Combat Simulation

(How do you adjust its difficulty, Master?)

Anetta's voice echoed in my head. At that moment, I was stretching and intending to take the hair tie from the right pocket of my pants afterwards. Although the shape of the clothing had changed, the items stored in the pockets would remain in place.

The gauntlet I was currently wearing had a missing palm protection part, leaving my palms exposed. This was so I could tie my hair more easily.

After taking the hair tie, I answered Anetta.

"Just as usual," I replied while tying my hair into a wolf tail haircut.

The usual adjustment I made with Anetta was one level above my strength. And during the simulation, Anetta also controlled my body when I hit the target or got hit. Anetta would create the sensation of pain from punches, slashes, and stabs, while controlling my body's reactions when under attack or when defending. Anetta would manipulate and control all my senses during the simulation.

If someone were to see me training, they would see me acting as if I were in pain and being struck or slashed without an opponent in sight. They would see me as if I were crazy or something, because my sparring partner only appeared in my sight and not in the sight of others.

(Adjusting the difficulty one level above Master's current strength. With the power system here, early-stage Champion ranks will be deployed for simulation battles.)

Early-stage Champions are in the range of general stats from 51 to 57. This is on par with Giselle. Then I looked at my stats.

...

Considering my experience, maybe I could win this simulation battle.

I took a breath and exhaled slowly. I took a fighting stance by turning my body to my left side. My right hand slightly clenched forward, while my left hand, placed on the left side of my waist, formed a fist with the back of the hand facing downward.

At that moment, a hologram appeared out of thin air. The hologram stood upright holding a spear. Slowly, the body, which was initially transparent orange, turned into a solid physical body. The hologram had features of a young East Asian man with short black hair and wearing ancient Chinese Dynasty armor.

His expressionless face with calm eyes and his upright posture made him look like a spear expert with extensive combat experience. As I stared at him, a semi-transparent text appeared above his head. Liang Jianwei. His name was Liang Jianwei.

As I read the name above his head, Liang Jianwei shot towards me with wind magic. With the help of wind magic, he became very fast. Because my focus was momentarily diverted by reading his name, I was slightly surprised.

The surprise caused me to lose momentum. And just before I was within reach of his spear, Liang Jianwei aimed his attack right at the right side of my waist. And before I knew it, the tip of his spear was very close to me.

"Damn!"

Since I was facing left, my right waist was exposed towards him. To avoid the blade of his spear, I couldn't turn my body and move away. Such a move would be very fatal, and the spear would create a hole through my buttocks or groin.

Quickly, I moved my right hand, using the handle of Liang Jianwei's spear as leverage to leap sideways into the air.

Seeing his attack successfully avoided, Liang Jianwei promptly planted his spear into the ground and leaped while holding the base of his spear. The curved shape of his spear added momentum to his body as he lifted himself up with his right heel ready to strike my head.

Since I was in the air with my head positioned downwards, my head was a soft target for his current kick. The curved spear of Liang Jianwei caused a post-curve reaction from the end of its handle that he released. I blocked this rebound reaction with my left hand. Then followed by Liang Jianwei's heel kick swiftly heading towards my head.

Still having my right hand free, I caught his leg and twisted my body to face the sky while in the air. I arched my body to prepare to throw his body. This position was highly inefficient for throwing or slamming because I had no support while in the air, I had no momentum.

The alternative was to use Arkium to activate my other skill. Short-range Telekinesis which was still imperfect. I pulled one of my own legs downwards with Short-range Telekinesis, causing a boost effect with my own body. With that, I managed to lift Liang Jianwei and slammed him directly below me along with his supine body cracking the ground.

With my body still in the air slightly leaning forward, I couldn't land with my feet if I let it be. Employing Short-range Telekinesis, I quickly rotated my body in the air again and positioned my feet to step on Liang Jianwei by pulling my own body downwards, and swiftly descended to step on Liang Jianwei.

"Ha!"

The ground shattered from my stomp. Liang Jianwei rolled to the left quickly to avoid my attack. In the midst of his rolling while facing the ground, he used it to lift his body and ended up in a crouching position after one full roll. At that moment, he ran towards his spear in front of him.

