Sword God in a World of Magic

"Alright, Astor," teacher Loran said. "Go two rounds with Mattheo."

On the side, a young man with long red hair sighed. He had two very heavy and hard gauntlets with spikes near the knuckles. Surprisingly, he was using knuckles as his weapons.

Astor looked at Mattheo and gestured to the side with his head. The two of them had fought many times before. Astor was the most powerful person in the Advanced Grade Caterpillar Class, and Mattheo was the second strongest. Because of that, it mostly fell on Mattheo's shoulders to fight with Astor.

"It would be really great if you could hurry up and become more powerful," Mattheo said to Shang while walking past him with a helpless and somewhat joking tone. "I don't want to spar with that guy every time I come here."

"I'll try my best," Shang said.

Mattheo only chuckled a bit. "You do know that I was only joking, right? You can take all the time you need."

Shang wasn't quite sure how to respond. On Earth, he would have simply given off a polite and small chuckle, but right now, he just didn't want to. It was like it was just too much work.

While Mattheo walked to Astor, Sarah frowned with frustration. She had worked so hard, and she was absolutely certain that she could fight evenly with Mattheo. Yes, she had lost every match so far, but all of their fights had been even most of the time.

As one of the very few women in the class, Sarah felt like she had to prove herself. Oftentimes, women weren't seen as talented warriors by men. After all, the sad truth was that it was harder for women to reach the different levels in the Soldier Stage.

The power one needed to reach each level was universal. It didn't matter if the warrior was huge or small, thin or thick. Sadly, that meant that smaller and weaker people needed to train more than bigger people.

It only became irrelevant as soon as the warrior reached the Peak Soldier Stage. At that point, gender and size didn't matter anymore. After all, everyone would have the same starting point.

Sarah trained so hard and put so much effort into her career, but she still hadn't been allowed to spar with Astor. Sarah was mostly put against the fourth or fifth strongest in the class, which she always decimated in a fight.

When Astor was on a mission, Sarah would get to spar with Mattheo. Those spars were very even, but she hadn't been able to win yet. Because of that, Sarah was certain that she could also act as a sparring partner to Astor.

"Sarah, you go fight with Shang," teacher Loran said. "I haven't been able to properly see his techniques yet since Astor won that quickly."

Sarah frowned as she glanced at Shang. She was already annoyed that Shang was in her grade with a superior body. After all, the body was literally the only criterium that decides which grade someone belonged to.

was literally unfair. That wasn't even a subjective

all, if Shang didn't have such a powerful body, he

people's feelings. He could very well

How did Shang feel?

a bit embarrassed. After all, he was essentially the equivalent of someone that had been held back a grade. They didn't manage to reach the grades necessary to advance, which meant that they had to repeat a year. That person would then

situation gave off

out of all of them, but Shang also didn't forget that he

managed to reach a level that normally only 20-year-olds could reach. On top

was too powerful for this grade. After all, Shang had only had six months

world,

Everything revolved around power.

as he was in the same Realm,

BOOM!

and Mattheo had already started fighting a couple

Mattheo's feet and elbows, boosting his speed. This made Mattheo reach the

an absolute barrage on Astor. With the speed of his two fists and the explosions, he let Astor gain absolutely no momentum. He was essentially barraging him with a storm of attacks every single

far more aggressive than Shang, and the pressure Astor was under was obviously also far higher than when

manage to unleash an attack

that fight. He was essentially being suppressed into a passive state, only waiting

parry or evade an attack. Sometimes, he would push his shoulder forward and receive Mattheo's fist, which he would skillfully divert to the

have to pull something like that

long. A couple of seconds later, he messed up a parry,

that's when

water, and it definitely couldn't hurt anyone. It almost seemed senseless to summon

quickly pushed him half a meter to the

effect was

had caught Mattheo off-guard. Mattheo had just released an attack, and he

that had destroyed his shoulder got used by Astor. He allowed his shoulder

Astor suddenly