"Now let's begin sparring." The teacher's voice resounded through the gymnasium.
Soon all the students went to the side and dropped their metal swords and grabbed foam swords instead. Students would practice form with heavy metal swords to train their bodies but would change to swords that didn't hurt when hit when sparring to avoid injuries.
"Form pairs on your own and if someone is left without a pair I'll find them one."
Orpal was there as well since he was the same age as Kyle. His minions formed pairs with themselves, but Orpal was irked today. He reached his limit yesterday and couldn't tolerate Kyle anymore.
Before he was only playing, but Kyle attitude to refuse him every time was starting to annoy him. He decided that he would make Kyle's life hell. Starting today with this sparring, he would abuse his greater power index and try to injure Kyle.
Orpal started to get close to Kyle while saying as if sighing. "Kyle, Kyle, today you're going to suffer."
Kyle wasn't weak minded, especially now that he had the cultivation system. He looked at Orpal and replied in the same sighing tone. "Orpal, Orpal, today I'll beat your ass."
"Shut up already and let's fight." Orpal replied angrily.
"Come, come you weakling. Today I'll teach you who is your father." Kyle chuckled.
"Hahahaha." Everyone started laughing. They found this situation funny. Orpal had a greater power index, but his intelligence was still lacking compared to others. He was a brute and his head only worked to fight. He tried to act cool, but Kyle managed to provoke him silly.
"Aarrgh, take this." Orpal said while swinging his sword like a brute would do.
Most of the students would spar like this since they couldn't grasp the meaning behind every move in the Thousand Transformations Sword Set. But there was still value in sparring because it would teach positioning, footwork and basic defense and attack.
Thomas, the teacher, was too tired to be a martial arts teacher. He grew numb to all this nonsense. He had seen bullying almost every year and he started to ignore it. What was the point anyway, students would do it every year. But what really made him dispirited was that no student really grasped his martial arts. They would simply swing their swords like brutes they were. Thomas could see the intent of using too much power to injure Kyle, but he decided to ignore it. It was just another day, another common occurrence.
The sparring swords had foam on the outside to about heavy injuries but still had a strong core so it could handle all the power from the students with higher power indices. So taking a beating with a foam swords would still hurt if enough strength was behind the move. Orpal was counting on that.
Orpal was holding his sword with both hands while stepping forward with his right foot and slashing his swords diagonally from top right to bottom left.
Kyle was originally with his sword pointing upwards in front of his chest, holding the sword with one hand while the other hand was hiding behind his back. His stance was firm with the right foot forward and the left foot slight behind while his knees where slightly bent.
Thomas was the first to notice the change in Kyle's stance. His eyes suddenly revealed an excited glint while his smile was forming. Most of the students would just meet the sword coming with another sword slash. It was not different from stick fighting, they were not treating the sword as a sword at all.
When Orpal's sword was withing Kyle's reach, Kyle simply sidestepped to his left then he removed his right foot and positioned it behind his body while he shifted his front to Orpal's side. Kyle's sword avoided contact with Orpal's, Kyle then slashed his sword and hit Orpal's neck from behind with his full force.
Orpal's shaky stance crumbled and with the momentum from his sword slash that hit nothing coupled with Kyle's hit that moved him even further, he fell flat on the floor with his face and his arms stretched forward.
When everyone saw this, they started laughing, except three people. Orpal was boiling with rage. His neck was aching, and he was furious due to everyone laughing at him. Thomas was excited that for the first time someone actually used the Thousand Transformations Sword Set. And Kyle was stunned when he got a new notification.
[Body tempering absorbed: +15]
But Kyle didn't have too much time to think about it because Orpal was already up and preparing another strike. Orpal lifted his arms and was preparing a downward slash with both his arms. His feet were both aligned with his shoulders as if he was simply standing.
Kyle lounged forward and his sword hit with full force on Orpal's neck, hitting the adam's apple. But Kyle was momentum was too big and he precisely hit when Orpal's hand where behind the center of mass causing Orpal to lose balance and was forced to take some steps back.
But Kyle was relentless, using his lounging stance he managed to jump forward made a downward slash with both hands hitting Orpal square in the face. Kyle abused the hit to propel him forward and continued to jump over Orpal. The his was so strong because it had momentum coupled with all of Kyle's mass, causing Orpal to be stunned for a moment, his feet staggered and he fell with his back on the floor. Then Kyle landed with both his feet over Orpal's sword. Then he quickly stepped forward and rotated to face Kyle again.
[Body tempering absorbed: +8]
[Body tempering absorbed: +25]
This confirmed it. When he hit Orpal, some of Orpal's body tempering was absorbed. Kyle started to sweat, but his sweat had some hint of black. But he didn't have time to think about it, his opponent was already getting up.
Kyle allowed him to get up only because during sparring matches, the teacher would enforce fair environment. Although there would be bullying from time to time, the teacher would turn a blind eye as long as both parties were standing and using their weapons. But if a student was on the floor or didn't have a weapon in hand, then the teacher would step in and punish both students. This worked best for Kyle after all, he would be able to hit Orpal until the class finished.
The class laughed this time as well. They were satisfied since no one liked Orpal, but they could never beat him before. Orpal's strength was well known and his last power index assessment resulted in 14.48. No one was crazy enough to fight him on their own accord, except Kyle. Everyone knew that Kyle had spine, and would never back down, but they thought he was crazy or masochist. The thing was that Kyle's power assessment was 1.85, the lowest possible ever.
Everyone was obliged to exam their power indices once a month and the results were public. There was no way to hide it. So this made this scene even more comical since Orpal, the strongest, was taking a beating from the weakest in class.
Orpal was enraged, his face and his neck were aching as well. He grabbed his sword from the ground and slashed forward one more time, but this time he tried to feint and hit where Kyle supposed to sidestep.
Kyle once again sidestepped to the side, but when he saw the sword coming for him, he simply parried using only one hand. He used the part next to the hilt of his sword to hit almost the same area from Orpal's sword, making his need to use less strength, then he rotated his sword downward and aligned his sword to aim at Orpal's face and thrusted forward. This time Kyle used lifted his front foot causing his whole body to empower his thrust while at the same time aiming his foot to land behind Orpal's right foot.
When Orpal was about to stagger back, his feet was blocked and once again he fell on the floor. Orpal was boiling with rage. He was already humiliated three times. But the worst part was he couldn't understand how this weakling was able to hit him, and it hurt every time. He noticed that something was missing, brute strength wasn't cutting it, but he was so enraged and focused on hitting Kyle that he didn't even register how he took the beating.
Thomas whole expression was one of excitement. He was extremely overjoyed, and his grin went from ear to ear. His whole career as a teacher he never seen anyone use actual martial arts. That's when he heard a raged scream.
"Aaaaaaaaarrrrghhhh. Kyle you will pay." Orpal raged.
"Enough!" Thomas shouted. But Orpal simply didn't listen.
Orpal didn't even bother picking up his sword and simply swung a fist towards Kyle. Kyle simply smiled and avoided the punch with a sidestep while slashing with both hands at Orpal neck.
Plow.
Orpal used both his hands to hold his neck while he gasped for air, falling on his knees.
"I said enough!" Thomas yelled once again.