Cleaver Of Sin

Chapter 499: All Versus One-2

Hearing the Instructor’s words, their frowns deepened even further, brows knitting together as disbelief and irritation flickered across their faces. The Instructor had said that he would step in when they lost against the Tenth Sun, didn’t that mean that Instructor Jude believed that over a hundred students would lose to a single student, that all of them together, despite their training and effort, still stood no chance whatsoever against one individual.

How could they be looked down upon like this? They might be weaker, they knew that much with painful clarity, but they still had their pride, their dignity, and the stubborn fire that refused to let them accept humiliation so easily. They had the advantage in numbers, a clear numerical superiority that should have meant something, so how could the Instructor make such a statement with such certainty and confidence.

Because of that, their reluctance and hesitation vanished into thin air like steam and vapor beneath a scorching sun, dissolving into nothingness as frustration took its place. Even if they couldn’t win individually against the Tenth Sun, with their numbers, they would at least force the Tenth Sun into his first true loss since his Awakening, even if it cost them every last ounce of strength.

Instructor Jude, noticing their sudden change in demeanor and the subtle shift in the atmosphere, simply nodded with a small, knowing smile as he spoke, "Good, that’s the spirit, you have the advantage in numbers," he said, his tone warm yet firm as he nodded in approval, clearly satisfied that their fighting intent had finally been ignited.

"Now, let’s get started," he added as he clapped his hands together sharply, the sound crisp and echoing as it drew everyone’s attention toward him, "the rules are simple, only hand-to-hand combat, nothing else, no ability, no Astra energy, or anything else, if you try cheating, you will be punished by me," his gaze sweeping across them with unmistakable authority that left no room for argument.

The students nodded their heads in agreement without much thought as this was the basic and normal rule of the hand-to-hand combat class, something they had followed numerous times before without complaint. With that, the students started to circle Asher in waves, their footsteps slow and cautious, forming a tightening ring around him as though they were surrounding a wild beast rather than a fellow student.

Asher remained calm and collected, his hands hanging loosely at his sides without a word, his posture relaxed and unguarded, his face unchanged as though their numbers made no difference to their inevitable loss, as though the outcome had already been decided long before this match even began.

’About one hundred and twenty students,’ Asher immediately made a head count, his sharp eyes flickering briefly from face to face, ’others are on missions or just didn’t come at all,’ he thought before he threw the thought out of his mind as irrelevant. He didn’t shift into any martial stance or prepare himself outwardly, he remained exactly as he was, calm and collected as he met their gazes head-on without fear or tension, as though standing alone before them was the most natural thing in the world.

Instructor Jude smiled faintly, his body lifting into the air as he hovered there with practiced ease as he spoke, "If any of you faint or lose consciousness or can’t continue, you are out," he stated as he gazed down upon everyone like an overseer watching a battlefield from above, yet the students didn’t reply, their eyes fixed firmly on the Tenth Sun, because even though they no longer hesitated, their caution was still through the roof and clung tightly to their nerves.

"Begin," Instructor Jude’s words echoed from above with a trace of glee.

At the command, a student tore forward, his adrenaline pumping wildly through his veins and pushing him onward as he raced toward Asher, his mind calculating every move Asher might make to dodge or counter, his breathing controlled but hurried. The moment he arrived before Asher and punched toward his throat with everything he had, Asher moved, he sidestepped with insulting ease, as though the attack had been happening in slow motion, his fist meeting the student’s gut with frightening precision, the student’s muscle mass rippling like waves across a water surface before the impact fully registered, then with that, the student shot backward, ricocheting against the earth before skidding violently to a stop.

He lay there unconscious as though he had been punched to his death, limbs sprawled and unmoving, and if it wasn’t for the subtle rising and falling of his chest, the rest of the students would have thought that Asher had killed him with a single casual attack.

The remaining students swallowed hard as they hadn’t rushed forward, the pressure in the air seeming to spike as the hesitation that had vanished before returned with twice the intensity, creeping back into their hearts like an unwelcome shadow.

Asher wasn’t stupid, yes, he was confident he could win, but he didn’t have infinite stamina, and although his stamina was immense and far beyond that of normal students, it didn’t mean he would waste it against useless attacks and pointless movements. His method for this spar was simple and efficient, he would only use one attack to render each student unconscious, conserving energy with a simple method..

And if they survived his first attack... well, there was nothing much to be said, all he could say was that it should have been better if they fainted on that first attack, because any follow-up would only hurt far worse.

"If you won’t come," Asher’s voice echoed through the open space, calm yet chillingly certain, "then I will," and the moment those words left his lips, he was gone.

In a blink, he appeared within the middle of a group, before they could even process what had happened, Asher’s fists tore outward toward the left and right at the same time, his fists meeting the jaws of two students with explosive force, their bodies shooting to the side like they were nothing but paper caught in a storm.

Asher didn’t wait, his body turning into a streak of phantom motion as he blurred between students, weaving through them like a ghost, he only needed a single attack per student before they crumbled to the ground one after another.

"He’s here!" a student shouted, but Asher’s hand hit his nape in a perfect chop, and he dropped to the ground below with a gentle thud, before others could react to the now unconscious student’s warning, he was already gone again, his speed swift, his attacks deadly and precise, leaving nothing but collapsing bodies in his wake.

A student closed in from behind, a kick screaming toward Asher’s cranium as he tried to catch Asher off guard, but Asher simply stepped to the side without even turning his head, the attack missing him completely, he caught the student’s leg midair, then threw him into a group of other students with immense force and power, knocking all of them off their feet like bowling pins, but before they could even rise back up, Asher’s foot met their chins with the accuracy of a sniper, the wind detonating outward from the impact like a contained explosion.

The remaining students swallowed hard as Asher had already eliminated over fifty students with nothing but sheer speed, control, and overwhelming power before they could even properly react. The difference between them and Asher was immense, vast like the gap between earth and sky, how could they ever hope to put up any meaningful fight against him.

It didn’t matter if they were a million or a billion, their numbers made no difference in the face of absolute power, because when strength reached a certain threshold, quantity became meaningless. Asher’s eyes shifted toward them, his purple irises landing on them one by one as the temperature in the air seemed to drop for no apparent reason, a cold, suffocating pressure settling onto their shoulders.

Asher didn’t hesitate or delay, he took a step, and with that single step, he erased the distance between him and them as though space itself had folded, and then he went on a rampage. Their determination was useless, their courage fragile, and deep down they all knew it, they should have remained afraid because Asher would never be prey to them, never someone to be hunted, because from the very beginning, he had always been the predator.