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

He focused.

physical energy his body

amazement

pressure from Rui's sheer focus. It grew by the second,

strong was

Nel wanted to know.

see whose Martial Path is stronger void boy!" He grinned as the savage weight of

of mental pressure the two boys generated

no one could

person could draw their eyes

the supervisor

RUMBLE

had

as he

WHOOSH

into a feint, hitting

BAM!

the side, but Nel simply blocked it, pushing the strike

POW POW POW

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

strong as Nel was, even he couldn't overcome the combination of two mid-grade

He grinned.

what if ordinary

capable

WHOOSH

burst forth with shocking explosive speed, launching a flying

BAM

his arm

confirmed that he could not take too many of Nel's more charged

another

wasn't going to try and

WHOOSH

with a feint. He used Balanced Direction

BAM BAM BAM

launched a flurry of

with Outer Convergence and

was

quick to allow Rui to land a clean strike on a vital, and when defended, his

"Tsk." Rui retreated.

ordinary attacks aren't

WHOOSH

a kick cleanly with the help of Primordial Instinct, stepping back to open up some

Or so everyone thought.

a punch, Rui charged

BOOM!!

clash shook the

the sheer display

weighted strike, while Rui had charged up his momentum to the max with

Nel's fist hadn't backed

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

switched things up with Phantom

him to avoid more strikes than his speed did, and allowed him to land more attacks than his