The Martial Unity

"..."

"..."

Rui stared at him.

Nel stared back at him.

"You... what?"

"Broke through without em."

"No, surely..."

"Nope."

Rui tilted his head with incredulous confusion.

Broke through to Martial Apprentice without learning a single technique? What sort of nonsense was that?

Rui wasn't even sure what to say to that.

He wasn't even sure he believed him.

Was he lying to get Rui to lower his guard so he could later unveil them?

Looking at his sincere clueless expression, Rui shook his head, this guy was serious.

But wasn't that even more absurd?

"You... What is your Martial Path?"

"Take your stances." The supervisor had arrived, and quickly told them to be ready.

"Heh." Nel chuckled as he crouched, letting his arms dangle freely.

"My Martial Path is to beat everyone up using my body alone." He declared, his aura growing more feral by the second.

"..."

Rui's eyes flew wide open at those words.

For the very first time, he had run into someone with a Martial Path even more obtuse than his own!

"Take your stance." The supervisor insisted to Rui.

"I see..." Rui ignored him, staring straight at Nel with a boundless fascination and excitement.

He just couldn't wait!

"...My Martial Path is to beat everyone up with my VOID alone."

Rui adopted a neutral all-rounder stance, dividing his weight perfectly, positioning his arms and legs to be equally conducive to offense, defense and maneuvering.

"Fuuu..." He exhaled.

His mind went blank.

There was nothing.

And slowly...

He focused.

vast mental energy his mind had bloomed across two

He focused.

ounce of physical energy his

in amazement

focus. It grew by the second,

how strong

Nel wanted to know.

boy!" He grinned as the savage weight of an apex predator oozed out of every cell in

maelstrom of mental pressure the two boys generated

no one could

single person could

the supervisor commenced the

RUMBLE

force with which Nel had

snarled as he launched a wild

WHOOSH

swing crashed into a feint,

BAM!

a powerful kick at his ribs from the side, but Nel

POW POW POW

jabs. Rui leapt back, having calmly mitigated the strikes with Inner Divergence,

combination of two mid-grade defensive techniques as well as one high-grade defensive technique with

He grinned.

what if ordinary jabs didn't

was capable of

WHOOSH

forth with shocking explosive speed, launching a

BAM

as he bruised his arm visibly despite

but only now had he confirmed that he

launched another

to try

WHOOSH

cleanly avoided it with a feint. He used Balanced Direction and Parallel

BAM BAM BAM

a

strike was powered with Outer Convergence and Vital

was not

were too quick to allow Rui to land a clean

"Tsk." Rui retreated.

attacks aren't doing the

WHOOSH

a kick cleanly with the help of Primordial Instinct,

Or so everyone thought.

a punch, Rui charged right

BOOM!!

shook the

gaped at the sheer

while Rui had charged up his momentum to the max with Balanced Direction and Parallel Walk,

Nel's fist

the power of five Apprentice-level techniques with his sheer

The boys furiously fought.

Fists were exchanged.

Kicks were dodged.

Attacks were endured.

And defenses were sieged!

his average offense, defense and speed were lower than Nel's. A symmetric battle was not in

up with Phantom Step and Primordial

did, and allowed him to