The Martial Unity

POW!

Rui swung a hook only for his opponent to step towards the strike, blocking it with an armed guard. Rui seamlessly hurled an already-wound straight punch to the man's face.

BAM!

Once again, the man stepped forward in the direction of the attack, blocking it with a forward guard. He was incredibly swift for a defensive Martial Apprentice, being able to keep up with Rui's every attack. Rui launched a barrage of blows, yet time after time, the man somehow continued blocking all of Rui's attacks casually.

('He's ruining the timing of my attacks.') Rui quickly realized. ('He's using a technique where he steps forward in the direction of the attack and blocks it prematurely before the attack has charged enough to reach its peak.')

It was a simple yet fascinating principle. Every attack had a peak as speed and power went. Martial Artists swung their fists and legs and spaced themselves such that the attack would land on their target when the attack was at peak power in order to deliver the maximum possible impact.

Rui's opponent instead, rapidly stepped forward in the briefest of moments before the attack had reached its peak and intercepted it when it was weak. This way he could prevent his opponent from showing their best striking power in a fight. Of course, he used other techniques to mitigate the impact, including some passive defense that came from conditioning.

Yet, it was this mistiming technique that drew Rui's interest.

This technique also foiled Reverberating Lance since Rui always timed the technique for the normal collision of the attack. But that was only if Rui continued to fail.

BOOM!

The man grimaced for the first time as a powerful body blow slammed into his guards

Rui kept a careful eye on his movements with Primordial Instinct boosted by the Mindmirror secondary brain, carefully readjusting the timing of the Reverberating lance to suit the sabotages of his opponent. Rui continued whaling away at him as he began inputting data about his opponent into his mind palace.

BAM!

bypassed his guard as a powerful blow crashed into the man's guard

read. If he approached attacks o through them

not even complete, yet at this

hook aimed at the man's jaw. The man, like clockwork, prematurely moves to mis-time the attack.

WHOOSH

It was an illusion.

BAM!

his jaw. The sheer impact of Rui's true, unhindered power crashed

THUD

on

Yet, Rui wasn't done.

Rui sighed

BAM!!

pool of blood began forming from the man's head. His skull had

BAM!

turned over as the deed was

to be no mercy shown to hostile competitors' Martial Apprentices. The participating Martial Apprentices were not allowed to let the vanquished Martial Artists survive. Rui began attacking the Martial Apprentices

favor of the Kandrian Empire. The reason for that was that the Kingdom

problem, as everyone soon came to

was particularly brutal. Yet what was even more brutal was how none of them

BAM!