In my position, Liang Jianwei's spear was behind me. I rotated my body to the left to turn around, then quickly dashed forward to crash my body into his body which was almost reaching the spear.

The result, he was thrown away from his spear. I didn't stop there and ran fast towards the direction of his thrown body. By the time he got up, I was already near him.

Knowing I was very close, Liang Jianwei swung a cross punch with his right hand. However, before his punch could hit me, I dodged to the left, grabbed his wrist with my right hand, and swung a knee kick to his diaphragm. I followed it up by twisting my body to the right to face his back and struck his head with an elbow strike. He staggered from this attack, causing him to slightly bend forward and exposing his back to me.

With my back facing him, Liang Jianwei was at my blind spot. He also had his back to me; we were now sharing blind spots. I reflexively bent down, and Liang Jianwei twisted his body to the right and swung his right hand with full force.

As I bent down and lowered my body position, Liang Jianwei's hand swing only passed above me and exposed his front body. Being already in a squat position, I immediately delivered a powerful back kick while supporting my body leaning forward with both hands.

I didn't know if his ribs were broken from my kick hitting his chest hard, but the effect was that he flew in the air.

Suddenly, a hard mound of earth appeared from the ground beneath me very quickly. My body leaning forward and closer to the ground couldn't react faster, so my beautiful chin was hit hard by the mound of earth, causing me to spin in the air.

"Ugh!"

'Bastard! Earth magic too?'

And as I was flying uncontrollably in the air, thrown by the impact of his earth magic, Liang Jianwei had already landed and was running towards his spear stuck in the ground.

At that moment, I thought he would let me fall with a perfect superhero landing on the ground after stabilizing my body in the air. But I thought too soon.

Liang Jianwei, who was almost reaching his spear, recited wind magic and launched me with a very strong wind. Not only did I fly further, but I also flew higher, making my descent slower.

Liang Jianwei successfully retrieved his spear. His body spun gracefully as he slowed down his feet while picking up the spear with a beautiful bow pose. After rising and adjusting his pose, a circle of magic lit up beneath his feet. The wind began to envelop him.

Meanwhile, I could only watch the majestic scene performed by Liang Jianwei from the air. I tried to apply Short-range Telekinesis again to my body to speed up my fall. However, the burden was too heavy. Applying Short-range Telekinesis to the body required a high level of mastery, and even then, it couldn't be used at all times. Forcing it to perform abilities that were not within its level would surely have side effects. Namely, rapid absorption of mental strength and Arkium, and the skill not working.

And with Short-range Telekinesis still unstable due to the condition of body displacement, I forced the performance of this skill by exerting more mental strength and Arkium. Although it was not much compared to the remaining mental strength and Arkium embedded in my body, I exerted more than usual just to overclock this skill. The result was an overheat. Meaning, it required a cooldown that shouldn't exist even though I still had enough power to do it again.

In such a state, I could only wait for my body to fall to the ground at normal speed. And just when I thought I would land safely, a fairly large magic circle appeared. It seemed to prevent me from leaving the magic activation zone as I realized the active magic circle.

'Bastard!'

I could only resign myself and land on the ground with a frustrated expression. I immediately ran at my best speed, but the magic activation zone was too large. The strong wind blew against me from the front, slowing down my speed.

Then I realized that the ground in this large magic activation zone was becoming more liquid. My legs sank up to the tops of my feet, about a quarter of my calves. Then I felt something locking my legs under the ground. Once the liquid ground was locked in place, I couldn't move my legs.

I tried to pull my legs with all my might, but there was no movement at all.

I looked towards Liang Jianwei, who was staring at me from afar with a blank expression. He seemed to be standing and holding his spear, which was also standing upright. Then he planted his spear.

What he did next was to raise his right palm. After that, a large whirlwind around him moved to his right hand and compressed to the size of the spear. The speed of the whirlwind increased after its size was compressed.

Of course, I didn't just stand still when I saw Liang Jianwei performing his trick. I started pounding the ground from the beginning while keeping an eye on Liang Jianwei. I hit it hard and strong to break it. However, when I was somewhat glad to be freed from the damn trap ground, the wind spear flew towards me very quickly.

"You son of a..."