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.

energy his mind had bloomed across two

He focused.

of physical energy

amazement

It grew by the second,

strong was

Nel wanted to know.

void boy!" He grinned as the savage weight of an apex predator

maelstrom of mental pressure the two boys generated burdened every

one

single person could draw their

supervisor commenced

RUMBLE

sheer force with which Nel had launched himself

as he launched a

WHOOSH

swing crashed into a feint, hitting

BAM!

at his ribs from the

POW POW POW

jabs. Rui leapt back, having calmly mitigated the strikes with Inner Divergence, Elastic Shift and Acute

combination of two mid-grade defensive techniques

He grinned.

what if ordinary jabs

was capable of

WHOOSH

shocking explosive speed, launching a flying

BAM

as he bruised his arm visibly despite his defensive

it, but only now had he confirmed that

launched another loaded

Rui wasn't going to try and tank it this

WHOOSH

avoided it with a feint. He used Balanced Direction

BAM BAM BAM

launched a flurry of

powered with Outer

it was

were too quick to allow Rui to land a

"Tsk." Rui retreated.

aren't doing the trick.') He

WHOOSH

Primordial Instinct, stepping back to open up some

Or so everyone thought.

when Nel charged at him with a punch, Rui charged right back with

BOOM!!

clash shook

at the sheer display

max with Balanced Direction

fist hadn't

matched the power of five

The boys furiously fought.

Fists were exchanged.

Kicks were dodged.

Attacks were endured.

And defenses were sieged!

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

up with Phantom Step

did, and allowed him to land more