The Foolish One
Aslan sat quietly in the waiting area, staring at the bracket in front of him.
Rai had told Zeroa how to analyze opponents. For Aslan, he had simply demanded that he develop the habit of analyzing.
That meant Aslan already knew how to analyze.
He had grown up in a military family where generations had served in the army. Naturally, he possessed far more knowledge than ordinary academy students. Trained by his house, and having listened to his grandfather’s countless tips and stories, Aslan’s head held knowledge far beyond what most cadets managed to fit in.
It was simply that he had never bothered to make good use of it.
Aslan first checked what he already possessed.
The very foundation of combat was to understand everything available to you, he had been taught.
Within the first-year range, his advantages were high-level skill, Rai’s wide-range attack techniques, and powerful body and stamina.
After a quick mental scan, Aslan felt a fleeting arrogance. *Isn’t it enough to just fight like this?*
He soon shook his head and continued worrying.
Next came the situation.
The battlefield was the most important factor in combat; one had to grasp it before the enemy.
The stage was a limited space. Beyond the stage lay invisible barriers. Aside from the opponent in a one-on-one duel, there were no other obstacles.
In such a place, Rai’s wide-range attack techniques would be extremely advantageous.
Even if Rai called him foolish, Aslan was still a child of a military house. Trainer Demian had slammed far more knowledge into him than anyone else. Even when he had been irritated at the time, the knowledge remained untouched in his head.
To Aslan’s surprise, he continued analyzing step by step, maintaining the basics.
His gaze eventually fell on his opponent, Randle.
Randle used sword and shield, employing standard swordsmanship with nothing unusual about him. While this evaluation was somewhat unfair, the revealed skill level was mid-to-low tier. Even if he had hidden his strength during training, the performance shown so far suggested there was no point in hiding it now.
“Is it even worth analyzing?”
Aslan muttered to himself, wondering if he should bother thinking when victory was already certain.
The martial arts tournament required multiple matches each day until the 128-strong bracket.
Therefore, against opponents with no chance of winning, one could simply forfeit quickly and save energy for the next round, or conserve stamina in other ways. There were countless factors to consider.
Every loss meant one more match would be required to advance to the next round, and the longer the fight, the more stamina and mana were drained.
Aslan had plenty of stamina, but the thought of fighting continuously made him hesitate. If luck was poor and he faced a similarly skilled opponent, he might emerge battered and lose the next match anyway.
Ultimately, consistently winning and advancing was the most efficient use of stamina and mana.
The technique Rai had taught him was strong enough to pressure even active-duty Demian. The downside was that it consumed mana extremely fast.
The longer the match dragged on, the more mana would be sucked dry, and even if he won this one, he might not be able to fight the next.
So the answer was simple.
Defeat the opponent as quickly as possible in each round and move on.
“Simple enough.”
Aslan smiled, stood up from his seat, and left.
If his grandfather, who had taught him strategy since childhood, had learned that this was the method, he would have slammed his desk and wept.
But strangely, many academy students used this exact approach.
When one believed the gap in skill was large, the best option was often to attack with full power and eliminate the opponent without leaving any room.
Even if the opponent was weak, they had reached the academy with varied knowledge and experience; slowly wearing them down often led to unexpected counters.
And Aslan’s method worked perfectly.
“**Stone Tornado!!**”
The stage floor was torn apart as dozens of stone chunks orbited around Aslan’s massive bone greatsword like a devastating tornado.
The attack range expanded to the size of a giant’s club.
Limited movement space on the stage combined with wide-area offense. Nothing was more difficult.
Randle, who had faced him in the first round, was unable to mount even a feeble counter and was eliminated in an instant.
New students at the academy widened their eyes at the technique they had never seen before. In a confined space, such overwhelming force was nearly impossible to counter.
As Aslan climbed round after round, students watching began to worry about how to counter Stone Tornado.
“Whoa— that’s amazing! It was taught by Raikkang?”
“... ... No, I don’t know anything like that.”
