SSS Talent: From Trash to Tyrant

The next morning came earlier than Trafalgar would have liked.

He had slept well, better than he’d expected after the days spent inside the dimension, but Dravok was already waiting beside the Gate by the time he finished breakfast. Rhosyn arrived shortly after, with Caelvyrn following at a slower pace, and within minutes the castle disappeared behind them.

The endless black spread out once more.

Trafalgar stepped away from the Gate and rolled his shoulders, testing himself as he walked. The difference a proper night of sleep had made was difficult to ignore. The pool could repair every injury they gave him, but there was a clarity in his head this morning that the dark water had never managed to restore.

Dravok led them farther onto the training ground before turning to face him.

”Godstep taught you one of the ways our bloodline moves. What I’m teaching you today is different. It’s simpler in principle, but I expect you’ll have more trouble with it.”

Trafalgar stopped a few metres away. ”You said Godstep was the easy one last night, so I assumed you weren’t planning on giving me anything comfortable.”

”I’m not. But this one has less to do with whether your body can perform it and much more to do with whether you can read what another fighter is doing.”

That caught Trafalgar’s attention immediately.

Dravok stepped closer and gestured toward his chest. ”Your body is already far tougher than a human’s. Your skin resists more, your muscles can take greater strain, and your bones need considerably more force to break. Even compared to most of our bloodline, what you inherited gave you an unusually strong foundation.”

”I’ve relied on it plenty of times.”

”Exactly. And that’s useful until it becomes a habit you don’t notice.”

Trafalgar frowned slightly. ”I don’t deliberately take hits because I know I can survive them.”

”I know you don’t. That’s not what I’m saying.” Dravok shook his head. ”You’ve spent years fighting with the knowledge that a mistake costs you less than it would cost most people. When an attack gets through, your body gives you a margin for error other fighters don’t have.”

He tapped two fingers against Trafalgar’s ribs.

”Against most of the people you’ve fought, that margin was enough. Against Caelvyrn yesterday, it wasn’t. Against me, it wouldn’t be either. There are people in this world who can make your natural durability irrelevant if you depend on it alone.”

Trafalgar thought of Caelvyrn’s claws opening his chest without much difficulty, then of the single strike from Dravok that had left him unable to move.

”So the next skill reinforces the body? Or that is what you are implying?”

”A very specific part of it.”

Dravok raised his left arm. Mana gathered beneath the skin and spread evenly from his fingertips to his shoulder, visible as a pale layer of power running through the limb.

”This is the crude version. You take mana and reinforce an entire section of your body. It works, and plenty of fighters do something similar without ever taking the idea further.”

The mana disappeared again.

”The problem is waste. If I’m striking one point on your ribs, there’s little reason to reinforce your shoulders, your other side, your legs, and half your torso. You’re spending power on places that were never going to be touched.”

Trafalgar looked toward the spot Dravok had indicated. ”So instead of spreading it across the body, you compress it exactly where the attack is going to land.”

”Exactly. The skill is called [Origin Guard].”

Dravok pressed his palm lightly against Trafalgar’s side.

”You reinforce the skin first, then the muscle beneath it, then the bone that has to absorb whatever makes it through. Depending on the attack, you can carry the reinforcement deeper. The important part is that all of it happens in one small area and only for as long as it’s needed.”

”How long are we talking?”

”A fraction of a second if you’re good enough. The mana should arrive just before the impact, take the force, and move on. If you’re still holding it there after the attack has passed, you’re wasting it.”

Trafalgar nodded slowly. The principle itself was straightforward, and far easier to understand than Godstep had been the first time Dravok explained it.

Which meant the difficulty had to be somewhere else.

”You said you expected this to give me more trouble. I’m guessing concentrating the mana isn’t the problem.”

”It isn’t. You already have the control for that.” Dravok stepped away from him. ”The problem is deciding where to concentrate it while someone is actively trying to make you choose wrong.”

He raised his right fist.

”Suppose I’m going to hit your ribs.”

Dravok moved slowly enough for Trafalgar to follow the punch without difficulty, stopping his knuckles just short of Trafalgar’s left side.

”You see the line. You reinforce here. Simple.”

