"Which one of you ugly pricks wanna 1vs1 me?” she said, spitting to the side.

Kara decided to give this business another more try, but with a slight variation to her opening line

They were a five group party with four men and one woman. In Kara’s eyes, they had little difference from the last vagabond group she had conversed with. Some were burley, some were scrawny, but they all had that gaunt look upon their faces. Stiff and unsymmetrical, they all seemed bitter and sour.

Their reaction, on the other hand, couldn’t be more different. She barely got another word out before a barrage of snickers, insults, taunts, and unexpectedly detailed descriptions of what they were going to do to her mother came out one after another.

But seriously, what does someone's mother have to do with anything

Instead of fighting her right then, however, the men first had to fight among themselves for the right to grant mercy upon the mentally deranged kid.

That’s more like it! Kara thought with glee, her muscles relaxing. Turns out it was amusing to watch men bicker over her.

Oh, so you get to do those jokes, but not me?

I get to reap my rewards in tasteless jests with myself. You, on the other hand, have neither the right to listen or say them. Begone. I will not play the straight character of your funny man act.

Gee, talk about grumpy. And you wonder why your relationships don’t last.

Before Kara was able to come up with a suitable response to that accusatory comment, one of the more nimble men stepped forward.

A fervor rose within Kara’s heart, replacing her indignation. Her fingers itched fiercely, tightening and untightening her grasp on the hilt of her sword, unable to contain herself any longer. She shook her feet, one after another and cracked her neck, taking pleasure in the simple movements of her new flesh.

“Do you know,” Kara began, interrupting her opponent, “of freedom? Of having limbs that move and twist without shattering like glass?”

“This will be a quicky,” he said, brandishing his blade across the frigid air. “Good luck next time, sorry you got fucked up. Happens to the best of us,” he said, mockingly, though Kara could never tell for sure with the likes of them.

He was clearly somewhat adept at manipulating his Life Force, as his blade was coated in a light layer of Life Force.

A passive speed and strength boost, or on-effect toggle with low requirements. At least he wasn’t completely underestimating her.

He lifted his blade high into the air, too high, already giving Kara a fatal opening. Using a Burst skill the distance could be easily cut, but that would have cost high amounts of Life Force, and more importantly, would have dissolved the chances of Kara having a proper sword fight.

Instead, she stepped back and turned to the side, letting the flash of the blade whiff by her as it went down, and stepped back and turned to her other side as the blade came back up in a diagonal slash, striking it lightly to the side as she had done so.

She confirmed the skill effects that way. Simple, risky, and unorthodox, but when lacking the appropriate tools one has to make-do. It was a simple weight buff. The force behind the blade was far greater than what her opponent was swinging with.

He dashed forward, driving his blade in a vertical slash from the top, allowing Kara to pick the direction to defend from.

She dug her feet into the ground, planting them firmly, and twisted her hips in conjunction with her upper body, swinging her sword diagonally from the same side. Metal struck metal with a resounding crash, the frisky vibrations reverberating through her bones. His power level was embarrassingly higher than hers.

His sword, however, was still knocked to the side. Striking the bottom side of his sword did not block his swing, but it did redirect it to go over her head as she crouched. The abrupt change in motion, combined with his own strength, caused her opponent to stumble past her carelessly as she stepped to the side, disappointed that the numbness in her wrists prevented her from striking him.

The man spun, his mouth panting and his eyes bulging out. He had turned his back on his opponent for just a second, but in a short moment, death had loomed close to his heart.

He snapped his sword up, sweat running down his brow.

“Ha! The kid is playing with him!” one of the men said. They weren’t being terribly subtle about the way they began circling Kara in attempts of preventing her escape.

“Your shaking, hideous friend. Finally realized you're out of your depth?" Kara said with a huff. She began stepping back, glaring at the men that attempted to encroach their duel. She began humming, focusing the range of her Death Siren’s Web. It provided increased visibility of the fight all around her, especially for the bow woman.

She captured everything within her senses.

“Lucky bastard. Getting cocky, eh?” the man said, edging forward with care. He was weak but he was no fool; the difference in skill was clearly shown. A different air came about him.

It was a minor detail, but significant enough for Kara to anticipate his next possible move. She focused her eyes towards the veins in his left hand, and was able to spot the tiniest of Life Force channels charging up.

It was the first step to casting a Life Force skill. First, he had to prepare the channel in which the Life Force would travel with a thin layer, and in the second step, he would have to allocate the proper resources, which by that point even the naked eye could see.

It made his next movement quick to understand. He lunged forward, raising his sword high in the air with his right arm, as his left swung behind him, out of sight.

Kara performed the same parry but with a slight variation to it. She stepped to the right, and answered the downward slash with a diagonal of her own, knocking his blade to the left side and leaving her right under his smirking face.

The force of the blow had knocked the sword from Kara’s hand, leaving them both defenseless.

Her opponent left arm thrust forward from the side with the strength of his entire body, a visible amount of Life Force coerced within his open palms.

The man was skilled, as with Kara’s inferior stats, he would have struck her with his right hand well before she could bring her sword down on him after the parry, which was precisely why Kara had simply released the grasp after pushing away his sword.

Her right hand swung towards his open palm, striking its side and knocking it aside well before it could be pointed at her.

A short moment later, an explosion resounded behind her.

Life Force Emission. No matter the variation, most of them centered around discharging a concentrated amount of Life Force in a blast.

The short respite was all that she required to cast her own Life Force skill. It was a simple and efficient body part of Empowerment skill, which was quicker and cheaper to cast than an entire body Empowerment skill. It required more training, but that was the only thing Kara did not lack in.

Kara’s left fingers, outstretched and tightly woven with a Life Force strengthened, jabbed themselves a few inches into the man’s open neck, and then cut to the side, spraying blood upon her opponent's teammates a few meters away.

Full Penetration!

You have dealt 26 Damage!

You have dealt Devastating Bleed Damage!

“Good day, thank you for the points,” Kara quickly said as she pinched her opponent's blade. By the time he fell to his knees, gasping, and then face first into the hard dirt, Kara had already booked her escape. Devastating Bleed Damage was at least 9% MAX HP damage per second, and no amount of Life Force could staunch that.

After a micro stun, the rest of the party began chasing her, throwing arrows, rocks, two hand axes, and poorly worded insults. As she dodged and wove her way around the small trees, Kara had good news and some very bad news.

First, the gap between this body and others were not as enormous as she thought. She could beat fools of that caliber all day long.

The second, and the one she had been expecting: None of his skills activated! Neither Short-Breath nor the Dodge skill were in effect.

She didn't need any of his skills, but if his skills were permanently closed off, including his menus, that meant that Kara was forever stuck with a level 20 skilless body.

Things were not looking good. If his Soul got stuck within the Trials, then Kara would be stuck like this.

Skills were linked to the Soul, not just the body. It was why she lost most of her Life Force skills when she lost half her Soul.

And Requistion only said that it would dominate the body, not the Soul.

I knew there was a catch. There is always a catch!