HEARTBREAKER'S HOTEL - A River City Story

On the second floor of River City's most luxurious coffee shop, Famous Coffee,
there has been known to be several apartments and offices for rent. In 202X, a
famous and retired Interpol agent came back to the city and bought the offices
and apartments there, as well as Famous Coffee. Retaining the staff on his own
payroll -- considering they would appreciate a smooth transition of power and
that they would continue to run the business effectively if they kept the same
managers and raised pay -- he then set out to turn the offices into his own
dojo.

This man, on a stormy night, was currently locked in the dojo, and locked in a
fight with one of his fellow teachers.

The windows of the dojo crackled with lightning, though it never once was flashing
from the outside; rather, the fight inside was the intense show of light, as if
the two foes were locked in a supernatural battle.

In short: Just another night in the Dojo of the HEART∞BREAKERS' HOTEL.

Indeed, with every strike, flares of red, gold, and green light surged across the
tatami floormats.

Left hook. Right hook. He took a punch to his solar plexus; the blow knocked the
wind out of him, and his assailant took the initiative. She swept his legs with
a low kick, then deftly pivoted to her hands and heel kicked his diaphragm. As
he flew back, he righted and flipped in the air, rebounding with a shockwave --
the famed Acro Circus of old -- and rotated, uncurling with a flash of golden
light and a cry of "Thunder Shoot!"

With fury, he brought the leg down, only for her to catch it in a palm. Her
jade hair seemed to sparkle in the dim candlelight of the dojo floor as she gripped
the leg at the shin and spun around, grabbing with her free hand.

"Daisetsuzan... Oroshiiiii~"

With a mighty hammer swing, she tossed him across the tatami mats, and he landed
on his hands right at the edge. He performed a handstand, precariously balanced
as he was, and sprung back into the middle of the mats, charging at her. She
met his charge in kind, the two of them connecting their hands together, locked
eye to eye.

With a growl, he headbutted her, and she met again in tandem. A trickle of blood
ran down his face; her own shimmered like static.

Her lips barely curled as she spoke.

"You... idiot. THIS was a FIRST BLOOD match."

Her eyes looked up.

"I'm not the one bleeding."

His own face fell into shadow, the trickle of blood staining slightly. He chuckled.

They let go of each other's hands, and he reached into his yoga pants' pocket. As
he pulled out a handkerchief to wipe away the blood, she stepped away, her own
yoga pants barely holding on with the sway of her hips, almost catlike in tread.

"Damn, I cannot believe it. I didn't bring down your camoflage even once, Recca,
you know that's not fair!"

She stopped as she stepped off of the mats, the bare back of her swimsuit-like
top showing pale peach flesh suddenly shimmer again like static, giving way to
slightly glossy porcelain skin, segmented in panels along the spine until coming
to a raised hump of plastic on the back, perfectly nestled at the base of the
spine and coming to a point at the crack of her ass, now revealed to be segmented
over whirring mechanical joints, the pants holding just barely. Her head turned,
now pale porcelain itself before seams across the back and front lit with a green
light in tandem, fizzling projections of shoulder-length neon green hair bobbing
behind her as holographic eyes and lips gave a secret smile, coy and playful.

This man was the renowned Ninja Slayer, "HEART∞BREAKER" Charles Finley, and the
now mechanical marvel before him was once the epitome of modern *karakuri*, the
Anti-Slayer Fighter "RECCA" project created by Charles' nemesis, the dreaded and
infamous Edward Swanson, "Ninja Ned". For twenty years, the world had been under
untold peril by way of increased ninja crimes, the American families of Ninja
of old giving way to new blood as the patriarchs of the McNinja family mourned
the loss of their best and brightest son. Retiring from the head of the American
Ninja Association, Daniel McNinja appointed a successor who themselves ended up
deposed in a bloody coup by Ninja Ned's Cyborg Ninjas.

With an iron fist, Ned sought no less than domination of the globe, and with his
eyes set upon the greatest of Ninja Treasures, the Twelve Dragons' Scrolls of the
art of "SENDO", the Way of the Hermit, he was sure to become successful. Only
one man stood against him, trained by Dan and his wife and youngest son for just
this fight: Charles Finley, entrusted with the Twelve Dragons' Scrolls by the
surviving heads of the Ninja Families.

It was with reluctance that Ned unleashed scant years ago the "RECCA" project to
defeat Charles once and for all... only for his prized *karakuri* to turn against
him, choosing her own path to success for his goals.

She chose, instead, to become Charles' successor in *legitimate* means. To learn
and one day surpass him as the mightiest of SENDO-RYU practicioning monks, in no
small task an impossible feat by virtue of her mechanical body providing no way
to channel the "HAMON" necessary to do so.

Seeing the task before him, Charles took the challenge, and now found himself
soaking in a hot sauna with the *karakuri* mending his wounds. With the same
porcelain hands that once felt like diamond metal to his body now soft as human
skin, she daintily held his chin with one hand while dabbing a cloth doused with
hydrogen peroxide and antibiotic ointments on the tiny skin lesions on his forehead,
a gentle touch betrayed by holographic eyes overlay over a vaguely featureless
human face. With this, she looked more like a mannequin with holographic details
over her head, but no less could Charles see the tinges of regret in her eyes;
perhaps she thought herself a bit too reckless in the fight?

Just another night in the Dojo of the HEART∞BREAKERS' HOTEL.