He drew the fist back and moved again, this time toward Trafalgar’s chest. Trafalgar tracked it naturally, his attention following the shoulder and elbow as the strike came forward.

Halfway through, Dravok changed the angle.

The fist dropped toward his liver.

Trafalgar’s eyes narrowed as Dravok stopped before contact.

”That’s where the real skill begins,” Dravok said. ”Anyone can defend the place they’re told is going to be struck. In a fight, your opponent wants you to read the wrong attack.”

”So I need to predict the final target before the blow gets there.”

”At first, yes. Eventually I don’t want you predicting anything.”

Trafalgar looked at him. ”Then what am I supposed to do?”

”Read it.”

Dravok gestured toward his own body as he explained.

”A fighter tells you what he’s going to do before the attack reaches you. His feet change the line he can generate force through. His hips turn. His weight shifts. A shoulder tightens, a hand closes differently, the head moves. Most of those signs happen before the actual strike.”

That much Trafalgar already understood from swordsmanship.

He had spent years reading the same things with weapons involved, judging where a sword could go from the stance holding it, where the weight sat, whether an opening was genuine or bait.

Dravok seemed to read the recognition on his face.

”You already do part of this. That’s why I’m teaching it to you now. But with Origin Guard, the punishment for reading badly is immediate. Put the reinforcement on your left side when the strike comes into your right, and you’ve spent mana defending absolutely nothing.”

”And taken the hit normally.”

”Yes.”

Trafalgar considered that for a moment. ”How much difference does the skill actually make when it’s done correctly?”

”A great deal, especially with your body.” Dravok answered without hesitation. ”A strike that would break a rib may leave you bruised. A blade that would cut deeply may barely pass the skin. As the skill improves, so does the amount of force you can concentrate into that defended point.”

He paused before continuing.

”But don’t misunderstand what I’m giving you. Origin Guard doesn’t make you invulnerable. If the difference in power is large enough, the attack still gets through. This gives your body another layer of defence. It doesn’t rewrite reality.”

”That’s more than enough.”

”It is, if you learn to use it without turning every incoming fist into a puzzle.”

Trafalgar’s brow drew together slightly.

Dravok tapped a finger against his temple. ”That’s the habit I’m expecting from you. You’re clever, and you’re used to solving what you see. For this skill, thinking through every movement will make you too slow.”

”You want the reaction before the thought.”

”Eventually. At the beginning, you’ll have to think. Then you’ll learn which details matter, and the rest will start falling away. By the time you’ve truly learned Origin Guard, the mana should already be moving before you consciously finish deciding where the attack is going.”

Caelvyrn had remained quiet near the furniture through most of the explanation. He finally spoke from behind them.

”He’s right about that part. Once you’re fighting people at this level, seeing the fist itself is already late. You’ll need to learn what happens before the fist moves.”

Trafalgar glanced toward him. There was none of yesterday’s amusement in the dragon now; he sounded entirely serious.

”Does Origin Guard belong only to Primordials?”

”The version he’s teaching you does,” Caelvyrn answered. ”Others reinforce their bodies. Your bloodline turned it into something far more precise.”

Dravok stepped into Trafalgar’s attention again.

”Enough explanation. You’ll understand the rest faster once getting it wrong starts hurting.”

Trafalgar exhaled slowly and let his stance settle.

”All right. What do you want me to do?”

”Nothing complicated yet. Watch me, decide where I’m going to hit, and move the mana there before I make contact. Don’t dodge. Don’t block. And don’t use Godstep to escape when you realize you’ve guessed wrong.”

Trafalgar drew mana closer to the surface of his body.

Dravok lowered his hands loosely at his sides, giving away very little from the stance alone. His shoulders were relaxed, his weight almost perfectly centred, and his pale green eyes remained fixed on Trafalgar without offering any clue.

Then his right foot shifted.

Trafalgar caught the turn of the hip immediately.

’Left ribs.’

Mana rushed toward his side, sinking beneath the skin and beginning to tighten through the muscle and bone beneath it.

Dravok saw it happen.

His weight changed.

The strike went the other way.

And Trafalgar understood, one instant too late, exactly why the next few days were going to hurt.