Oblivion: Rise of the Lost King

Chapter-13 The One

Ken calmly stood before me with a nonchalant expression and unsheathed his sword.

"Hey wait, Don't you think you should give me a bit of time to prepare.", I said trying to stand up.

Instead of using the sword himself, Ken threw it to me, "Pick up the sword, you are gonna need it."

"Go easy on him!", the clan leader shouted from behind

"Yes, sir", he put one of his hands behind, "I will let you get the first hit and I will only use one hand. If I use my second hand, I lose."

I picked up the sword before me, "You sure that isn't overconfidence?"

"Trust me, kid. You will be thankful."

One thing I knew for sure was that I couldn't defeat him with just strength or speed alone. I needed to use my brain. What can I do to land a strike on someone like him? Someone whose moment I couldn't even see the first time he appeared.

I had to be faster than him. I didn't focus on defense and concentrated all my QI into my legs to increase my speed, I knew he would not hit me since he was going easy on me.

I ran towards him as fast as possible and swung my sword at him, but the moment my sword was going to touch him. He disappeared.

"Here", I heard him say from behind me Even if I had become faster I still wasn't able to see his moments, I turned back and swung my sword from above again. This time, he dodged it and punched me in the stomach, I went and crashed into the wall. I had turned my QI output from my legs to my back at the last moment but it still was too weak to protect me completely. I could only imagine what would have happened if I hadn't protected myself.

"Impressive.", Ken's face brightened, "I didn't expect you to be able to protect yourself at the last moment."

"Weren't you gonna go easy on me?", I said trying to stand up

"I am. Now remember one thing. NEVER and I mean NEVER, leave yourself defenseless. You could have died right now."

"Yes I know.", I said wiping my face, "I will keep that in mind." This time he didn't give me any break. He disappeared, but this time I could see him, even if just a single frame I was able to see him move towards the left. I looked over to my left and blocked his attack, but still, it was so strong that I lost grip of the sword and it went and fell over to the other side of the room.

I tried running to get it, I made sure to constantly maintain eye contact with him. He was just standing there looking at me as if he was the predator and I was the prey.

I bent down to try and pick up the sword but the moment my hand touched it, he kicked the sword away.

"I gave it to you once, You think I am gonna give it to you once again?", he said, trying to kick me in the face

but this time I was able to see it and ducked to dodge the attack. I had an opening, and chance to attack him, or so I thought.

I tried to punch him from below thinking that since he had one of his legs in the air, he would be vulnerable but I couldn't be more wrong. The moment I tried to attack him, he grabbed my fist and threw me towards the glass wall like I was nothing but a doll for him, I hadn't felt that way since I fought the golem. This guy though nowhere the size of the golem, felt way stronger.

I barely managed to regain control and stop myself from crashing into the glass wall. I had no weapon in my hand and my chances of even landing a hit on him were zero, If I focused only on speed I would be left defenseless. if I focused on defense, I would not be able to keep up with his speed. There was nothing I could do. But I still had one way, one trick to maybe get him to use his other hand. But there was no certain way to know if it would work or not. It required an expert level of precision and control. But it was the only possible way for me to ever win this match.