The World Is Mine For The Taking

When Sakai rushed toward me, she swung her sword with considerable force, putting her strength behind the attack as she aimed directly at me.

I raised my wooden sword and blocked her attack without moving very far from where I had been standing.

The sound of the two weapons colliding echoed through the area, and Sakai’s eyes immediately widened when she realized what had happened.

Naturally, she was surprised by the result, because from her perspective, the situation probably shouldn’t have worked out that way at all.

Her sword was made from high-quality materials, while mine was nothing more than an ordinary wooden sword that I had picked up from somewhere nearby.

Under normal circumstances, there should have been absolutely no way for a wooden sword to withstand a direct strike from a weapon of that quality.

It should have snapped like a twig the moment her blade connected with it, leaving me standing there with half a wooden stick in my hands while she wondered what the hell had just happened.

Instead, I had blocked her attack without experiencing even the slightest difficulty.

The expression on her face made it obvious that she hadn’t expected that outcome at all.

"Hya!"

She immediately followed up with another slash, apparently deciding that she could overwhelm me by keeping up the pressure instead of giving herself time to think about what had just happened.

I blocked that attack as well, turning my wooden sword just enough to intercept hers before it could reach me.

She swung again from another angle, and once again, I stopped the attack without much effort.

Another strike followed soon afterward, and I continued blocking each one while keeping my movements as simple as possible.

Her speed was impressive, and I couldn’t deny that she had improved considerably.

The rate at which she swung her sword was fast enough that most instructors would probably have struggled to keep up with her movements, especially if they were expecting to fight her using ordinary human physical abilities.

I didn’t have that problem.

I continued blocking her attacks without much effort, moving my wooden sword into position before her blade could reach me and making sure that none of her swings managed to catch me off guard.

Even when she increased the speed of her attacks, I remained completely composed, because her movements were still easy enough for me to follow.

However, after watching her for a while, I began noticing something else that was far more important than her speed.

She was hesitating.

Her movements were fast, and there was certainly some power behind her attacks, but something was still missing from them.

She was afraid of actually hitting someone.

I could see it in the way she swung her sword, because although she attacked with plenty of speed, there was always a tiny hesitation right before the moment of impact.

It was as though some part of her mind was subconsciously stopping her from following through completely, even though the rest of her body was already committed to the attack.

I could understand why that might be happening.

For all I knew, she might never have actually struck another person with a sword before, which would explain why she still hesitated whenever she got close enough to actually make contact.

Still, that was a serious problem that couldn’t simply be ignored.

If they were going to participate in a war, they needed to accept the reality that they would eventually have to strike another person.

Hesitating at the wrong moment on a battlefield wouldn’t make them merciful, and it certainly wouldn’t make their opponents decide to politely wait until they finished overcoming their emotional issues.

It would simply get them killed.

If they couldn’t overcome that hesitation, then all their strength, speed, and other impressive physical abilities would mean very little when the fighting actually began.

"Do you really think you’ll be able to contribute anything with this level of swordsmanship?" I asked her, keeping my eyes focused on her movements.

"W-What?" she asked, clearly caught off guard by the question.

"You are going to kill people on the battlefield," I said, keeping my voice calm as I continued watching her. "Do you really think this kind of half-baked swinging is enough for you to contribute anything when the fighting actually begins?"

The moment I said that, she froze in place.

Her eyes widened, and judging from her expression, my words had clearly hit harder than she had expected them to.

I didn’t give her enough time to recover from the shock, because hesitation was precisely what I was trying to teach her to overcome.

I stepped forward and swung my wooden sword directly toward her stomach with enough force to make the lesson very clear.

She reacted too slowly.

She tried to raise her sword and block the attack, but her movement was nowhere near fast enough to stop me before the wooden blade reached her.

The sword struck her directly in the stomach, and the impact immediately forced the air out of her lungs.

"Gah...!"

Her body doubled over from the impact, and she immediately clutched her stomach as her legs gave way beneath her.

"Cough, cough...!"

She struggled to breathe while remaining hunched over, coughing repeatedly as she tried to recover from the blow.

I watched her for a moment, making sure she was still conscious and capable of continuing before shifting my attention toward the other four who had been watching the entire exchange.

They were still standing there, and I could already see the tension in their expressions after watching Sakai get knocked down so easily.

Good.

At least they understood that this wasn’t going to be some friendly practice session where I would simply praise them for trying their best and send them on their way.

They were preparing for war, and war didn’t care whether their feelings were hurt during training.

If they wanted to survive, then they needed to understand their weaknesses before an actual enemy discovered them the hard way.

I raised my wooden sword slightly and looked directly toward the other four.

"Next, I want to see what the rest of you can do," I said.