The sound of drumbeats and trumpets blared through the tent as various circus performers appeared from each side of the stage. Some of them were even doing backflips... I was amazed they could do that without crashing into each other.
They soared through the air as if they were bounding on a trampoline. Each member of the troupe wore beautiful, billowing clothing. The stage erupted into color, making it look like an enormous flower in bloom.
“It’s amazing that they can pull all that off without any mistakes.”
“I bet they practiced a ton.”
As I was chatting with Lu about the amazing motions on display in front of us, two men appeared. One threw apples into the air and began juggling, while the other stood off to the side. He seemed to be an assistant of some sort. The man to the side passed more apples to the juggler until eventually, he was tossing a full ten of them into the air.
The audience let out loud applause, but the juggler wasn’t done. His assistant threw a knife over to him, which he added to the juggling mix. He slowly swapped the apples out for knives until he was juggling ten of those too. I couldn’t help but be amazed as the guy effortlessly juggled the knives. It was a real sight to behold.
Just when we thought it couldn’t get any better, the juggler’s assistant reached into a wooden box and produced a set of hatchets. He grinned wide as he waved them toward the audience.
He’s gonna juggle those next?!
The audience began to murmur as the juggler started throwing the knives even higher into the air. He glanced over at his assistant as if to seek the perfect timing.
Everyone went silent. We were all on the edges of our seats. And then...the assistant passed the first hatchet. Then the next. And just as the apples were replaced by knives, the knives were replaced by hatchets. There weren’t as many hatchets as knives, likely due to the weight, but it was incredible nonetheless.
The audience clapped even harder. How could we do anything else?
“W-Wait, is that...?”
“No way...”
The assistant began to set out several small logs that were about thirty centimeters long each. He lined them up in a row in front of the juggler. The juggler walked closer to the leftmost of the logs as a drumroll began to play in the background, indicating some kind of imminent action...
Cymbals crashed as the man threw an axe into the air. It came crashing back down, landing perfectly into one of the logs’ centers. Then, he began to slowly walk sideways, tossing axe after axe into each successive log. When he finally reached the last log, he gave a bow and thrust his empty arms outward. The crowd erupted into jubilant applause once more.
“Wow, talk about intense...”
“Yeah, I thought he’d mess up for sure...”
As Lu and I exchanged a few words amid our applause, the juggler left the stage and was replaced by a jolly-looking fellow on a bicycle.
The cycling man circled the stage, waving to the crowd. First he waved with one hand, and then he waved with both. He rode the bike without any hands on the bars at all.
I was just about to mention that I could do that when the man proceeded to stand up on the seat of his bike, steering the handlebars with one of his feet...which was something I definitely couldn’t do.
Three more cyclists appeared from the side of the stage, all of them crisscrossing as they circled the area. I was amazed none of them crashed. Then, a stagehand appeared with some kind of sloped platform.
Are they gonna jump?
One of the bikes raced full-speed toward the platform. It leaped into the air, did a full rotation, and then landed on the other side of the stage. The other three bikes followed suit, eliciting applause from the audience.
I was the one who’d introduced bicycles to this world, but these performers were using them as if they’d been riding them their whole lives. And they didn’t look like ordinary bikes either. I could see some clear modifications for shock absorption, which seemed pretty clever to me.
The four cyclists began circling the stage again, as more helpers came out with a length of rope. One man grabbed one end of the rope, while the other man grabbed the other end.
Oh, I see. They’re gonna do some bike jump rope, huh? Neat.
“What are they doing now?”
“Hush and you’ll see.”
Arcia couldn’t help but wonder what was about to happen as the men began to spin the rope around.
One of the men holding the rope muttered something under his breath, making the spinning jump rope suddenly ignite.
...Whoa, that’s a step above what I was expecting.
One of the bicyclists rode into the middle and began to jump his bike over the rope as it swung under him.
...Yep, this is what I thought was gonna happen, just with less open flames. Wait, how are they even holding the rope if it’s on fire?
