“What?” He asked, with an innocent look.

“Your sister?” I asked, pointing at her.

“No,” he answered, confused.

“Oh, you had the same manners, so I thought you grew up together,” I said, looking back at her.

“You fucking with me, boy?” she asked, glaring at me.

I grinned. “Later if you want. I’m here for a fight now.”

She wasn’t exactly my type, but it had been some time since the last one, so I wasn’t too picky. She didn’t seem to appreciate my response, though.

“Come inside and let’s have a quick one-on-one,” she said angrily as she entered the cage.

“Here in front of everyone? You must be quite pent-up,” I told her.

Not surprising, considering her character.

“A fight!” she snarled.

It was funny since she was quite small. She didn’t even reach my shoulders.

I turned around, looking at her companions. Larin had an awkward look on his face, while the mage was just smiling politely; the other two looked amused.

“Is she a Berserker by any chance?” I asked.

The healer laughed.

“Surprisingly, no. They come from the same village, though,” said the archer, pointing at Larin.

“Yes, childhood friends,” added the healer.

“Oh, everything makes sense now,” I said with a look of realization on my face.

Larin looked at me annoyed. “Could you stop riling her up? She’ll take it out on me later.”

I shrugged.

“Let’s go inside. I’ll have a quick spar to calm her down, then we’ll have a normal introduction, and we’ll see how to go from there,” I told them as I followed the fuming woman.

“See you later, John.” He had been observing silently from beside the door for a while.

The fight went as well as I thought. While the skillset was almost the same, she was a bit more capable than the bandit I fought on the hillock, but I was a lot stronger now. The spar ended within ten seconds, with my victory.

She was a bad match-up with me.

I could dodge the wind blade easily, the air blast barely slowed me, and I was both stronger and faster than her. She also didn’t have the high Toughness and armor of Larin, so she went down with a punch in the stomach.

I may have used a bit too much strength, though, since she threw up her breakfast.

Everyone aside from Larin looked shocked.

“Why those faces?” I asked while looking at him.

“They haven’t been in the guild for the past week, so they thought I exaggerated when I told them about you,” he explained, smirking.

“Shame on us, but you shouldn’t have needled her so much,” said the archer.

“Serves her right for making fun of me,” shot back Larin, with a snort.

“Yes, and now she’ll be pissed at you for pushing her into a losing fight. Good job,” countered the other.

So he’s the one riling her up. Talk about pushing fault towards others.

“You’re really something, though. How do you become strong so fast? Is there a trick or something?” said the archer, with clear envy in his eyes.

“I trained and fought a lot,” I told them.

“I can’t imagine how much I’d have to train to Level up so quickly,” he said with a sigh. “You must be quite talented.”

“I’m amazing, I know.” And I really trained and fought a lot.

I didn’t insist, though, since I knew he was just lamenting without purpose, and the woman was stomping towards me again.

The healer went to help her after I took her down, and now she came demanding another fight, which I accepted.

She lasted a bit longer this time, by trying to keep a distance, but it was ultimately useless.

“Is this enough or do you want to keep wasting everyone’s time?” I asked, with my sword pointing at her throat.

She gritted her teeth for a few moments before spitting out, “Enough.”

“Good,” I said, sheathing my sword. “Now we can get to the real thing.”

I had been looking forward to this day.

When we walked back to the other people, I saw Larin trying to hide behind the others.

Not much of a chance with that size of yours, I thought as the woman glared at him.

“Are you satisfied now?” The healer asked her.

He just received a snort in response.

“It’s time to get down to business then. How about an introduction? I’m Alex, the scout and ranged fighter of the group,” started the archer.

“I’m Carl, the healer, as you can see,” he said with a grin pointing at his coat.

“My name is Ophelia. I’m a mage specializing in water magic,” said the robed woman.

They then looked at the other grumpy woman in the group.

“I’m Molly,” was all she said.

“Nice to meet you. I’m Silvester. I specialize in close-quarter combat and one-on-one duels. I have also some experience against multiple foes,” I introduced myself.

After that, we talked a bit about how we should proceed and we started the fight.

They usually had other people helping with their practice, to which they asked to only use Skills pertaining to physical capabilities. It was either a singular strong fighter, simulating an orc, or a lot of weaker opponents, simulating a lot of goblins, since were the most common threats on these mountains.

As Larin said the previous day, I didn’t have much to do other than fight like usual, so the only thing we had to discuss was when to stop and how hard to go at it.

We started around thirty meters apart until a shout of, “Begin,” started the fight.

I ran at them at full speed.

Larin used his Skill to make a hammer of earth, then dashed towards me. Molly followed behind him, releasing a Wind blade when we were just a few meters away from each other.

The moment I moved to dodge the Skill, Alex released an arrow, predicting where I was moving to. It was almost impossible to see, but I was already using mana to boost my perception, so, the moment he let go of the string, I moved out of its path.

The arrow was impossibly fast, and I could barely see it even with my enhanced sight. I was sure I was out of its way when, just a few meters ahead of me, it curved. I barely had the time to twist my torso while leaning back when it reached me, scoring a gash in the leather of my chest.

I was already out of balance when Larin made the ground wave under my feet, preventing me from regaining my footing; then he swung his hammer.

At the last moment, I tried to jump back to reduce the impact as much as possible, and concentrated most of my mana on the arms, protecting my torso.

The moment the hammer hit me, I heard a dull sound and my arms smashed against my chest as I was sent flying.

When I hit the ground, I rolled and jumped to my feet while trying to look out for any incoming blow.

Suddenly, before I could even get my bearings back, I saw white in front of my eyes, and a moment later something hit my chest hard enough to make me stagger.

“Okay! That’s enough! Stop the fight!!!” I heard a shout.

The vision in front of me then suddenly cleared.