Chapter 91 Application

“Whump!”

A huge, callused palm covered in dense body hair slammed down like a broad fan.

It hit nothing but air.

The black-haired figure standing in front of the bugbear blurred for an instant, then shot backward.

The blow that should have caved in Xia Nan’s chest missed completely. Not only was he unharmed, he did not even suffer a graze.

And he still had enough momentum left to counterattack.

The bugbear had only just finished its swing when Xia Nan tightened his grip on the iron-gray longsword. The sword point flicked forward, the edge grazing across the thick muscles of its waist and opening a bloody gash.

“ROAR!”

Its furious bellow crashed through the cave like an invisible wave, rebounding again and again between the stone walls.

Fine frost-white fur stirred in the vibration.

A pair of ice-blue eyes calmly reflected the two figures fighting in the cavern.

Forgan had made no effort to conceal his presence, but he showed no intention of interfering in the fight between Xia Nan and the bugbear either.

He simply stood in a corner of the cave, silent and unmoving, like a totem carved from ice and thorns.

His chest rose and fell with long, steady breaths.

With every breath, strands of faintly glowing frost mist drifted through the air. They brushed over Xia Nan’s body, seeped through his pores, and sank into his muscles and bones.

The bone-chilling wind of the distant Northlands helped the young man who had grown up in the heart of the continent regulate his body temperature.

More importantly, the cold sharpened his awareness.

Every shift of bone, every contraction of muscle, every minute change in posture became unusually clear.

And without Xia Nan even realizing it, the frost guided his movements whenever he used the combat technique, nudging each motion closer to the proper form.

Before Forgan’s eyes, the black-haired young man used the technique he had only begun practicing a few days ago once again.

He slipped past the bugbear’s whipping kick.

The instant his displacement ended, Xia Nan borrowed the remaining momentum, raised the shield strapped to his left arm, and drove it into the bugbear’s body.

The hulking creature staggered.

For a moment, it nearly lost its balance completely.

Forgan gave the faintest nod.

There were several reasons he had chosen to teach Xia Nan [Fang Hunt].

The half-elf’s mother had once been his teammate in her youth. They had adventured together, and Forgan owed her more than one favor.

Now that she had entrusted her child to him, he naturally intended to see the request through properly.

Xia Nan’s fighting style also happened to suit the technique.

That was one reason.

The other lay in [Fang Hunt] itself.

A standard one-handed sword was still the same sword whether it was held by an ordinary adventurer or a Legendary sword saint.

But the power it could display in those two sets of hands was worlds apart.

At first glance, [Fang Hunt] looked almost painfully simple.

It was a movement technique.

Dodge an attack.

Close the distance.

Create distance.

That seemed to be all it did.

But its simplicity was exactly what gave it room to become something more.

Defense.

Offense.

Evasion.

Other combat techniques.

Anything the user could think of could be inserted into the movement.

Once the charge began, the user could adjust according to the battlefield and combine [Fang Hunt] with whatever action the situation demanded.

Its upper limit was extremely high.

The demonstration Forgan had given two days ago was a perfect example.

What Xia Nan had seen was not merely [Fang Hunt].

Forgan had taken the technique as a foundation, then layered his own totemic power over it, along with the freezing aura granted by his Transcendent class, [Mourning-Frost Oathbound].

But a technique with such a high ceiling naturally came with equally demanding requirements.

To truly bring out the potential of [Fang Hunt], the user needed either vast combat experience…

Or an exceptional instinct for battle.

A flash of insight.

The ability to notice a fleeting opening in the middle of a chaotic fight and seize it without hesitation.

In Forgan’s eyes, Xia Nan had exactly that quality.

He had already suspected as much two days ago, after watching Xia Nan fight an entire battle from start to finish.

And over the days that followed, as Xia Nan grew increasingly familiar with [Fang Hunt], an odd thought had begun creeping into Forgan’s mind.

This was…

Too fast.

Before the age of twenty, Forgan himself had already been able to hunt a highland ice python alone with his bare hands.

By any reasonable standard, that had made him a monster among his peers.

Yet even he had never learned combat techniques the way Xia Nan did.

For Xia Nan, every breath seemed to matter.

Every step seemed to matter.

Every hour of practice produced visible progress.

It was as if proficiency accumulated naturally with every motion of his body.

That was why Forgan believed Xia Nan could become a class holder in the future even if [Spinning Slash], the combat technique he had already trained to Mastery, was ignored entirely.

Even if he discarded everything and treated [Fang Hunt] as the first step toward his class, he would only need to learn two more combat techniques and raise one of them to a sufficient level.

At the pace Xia Nan had shown over the past two days?

A few years would be more than enough.

A class holder in his early twenties was exceptionally young.

Even in the tribe…

Forgan’s thoughts stopped.

The steady flow of his mind broke apart for an instant.

The ice crystals suspended in the air around him trembled with it.

He lowered his gaze.

A moment later, the frost settled.

The crystals stabilized.

Forgan looked back toward the battlefield.

“ROAR!”

The bugbear was still roaring.

Still furious.

Still vicious.

But compared with before, the force behind that roar had clearly weakened.

The fight was almost over.

“Tap.”

Xia Nan’s leather boot landed in mud streaked with fragments of ice.

His eyes remained fixed on the hulking enemy ahead.

Both hands gripped the sword.

He turned slightly sideways.

A lock of black hair shifted across his forehead as another attack passed harmlessly beside him.

After several rounds of exchanges, the bugbear was slowing down.

Xia Nan did not stop moving.

He leaned forward.

His abdomen tightened.

His calves tensed.

Exhale…

Inhale…

Tiny crystalline flecks scattered from his breath like mist.

The combat technique that had once felt unfamiliar was now sinking into muscle memory.

He used it again.

“Bang!”

Mud burst outward.

A dry streak appeared across the damp cave floor where his foot had kicked off.

Xia Nan’s figure blurred.

Using the force-generating method of [Fang Hunt], he slipped past the bugbear and appeared behind it.

And at that exact instant…

There it was again.

That familiar flash of battle instinct.

He did not analyze it.

He did not test the idea.

He did not ask himself whether it would work.

It simply felt right.

After using [Fang Hunt] to evade the attack and reach the bugbear’s back, Xia Nan did not even turn his head.

His right foot slammed into the ground.

The forward momentum of his charge became rotational force.

Step.

Turn.

[Spinning Slash]!

The iron-gray sword flashed.

A sharp crescent carved through the air.

“Hummm.”

Blood sprayed.

The roar stopped.

The bugbear’s shaggy head spun away from its shoulders and crashed to the ground.

Xia Nan remained where he was, frozen in the finishing posture of the swing.

For a few seconds, his eyes were unfocused.

He replayed the movement in his head.

[Fang Hunt].

Then [Spinning Slash].

Rush in.

Turn.

Sweep.

A grin almost tugged at the corner of his mouth.

[So they can be used like that.]