THE LAST KEEPER

Chapter 27: Chapter 27: TEAM MANEUVERS

Sagiri was too cold to even walk after they pulled him out of the pool. He was a shivering mess and he needed help even to stand. The two junior instructors hooked their hands beneath his arms and dragged through the dimly lit corridors till they got him outside but not a second longer. Once outside they let him go and his body hit the hard ground with a thud. He fell down and laid unmoving on the hard surface. From where he lay he could hear commotion as students pooled to the other side of the assembly ground. He couldn’t believe he had been in that pool for just around ten minutes yet it had felt like hours. He wanted to move and go to the assembly to avoid more punishment but he seemed to have used the last of his will in that pool. It seemed breakfast time was already over and he had missed it again.

”Fuwuka seems to have thrown you in hell pool after you barely got here.” a voice said towering above him and he moved just his eyes to regard the towering figure. Captain Salka. He was even taller from where he lay and he was munching something but sagiri couldn’t smell it from how badly his senses had been frozen yet he still felt the desire to eat it.

”Here eat this, I don’t want you to faint on me again.” Salka offered what he was eating. sagiri looked at the piece of pastry swallowing with hunger. He almost reached for it but something deep inside him was awoken in that pool. He would not succumb to his body’s weakness, he was going to find a way until he was fast enough to get to breakfast on time. He retracted his frozen fingers and shook his head.

”For a small guy you are quite strong.” Salka applauded. ”but at least let me help you to the assembly ground if you don’t want to be punished in the suspension chamber.” Sagiri could not even move his head before Salka lifted him by his waist like some weightless bag just like the other day letting his arms and feet hang limply. Everyone had already gathered except the instructors when Salka burst into the assembly ground. All eyes fell on them and most of them seemed to know which direction he had come from.

”He has been thrown into the hell pool already?”

”Must be captain Fuwuka”

Whispers broke out as Salka came to a stop and dropped him in the fourth year front line.

”FORM UP!” Salka barked and everyone fell into formation and into silence. Just then the door of the central pentagon opened and instructors poured out with principal Senraki in the lead. Sagiri pushed himself into position and in line with trembling feet.

”WARRIORS KNEEL!!” Salka barked again before he stepped back allowing for other.

instructors and principal senraki to took to the podium. Sagiri barely heard whatever was being announced. The instructors’ voices reached him like muffled echoes. He heard nothing clearly. Commands, announcements or discipline reports. Everything was blurred together. He didn’t even register the principal’s speech, only a low tone moving in and out of his ears. Then, suddenly, the entire school recited the creed. Sagiri joined several seconds late, his voice barely a whisper.

”Recruits and cadets dismissed!” The principal finally announced. Everyone rose at once to return to their respectable pentagons but Sagiri stayed crouched for a moment longer, legs stiff, arms trembling. Only when the courtyard was almost empty did he manage to push himself upright. He limped toward the first-year pentagon, dragging one foot after the other, each step heavier than the last.

The library was warm, silent, and almost empty. He found a small table tucked into a corner and dropped his books on it. he sat down with the feeling that his bones might fall apart. The Archive inside him felt quiet now, completely still like it had gone dormant after the chaos earlier. just great abandoning him when he needed to feel its presence. Even so he wasn’t going to let it out of control again and that meant he wont allow himself to read too much he passed out and allow it to work while he passed out. Well, until he understood how all of it worked. He opened the textbooks he had planned to study and pulled the second book toward him.

He opened one of the textbooks he had planned to study and pulled the second book toward him from the Terrain Advantage, Small Unit Maneuvers, Battlefield Simulations and Tactical Reading and Analysis textbooks heap. but since the archive inside him already absorbed the terrain advantage in one go, he was only left with the three. He opened the Small Unit Maneuvers.

His eyes skimmed the first Chapter of the book. Small unit maneuvers were the backbone of the academy’s battlefield doctrine, three to six-man teams operating in tight formation, moving like one body rather than individual fighters. The book explained how strength didn’t matter as much as synchronization. A perfect small squad could overpower a unit twice their size simply through coordinated motion. He read about formation flow, where each member had a role depending on spacing and terrain. One led movement, one handled flanks, one covered rear vision, and one manipulated angles of attack. Switches happened without verbal commands, just cues, posture changes, or finger taps.

There was a long section on pressure lines, explaining how three fighters could create invisible angles that boxed an enemy into a disadvantage without ever touching them. If executed correctly, the enemy would feel trapped long before any blade was drawn.

Another Chapter described breaking rhythm, this is a maneuver used to shatter an opponent’s timing by attacking from two directions, retreating, then converging again the moment their stance opened. It required absolute trust between teammates; if one hesitated, the entire maneuver collapsed.

