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.

mental energy his mind had bloomed across two

He focused.

ounce of physical energy

grinned in amazement

Rui's sheer focus. It grew by the second, pouring onto him from

strong

Nel wanted to know.

savage

the

no one could

could draw their eyes

the supervisor commenced the

RUMBLE

force with which Nel had launched himself sent tremors across the

as he launched a wild

WHOOSH

into a feint, hitting

BAM!

from the side, but Nel simply

POW POW POW

having calmly mitigated the strikes with Inner Divergence, Elastic Shift and

he couldn't overcome the combination of two mid-grade defensive techniques as well as one high-grade defensive technique with ordinary

He grinned.

what if ordinary jabs didn't

capable of much

WHOOSH

explosive speed, launching

BAM

he bruised his

long suspected it, but only now had he confirmed that he could not take too

launched another

going to try and tank it

WHOOSH

He used Balanced Direction and Parallel Walk, to

BAM BAM BAM

launched a flurry

powered with Outer Convergence and

was not

Rui to land a clean strike on a vital, and when defended, his defense was too

"Tsk." Rui retreated.

attacks aren't doing

WHOOSH

the help of Primordial Instinct,

Or so everyone thought.

charged at him with a punch,

BOOM!!

clash shook

at the sheer display

max with Balanced Direction and Parallel Walk, and launched

Nel's fist hadn't

five Apprentice-level techniques with his

The boys furiously fought.

Fists were exchanged.

Kicks were dodged.

Attacks were endured.

And defenses were sieged!

speed were lower than Nel's. A symmetric battle

up with Phantom Step and Primordial

than his speed did, and allowed him to land