Combat Class

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A new day arriving, the night of sleep having cleared up his mind, Yune didn't start to practice using his mana to increase gravity again, knowing that it would probably be to no avail.

Even though Yune felt a little disappointed by this, the excitement he had for the first ever combat class cancelled out this emotion, and then some more.

Yune's day started like normal, following a theoretical lecture and eating lunch with Alvin, but after that moment his normal routine changed finally changed.

Instead of going out to the field for the practical class, Yune was now headed towards one of the buildings in the academy as instructed by Noah Cain.

Arriving there early, Yune got a good look in the building, which was a gymnasium. It looked similar to the room they took their evaluation test in, with a soft but durable floor, walls made out of some sort of reinforced metal and filled with different type of machines throughout the room.

With still some time left, Yune got a good look in the whole building, until more and more students started to show up.

Eventually there were around three hundred students in the room, which Yune was surprised by as previously there were only fifty students still left attending the practical class.

Walking in, Noah Cain didn't seem surprised by this showing for some reason. Stepping in front of all the students, Noah Cain held a list in his hand. "When I call your name, come stand behind me." He said, his tone unwavering and authoritative.

Just like he said, Noah Cain began calling out names. After he had called out exactly fifty names, including Yune's name, Noah Cain suddenly stopped.

At this point, the fifty students that were now standing behind Noah Cain, had a strong feeling that they knew what was going on.

Putting the list of names away, Noah Cain looked up at the students that were still in front of him. "Who are you guys, and what are you doing here?" Noah Cain said, faking a confused expression.

The students standing in front of Noah Cain were surprised, almost dumbfounded, by this comment. "We are your students, students from class five. We are here for the combat class." One student said, speaking for all students there.

Noah Cain smirked as this was the response he was hoping for, and frankly the only response the students could have given him. "But you aren't my students. You aren't on my list, see?" Noah Cain said as he showed him his list of names.

Hearing this, the students quickly started becoming visibly annoyed, getting a slight hunch at what was going on. One student tried to give a response, but was quickly cut off by Noah Cain.

"Okay, this isn't fun anymore. Now, get out of this building before I remove you myself. On the grass field another teacher has arrived. Once you complete her training, she will start giving combat classes just like I am going to do now for these fifty students who have endured my physical training schedule." Noah Cain said, his voice sounding dissatisfied.

The events that took place shortly after this didn't look pretty. The students became even angrier hearing that they weren't going to be taught combat and continued to argue with Noah Cain until they were eventually forcefully removed by Noah Cain, just like he said he would.

After having literally thrown the last student out of the gymnasium, Noah Cain's joyful expression returned as he faced the fifty students who were left. "Sorry you had to see this guys." Noah Cain said.

"Don't worry, it was fun to see." One student said, to which another student added: "Yeah, don't worry. We all don't like the other students, thinking they can just come to class after skipping for two weeks like nothing happened!"

"Haha, well said." Noah Cain said, laughing as he had the same mentality.

After gaining his composure back, Noah Cain got onto a little more serious topic. "Now that there are only fifty of you to teach instead of two thousand, I will be able to focus on teaching you guys as individuals."

Hearing this, every single student couldn't be more happy. 'The two weeks of that torturous physical training has finally bore fruit!' They all thought inside their heads.

Reducing the number of students to be able to teach a smaller group better was one of the purposes of these first two weeks of physical training.

But besides this, Noah Cain's statement still stood: A person needs good physical strength before they can effectively start learning combat and anything related to marks.

"Okay class, before I will be able to best teach you guys, I will first need to get a better understanding of each person's combat strength at this point in time. So that will be the goal of today's class." Noah Cain said, guiding the students to a device they were familiar with.

"Okay, I don't think I have to explain as I am going to test you in the same way as at the evaluation test." Noah Cain said.

Without any problems each student began the first test, the mana test. Seeing the faces of the students who had taken the test, Yune was confused as to why they had a neutral expression.

But he soon found out that almost every student was getting around the same score as they had gotten at the evaluation test, not having been able to train their mana much, or even at all, because of only doing physical training at practical class without training their mana.

Yune however had continuously trained his many, and was now hoping to confirm how much he had grown.

It having become Yune's turn, he stepped forward confidently. Unlike last time, Yune now had control over his mana. So, he wasn't nervous in the slighted, instead he was excited to find out how much he had improved.

Placing his hand on the glass ball, Yune closed his eyes as he started concentrating. Feeling the mana in his body, he started guiding it to his hand where it all suddenly disappeared. Opening his eyes, Yune saw the glass ball glowing a tone of purple, way brighter than before.

