Ch.19Chapter 19: High-Performance Punching Bag

“Hm?”

As Valt looked toward the source of the voice, he saw a middle-aged man of average build, about 175cm tall, standing there.

He had a friendly impression with droopy eyes.

His light brown curly hair stood assertively.

He clearly had no interest in decorating his appearance.

But his piercing gaze suggested he was no ordinary person.

‘He’s strong.’

Barbarians can instinctively sense an opponent’s strength.

Unlike Central Continent people who use mana to sense ki, they possess an innate intuition that remarkably identifies strong opponents.

Valt could detect mana as well, making his accuracy even higher.

As we know, Valt is by no means weak.

Rather, he’s quite strong for his age.

Though not a true great warrior, he possesses a great warrior-class physique and now knows how to handle mana.

But Valt’s intuition screamed:

‘I can’t win against him. Who on earth is he?’

Just as Valt thought this, the man introduced himself in a languid tone.

“Ah, pardon my rudeness. I’m Riman Squat, a professor teaching swordsmanship at the Academy. Since you’re a student, I don’t need to treat you like a prince, right?”

To be an Academy professor, one must be at least a Floor 6 Aura user or a 6th Circle magician.

That’s the basic qualification for an Academy professor who teaches students.

But the man before him seemed to be at least Floor 7 in Valt’s estimation.

This meant he was too powerful for any non-great warrior barbarian to face.

“That’s right. Do you have business with me?”

“Being a country bumpkin, I’ve never seen a Barbarian before. Seeing you out so early, I assume you’re here for morning exercise? Care to join me if you don’t mind?”

‘Huh? Is this…?’

Valt thought the man might be picking a fight, but instead, a good opportunity had presented itself.

He had been wanting to gauge his own abilities anyway.

And now someone of this caliber was suggesting they exercise together.

Though he called it exercise, it clearly meant sparring.

Thinking he’d made a good decision to wake up early, Valt replied:

“Sounds good. Let me finish eating this first, then we can go.”

Riman laughed heartily and said:

“Hahaha, that’s a Barbarian for you! So straightforward!”

There was plenty of time until noon when he needed to meet Arias, so spending time with this person seemed like a good idea.

***

And so they arrived at the sparring grounds.

The vast colosseum-like arena was truly impressive in scale.

The open sky above gave a sense of spaciousness.

Numerous reinforcement and barrier spells were cast on it, theoretically making it resistant even to 9th Circle magic.

Naturally, no one was around in the early morning during vacation.

Standing opposite Valt, Riman smiled and asked:

“Bare hands? Weapons? What do you prefer?”

Using weapons would be meaningless since they wouldn’t be able to inflict real damage.

For Valt, who didn’t know proper weapon techniques, bare-handed combat would be much better against someone who was a swordsmanship professor.

“Let’s go with bare hands.”

Though Valt expected disappointment, Riman actually seemed pleased.

“Hmm… this is quite a treat. Bare-handed combat with a Gerung-Tu, how thrilling!”

Despite his words, his eyes were filled with curiosity.

“Ah! Let’s keep it moderate so no one gets hurt, okay?”

“Understood. I’ll give it my all.”

“Hahaha, you’re quite reasonable, aren’t you?”

What injury? This professor would likely remain unscratched even if Valt went all out.

Valt understood that Riman was indirectly saying he would hold back while Valt should give his best.

Riman extended his left hand forward, took his stance, and called out to Valt:

“Come at me.”

The concession of a strong opponent offering the first move.

Usually, Valt would be the one making such concessions, but this time he didn’t hesitate.

Despite being three heads shorter than Valt, the man’s presence was no joke.

Instead of answering, Valt stomped on the arena floor and charged at Riman.

Judging by his stance, it seemed Riman would receive the first attack.

Valt chose the most unexpected attack he could manage.

Feigning a punch, he grabbed Riman’s wrist.

Thup!

“Huh?”

In the moment Riman was surprised by the grab instead of a punch—

Whoosh!

Valt threw him upward with all his might.

“Oh! Ohhhhh!!”

Riman flew toward the upper barrier of the arena at tremendous speed.

But rather than panicking, he shouted excitedly:

“Hahahahaha! This is amazing!!”

Despite the arena’s size, Valt had thrown Riman with such force that one would expect him to be alarmed.

But there was no sign of that at all.

As expected, Riman spun his body and planted his feet against the barrier in mid-air.

Thud!

The barrier glowed white, indicating it had absorbed quite an impact.

“Wow! That could have been serious trouble without the barrier!”

Landing back on the ground with ease, Riman grinned at Valt and said:

“What are you waiting for? Keep coming!”

This man apparently had no intention of attacking Valt.

He truly seemed to be here out of curiosity to experience a barbarian.

‘With someone this strong…’

Valt had never tried using physical-to-magical conversion and physical magic simultaneously before.

In fact, he had come out early this morning to test this, and conveniently, a high-performance “sandbag” had appeared on its own.

Though he wasn’t sure if he could land a hit.

“Hup!!”

Valt tensed his entire body, converting physical power into magical power.

He didn’t know if there were other methods, but this was the only one Valt knew for now.

