I Had a Severe Lapse in My Judgement

Ever since I used the Prestige ability, I had been very careful not to raise any suspicion with anyone that knew me. I came to this decision because whenever I read stories where the main character was a regressor and travelled back in time to an earlier point in their lives, there was always a big point made about how they needed to keep their abilities a secret. Either to protect their loved ones or keep unwanted attention away from them. That kind of thing, you know?

Sometimes, the cons of having a unique power supremely outweighed the pros.

So, when I found myself telling Penny about the fact that my 'Critical Eye' skill allowed me to analyse the low kick she performed and turned it into a skill I could activate, you could say that I completely ignored what all those regressor stories warned about.

And you could say that my old crush on Penny started to rear its ugly head and I wanted to impress her, and I wouldn't be able to fully deny that fact, but it all doesn't change the fact that I DID tell her.

You see, after Penny explained that even though 'Critical Eye' wasn't a unique skill (she had read about a handful of other Players that had access to the skill), the fact that it turned a physical martial art move into a System skill was unheard of.

When the System was revealed, it provided the Gen-1 Players with many fantastical skills and abilities. Skills and abilities that defied the laws of logic, physics — almost anything. Super strength that allowed a Player to be able to lift a real-life tank as if it was a toy one…The super speed that allowed a Player to be fast enough to run around the world in a few seconds…An invisibility power that was unfortunately abused by a Player who turned out to be a pervert…

Any kind of superpower you can think of, and the System would be able to accommodate. However, people started to notice that the System didn't count any form of martial arts that a Player may have trained in as an official System skill or ability.

Thankfully, past her initial excitement at the prospect that a martial art technique had just been turned into a System skill for the first time in the 30 years of the System's existence, Penny calmed down and understood when I told her that I didn't want to make a big deal out of it.

"I just want to get stronger so that I can afford to pay back Alan and Mum for all the support they've given me over all these years," I meekly said to Penny.

We had moved back to the now-empty locker bays again to get a little bit of privacy while I told her about my 'Critical Eye' ability, and even though she leant her shoulder onto a locker bay while she had both her arms on her waist and looked a little bit disappointed, she nodded her head.

"Fine," she said in a mock-whiny voice, "And you're sure that after watching me do all those drills, the only one your ability reacted to was the low kick?"

"Yeah," I said, "The description doesn't say the exact odds of that effect activating, but it seems to be pretty low."

She crossed her arms in thought for a moment, before concluding, "Seems like you're still going to have to go through learning the techniques the old-fashioned way like everyone else, and whenever the effect comes up, then that's just a sweet little bonus."

I shrugged, "I guess so."

***

For the next few weeks, as I continued my workouts with Alan every couple of days, every other day Penny continued to teach me about basic self-defence techniques. And while my 'Critical Eye' ability never activated on anything else, I have to say I was glad I didn't have to experience the strange sensation of my muscles shifting under my skin. It was like certain parts of my body fast-forwarded in time to reflect my performing the kick thousands and thousands of times to the point where I apparently had developed the muscle memory to do the low kick perfectly.

Even though it wasn't a painful process, I can't say that I particularly liked the sensation.

The day, when higher-tiered guild members went out to go on the A-tier Dungeon Clearing Quest, came by and there was a huge send-off of the members in the morning. I decided to keep Mum company since she never really enjoyed seeing someone, she loved off in a Dungeon Clearing. Not even when she was married to Dad.

I got into the gym that afternoon and it was oddly empty.

Since both Alan and Penny had been conscripted into the Dungeon Clearing Quest, I decided to first focus on my Fortitude Tasks before ending the day's session with some of the personal drills that Penny had shown me in our self-defence sessions.

I was now around 95 kilograms (209.4 lbs), which was quite close to my personal weight loss goal of 85 kgs (187.3 lbs). And I had those that helped me with workouts and healthy eating to thank as well as a copious amount of muscle soreness healing by the 'Blood Circulation' skill, without which, I wouldn't have been able to work out so often.

I managed to finish all three of the Fortitude tasks in record time and was celebrating in my head about the fact that I had finally done the Fortitude tasks enough times to save up to 5 PPs when I heard someone call out to me.

The voice came from a lean and athletically muscled guild member whom I had seen Penny talking to a few times over the last few months since I joined the guild. He walked over to me with a determined and somewhat angry scowl on his face.

"Can I help you?" I said as I stood up from the floor mat that I was using. I wiped the sweat off my face and hung my towel around the back of my neck.

"I've seen you around spending a lot of time with Penny, and I was just curious to ask," the man crossed his arms in a way that seemed like he was trying to show off his muscles, "What the hell man?"

I had just finished the last of my sit-ups, and I had pushed myself a little bit, so I was still catching my breath which resulted in my underwhelming response of: "Uh, excuse me, what?"

The man scoffed and shook his head, "Bro, I've been chatting her up for ages and then you come in all of a sudden and just hogging up all of her time. What gives?"

It then clicked in my head, "Oh."

"I've known her for a couple of years, and she's always been busy with the guild stuff, that's why when I finally got the chance to do my Registration here, I took it. I didn't realise there was going to be cock-blocking going on!"

"How'd you meet her again?" I asked.

"Bro…" he said as he sneered at me. He was lighter in weight than me and looked up and down at me with disgust.

I still had a little bit of pudge on my arms and stomach, but once I got down to my weight goal I was planning on getting Alan to help me out with some muscle-building exercises to fill out some of the loose skin.

"Don't even bother mate," the man chuckled cruelly at me, "You think you have any chance with a 10 like her? You're hilarious!"

Now, I only had a crush on Penny, always had been just a crush. But she was also a real close friend of mine when I was younger and now that we were starting to hang out again after so many years, you could say that I didn't like hearing my close friend spoken to about like this guy had been.

"I had dibs on her, so won't you kindly just back off, ya fat bastard?" the man then said and that was the end of my patience.

I'm ashamed to say that, in a moment of clear anger, I had a severe lapse in my judgement, and I automatically swung my leg at him in a low kick. Though I barely put any strength into the kick, my upper shin hit him square in his thigh and he buckled down onto one knee with a cry.

I then quickly stepped around so that I was kneeling behind him and wrapped my arms tight around his neck and pulled slightly back causing him to start gripping at my arms and choking.

The staff member at the reception desk, who had been the only other person in the gym at this point just happened to look up at that exact time and saw the position that this guy and I were in and quickly raced over to us.

"Stop this right now!" she ordered, and I felt an invisible force pull at my emotions and I became numb.

My anger disappeared in an instant and I unhooked my arm from the man's throat and stood back up away from him. He sputtered and coughed as he caught his breath.

"You son of a bitch!" the man then yelled and looked livid as he stood up and threatened to throw a punch at me.

"You too!" the receptionist ordered and the man's face turned blank and he dropped his hand.

After a quick reminder of the guild rules that there should be no fighting between guild members, I was swiftly kicked out of the gym and told that my membership to the guild building would be suspended until after the Dungeon Clearing party came back from their quest since it had both Alan and Edward who would want to hear what happened.

"Damn it!" I hissed under my breath.