in the air before him in shock. He’d never done it so perfectly! And the damage!
The principal’s eyebrows stopped growing. They now reached all the way to the floor. In a smooth motion, he slipped his right arm beneath the eyebrow-curtain and flipped the whole mass back and over his head. “Now that I’ve restored the hair of my youth,” he roared, “I’ll defeat you once and for all!”
“That’s not hair!” Zane yelled, pointing. “That’s an eyebrow comb over!”
“It’s hair!” The Principal insisted, “and it will be your undoing!” With a snap of his muscled neck, the principal’s eyebrow hair shot forward, snaking Zane’s leg and pulling it out from under him. The principal yanked his neck back, pulling Zane straight into his tremendous fist. For a second the whole world blacked out. Zane completely tumbled backwards from the attack, the hair-restraint unraveling from his legs. He landed face-down, like a cat, on his fingers and toes just in time to flip sideways away from a high-heel smash from the principal that left a crater in the center of the gymnasium floor.
Zane leapt to his feet, looking at the crater. “Holy crap! That would have killed me!”
“That’s the point, you moron!”
Zane blocked a huge overhand right from the principal. “You’re supposed to be an educator! You can’t call a student a moron!”
“You can if he’s a moron!” the principal thundered.
Zane leapt forward, grabbing the back of the Principal’s head in both hands and leapt, smashing it straight into his knee with full force.
The principal stumbled backwards, dizzy from the blow. Mr. Kawasaki leapt into the fray from the side, preventing Zane from pursuing the wounded Principal. Mr. Kawasaki’s fists and feet struck out swiftly in claws, kung fu - tiger stance, and Zane had to dance away from the deadly grasps and kicks. Mr. Kawasaki dashed forward, his fist blazing, but Zane leapt up and over the fist in a front somersault, landing with his legs wrapping around Mr. Kawasaki’s neck. He pummeled blow after blow, knocking his face left and right, his neck stretching this way and that with every blow.
Mr. Kawasaki fell to the ground, unconscious.
Zane stood panting. “When the heck did you guys get so strong?”
The principal stood tall, on firm legs. “Every time you’ve ditched a class, the three of us gathered here in the gymnasium after school, and trained.”
Zane’s jaw dropped. “You guys must be so strong.”
The principal threw his hands down by his side and laughed. “We are! You might have beaten the janitor, and my trusted right-hand teacher, Mr. Kawasaki, but you’ll never defeat me! I trained harder than them all” He started screaming once more, at the top of his lungs, and his form swelled, growing bigger, filling the entirety of the gymnasium. Rubble fell from the ceiling as Zane dodged this way and that. The principal grew to the size of a giant. He threw a massive strike, a punch that glowed like a meteor as it raced down from the sky. Zane ran forward to meet him and leapt over the punch. Faster than a flash of light, Zane dashed up the length of the principal’s arm, his fist glowing in golden flames. He threw a huge punch right into the center of the principal’s forehead.
The principal’s head rang like a bell.
Like class was dismissed.
Zane landed, and he looked around for the sound.
Where was the ringing coming from?
The illusion broke as Zane’s eyes snapped open. Everyone had already fled the classroom. Mr. Kawasaki was nowhere to be seen. Zane’s heart still pounded like mad. “Oh, man… was that just a dream?” He stood up, blinking heavily, and for a moment just stood there, bracing himself on his desk. He felt… strange. He grabbed his backpack and headed out of the classroom and down the hall, into the busy crowd of students.
He walked past the gymnasium where he glanced in. The principal was inside, talking with Mr. Kawasaki and the janitor. And then he stopped. Dead in his tracks.
They were training.
His heart pounded in his chest as he retraced his steps.
He had the feeling that if he went in there, and raised his fists to them…
That it might happen. The fight might happen for real.
Zane dropped his backpack and strode into the gym.
The three men looked up, bewildered, their conversation cut short.
Zane brought up his arms, in a Muay Thai fighting stance, fists raised almost to his forehead, elbows high, light on his feet.
“What are you doing, young man?” The principal asked, aghast.
“You can’t trick me. I ditched two classes today.” Zane blinked heavily, tight in the grip of the fervor of the dream. His fists loosened, dropping slightly. “Aren’t you training to defeat me?” His voice was intense, full of eagerness.
