"Woojin," he reminded himself as he meticulously followed the instructions.
"It's a little faster, but it still doesn't seem right," Woojin noted, considering his leg movements.
"Is there something wrong with the posture in the second half?" he questioned.
Woojin diligently mimicked the moves from his memory of a battle in his consciousness against a middle-aged man, the moves that had left a deep impression on him.
With each imitation, practice, and correction, he noticed that the speed of his kicks seemed to be increasing. Every kick became sharper and more powerful. He lost track of time.
"Huh—"
Woojin gasped for air, his chest heaving, as he gradually emerged from a state of absolute concentration.
Wiping the sweat off his forehead, he immediately checked his progress.
[Basic kicking level 4 (160/800)]
Woojin was startled, then elated. He recalled that just yesterday, his basic kicking skill was only at level 4 with 50 experience points. Now, it had reached 160 experience points.
"This practice has boosted my experience points by more than a hundred!" he thought.
"Progress is truly rapid with benchmarking and practice, and real combat experience is invaluable. There's no better way to learn than being tested up close."
Woojin attempted another kick. Despite the exhaustion and slight numbness in his leg muscles from prolonged practice, the kick still produced a subtle whooshing sound as it cut through the air, clearly faster than before.
"The direction is right," he acknowledged with satisfaction. "We just need to persevere in this direction."
He glanced at his increased professional experience points, which seemed to have risen by 10 points. He estimated that his practice session had lasted about an hour.
Just as he was about to inquire about the time from Arya Liu, he turned around to find most of the people in the training room observing him with curious expressions.
Arya Liu, standing nearby, wore a look of admiration.
"Woojin, you're incredible!" she exclaimed, her round face blushing slightly, stars gleaming behind her glasses. "Those kicks you just performed were so impressive!"
"Uh," Woojin stammered, momentarily taken aback before comprehending the reason for the attention.
His leg training had seemingly "impressed" all these onlookers. It made sense, considering the fighting kicks he had learned from the middle-aged man were honed through actual combat, resulting in sharp and effective moves.
With his strength at 11 points, correctly applying force, he could execute powerful kicks. To a group of martial arts beginners in the basic class, this display was undoubtedly remarkable.
A man in his thirties, wearing glasses, approached him with a friendly smile, holding a mobile phone.
"Young man, your leg skills are really impressive. Let's connect later. I'll share my contact details."
"Sorry, I didn't bring my cell phone," Woojin replied, stopping the man with glasses, and then turning to Arya Liu.
"How long have I been practicing?"
"One hour and seven minutes," Arya Liu answered without thinking.
Woojin basically asked her for the time in every class, and she had developed the habit of helping Woojin track time.
Pretty much what he expected.
Woojin immediately wondered, "Isn't Coach Lin here?"
"He came. He looked at the door and let us practice by ourselves and left again. You were training at the time, so you might not have seen it."
It seemed that Lin Zhiqin was going to have another class. Frustratingly, even though Woojin had a good temper, he still had some complaints when dealing with a coach like Lin Zhiqin.
However, Lin Zhiqin's absence from class made it easier for him to do another thing.
Thinking of this, Woojin asked Arya Liu, "If Coach Lin comes, tell me that I have something to do and take half the class off."
"Oh," Arya Liu nodded obediently.
As Woojin reached the door, he suddenly remembered something and shouted back, "Water! You haven't drunk the water yet, Woojin."
Unfortunately, Woojin's figure disappeared in a flash.
Arya Liu held the vitamin energy drink that she had prepared in advance and specially selected before coming here. She looked toward the door and pouted with some disappointment.
Woojin left the training room and arrived at the martial arts hall.
Looking around, his eyes quickly locked onto one person.
She was a young woman, probably in her early twenties.
She was wearing a blue short-sleeved shirt with the words "Genbukan" printed on it, and her work badge was hanging around her neck.
In fact, there were many people like this in martial arts gyms, and their main job was to receive and guide. Most of them were recruited from nearby universities, and there were more female attendants.
"Hello, where is the device for measuring boxing strength?" When Woojin approached, the young woman was staring intently at several male students who were exercising in the strength training area. Woojin's words startled her.
"It's a device for measuring punching strength."
The young woman's face turned red, and then she quickly pointed in a direction.
"Go straight this way to the left. Forget it, I'll take you there."
She led Woojin to a large room with some training equipment. This room was more advanced than the one in the hall outside.
"This is the training area for our senior students. The device for measuring punching strength is right there. You can use it after they finish."
The young woman pointed to a large vertical sand pile-like device and whispered to Woojin, as if it was against the rules.
"Thank you," Woojin said and entered the training room.
There were three or four people surrounding the punching strength test device that the young woman had pointed out, all of them young men and women.
"Great job, Guo Shu! Your punch reached the fourth level!"
"Haha, you think I practice for nothing every day."
"I'm here to test, let me try!"
Several people were chatting and laughing with relaxed expressions. Woojin entered and glanced at them but didn't pay much attention.
"Only for senior students," he noticed the words posted on the wall, and then he understood why the young woman had spoken to him in a low voice earlier.
"I'm a senior student. Isn't Cheng Peng a senior student?"
When asked, Woojin casually mentioned Cheng Peng.
Woojin had no psychological burden and took advantage of the opportunity to use the punching machine. He walked around and explored the diverse training equipment in the room. There were specific machines for training arm strength, wrist strength, and finger strength. Some were so complex that he couldn't figure out how to use them.
There was also a large LCD TV hanging on the wall in the middle of the room, displaying tutorials on basic boxing, kicking, and footwork.
Woojin circled around and stopped in front of a bench press. He tried it out and even after pressing 130 kilograms, he felt he still had some strength left.
He felt relieved because generally, punching power would be higher than bench pressing. The former required an instant burst of power, while the latter focused on sustained output. In comparison, Woojin thought the bench press was a more suitable standard for measuring a person's strength because boxing power relied heavily on technique.
"The normal bench press level of an adult male with 9 points of strength is about 60 kilograms. I've exceeded this value by more than twice. The difference between these 2 points of strength is more significant than I thought."
Woojin was about to find out his limits.
At this moment, the young men and women surrounding the punching machine had finished and started walking towards him.
Woojin quickly stood up and moved toward the punching machine.
(End of chapter)