What followed was about half a day’s worth of Mobito teaching me some simple hand-to-hand combat moves and drills. I managed to pick it up extremely quickly, quick enough to surprise my teacher.

At the end of a series of drills that were designed to imprint muscle memory into movements, Mobito suggested that I spar with him.

We stood about a metre and a half away from each other and he said, “are you ready?”

I nodded, and we both entered a neutral fighting stance.

“Remember, all that you’ve learnt are defensive moves. On this journey, the adults will handle most of the fighting, but to be able to fight properly, we need to trust that you can protect yourself, okay?”

“Yep—”

As soon as I started to reply, Mobito slid closer to me and entered an aggressive fighting stance and rounded his back leg for a low kick to try and knock me off balance.

On instinct, I lifted my front leg out of the way and stepped back, while Mobito continued to keep his close distance by stepping forward and throwing a jab at my face.

A Window popped up at the corner of my vision and before my mind could comprehend the Message, I had brought my arm up and redirected the jab away from my face and lunged to throw a jab of my own.

Mobito calmly ducked away from the jab and took a step back, creating a little bit of space for both of us to breathe for a moment.

My eyes quickly flitted to the Window and saw:

[DUE TO EFFECTS OF ITEM: {REDACTED}LEFT ARM OF THE ████████████{/REDACTED}, USER HAS MASTERED “PJANIC SELF-DEFENCE TECHNIQUES — BEGINNER”.]

I was still sharing my Status Window with the party and sent them the Window message. Nato was confused and seemed slightly angry at it, while Saizo cheered me on. I looked at Mobito, and he had cocked his head slightly to the right and motioned for me to come at him. A smile of confidence was firmly on his face as he did so.

I wanted to take that grin off the man’s damn face. I lunged at him with a speed that took him slightly by surprise. He raised his hands into a defensive stance as I threw a slightly complicated series of jabs and swings at him according to the drills that I had been taught only a few moments ago.

This particular series of movements were considered to be the most complicated in the Beginner Pjanic Self Defence martial art, and even though I performed the movements to perfection, Mobito managed to block and protect himself from every single attack.

He then moved into counterattack with the same series of movements. This was to test my defensive capabilities. Of course, like what the Message had told me, I was able to also stop all of his advances.

In a sly movement, he used both his palms to drive my hands up and away from my body, breaking my defensive stance and I could only watch in helplessness as he quickly brought his hands back close towards his body and throw a short but powerful punch right at my torso.

Instinctively, I managed to bring a knee up to my chest, right in the way of his punch and successfully blocked the attack. The force of the punch was absorbed and forced the leg back behind me. I forced the leg down onto the ground to prevent myself from falling over and pain throbbed from my knee.

Mobito returned back to a defensive stance and then relaxed, “that’s enough I think.” He turned to Nato and Saizo, “what do you guys think?”

I relaxed and looked at the other two. Nato scoffed and said, “I guess that was okay.”

Saizo looked at him in disbelief, “okay? That was incredible!”

“I agree,” Mobito said, directing my attention back to him. He started to make his way over to the other men, while he nursed his knuckles.

“Yeah?” I asked. I swiped and saw on my Status Window that a tiny portion of my HP had gone in the spar. Not enough for me to have to bandage or take any of the HP elixirs Saizo made me buy. It was just my knee, and even now the throbbing started to dissipate.

“Like the Message that you shared with us said, you’ve managed to master everything that I taught you in such a short amount of time, and you were able to perform them flawlessly,” Mobito explained as he took out a leather canteen from his Inventory, “and to top it off, you even managed to block my punch right at the end, which was fascinating.”

He took a big gulp of water from the canteen, “I’m guessing that was the same instinct that helped you out in the Goblin Dungeon?”

“Yeah,” I said.

Mobito took another gulp before he secured the cap on the canteen and placed it back into his Inventory, “Gods, I wish I had that natural fighting instinct when I was your age. I would have been able to get out of more fights injury free.”

I thanked him for the lesson.

Saizo spoke up next, “now, are you guys finally happy? Can we start making our way towards the Crimson Tower?”

Mobito grabbed a small bandage from his Inventory and started to wrap it around his knuckles, “I think he’s going to be fine, as long as we don’t run into any cultists along the way.”

“If Mobito says he’s fine, then I think he’s fine,” Nato mumbled.

“Great!” Saizo exclaimed and gave me another nudge as I grabbed my own canteen from my Inventory. I hydrated and after I placed my canteen back into my Inventory, I noticed my knee was a bit dirty.

I rubbed my knee clean and a Window that I’d seen once before popped up in front of me appeared once again. I looked over at Mobito who finished wrapping his knuckles in a bandage. There must have been some surface-level damage from my knee block because the Message in front of me said:

[ALERT!
BLOOD SACRIFICE VICTIM ACCEPTED!
BLOOD SACRIFICE STATUS TILL COMPLETION: 33% (+)]