Ito Toshihiro extended his right hand with a slight incline towards the right, a signal that he was giving the initiative to Adam.

Of course, Adam wasn't the type to honourably decline this gesture. Within a split second he was before Toshihiro, his left palm extended upwards in a chopping motion.

It wasn't aimed at anywhere in particular, it was simply a probing attack. Adam was confident that he could dodge any frontal counterattack against his probing strike, regardless of how fast it came.

However, to Adam's shock, he lost on this exchange of moves.

Adam's palm was about to strike Toshihiro when he suddenly flew into a flying kick from his stationary position.

'Not good!'

Adam had to hastily block the flying kick with his outstretched left hand, allowing it to take the brunt of the impact.

Adam hastily retreated backwards and flexed his injured left hand. He looked at Toshihiro's hands, only to see them glowing with a golden aura. The sunlight from the open courtyard reflected off it and gave off a blindingly regal feel. Toshihiro opened his mouth to speak.

"I know you are an awakened, Old Man Li wouldn't have chosen anybody else as his disciple! Now, show me your true power if you hope to win!!!" Toshihiro shouted towards Adam.

Toshihiro discarded all pretence of appearance, rushing forwards with his golden palms in an aggressive stance. If Adam managed to block this then he would certainly land a critical counterattack. However, this stance showed how confident Toshihiro was of his attacking power. No doubt this was an insidious tactic to make Adam attempt to block this blow.

Toshihiro was taking advantage of the fact that Adam didn't quite know how powerful his strikes were when he used the his Golden Palm Style technique, however, from the way Toshihiro seemed to be moving, it looked like those golden palms were in fact quite powerful.

Of course, Adam wasn't the type to jump headfirst into a trap. If you were to scheme against him he would lead you on and make it look as if he fell for it, only to turn the tables at the last second.

Toshihiro had already closed the distance between them, he pulled his right hand back to perform a basic punch into Adam's body. Normally this move would be hardly threatening in a fight between martial practitioners, however, this time Toshihiro had his [Golden Palm Style] to strengthen his attacks.

Adam didn't dare to take this attack lightly.

Doubtlessly, Toshihiro expected him to dodge considering this was a fairly rigid strike. However, Adam chose not to dodge since it would basically mean handing the initiative over to Toshihiro, something Adam was unwilling to surrender.

In a split moment Adam had formulated a simple strategy with which to counter Toshihiro's attack.

Toshihiro's hip was slightly turning to the side opposite of the coiled fist, a sign that he was about to unleash his strike. A textbook punch from someone of this level would be equivalent to being hit with a hammer, perhaps a sledgehammer if Adam took into account the golden aura surrounding Toshihiro's golden fists.

If Adam couldn't block this blow directly, or dodge. Then there was only one option.

Adam's injured left hand was extended in a palm, it was twisted into a grappling position. Adam used his injured hand because the move he was planning to execute wouldn't involve a great clash of kinetic energy, instead the mere redirection of force.

His left hand swerved in-between the two of them. It was at chest height between the two.

Toshihiro's fist had already left it's coiled position and was well on it's way to Adam's upper chest.

Adam's left hand twisted unnaturally and caught onto Toshihiro's forearm from the inside, the forearm of the attacking hand!

Adam pulled it towards him while slightly shifting it towards the left, making it miss him completely and pass by his left shoulder. Adam only grabbed the forearm and didn't make contact with the golden skin so he couldn't measure the density of the golden hands. If they turned into solid gold or merely took a gilded texture, only Toshihiro knew.

Seeing his initial attack miss, Toshihiro attempted a textbook karate counterattack and attempted to pull his attacking arm back while at the same time coiling his other arm into a position for an elbow strike.

Toshihiro chose to use an elbow strike because the two had already entered close range melee combat, in which most punching and kicking techniques were too impractical to be used. Thus the choice of combat manoeuvres was limited to grappling, kneeing, elbowing and head-butting.

Of course, Adam practically foresaw that Toshihiro would do this, it was the most effective attack in this position. Which was why he prepared for it.

Firstly he clenched his left hand so as to prevent Toshihiro's other hand from pulling back, lessening the strength of Toshihiro's elbow strike technique since he couldn't perform hikite1 to lend extra strength to his blow. Furthermore Karate techniques depended upon using hikite in order to lend strength to the other hand. This meant that Toshihiro was startled and his stance was destabilised after futilely attempting to leverage strength from the ground to smash the elbow against Adam.

This meant that Toshihiro was placed in a dangerous position, however, he decided to carry on with the attack lest he lose the initiative.

To Adam's shock, Toshihiro's attacking elbow began to take on a golden lustre, promising a heavy blow if this would land.

