"I-I beg y-you…"
If someone were to come in and take a look, they would never be able to guess what the man hitting his forehead against the ground looked like a mere two hours ago.
"Just l-let me d-die…"
It was nothing more but my courtesy and own interest to prolong his plight.
After all, while the mere voice of that bitch-goddess was enough to make me retch, it did confirm the rapid growth of my talents.
The two of us took roughly ten minutes for my special collection of combat talents to match the level of my general combat talents. But that time also accounted for me trying various tricks to mark out what constituted combat and what actually increased my special talents.
Then, an hour and a half of smooth sailing followed, with my opponent's condition degrading further and further.
Out of those two hours, it took me about forty minutes to drop down to the second layer of my Hero Gate. Not too long ago, I decided to limit myself to just its last layer, both due to my own growth and the degrading form of my unwilling training partner.
But as with all good things in life, even this exercise soon had to come to an end.
"Stop whining like a little bitch," I spat out with disgust while staring down at the growling man.
Mere two hours and there was nothing left of his dignity, nothing left of the threatening aura of an expert he emanated with before.
Just two hours of intensive hand-to-hand combat training.
And I wasn't just viciously underestimating the situation here, merely for the sake of putting the worth of this man down.
It really was just the standard course that I would run down every morning with my soldiers, back during my time crusading against the demons.
No, that didn't give the situation justice. So, to be perfectly clear…
IT WAS ROUTINE TRAINING FOR ALL THE RECRUITS THAT JOINED THE LEGIONS OF THE CRUSADE!
A farmer, merchant, artisan, or mercenary... They would all go through this kind of drill, honing their bodies and reflexes while getting themselves accustomed to pain.
Sure, newbies would end up down on the floor, crying to go back home to their mothers… A mere week of this brutal conditioning and a proper man would reach the stage of silent, cold determination. Two months and this kind of gruesome training would become a norm.
'Is it because all that awaits him at the end is death rather than a hot meal and half an hour of rest?' I thought. 'Or is it because his muscles were a product of alchemy and magic rather than his own, hard work?'
This was the surprising truth behind the man's facade. Rather than a combat monk, he was merely a puppet master, using magic to both swell and then move his muscles around as well as to cover his body with magical shielding to even further enhance his close-quarters-combat ability.
The very moment my fists broke past the man's reinforcements, his entire essence seemingly sizzled away, the process only further accelerated by the ongoing beating.
"Well, since you asked so nicely."
I rolled my eyes before taking a step forward while raising my Hero's Gate back to its second layer. Then, with a single stomp, I crushed the back of the man's neck, severing his spinal cord as quickly and surely as one could cut it with a proper blade.
By now, all of my weapons were chipped and broken, a testament to the quality of what mere bandits in the forest would wield. A part of their wear could be attributed to the exercise, given how even the skin of my fists was all bruised and red, but…
But at the very least, I did have some progress to show for all the time and resources I laid on the altar of my first proper workout in this world.
[Talent: A collection of basic weapon arts[5]: Novice(32)>Amateur(8 439)]
[Talent: A collection of specialized weapon arts[3]: Amateur (66)>Amateur(1 143)]
The difference between me before the training and after was… Overwhelmingly massive.
I could feel it in my bones, in my flesh, in every fiber of my being.
My muscles hardly grew… out, but they definitely grew thicker. There was now more power hidden in a single strand of muscle than there was in the entire knot of them before. I also had an incomparably greater degree of control over those muscles, allowing me to make actual use of the improvement to my senses and perception itself.
Overall, it was an extremely productive session, well worth the two hours that I spent partaking in it, even if it meant giving my targets two more hours to run.
"Now then," I muttered to myself as I took a deep breath and closed my eyes before prying them open and looking into the state of the ancient road.
Whatever mana I stole to power up my Hero Gate turned out to be merely an insignificant whisk when compared to just the richness of mana in my direct surroundings. Most importantly, my interference didn't seem to upset this world's magical balance enough to throw it completely off the rails, plunging this entire world into a magical apocalypse.
'There you are.'
With my focus now on the road, locating everyone on it turned out to be even easier than when I did it from the path's entrance.
'Is it because I'm a bit closer to them now? Or maybe because I'm not at the road's edge? Or, who knows, maybe I just got better at reading the mana of this place?'
All three of those could be possible at the same time… Or maybe there were some other reasons that I simply didn't think of. Whichever the case might be, though, I couldn't care less. Maybe even it was the benefit of my constantly growing experience for the observer talent? Whatever it might be, the important thing was that I now knew where to go.
Yet, rather than giving chase after the second group that split from the rest before I tracked them down, I turned around and walked the same way I came, not hurried in the slightest.
As leisurely as it was, training was still a training. And with my flesh tired, it was better not to push it even further when I couldn't really tell for sure what awaited just a few minutes walk away.
Sure, the adventurers continued to get away even as I walked back, only furthering the lead they had on me…
But there was still one more loose end that I had to take care of. And against my best wishes, that strange girl from before…
Rather than trying to catch up with her friends, she actually crawled back the way all of us came while I was busy power-leveling my talents!