"28 points, next." Noah Cain said as he looked on the display with a smile on his face.

Although this wasn't nearly as high as most students of the academy, Yune was still happy with this result. This score being somewhat comparable to the other fifty students of his class, and most of all, a score way higher than at the evaluation test.

With everyone having completed the first test, they swiftly moved on to the second test, the strength test.

Seeing the other students hitting the strength test machine before him, Yune's expression became conflicted. Almost everyone was using their powers to hit the target harder, some with body strengthening and some by even throwing a fireball at it while punching the machine as hard as they could.

With Yune now also having control over his mana, he could now also use his power at this test. But only being able to decrease his weight, his hit wasn't really going to pack a punch, it would probably be even weaker than his punch would be with his normal weight.

'If only I could increase my weight, than I would be able to get more power in my punch.' Yune thought dejectedly.

But as Yune thought about his weaknesses and strengths, an idea began to form in his head. An idea with which he could possibly increase his punching strength, even though it was a bit unconventional.

The more Yune thought about it, the more viable this idea became. Now waiting for it to be his turn, Yune had already started to prepare to actually make this idea into a reality.

And when his name was finally called, Yune felt ready. Standing before the machine, Yune activated as much mana as he could manage, decreasing his weight by around 20%.

Yune knew that punching with a decreased weight would be counterproductive, but he had come up with a way to utilize the strengths of his decreased weight.

After having decreased his weight, Yune just stood still, this all being part of his plan.

Seeing this made people wonder what he was doing, but despite people finding this weird, they stayed quiet as they heard Yune counting starting from exactly 53 seconds.

With each second passing, counting down each second, Yune's heartbeat began to beat louder, adrenaline rushing through his body as he didn't know if this was even going to work.

But there was no going back now.

Finally, when Yune counted to "one!", the motionless Yune quickly opened his eyes as he swung his arm towards the machine as fast as he could. 'Deactivate now please!' Yune screamed inside his mind, this fraction of a second being the make it or break it.

With Yune's fist just milliseconds away from making contact with the machine, Yune could feel his weight return to his body. 'Yes!' Yune thought, to which directly after a loud thump could be heard, his fist having made contact with the machine.

'It worked!' Yune screamed internally.

Yune had timed when his mana would deactivate perfectly. With that knowledge, Yune had made use of the speed he got from his decreased weight whilst hitting the machine with his normal weight. This, together with his improved physique caused an impact incomparable to that at the evaluation test.

"32 points, next." Noah Cain said, once again impressed by the improvement Yune made as he could see the scores Yune had gotten at the evaluation test.

This result again was around the average score of the other students in Noah Cain's class, but nonetheless Yune was overjoyed. Not only because his sudden idea worked, but also because he managed to improve this much.

Happy with these average scores, Yune was content while starting the next test, the speed test. Full of spirits, Yune decreased his weight again, this time managing to decrease it by around 25% after using nearly every last particle of mana inside his body.

Getting in position, Yune shifted his weight forward, tensioned every single muscle in his leg and explosively started his sprint.

With the first step Yune took, he dashed forward an incredible distance before even taking his next step, which accelerated him even faster. With Yune's well developed leg muscles, a near perfect sprinting form and his weight decrease of 25%, taking off a weight of over ten kilos, Yune was practically flying towards the finish line.

Seeing this display of speed, the students were surprised by Yune's unexpected performance, quickly looking back to Noah Cain to hear the results.

"40 points… next…" Noah Cain said, being surprised himself along with the other students as this was the highest score anyone had gotten so far from the class.

Yune was especially happy with this result, as currently his agility was his strongest asset. For the first time, Yune felt proud that he had this power.

And with the evasion test coming up, which Yune thought would also depend on agility, Yune got his hopes up, thinking that he might be able to get first place in this test as well.

However, Yune was only half right. He did do incredibly well in the evasion test with his increased maneuverability using his powers and his improved physique, but this time he wasn't the best of the class, as one students easily bested him, getting a score of over fifty.

This student seemed to have eyes in the back of his head, moving out of the way before the projectile came even close to him.

Seeing this amazed Yune. 'How can I beat that?' Yune thought, not feeling disappointed about having been bested, instead feeling even more motivated than before.

Seeing each other's scores, most of the students were starting to become a little competitive. Luckily this competitive nature of the students came in a friendly manner as they had become quite close in these last two weeks of training together.

Now with this competitive spirit having formed, the students had become even more motivated than before which made them grow even faster, taking yet another step ahead of the other students of class five.