Even though it was the technique Rai had taught him, Rai himself did not know the childish name “Stone Tornado.” Embarrassed, he denied it when Cecet asked.
The name mattered little; the power had been clearly demonstrated. Stone Tornado began spreading among the students.
Aslan easily defeated his second-round opponent and imprinted Stone Tornado in the minds of the academy students. When the commentator asked how to counter it, Aslan answered with a delighted voice.
“It’s a technique Rai taught me. Thank you.”
Aslan smiled brilliantly and pointed toward the stands where Rai sat.
“You didn’t teach it.”
“I didn’t teach it.”
Rai tried to deny it to the end, but Stone Tornado had become known as his technique.
Aslan, riding the momentum to advance in the rounds, suddenly faced a problem.
“... ...”
A silver-haired girl stood with an expressionless face, giving off no fighting spirit. Her ordinary longsword, dangling limply, looked pitiful, yet it pressed Aslan down more powerfully than anything else.
She was Violet, the prodigy hailed by everyone.
At first glance she seemed fragile, but the aura emanating from her was no ordinary level. Simply standing before Aslan gave him the impression of facing a ferocious, gigantic monster.
“Stone Tornado... show me.”
Violet was not a talkative person by nature. Even when crowds gathered around her, she simply sat quietly. She rarely took interest in anything.
Yet when directly challenged, the corners of Aslan’s mouth lifted.
He acknowledged Rai’s technique, but Stone Tornado had come first.
It was embarrassing for his pride, but more than that, a stronger opponent stood before him.
The feeling was different from facing Rai. Thinking he could mix his swordplay with Violet, the peerless strongest among his age, stirred his fighting spirit to new heights.
The tournament reminded one of the importance of conserving stamina, but with such an opponent, what other thoughts were possible?
Stamina and tactics were irrelevant.
A warrior was supposed to smash the opponent in front of him and charge forward, was he not?
It sounded as though Rai and Demian were weeping somewhere, but Aslan raised his greatsword, determined to make Violet look at him.
Like every other match, Stone Tornado activated the moment the fight began. The stage floor was torn apart as the tornado converged on his blade.
At the same time, a staff member standing nearby began to wail. He was the person responsible for the stage; every time Aslan fought, the entire floor had to be rebuilt.
Wails echoed from all around as Aslan, wielding a blade that had destroyed everything nearby, looked like a demon king.
Violet slowly approached Aslan, who had been transformed by the vicious blade, and the two clashed.
“Well, I lost.”
In the losers’ bracket of the third round, Aslan sat on a chair in the waiting room, looking ragged.
Violet had analyzed the technique and, after knocking aside the stones with her sword, landed a single strike. Aslan’s posture was ruined.
“I know a similar technique too.”
As Violet spoke calmly, mana gushed from her body like a flood and wrapped her sword in light.
Wrapping a sword in mana was a common technique, but the problem was how enormous it had become. Aslan’s eyes widened at the light-sword that could slice through a city wall if swung once.
Violet raised the massive holy sword high and performed the fundamental strike that was the foundation of all swordsmanship.
And Aslan lost consciousness.
“What do you mean ‘similar’? It’s completely different!”
Still clutching his aching body, Aslan grumbled.
A single downward strike had covered the entire stage. It was not wide-range; it was full-range. Stone Tornado’s blade had been completely useless against it.
“Even if I thought Stone Tornado was a scam, that technique is the real thing. You don’t think so?”
“... ...”
In the losers’ bracket of the third round, Abigail stared silently at Aslan.
There were plenty of other seats, yet the man sitting beside her refused to understand.
Ignoring him until now and receiving no answer, Aslan continued chatting without hesitation.
They were not close enough for him to be friendly with Rai, yet this guy was acting familiar. Abigail glared at him with eyes full of displeasure.
“Right? You think the same thing, don’t you? It’s too much of a scam.”
The glare meant “shut up,” but Aslan mistakenly took it as agreement and annoyance.
Abigail let out a heavy sigh and opened her mouth.
“Shut up.”
“Why? Don’t you have any pre-fight routines like meditation or whatever?”
