Sweaty forehead, clenched fists, and subconsciously gnawing on the leaves, Aryn had been on the edge of his seat ever since Rudolph had stepped out to face the Hyena on his own.

He had done his part and restrained the other Hyenas to stop them from ganging up on Rudolph but he still couldn't keep his heart at ease.

The idea of weakening the Hyena through magic – he had ways of doing so – formed in his mind but it went as soon as it came. This was Rudolph's battle and he had no right to interfere.

Still, he watched the battle between a man and a beast with the intensity of a hawk. When the Hyena lunged at Rudolph and left a gash on his thighs, Aryn almost let out the shielding spell he had been close to casting all this time.

He was surprised when he saw Rudolph standing despite sweating and breathing hard as an over-worked horse, but he also knew that he had no chance to win the battle. He was about to step in before the situation turned more dangerous for Rudolph when a sudden situation caught him off-guard.

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Ding! Inbuilt Sword Tutorial Activated!

Stillsword art:

Completion rate: 0%

Rudolph looked at the prompt and the progress bar hovering in front of him, dumbfounded. His pupils shrank to the size of a dot and with it came a ton of information that drilled into his brain, making him hold his head and roll down in pain.

The Hyena reacted fast. It didn't give him any time to recover and taking advantage of the situation, drove his bloody canines towards Rudolph's head intending to shatter his skull, but Aryn who had been observing the situation was even faster. Before the Hyena could succeed, a circular green shield materialized between its jaws to prevent them from closing, while roots and vines erupted from the ground and held the growling Hyena in place.

"Rudy! Are you alright!?" Aryn asked as he dashed towards Rudolph and placed a hand on his back.

Rudolph didn't answer but his rolling had come to a stop. The pain was still there but receding, albeit very slowly. He gritted his teeth as information continued to swarm into his brain. Information about swordplay, angles, positioning, movement, and plenty of other information related to swords he never knew existed before today.

The situation continued for a couple of minutes before he could relax his clenched jaws and open his eyes. As soon as he did, he was greeted with the notification of his pain resistance reaching Basic Ill rank. He only glanced at it for a second before looking at the completion rate and the progress bar which had reached 20% and then to Aryn who was looking at him with worry.

"I am alright, Aryn," Rudolph said after a moment.

"What happened? Why did you start rolling all of a sudden?"

"I-"

Rudolph tried to tell him what happened but to his alarm, he couldn't form any thoughts. It wasn't because he was stunned but he had genuinely lost the ability to convey his thoughts to Aryn. Just when he was thinking about what went wrong, new information entered his mind, causing him to look at the black impermanence in surprise.

'Just who are you, Sithis?' Rudolph thought and looked at Aryn who was waiting for an answer.

"Just a slight headache, nothing to worry about." Rudolph lied.

"Are you sure it was just a headache?" Aryn raised a brow at his unexpected answer.

"Why would I lie?" Aryn stood up and smiled at him which ensured Aryn's belief that he was lying.

Aryn didn't believe that this was just a minor headache, his reaction was far from something a headache could cause but he also didn't pursue him, to tell the truth. Everybody had their secrets, he too had them so it was normal if Rudolph didn't want to share them with him.

"Let's go. You are in no condition to fight right now. Maybe you can try again after you have fully recovered." Aryn said, half dragging Rudolph away from the Steel-hide Hyena.

Rudolph pried away his pulling hands and gave him an apologetic gaze, "No, I can't do that. I want to complete this battle and this time, I am confident that I will be able to kill it. Believe me."

Seeing his unyielding eyes and the conviction within his words, Aryn knew he couldn't change Rudolph's mind today so he didn't force him and stepped several meters away from him, just enough to reach him if things go sideways.

With a gesture of his hand, the roots came undone and the Hyena, free from his restrictions, growled and looked at Rudolph with bloodthirsty eyes. Wisps of coppery aether circulated through its body and its long canines and sharp claws turned even longer and sharper. It gave another growl and charged at Rudolph who stood there calm as a cucumber.

The Hyena – closing in fast – was only several meters away from him but he still hadn't shown any signs of movement. There was a voice ringing at the back of his head, his intuition probably, telling him to stay his ground. Only when the Hyena pounced and clawed at him did he use his heel as a pivot and turned slightly to his right, causing the Hyena to miss out.

In the next minute, the Hyena would attack again and again but Rudolph would always find ways to dodge its attacks, sometimes by stepping back and sideways, sometimes by rotating, sometimes by ducking and jumping, and sometimes using his katana to parry the claws aside.

In the face of danger, adrenaline took control of his senses and his blood circulated faster and faster, his movements got more fluid as he continued to dodge the attacks and get more familiar with the information surging through his brain.

Soon, the progress bar and the completion rate reached the 40% mark.

His thoughts churned like a computer; twice as fast as before and he began analyzing the attack patterns, speed, and movement of the attacking enemy. Even the Hyena's and his own attack angles were dissected by him in a fashion more suitable for him to understand. But the weird thing was that he hated maths and had never taken the time to learn this stuff but now he felt like everything was imprinted on the back of his mind.

Ding! You have learned the skill [Thought Acceleration] (Rare) (Active).

Rudolph didn't have the luxury to check the notification as he was fighting a Hyena, an enraged one at that. It stopped and stood at a distance with its tongue hanging out of his mouth, a sign of exhaustion. However, with another circulation of metallic aether, its fur turned to needles and stood up like a porcupine's.

It aimed and shot the sharp needles at Rudolph who was caught in a dilemma at this unexpected attack. His thoughts spun like crazy, trying to figure out the best route to escape this predicament.

'What should I do? Duck? Step? Parry?' he thought.

His intuition clicked in and he knew none of them were feasible here so he jumped and twisted his body mid-air at an angle he never thought was possible. His actions were a perfect case of 'What the mind thinks the body follows', gone wrong as he was struck twice in the shoulder, once in the foot, and one of the needles grazed his cheeks, leaving a bloody line.

His control over his body was extremely lacking so he couldn't properly execute the moves as he had envisioned within his mind.

The progress bar and completion rate reached the 60% mark.

Rudolph landed on his toes and without stopping, lunged straight at the Hyena who had stopped its assault and was retreating groggily.

Ding! You have learned the skill [Flash Step] (Iron) (Active).

He was breathing and bleeding heavily and knew he had to end this battle fast or risk bleeding out to death or succumbing to exhaustion, none he could afford. He knew that it wouldn't happen since Aryn was still present there but he didn't want to rely on anyone's help to finish a battle that was his, to begin with.

Dashing in, Rudolph put all of his remaining strength into his slash and the katana in his hand accelerated all of a sudden and blinked in front of the Hyena and severed the beast's head from its body.

Ding! You have learned the skill [Quick Strike] (Iron) (Active).

A barrage of notifications, ringing, a falling head, and a fountain of blood was the last thing he saw before his head throbbed with intense pain – different from before– and his vision turned dark as he fell face first on the ground.

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