Valt’s muscles and snake-like veins bulged as his magical power rapidly amplified.

Seeing this, Riman looked surprised.

“Huh? How?”

In that moment, Valt stomped hard, shattering the arena floor.

Kwang!

Valt snatched a piece of the floor that had been kicked up, cast an enchantment spell that had become somewhat familiar to him, filled it with overflowing magical power, and threw it at Riman.

Shwaaaak!!

Though Riman had sensed magical power, he hadn’t expected a barbarian to actually use it, and hastily drew up his aura.

‘Should I dodge? No! I have my pride as a professor!’

In a real battle, he would have dodged, but right now, experiencing this barbarian was the priority.

Riman concentrated aura in his hands to block the stone Valt had thrown.

Kwang!

‘What? How can a mere stone have such power!?’

A sizeable explosion occurred as magical power and aura collided.

Valt had already launched himself forward immediately after throwing the stone.

Right after the explosion, Valt’s palm extended toward Riman.

Whoosh!

‘Image! The image helps even without calculation and incantation! I need to visualize it strongly!’

Valt’s judgment proved effective.

Imagery is influenced more by will and spirit than intelligence.

Even excluding Valt, barbarians have quite high stats in those areas.

‘A striking weapon stronger than a fist! A hammer!’

As Valt concentrated on the image,

The Wind Fist, which previously appeared as just a concentration of wind, now transformed into a hammer shape with tremendous magical power and imagery, extending toward Riman.

Seeing this, Valt inwardly rejoiced.

‘Great! It worked! It can take different forms!’

Riman, who had just blocked the stone, looked surprised at the approaching Wind Hammer.

“Magic? Is that magic?”

The power was formidable.

This level of force would trouble even Floor 5 Aura Experts.

“Whoa! This is no joke!?”

But Riman was a Floor 7 expert.

He strongly drew up his aura and deflected the approaching wind hammer by striking it upward at an angle with his arm.

Tong!

If he had met it head-on, a magical explosion larger than before would have occurred, which might have injured the barbarian before him, if not himself…

That might have been unnecessary concern.

But his body had already moved, and after deflecting Valt’s Wind Hammer, Riman reflexively struck Valt’s exposed pectoral muscle.

‘Oops!’

He hadn’t intended to attack, but Riman had reflexively extended his fist, feeling threatened by Valt’s overwhelming presence.

Pung!

“Ugh!”

Scrrrape!

A groan escaped Valt’s lips as he was pushed back about ten steps.

‘What? Only ten steps? What kind of durability is this!’

Though Valt seemed fine, Riman asked out of courtesy:

“Are… are you okay?”

Valt, who had taken Riman’s attack, spat out some saliva.

“Hmm… I can handle it.”

He wasn’t just a sandbag after all.

But Valt was actually pleased that his attack had posed a threat to a Floor 7 expert.

‘Right, what’s the point of me just attacking?’

As expected, his attacks weren’t effective. Valt’s best moves were easily blocked, and he even suffered a counterattack.

But a proud barbarian couldn’t give up so easily.

Valt charged at Riman again.

“Feel free to counter like that again.”

“Hahaha, this is really exciting!”

***

“Huff! Huff!”

Valt appeared exhausted.

The sparring had continued, but Valt’s chances of landing a successful attack remained remote.

Riman, looking completely fine, said to Valt:

“Whew! Let’s stop here, Gerung-Tu prince. That was truly enlightening! It’s amazing you can fight at this level!”

Valt’s breathing quickly returned to normal after a short rest.

“Haa… thank you for your time. I don’t deserve such praise when I couldn’t even land a proper attack.”

Riman smiled warmly and said:

“Not at all! I wonder if anyone else in this year’s class can fight like you. But your fighting style is quite different from the Gerung-Tu combat method I’ve heard about. Your physical abilities are extraordinary, of course… but a Gerung-Tu handling magic? Are you some kind of special case?”

Valt, not wanting to explain in detail, simply agreed. It wasn’t a lie anyway. He was indeed a mixed-blood, different from pure barbarians.

“That’s right.”

Riman crossed his arms and said:

“Hmm… magic… It’s certainly powerful, but for a Gerung-Tu who specializes in close combat…? Why not learn aura instead?”

Surprised by the unexpected suggestion, Valt responded:

“Aura? But for that, I would need an aura cultivation method…”

Realizing Valt’s concern, Riman smiled and said:

“Haha, the Academy has plenty of common aura cultivation methods. They can’t compare to noble family secrets, of course… but there’s no harm in trying, right? Though I’m not sure if a barbarian can learn it.”

If all barbarians learned aura, it would be a different story.

But it’s difficult for barbarians with innate magical power of 1 or 0 to learn aura.

However, Valt could do it. His magical power was at 70.

He wasn’t sure if it would work with a physical-to-magical conversion item, but if he could learn it, there was no harm in doing so.

“I’ll consider it.”

Riman smiled and said:

“Good. I don’t know which class you’ll be assigned to, but I hope we can meet again. Thanks for your time—I got a proper morning workout thanks to you.”

As Riman was about to leave, Valt spoke up:

“Since I granted your request for a sparring match, may I ask for a favor in return?”