Toshihiro had made up for the lost strength by applying his aura to the attacking limb!

Adam thought to himself in shock.

'So his awakened technique isn't limited to applying strength to the hands?! Is it limited to the arms or is it any part on his body?'

Nevertheless, Adam didn't have much time to think of possible ways to use this newfound knowledge as the elbow was well on it's way to Adam's face.

It was a good thing Adam prepared himself for this exact outcome, apart from the golden sheen coming off from the opponent's elbow.

Adam bent his knees at a ninety degree angle, putting him well below where the strike would hit. Then, taking advantage of the opening wrought about by Toshihiro's raised elbow, Adam smashed his own elbow into Toshihiro's left ribcage.

As soon as Adam heard a cracking sound form from Toshihiro's ribs he retreated backwards, allowing a breather for the both of them.

There was a distance of about seven metres in between the two of them. Toshihiro was glaring at him hatefully.

He was also slightly leaning to the left, as if injured. It looked like his ribs really were broken, much to Adam's delight.

This would only make the rest of the battle easier.

If Toshihiro was a second rate 'villain' in any other novel, he would be screaming and shouting obscene curses at Adam, except he wasn't. He was critically analysing Adam's every move. This battle had long since reached the point of life and death.

Toshihiro began pacing to the right, Adam paced to the left in order to maintain the centre of combat in the middle of the courtyard.

Toshihiro was playing mind games now, injured and at a slight disadvantage in a frontal combat he began to make attempts to unnerve Adam by pacing around him.

Doubtlessly Toshihiro was imitating Miyamoto Musashi's shameless tactic of arriving late and unkempt to a duel in order to unnerve the opponent.

On the 13th of April, 1612, Miyamoto Musashi fought his first duel against Sasaki Kojiro in Funajima Island. Sasaki had arrived extremely early to the duel and prepared himself for the oncoming fight, however, seeing that the appointed time had came and gone, he started to worry that Miyamoto had forgone the duel, deciding to simply not show up. By the time that Sasaki was at his wits end, Miyamoto showed up with a wooden sword. Seeing this, Sasaki couldn't hold down his nerve and immediately charged Miyamoto to end the duel once and for all. However, all the waiting had deteriorated his mental state and fighting spirit, allowing Miyamoto to easily kill Sasaki with the wooden sword.

Toshihiro was attempting the very same tactic here, attempting to unnerve Adam, trying to force him to reveal flaws in his stance.

Well, if he could play that game, so could he.

Knowing fully well that he was in the middle of combat, Adam tore a strip of cloth from his pants, the lower seam. He displayed it for Toshihiro to easily see.

His opponent was clearly confused as to what he was doing, trying to decipher which trick Adam was playing at.

Then, in one fluid motion, Adam used the piece of torn cloth to cover his eyes and tied it around the back of his head.

Tied to the back of his head like a bandana, it wouldn't come off unless a great amount of pressure and effort was used to tear it off.

Toshihiro had a blank expression on his face, he couldn't register what had just happened. What had Adam just done?

Did he just blindfold himself?!

In the middle of a fight?!

To the death?!

Toshihiro couldn't accept this sequence of events. It wasn't that he was some second rate antagonist but rather it was all just too incredulous to happen in the middle of a fight.

In all of his years pursuing the martial Dao, not once had he seen anything such as this.

Therefore, his mind immediately aligned this event to the closest thing that it looked like to him.

Disregard.

Insult.

Utter disregards and insult of his combat ability.

Toshihiro lowered his head and looked at the ground for a few seconds. His cheeks were becoming flushed and his eyes started to become bloodshot.

His fists were lowered to his sides, quivering from the sheer shame he was suffering.

He was fighting with his very best, and the opponent disregarded him. Almost as if he was but a stepping stone on his path to power, not a formidable opponent with whom to fight.

There was no greater shame to Toshihiro than this, his clenched fists slowly relaxed as an unyielding gaze swept over Adam.

If Toshihiro couldn't receive proper respect from his opponents, then he would force them to recognize his martial prowess.

On the other side of the courtyard Adam stood solemnly with a blindfold around his eyes, alike to a lonely hero facing a great adversary.

Adam had blindfolded himself, however, this was a calculated risk.

There are three systems of perceptions. Proprioception, exteroception and interoception.

Interoception was the perception of the body's organs, such as hunger and thirst as well as the beating of the heart.

Exteroception was the perception of the outside world through the five senses.

Proprioception was the perception of the self, the awareness in the movements of the body.

Adam had taken the [Awareness] feat a long time ago. When he first took it he sensed a great change in his Exteroception, however, this wasn't the limit.

