The hivemind is conquering for me?

Valerica was not going easy on anyone. She wasn’t using her full strength, but she was not limiting her raw talent in the art of combat. Which made it all the more impressive in my eyes when someone lasted more than a few rounds of engagement.

And it was more than I had expected. Though I supposed it made sense with the nobles, they would be trained from a young age to fight with family techniques, it made more sense they could hold out, even for a little bit.

Valerica just gracefully placed Ambrose on the floor after he threw quite a solid punch towards her, but over extended. Valerica smiled and helped the man up, she always respected those older than her, they reminded her of Hank.

”Good instincts sir.” She said as she began helping him up. ” I can see you have talent, we can hone those with time.” Ambrose smiled and patted himself down. ”Thank you Miss Valerica. I appreciate not getting the rough and tumble treatment, you would have seen a man in his hundreds start crying, that’s for sure haha!”

Valerica simply smiled and nodded at the man and watched a moment as he walked off. When she looked back, she began scanning for her newest target. ”You.” She declared as she pointed at the woman with pink hair. The woman had been staring daggers at her for a while with that murderous aura. She thought it was time to give the woman her shot.

The woman seemed unstable and once she had permission to commit violence, she shrieked out ”You will pay!” And charged at Valerica with frightening speed. Somehow the woman was able to throw out a punch while Dodging Valerica’s leg sweep, but Valerica dodged her punch as well.

This was already more intense than 99% of the fights so far. The pink haired lady used her elbow after dodging towards Valerica and jabbed it into Valerica’s ribs. A gasp of surprise emerged as it was the first time someone managed to land a strike on the teacher.

Valerica absorbed the blow and backhanded the pink haired woman hard. The woman was sent flying backwards, but in a feat of absolute agility, The woman composed her flight backwards, spun in the air and landed on one knee with her other leg extended.

The woman then spat on the ground, blood mixed with her saliva before flashing a menacing bloody grin towards Valerica ”You want more? Or are you frail like that little flimsy lover of yours?” Valerica goaded, not out of malice, but as a legitimate battle tactic.

The pink haired woman’s eyes, visibly lit up and glowed red. ”I’ll kill you!” Valerica tutted. ’To think all that talent is locked behind all that crazy...’

The sudden rage effect the pink haired woman became under the influence of, increased her durability as she was taking multiple hits to the face and body from Valerica like it was nothing, it also seemed to make her less battle aware... As she was taking multiple hits to the face and body, not even trying to defend herself as she threw out attack after attack after attack.

Valerica followed the same tactic, I think out of sheer disrespect, and allowed the woman’s attacks to connect. One strike had hit Valerica in the nose causing a slight bleed, but she kept her face composed and decided now was a good time to squash the rage monster.

Raising both her hands up above her head, exposing her abs to a flurry of blows, She then came down with significantly increased force, directly atop the woman’s head

*BONK*

The sheer noise the connection made had a lot of people wincing as they watched the woman crumble to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut. Valerica then waved over a medic and wiped the blood from her nose. ’The woman might be mental, but she packs a punch, that’s for sure.’ She couldn’t help thinking.

Valerica watched as the medic began to do his craft of mending the woman’s skull. It wouldn’t take long as she only cracked it, not broke it. But it gave her a moment to think.

’Hmm. Crazy needs to be harnessed and that green haired punk is clearly not harnessing it correctly... He is definitely just letting her run rampant whenever. This will not do. The woman is a hound, she needs a tight leash, she needs...’

Valerica then looked up at a particular someone who already had a number of crazy companions and dealt with them without hassle... Orchid, Keyla and what’s her name?...Kathrine! All were crazy in their own way, but her son kept them in check, he clearly had a knack for it.

’That woman is a spartari asset, she just needs the correct handler then her training will go much easier...’ Valerica began hatching a plan, unconcerned for the mental manipulation she was going to be putting into play. As long as her baby was not under duress, she didn’t care about anyone else’s emotions.

...

I waved at Valerica briefly, she was looking at me hungrily, a look I have seen from her a couple of times so far and one of those times she chased me out of the room as she was going to force herself upon me if I didn’t leave...

She did look away though and turned her attention to the medic as he said. ”The patient is fine, no neurological damage, though I have given her a synaptic dampener for when she wakes up to quash some of that rage.

As if on cue, the woman woke up and pushed herself off the ground before feeling confused as she stroked her head. ”Nnhyyuggh. Brain hurty.” Valerica exhaled audibly through her nose, finding the little lost look on the woman’s face funny.

”Go join the others on the obstacle course.” She declared, prompting the pink haired woman to look up at her for a few long seconds. ”’kay.” She got up and began jogging over to the course without a care in the world.

...

After that, the fights continued at a rather hasty pace until it was just me as I watched Valerica knock Mindy to the floor quite hard.

Valerica instantly offered a hand to help her up. ”Sorry Mindy, but external Psionics were not allowed.” She said, flicking off a piece of rock from her chest. Mindy took the hand while groaning.

”Sorry, it activates on instinct when I am in danger, I didn’t mean it, I am still learning to control my power after all.” She said, apologetically. Valerica helped her off the ground and smiled. ”Oh don’t worry about it, there was a reason I only tripped you and didn’t bop you square in the face, I could tell it was accidental. Now go on, head to the course.”

Mindy nodded before looking at me and waving goodbye, I waved back before walking towards Valerica and getting into a ready position. Valerica looked me up and down, confused. ”Apollo, what are you doing?”

I broke my stance, confused. ”Getting ready for the spar?” Valerica tutted. ”Don’t be silly Apollo, I already know your combat capabilities, in fact, you are already vetted to go on expeditions, you have multiple powerful individuals backing you up. So go and take a seat over there till everyone is done...”

”...”

”...”

”...!!!”

”...???”

”Are you being serious?!?” I couldn’t help but ask in shock. I had pumped myself up for a fight, naturally since everyone else had been fighting. ”Very serious, Apollo. You have an actual war record at this point, that is more than can be said for a majority of the people here. I mean look at them, some are struggling with that basic ass obstacle course, do you really think you need to prove yourself with that?” Valerica said mockingly as she pointed towards the course.

I turned around to look at the course. It wasn’t that bad, better than the one I made on home world for sure. It was a good mix of speed, coordination and patience in order to complete-

I felt danger screaming at me from behind me and my instincts kicked in. I lowered my body and allowed the high speed object to pass over my shoulder. I wasted no time. Coming back up, I pulled down on the object, against my shoulder, locking it in place, before exerting a great deal of Gyrokinetic energy into the object, flinging it over my shoulder before reversing the Gyrokinesis, forcing it to come down hard.

I raised my fist on instinct to begin assaulting the object while I had it in a vulnerable position before getting an incredible sense of Deja-vu. Valerica was looking up at me, a smile radiant on her face. ”Glad to see you can still dodge that, even when it’s stronger and faster.”

I said nothing as I positioned her hand above her head before reaching out for the other one and doing the same. With them pinned, I then straddled her waist before applying as much Gyrokinesis as I could into my body, causing the ground to indent.

Looking down at Valerica who was looking up curiously, I smiled and stated. ”Looks like I beat the teacher, I have her pinned down with nowhere to go. Do I get to become a guardian now?”