One-Sided

Within seconds of the fight beginning, Damian moved quickly. While he had never been taught how to fight, he had at least learned to dodge during his times living in the ragged outer ring of the city. Fights often broke out in run-down areas with gangs often oppressing the masses of poor who cannot fight using numbers and weapons.

Damian frequently found himself in situations where he'd been threatened by people trying to rob or enslave him over the years.

In those dire times, his small and skinny stature helped significantly with handling dangerous people and trying to escape from them.

But with this newfound enhanced physical strength, he felt reinvigorated and confident that he could take on any thug who would approach him. For the first time, he decided to initiate the engagement without any plan of escape.

Damian swung his clenched fist at the man—his movements impressive for a starved teenager.

Unamused, Valyn shifted slightly, blocking and pushing his arm away in fluid motions. Stuck in an awkward closeness while slightly off balance, Damian attempted to use his momentum to veer away from Valyn as quickly as possible.

But Valyn was quick to capitalize on his mistake, turning to him and striking him in the side with his knee at an impressive speed.

The hit sent Damian painfully crashing into the dirt. Clutching his side, he glared at the man staring at his fallen figure—clearly unimpressed.

'I thought I was supposed to have the advantage. What the hell is this bullshit!'

Driven by irritation, Damian slowly got up from the dirt. Noticing this, Valyn nodded—the two then stood preparing for the second round.

This time around, Damian was not so keen on recklessly charging, now reverting back to the old methods he used while living in the slums.

The two recruits circled the dirt platform slowly—each unwilling to make a move.

However, the tension between the two eventually gave in with Valyn dashing forward.

In the comfort of his old habits, Damian resisted Valyn's precise hands, piercing forward at a resounding and repeating pace. At that moment, Damian moved and dodged Valyn in reckless abandon—his eyes barely keeping up with each approaching fist.

Even on the defensive, he felt the Gap between him and Valyn had closed almost immediately. And this inevitably led to his collapse as Valyn landed a precise strike to the stomach. The impact then translated to a kick at his ankle, sending him falling forward and his arm getting pinned behind him.

Lying with his stomach on the floor, Damian twisted and struggled under Valyn pinning him with a knee to his spine and his arm locked at his back. Going against Damian's strength, Valyn applied more weight to his knee, sending him into a paralyzed groaning pain.

The crowd around them ogled in mild surprise. While Valyn was considered the best of the best this outpost had to offer in terms of regular humans, people were more put off by the manner in which he was able to deal with the Imprinted—it didn't even look like a fair fight. It was just a boring one-sided affair, almost as if that scrawny boy in front of them had never received enchantments in the first place.

A pressuring silence continued between the two until Valyn once again eased away, letting Damian recover.

'I've had enough of this humiliation.'

Persevering through the pain and soreness pressing at his body, Damian prepared for the third round.

Surprised by Damian's intention to continue the fight, Valyn nodded.

Choosing to aggress in slight frustration, Damian dashed forward. Given his renewed wit, Damian's hand shot for the eyes while simultaneously stepping onto Valyn's foot. However, these cheap tricks were all for naught as Valyn skillfully shifted his head away from the hand, allowing it to pass by. Again, stuck in a slightly awkward position, Damian readily attempted to back away only for his punching arm to be grabbed and his entire body then swung into the air and quickly thrown onto the dirt.

With his mind in chaos, Valyn then latched onto the opportunity, choosing to straddle on top of the ragged boy. Locked into their positions, Valyn prepped his arm for a crippling strike to the neck.

"Stop, that's enough."

A stern voice suddenly spoke up at the near moment of impact.

At the call, Valyn paused as if he were awaiting the announcement. Swiftly, he separated from Damian and stood aside, listening in for any more instruction. In the process, Damian rolled over and sat sweating and breathing heavily with a vague expression.

With the two settled, the instructor continued:

"It was a good fight. Both of you fought hard, and I must say; nice job Valyn. You've always been the best regular we've had and that skill of yours showed today. Although Damian is inexperienced, the fact that you won against an Imprinted is still very impressive."

"...Thank you." Valyn calmly replied to the kind words.

The instructor nodded in confirmation.

"With this duel finished, let's all gather around and learn some basics. I think it's pretty clear we're gonna need to go over it for all the new arrivals." Vailecks announced, somewhat glancing at Damian's resting figure.

As everyone moved to get ready for class instruction, nearly every recruit gathered around Valyn, commemorating him for his incredible feat of defeating an Imprinted in such a convincing fashion.

Slightly surprised, Valyn accepted the praise before subtly looking toward Damian sitting at the side.

"I really appreciate the compliments, but the fight was a lot closer than it may have looked to everyone else. Damian was a tough opponent and truly did push me to my limits in certain instances of the duel." Valyn spoke aloud, attempting to alleviate the excitement.

Hearing his words, Damian's face crumpled severely.

'You think I need your pity..? Go to hell! It was barely even a fight, you disgusting trash.'

Silently cursing the man, Damian then noticed a pair of legs stop in front of him. Hiding away his anger, he gazed up to find that familiar fidgety girl from earlier now standing in front of him. With a troubled face, the girl then held her hand out to him—attempting to help him up from where he sat.

Scrunching his brow at the courtesy, Damian sighed with a tired look. Roughly slapping away her hand, he propped himself up while heading over to the rest of the group.

For the rest of the session, Damian found himself learning basic etiquette and rules in combat in both one-on-one and group combat. Although he maintained his attention throughout the hours of instruction, his mind was left in constant disarray due to the fight with Valyn from earlier.

'If rune magic is supposed to improve my physical ability to the point where simple humans couldn't in any way compete with me, how weak was I before my enchantments?'

'I know I'm supposed to have gotten stronger and faster after the imprints, but if I'm losing that bad to some nobody from some small unknown outpost—was I really that weak beforehand? Or I guess, am I actually that weak still?'

'Gosh, it really seems like I've got a lot of work to do.'