The three men blanched, faces going pale at the thought of fighting. The principal stepped forward hesitantly, one hand held up in alarm. “Mr. Shields, are you on drugs?” He turned to Mr. Kawasaki, speaking in a whisper. “Go call security.”
Zane shook his head, wiping a hand across his face. It came back soaked in sweat. He shook his head. “No, no… my mistake.” He turned and ran out the side gymnasium door, leaving his backpack behind.
Zane’s feet took him to the mall.
He felt strange. A deep yearning hung heavy in his chest.
That dream… It had been so real.
Well, besides the mop sword. And Mr. Kawasaki knowing tiger stance. And the principal's eyebrows growing to the floor and becoming a comb-over. And the principal breaking through his clothes. And the principal being shredded like a professional wrestler. And the principal growing larger than life, to try and crush Zane like a bug…
But besides that, it felt so real. The fighting. The enjoyment.
He’d never felt anything like it.
As he’d stood before the three from his dream, he’d really wanted to fight the principal and Mr. Kawasaki. He wanted to jump into a wild battle with the janitor and let his fists fly. He’d wanted it to be as epic as it had been in his dream.
He didn’t understand why he felt this way, why he always felt this way. He wanted to fight! He got into more fights than anyone he knew! Why was he born this way when most people recoiled at the idea?
He sighed deeply as he walked through the mall entrance door. The air conditioning rolled over him and his sweat felt like icicles rolling down his back. Even though it had been a dream, he had the after-battle chills. He went to the coldest place he could find, to weather them, to intensify them. He turned right into a small grocery store and headed for the frozen food section.
Some days, he cursed that he was born in the modern day, where fighting and causing a ruckus was frowned upon. Whoever thought taking growing boys and shoving them in a box for twelve hours a day was normal? Zane had always gotten jumpy at school, bouncy. And more than anything else, he loved, loved, loved to fight!
He always had.
He made it to the ice cream section and opened the door, shoving his head in between a tub of vanilla and a pint of rocky road.
“Excuse me.” A shrill voice called from behind. “I need to get in there.”
Zane handed the lady a caramel turtle ice cream without looking.
“Excuse me!” She repeated, then making a chirp of annoyance, then turned on her heavy heels, likely to go fetch a manager.
Zane gave a deep and weary sigh, watching her retreat. It wouldn’t do to cause a scene in the mall. What was he going to do? Fight the grandma?
She’d fling the turtle ice cream at his back. He’d spin, kicking it out of the air. She’d pull out her knitting needles and stab wildly. Zane would dodge this way and that, and slam his fist into her face. Victorious!
Zane laughed at the thought, but the feeling died quickly. It would get him sent to Juvie again for sure. And worse than that, it wouldn’t be a fight at all. She would scream, cause a scene, and he’d look like a mega jerk.
He pulled his head from the ice cream door and strolled lazily through the aisles with his hands in his pockets.
Something caught his eye. A man, young, perhaps 16, no 18? Maybe even his age, Zane couldn’t tell. He was a good looking guy with wavy hair, sandy in color, and he was tall. He’d have a good reach. His eyes were closed, but it was none of those things that caught Zane’s attention. It was his fists. In his left hand he held a small turkey, wrapped up tight with netting, its flesh pushing out through the little squares. His other hand was clenched into a fist, which he threw straight at the turkey.
Zane watched, entranced.
This boy stood tall… shadowboxing the turkey.
Simultaneously, the teen threw a right uppercut toward the turkey, and phasing his neck sideways as if trying to dodge the turkey’s reprisal blow. Then he did it again, this time rolling his shoulder and throwing a right hook while fading his head back and to the right, turning away from an invisible attack. A third time he threw a straight right, while he leaned his head back, as if dodging by inches.
“What are you doing?” Zane asked, interested.
The boy’s eyes popped open, light blue behind silver glasses. They focused on Zane and took him in, in a way that few people did. Zane knew instantly this boy was like him. He was a fighter.
“Dodging the uppercut, evading the left hook, and leaning back from a right straight.”
Zane nodded. “I got that much, but why are you doing it holding a turkey? Does it help?”
