Sword God in a World of Magic

"Yes," Shang answered as he slowly stood up.

Shang had always wanted an evaluation from a neutral party. After all, he could evaluate himself only to a certain degree.

And on top of that, Shang had already been given some feedback just now.

His headwound was proof of that.

'I didn't notice such a huge vase coming towards my head. Now that I think back, I can remember hearing the column shake, but I simply filtered it out as irrelevant information.'

'I guess that's the Vice-Dean's way of showing me that I ignored my surroundings. I can get why that is a bad habit on a battlefield.'

"Alright," Soran said as he sat back down in his chair. "Then, let's talk about your sword techniques first. Mervin?" Soran asked as he looked at the older man beside him.

Mervin nodded and looked at Shang.

"Horrible."

Silence.

Shang was waiting for more, but nothing more came. "Could you elaborate?" Shang asked.

"Your movements are fast, but that's it," Mervin answered. "You plan your next strike very well, and you unleash your strike with quite some speed, but there is no after. You fight like you only think about the current strike and not the one after that or the one after that."

"When something goes wrong with your current attack, you hesitate and pause for a moment because you're unsure about what you should do next. In essence, you are planning your attack only when it's already time to unleash it, not beforehand."

"Another thing is that your attacks have no nuance. Your attacks are all very straightforward and honest. What the enemies see is what they get. You don't use feints, and you don't use your sword to manipulate the enemy's perception."

"Lastly, your only goal in attacking your opponent is to kill them. However, that is the end goal, and it can't always be achieved with one strike. Oftentimes, you have to achieve multiple subgoals in order to finally take your enemy's life."

and walked past

bit when they saw him get up of his own volition. Obviously, the youngster had woken up Mervin's teacher

him as he looked at Shang. "Can you take me out

Mervin. "No," he

didn't seem to hold his sword in any special way, but Shang felt like Mervin's

"Why not?" Mervin asked.

of your sword,"

you get rid of my

"Difficult," Shang answered.

you need to

to keep attacking you and shake your balance until I get the chance to

answered. "I noticed that you realize these things rather quickly in a fight, but you don't realize them immediately. You first have to try something before you know that it doesn't

said as he put his sword away again and

become overwhelmed by your sheer killing intent. After all, your attacks very

in a battle will be your downfall. They will notice your very simple attacks and goals, and they will lead the battle into a

block. Then, you attack again, and they block. And then, they attack. Suddenly, you are with

plan, and they will push you

human. You are not using

sword techniques. After all, these techniques are specifically created to avoid such situations. There are attacks that are perfect to use if you feel pressured. There are attacks that are perfectly suited to pressure

these techniques, you will subconsciously already plan against your

for slaughtering beasts, not humans, and a warrior that can't fight humans

sentence, Mervin became

listened intently to Mervin's barrage of

this was what he

Feedback!

Teachings!

was completely right in everything that

hadn't truly fought a powerful human yet, but Shang could very well imagine how such a fight would go