I squinted and noticed the men were wearing some kind of thick gloves. They were probably flame retardant. The rope was probably made of special material as well.
All four of the cyclists were now jumping the rope and crisscrossing past each other at the same time. After a few dozen flaming jumps, they fanned out and ended that segment of their act.
After that, the cyclists did a few more acrobatic tricks before exiting the stage.
“Ladies and gentlemen! Are you ready for our resident strongman, Full Power, to show off his might?! Bear witness to the limits of the human body being utterly stretched beyond all reasonable measure!”
The top-hatted ringmaster cheered through his loudspeaker as the curtains in the middle of the stage opened up to reveal a massive muscular man. He stood flexing in various poses that emphasized his muscles.
...Yep, that’s the god of strength.
At both of his sides stood beautiful women wearing bunny ears.
Wait, no...they’re actually bunny beastmen, aren’t they?
Their outfits reminded me of the traditional bunny girl attire, though. The only difference was they were wearing skirts rather than fully visible tights. I’d remembered showing an image of the bunny girl costume to Zanac when he wanted some new costume ideas... Presumably, he’d gone ahead and made it.
“Hmph!” Power grunted as he squatted down before taking the women into his arms and lifting them with relative ease.
The audience gasped in shock. He hadn’t just lifted them with his arms, they were standing square in the palms of his hands. It was surely an incredible feat of strength to lift them like that, but it was an equally impressive feat of balance for the rabbit girls to stay standing and smiling without falling off.
“Hmph!”
Not content with simply lifting the girls, he then brought his arms even higher and held them over his head. The two bunny girls smiled and waved as they balanced atop his hands.
“Amazing!”
“Wow, he’s so strong!”
Linne and Frei watched the act with amazed expressions.
You two could probably do that too... Though I guess your hands are kinda small. If I use [Boost] or [Power Rise], I bet I could do that, psh... Wait, why am I getting competitive about this?
The two bunny girls were returned to the stage. They quickly scampered off to the side and lugged a huge kite shield onto the stage. It was enormous and sturdy, probably made out of some kind of dense metal.
Power gleefully took the kite shield from his beautiful assistants.
“Nhhh!”
My eyes went wide in shock as Power bent the kite shield with little effort.
“Hngh!”
Power then took the bent kite shield and bent it again! He’d folded the thing over twice. His strength really riled the crowd up, and he responded to their cheers by hefting the shield into the air and showing it off.
As he posed and flexed his muscles, a large cart was pulled onto the stage by dozens of staff members. It was a flat loading bed, the kind you’d attach to a cargo carriage. There weren’t any animals pulling it, however. It was just the cart. It was about the size of a truck bed and had enough space on it to carry a lot. It could probably have carried dozens of people at once, even.
The staffers who’d dragged it onto the stage all started filing toward it and standing on top of it. They bunched up until they were all on it, bringing the total count of occupants to at least twenty-four.
“No way...” I could hear some murmurs of disbelief from the audience. I too briefly had my doubts, but I came to the realization that if anyone could do this, it’d be him.
Just as we were expecting, Power placed his hands on the bottom of the fully loaded cart.
“Hnnngh!”
I stared in awe as he began lifting it off the stage and placed his arms flatter against the bottom of the surface. The full brunt of it now rested on Power’s shoulders, neck, and arms as he slowly brought himself fully under it.
A moment of silence hung over the room, and then there was a drumroll... With a sudden whoosh, Power stood up tall and lifted the stacked cart completely above his head as if he were lifting a weighted barbell.
“Amazing!”
“Impossible!”
“Such power!”
The audience erupted into jubilant applause. Even my children were completely enthralled by the performance.
If each of those people weighs an average of fifty kilos, then he’s lifting over a ton there... I’ve never seen anyone lift that much before... Pretty sure that’s nowhere near the limit of his power either... He might be able to get even stronger. Or maybe he’s actually going all-out for the performance... It’s hard to tell.
“Dad, he’s amazing!”
“I don’t think I could pull that off...even with [Power Rise] on.”