Every day inside the well and every night when training Adam found his senses adapting to the improved awareness.

When he was hungry, he learnt to supress the pain in order to complete difficult tasks.

He learnt to control the rate at which his heart beat, allowing it to beat once every five seconds and slow his metabolism to a crawl.

He also learnt how to see without light during moonless nights, he learnt how to perceive his surroundings with the shifting tapestry of sound and developed his sixth sense to see unknown threats.

With the pinnacle of the three systems of perception, Adam could achieve a realm of martial prowess which was incomparable to his prior combat state.

Pushing the sensations of his body to the limits, he entered a Zen-like state. The world seemed slowed down to his view, the lack of eyesight did nothing to bar the influx of sensory information.

This caused his cognitive functions to overload and perceive everything at a slowed rate, the same slowed motion which people at deaths door had reported seeing.

Toshihiro was charging him, his golden palms gathering the light energy in the area into themselves.

He wanted to end this in a final exchange of martial techniques.

A gust of wind happened to fall over the courtyard in the moment of this exchange.

With the fresh wind of spring came the fallen petals of cherry blossoms. To Adam, they seemed to float in the air because of his slowed perception.

They danced in a peaceful tumult of suspense, the petals created a perfect contrast and audience to the conclusion of this duel.

The sun hung overhead, allowing the petals an enrapturing contrast of shade and light, causing a swirling flood of white and grey on the stone pavement of the courtyard.

Adam was in a true epiphany, he quietly admired the floating cherry blossom petals and the dancing light around him. He had no plan to counter Toshihiro's attack, an attack which seemed incomparable to all of his prior one's combined.

Toshihiro seemed extremely slow to his perception, although in reality he must have been mind numbingly fast.

Then, Adam let his own body guide his actions.

He used his greatest trump card which he hadn't used in the fight yet.

Gathering the power of shadow around his hands, the swirling mass of cherry blossom petal shadows gathered into a single point.

His index finger.

The golden light around Toshihiro intensely reacted to the abyssal power of shadow, it intensely grew in power.

It seemed like a burning sun, incomparable to burning magnesium.

The light seemed to permeate throughout the entire courtyard, in fact, had Adam not blindfolded himself then this light would have rendered him permanently blind.

Then, Toshihiro struck out.

His whole body had shockingly turned completely golden, only his eyes retaining their original substance. They were completely red, not only from rage but apparently from the huge strain his body was put under in utilising this forbidden technique.

Adam was completely at ease, he stood directly in the path of Toshihiro's golden fist.

Then, a golden explosion shook the courtyard and shattered the stone pavement. Cherry blossoms covered the entire fighting scene so none of the spectators could see the outcome of the fight.

However, another gust of wind took away the majority of the cherry blossom petals and a shocking seen could be seen within.

The spectators knew Toshihiro's power very well and thought that the young western man couldn't hold a candle against him.

However, before them, they saw Toshihiro on his knees.

His body was back to it's fleshly form, his right hand was covering his left eye and his face was extremely pale, a symptom of severe shock.

Adam stood before him, he was completely unruffled and even his hair was still neatly combed in the face of this explosion.

He stood upright, not in any martial stance whatsoever.

However, his right hand was outstretched in front of him.

It was pointing towards the position in which Toshihiro had been standing in before he fell on his knees.

His right hand's index finger was extended outwards, blood was dripping from the tip of the finger onto the fallen cherry blossom petals.

Then, from Toshihiro's covered left eye, an imperceptible trickle of blood crawled down from the gap in between the ocular cavity and the nasal bridge.

Adam still had a distant look in his eyes, and, under the shocked gazes of everyone, walked to the gate and left.

From the swinging doors, the karate practitioners could be seen rushing towards Toshihiro to check for his health. Whereas the person in question had fallen backwards to lay face up on the floor.

He looked up at the sky, his clothing was tattered and his hair was bedraggled. The place where his left eye should have been was no more, instead, a shadowed cavity filled it's place. If one were to look carefully, a glimmer of green light could be seen deep within the bloody hole.

The perpetrator of this injury was outside the temple by this point. His mouth was curled in a smile. Not the cold one that he usually showed but a genuine smile.

He wasn't happy because of his victory, but rather because of the unforgettable scene within the cherry blossoms.

Then, from his peaceful stance, Adam suddenly got a coughing fit and used his right hand to cover his mouth.

The spontaneous coughing fit ended shortly, however, looking at his right hand, Adam saw a stain of blood upon it.

He could also feel the blood beginning to pool within the recesses of his throat.

Toshihiro was a difficult opponent.