A Kickboxer's Submission Lesson

Akino felt the girl’s legs close around her leg and neck until they were firmly locked in place, then began to constrict against her. Konata then grabbed her arm to hold it still, and though it was true she did that part out of order, that didn’t matter much. The legs were the important part, and she seemed to have that down.

The blue-haired girl stayed trapped between Konata’s legs, and gave a couple light struggling tugs in a few different directions just to check for weak points in the hold. But quickly she was convinced there were none, or at least, none that would be easy to exploit. So she tapped out on the girl’s thigh with her free hand. “Very good. Well done.”

As soon as Konata’s legs uncoiled from around Akino’s head and neck, the blue haired girl rolled her neck and rubbed it with her hand. Even if the girl hadn’t applied full pressure with that triangle choke, she still had a nice, firm grip with those legs. If she had gone all out with it, it probably wouldn’t have taken long to knock Akino out.

“Spar, huh? Alright. We can do that.” the one eyed girl said as she stood back up and took a few steps back. “You can decide whether we go all out or not with it, but lets keep the immediate tapout rule. No need to get riskier with this than need be. Alright?”

Akino watched as the energetic girl kicked and punched the air, the excitement for the impending spar certainly clear just form looking at her. “Sounds fine to me.” she said when Konata laid out the rules for the spar, before chuckling at her confident words.

“Careful. Get too cocky and you may be tapping out before you even land a hit.” she said with a slight grin as she put up her hands and crouched down a little bit. And once Konata seemed ready, Akino would start to inch closer to her, before taking a feint step toward the girl to try to lure her into throwing a punch or kick. And if she did, Akino would try to catch the limb and and pull down on it in an attempt to bring Konata down to the mat.

Akino saw the brief moment of frustration in Konata’s features when the girl flinched in reaction to her feints. Though slightly amused she didn’t let it show too much, and remained focused on her opponent, just waiting for that opening to take advantage of. And sure enough, she didn’t have to wait long.

The girl had thrown a hook right toward Akino’s face. Her blind left eye prevented her from seeing the arm fully, but based on the girl’s body movement she could still tell the arm was being thrown at her. Whether Konata had intentionally targeted Akino’s blind side or not was unclear. But if the girl thought it’d be an easy hit just because there was an eyepatch on that side, she was in for a surprise.

Angling her body toward the oncoming fist, Akino sidestepped the punch but interlocked her right arm with Konata’s. And from there she’d attempt to twist her body back the other way while falling toward the mat, aiming to pull Konata down onto her front. And if successful, she’d hold onto her foe’s arm and pull it back to try to apply a simple but effective fujiwara armbar.

“You should pick your shots more carefully.” Akino said as she wrenched back on Konata’s arm in the hold. With the speed and momentum behind the smaller girl’s fist, she didn’t doubt it could’ve had some troubling impact had it landed. Against another striker, that would’ve been much more dangerous. But against someone like Akino, who could turn something like this against the user in the blink of an eye, it was just reckless.

She expected Konata to tap out immediately, as they’d previously done. But to her surprise, not only did the girl refuse to submit, she even threw some trash talk at Akino too! Though impressed by the girl’s spunk, the one-eyed woman wasn’t about to let that little taunt go unaddressed. “You want more? You got it.”

And with that Akino suddenly shifted, attempting to swing a leg over the trapped arm to position herself now straddling Konata’s shoulder while still pulling back on the arm, but now with her hips pushing against the arm to add to the pain and pressure of the hold. This hold was one of Akino’s finishing holds, which she called the Shoryu Kekkai. And if she got it locked in, she was confident it would force a submission out of Konata.