Linne, who was seated in front of me, seemed completely amazed. Even Frei, who was sitting next to her, was thoroughly impressed.
[Power Rise] and [Boost] were spells that bolstered the power of your muscles. A child using those spells wouldn’t be able to do as much as a powerful older man. Linne’s [Gravity] could definitely let you cheat, though... She could easily reduce the weight of what she was lifting.
“Hngh!”
Power set down the cart and began to go through his series of flexes and poses once more.
...We’ve already seen that, man.
“Hngh!”
“Hah!”
“Hooah!”
Frei, Yoshino, and Linne all started making macho flexing poses like Power. I wasn’t really sure how to feel about that, since they weren’t exactly brawny enough to pull it off.
“Hm?”
The sound of drums suddenly filled the stage as Power walked off with the cart in tow. Band members filed to fill the spot he’d left behind. The rhythm of the drumbeat was slowly joined by trombones and trumpets until it all came together in a cohesive melody.
Oh, I know this one!
The curtain came up on the stage, revealing a full orchestra. I immediately recognized the principal drummer. It was Sousuke, the god of music.
After the intro died down, the saxophone began to play the main melody. It was a tune you could really dance to. The composition was a swing jazz song, and it happened to be one of my grandpa’s favorite melodies. The song had been featured in a Japanese movie about a group of teen girls who formed a jazz band together. The song was one of the most famous ever performed by the jazz musician everyone knew as the King of Swing.
As the band continued to play, circus performers came in from either side of the stage and began doing backflips and gymnastic acts to the beat.
It’s an all-women act, and their clothes look culturally Arabic... They’re all kinda dressed like they’re from Mismede, come to think of it.
As far as their torsos went, they were only wearing fabric to cover their chests. Their lower bodies were adorned with baggy harem pants, but the material was partially see-through, allowing the audience to catch glimpses of their legs.
The dancing troupe lined up on the stage. The goddess of dance, Prima, stood in the middle of their row. The dancers began to move hypnotically to the beat of the music, eliciting cheers and whoops from the audience. I, of course, remained silent. I was surrounded by my wives, so there was no way I’d risk making a wrong turn here.
Their moves alternated between hard and soft, fast and slow, switching between flashy and subdued in seconds flat. It was the kind of dancing you couldn’t take your eyes away from.
So this is the power of the goddess of dance... She didn’t look all that expressive yesterday, but she’s sure showing it now.
Her dancing troupe must’ve been made up of very talented women. Some danced in a way that matched Prima’s motions, while others varied their dancing to complement her, creating a whirlpool of color on the stage. It was like witnessing a shifting metamorphosis of artistic expression.
Before long, the dance reached a feverish pitch and everyone in the tent was on their feet clapping to the rhythm. This performance was a collaboration between two gods, so it was no wonder that everyone had been completely enthralled.
We weren’t an exception either. All my kids were clapping their hearts out. So were Ende and Ney. In that moment, I was reminded of just how scary the gods could be.
When the act finally came to an end, the audience gave a resounding standing ovation. Not a single person could remain silent after witnessing such a display. Some audience members were even weeping tears of joy. I couldn’t blame them, since it wasn’t every day you got the chance to see something like this.
“That was amazing, truly... I wish to sing on stage like that...”
“I want to sing there too!”
Sakura and Yoshino seemed the most excited about the performance out of anyone in my group. It was hard to get them to calm down.
The stagehands began moving things around again to prepare for the next act. Sousuke sat up on stage as they did their work, gracefully playing the piano as if to calm everyone in the tent.
...Wait, isn’t that one of the castle’s pianos?
The song being played by Sousuke and the backing band was the theme to a popular anime from Earth. It was a series about a master thief. The third one of his line, as I recalled. Sure, it was jazzed up a little, but I couldn’t help but wonder why he’d chosen this song of all things. As the song rang out, I saw barrels and circular targets being set up along the edge of the stage.
What now? Knife throwing?
I was wrong. It was axe throwing. This circus sure seemed to have a thing for axes.
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