Chapter 228 - 228)Another One.

"What the fck?" 

It was a common feeling shared by everyone who witnessed the spar. One-sided wouldn't even cover one percent of how dominating Luke was, at some point, it looked like his opponents were trying to miss him. He slipped past every punch and dodged every kick and grapple, be it from behind him or from his side, there was nothing that wasn't under his control.

All six of the fighters were either on the floor completely or on their knees, so far all Luke did was simply parry every attack, which only made them feel weaker as it was obvious that he was playing around with them.

"Is that enough?" Luke asked as he stood in front of them and look down at them, from their perspective it seemed as if their new instructor was an overconfident snobby brat, who only wanted to show off. However, they were wrong, completely, the only reason Luke didn't strike back was because he wanted to analyze their attacks and techniques properly.

"You with the man bun," he pointed to an individual with long hair tied into a knot, "When you're charging at me and coming in for a grapple it's very obvious. If you're grappling someone, you need to make sure it connects, if not, you're in a vulnerable spot. There were six of you, and you guys worked together, but somehow failed. Since you use holds a lot, your job is to pin me down and get me in a disadvantageous position. Try jumping in with the others,"

"...." The man looked at Luke with a complex expression and wide eyes, the truth was, he wasn't expecting constructive criticism from the new instructor, as mentioned before, all of them thought of him as an over-talented snob.

"Oy, say something, did you catch that?" Luke asked after getting no reply.

"Y-yyesss….yes I understand. Thank you for your ef-eefortssss!" he got up and bowed down, what Luke had said actually made sense to him, if he were to work on this, then surely it would be a step forward.

"Good. You with the weird tattoo on the forehead," he then looked towards the woman with a complex symbol inked onto her face, "You aren't bad, but you're far too safe and calculative. Thinking is good, but thinking about necessary shit isn't. Either you do something about how quickly you calculate information or you stop worrying about what's pointless. Jump in, rely on your gut a bit, take a few hits, it'll make you better,"

"Ttthank you for your advice! I shall work on it!"

One by one, Luke pointed out the wasted movements and wrong usage of techniques, until finally, he turned to the rest of the students, he looked through the horde as the other six students slowly joined the others.

An advantage that Luke had over Cara, Nate's mother, was that he could see the individual's internal energy flow, meaning, the stronger the flow, the more potential they had, or at least he assumed. So far, the only one who truly surprised him was Basile, the rate at which his energy was produced almost managed to counter Luke's supernatural ability.

"Hmmmm…." The students nervously shuffled as they felt Luke's purple eyes fall upon them, it felt as if he was seeing right through them, moreover, after the experience and insight Luke just displayed, all of them were eagerly waiting for more input. "Interesting…"

"Alright then, now before we begin for real. I will give you guys the option to walk away right now. The training is going to be hell, and there's no running away in between," Luke spoke as he removed a hairband from his pocket and tied up his hair, revealing all his facial features clearly, the breathing of some of the students suddenly got heavier and their faces grew pink.

"Hoh? No one? Okay. Since it's the first day, let's start with the basics, that is, physical training. If I'm being honest, I never focused so much on enhancing my physical capabilities, but I can tell you, that it is a critical factor. We will only be focusing on martial arts once each and every one of you has reached a certain point,"

"At the end of your training, you're either going to wish you never met me, or wish you had met me earlier. It all depends on you, and how much effort you put in. I assure you, follow me, and I'll prepare you for the worst," Luke spoke in a confident tone as if he meant every word of what he said, and the truth was that he did. The unknown probability that something or someone supernatural could be their opponent was a huge factor that he couldn't leave out. Training them to the point where they could at least fend for themselves was the short-term goal.

Luke wished to push them to the point where he wouldn't need to worry about the safety of the civilians, naturally, this was unlikely, but even if all of them couldn't do so, even a single one of them would be a huge asset.

"Any questions?" 

He looked at the changed determined expression on everyone's face and tapped into the newfound motivation, Luke now had to find a balance between reality and Genesis, he had to grow in both worlds until the worlds collide.

"Good, start off with 100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, uh a 100 suicides? Use those the pillars and stuff as a line for the suicides, and do the last 10 suicides backward or some shit," Luke tried to recall the different exercises he witnessed back when he was training. The truth was, Luke was a good teacher, and was experienced, unfortunately, he was gifted, and his potential had no bounds, which is why he didn't require to go through the same amount of physical exertion as the others.

"Y-yess..? Yes sir…" The students agreed with a rather hesitant look on their face, other than the suicides, the push-ups, and the sit-ups weren't that hard to do, these were martial artists that were made to perform such tasks, however, because of how professional Luke was about the techniques, they decided to follow things through regardless of how unusual the exercises were.

'Was that…too little? Or too much?' Luke wondered as he took a seat on the stage and watched all of them. Teaching felt nice, felt natural, and close to him, although the probability that someone could reach his level is nearly nonexistent, it was still heartwarming to see his students grow.

'Wait a second…..what if I can train them in Genesis as well? Wait but that won't do them any good….but…urgh I can't figure this shit out, I'll ask Nate I guess. Training here should do, and I think I should simply help them refine themselves and get better,'

This wasn't like in the murim novels, the martial artists here were slightly better than the average humans, and if they pushed themselves to the max, then very rarely, geniuses that defied reality would show up- people like Luke or Basile or even Elena. However, that was highly unlikely, dodging a bullet wasn't a common occurrence and there wasn't anything called cultivation.

Martial arts was simply a form of self-defense where individuals hone their bodies and condition them to withstand immense pressure, there was no internal pure energy that could blast mountains, there was no ki or anything, it was simply the will and determination of a martial artist.

After about an hour, Luke noticed that one of the students there had finally finished, he was scrawny compared to the others, his entire presence screamed timid, and yet, he was the first to finish. The boy had blood on his elbows and sweat dripping from all over his body, his lips were dry and his back was bent, but his eyes. His eyes held determination that sent shivers down Luke's back, it was a sense of nostalgia, not fear.

"You're done….?" Luke looked at the boy with wide eyes, all of the other students were gasping for air as they continued, every now and then they would shoot glances at the boy standing in front of Luke, it was clear that this was completely unexpected. The boy simply nodded his head in response, perhaps his throat was far too dry. "What's…your name?"

"Nate…." The boy replied in a low voice, he was clearly parched but for the moment he made do with his own saliva. As soon as Luke heard his name, a smile appeared on his face, it was a funny coincidence, but it was weirdly comforting to hear the name of his best friend. 

"Haaah, then from today I'll be calling you little Nate," Luke patted the boy's hair, by the looks of it, this boy was the youngest there, he was around 17 years old which was surprising. How was he here? And what made him suddenly push himself so much?