Surprisingly many people engaged in meditation or set routines before important matches.
Abigail had none at all and actually considered such people weak, but she did not feel like explaining it directly to the idiot.
Frustrated, she clenched and unclenched her fists.
“Stop acting close and get lost.”
“We’re close. We spar with Rai together. Honestly, I had no friends in the waiting room either, so it’s good I did.”
“Even if we might fight in the tournament, do you want to act close?”
“If you get the same waiting room as me, you won’t face each other in the next round. Did you not know that?”
Abigail was about to explode, but since she did not want to talk to him anymore, she kept quiet.
A brief silence followed, but Aslan sat beside her, massaging her shoulder and shifting his weight.
Abigail, who hated being next to someone so irritating, checked the bracket and moved to another seat when the pairings were announced.
“Why are you following me?”
“I have something to ask.”
Aslan followed her and smiled.
Abigail wished she could punch him for annoying her, but she held back so she would not be disqualified by a staff member. She let her hand drop.
She had her own problems to think about now.
Following Rai’s demand to fight with bare hands, Abigail was suffering in the tournament.
Philia had a month of preparation time, but Abigail had received only one week from Rai.
It was impossible to abandon habits ingrained in her body and learn new ones quickly.
Moreover, defeating someone wielding a weapon with bare hands was a legend at best and impossible in reality.
A fighter was far weaker than someone facing a weapon-wielder.
Although the academy taught martial arts, it was only to improve footwork and empty-hand techniques when fighting with weapons; there was no actual martial arts course.
In the end, Abigail had only barely advanced by alternating wins and losses in matches that were too similar to real combat.
With no time to spare after Aslan’s question, she answered quickly.
“How do you analyze well?”
“... ... Why don’t you know how? Just look at the opponent.”
“You sound like Violet. You’re not a genius, are you? There should be some unique insight or your own method.”
Naturally rude, Aslan’s words made a vein bulge on Abigail’s forehead, but she swallowed it down again.
She had no time for arguing with this brat. Since Rai had asked Aslan to develop the habit of analyzing, simply worrying about it now was enough for him to have succeeded.
It was easier to pretend to listen, agree, and then kick him out.
“Analyze the guy I’m fighting.”
“Tena is from a military family. The sword style she uses is Alterion. It’s the secret technique of the Alterion family. Lots of movement makes it look flashy, but the actual technique she uses for combat is thrusting. She tends to look for counters using those thrusts. She prepared for tactical training until the day before the match, so she will lack stamina. She’s also fought with low stamina in previous matches and adopted a passive stance.”
Watching Aslan recite the information one after another, Abigail was astonished.
Merely glancing at the bracket gave her a flood of information about Tena.
As Abigail stared blankly, Aslan finished speaking and looked at her, waiting for an answer.
“Analyzing like this should work.”
Abigail’s late realization made Aslan frown and scratch the back of his head.
“That’s the problem. I don’t know how to use it even after analyzing.”
He had insight but could not use it.
Whether he was teasing her or was truly an idiot, Abigail could not understand. She pondered for a moment and said,
“I’ll do what the opponent hates.”
“What does ‘what the opponent hates’ mean?”
“Weak points. Things that annoy them. You know what Rai often does.”
“You provoke the opponent?”
“You idiot, ‘what the opponent hates’ means weak points or vulnerabilities. If they’re weak, attacking there makes them hate it.”
As Abigail finally exploded, Aslan nodded.
*Ah, I see.*
As Abigail finally felt free, she regained her freedom.
Time passed, and Aslan stepped onto the stage to face Tena.
He had been beaten mercilessly by Violet, leaving his body battered and mana depleted.
In this unfavorable situation, Aslan faced Tena with a confident expression.
“What do you hate?”
“Huh?”
“What do you hate?”
Tena, on guard against Aslan’s sudden question about tastes, answered cautiously.
“Eggplants.”
“... ... Eggplants taste bad anyway.”
Nodding in agreement, Aslan still failed to learn anything and faced Tena.
**Third-round losers’ bracket: Tena wins.**