Sagiri took slow notes, repeating diagrams in the margins. His hands were still trembling, but the information sank into him naturally. His exhaustion made everything feel heavier, but he forced himself to keep reading.

The next volumes Battlefield Simulations and Tactical Reading and Analysis waited in a stack beside him, but for now, Small Unit Maneuvers demanded all his focus. It wasn’t just interesting, it was vital. If he didn’t learn to function inside a group, he would be dead in any real fight. And also he was avoiding overworking himself and passing out like the day before. He leaned back for a moment, breathing unevenly. The cold lingering in his bones made it hard to concentrate so he pushed the textbook closer and returned to the diagrams.

He let himself soak in the information not pushing himself too hard while he waited for the gong to move to the third year library. Some of the cold had left his system and his clothes had dried a bit but he was still hungry, tired and cold. Sagiri sat alone in the Third Year Library just like the day before, the library was packed but silent as everyone moved on the ball of their toes like it was a battle field, he had only covered the introduction of the third year compressed topics, introduction to theory of Advanced Mobility, Pressure Point Strikes, Pattern Recall, Strategic Layering, Ethical Command and Situational Hierarchy. He picked a stack of scrolls and books on the introduction of each one of the third-year manuals and placed them on the table and pulled the advanced mobility book towards him.

Sagiri flipped through more pages of Advanced Mobility, The deeper he went, the more the manual shifted from basic footwork to specialized techniques used by trained combat units that were divided into five sections. He flipped through the first section, it was on direction shifts and combat level. The beginner version he had studied the day before was on simple stepping but the advanced version was entirely different.

The manual explained how seasoned warriors perform directional shifts without losing power in their stance. It broke down the Quarter-Step Angles about turning the body 45 degrees while maintaining forward pressure, Ghost Steps about planting the foot but not committing weight, allowing instant redirection. and Switch Lanes which involves sliding diagonally out of an opponent’s attack path without widening the stance. Several sketches showed fighters rotating around an imaginary enemy, their footprints forming crescents on the ground. Sagiri memorized the angles carefully. He repeated the foot placements under the table, even though his muscles screamed.

The next section was on weight transfers and combat stability. The next pages showed two fighters locked in close combat, one overpowering the other not with muscle but with perfect distribution of weight. The manual described on three more sub topics. Zero-Delay Transitions was the first, it expounded on shifting weight from front foot to back foot so smoothly an opponent couldn’t see the moment of commitment. The second subtopic was Counter-Lean Correction about absorbing force by tilting the spine just enough to reduce impact without losing balance. And the third and last was Power Stacks meaning generating maximum force by aligning hips, knees, and shoulders in a straight line during an attack.

Sagiri studied the diagrams showing red arrows along the spine and legs and the flow of force in every strike. If the alignment broke, the power collapsed. If the alignment held, a smaller fighter could break a larger one’s guard. He traced the arrows with his fingertip, feeling his own posture straighten. Studying new times was actually something sagiri found enjoyable rather than being thrown in freezing pools.

The third subtopic was momentum cuts and stopping power instantly. This part of the textbook was blunt and the first line was all too telling. ’Momentum cuts decide whether you die or live.’ The pages described how to stop a full-speed sprint or attack instantly without falling forward or opening the guard. Soldiers learned to cut their momentum with three maneuvers, the first was Anchor Drop, planting the heel sharply to halt forward motion then Hooked Stops which involved twisting one foot inward to lock the lower body and stop sliding and lastly was Core Brakes which is the tightening of the the abdomen at the exact moment motion ends, preventing collapse. Pictures showed trainees running, stopping, spinning, then striking like fluid motion broken into frames. Sagiri imagined himself trying it but he shook his head at the idea, With his current stamina, he’d collapse in three steps.

The fourth subtopic was on multi-angle approaches. This was where the three techniques combined into one. The manual emphasized that a fighter who moved in straight lines would die quickly. The strongest soldiers approached targets in unpredictable but controlled patterns either the Z-Patterns, which involves zigzag approaches to confuse an enemy’s aim. The Half-Moon Entries which involves circling into an opponent’s blind side and the Shadow Steps which involves moving as if to attack from one angle, then slipping to another before the opponent realizes. Each pattern came with diagrams showing footprints across the page like trails of ink. Sagiri leaned closer, studying the way each movement began and ended.

The fifth and final subtopic was on application of the first four in small unit attacks. The section tied everything together. A squad that could perform advanced mobility as a group was said to move like a single organism. The manual showed drawings of units moving in sync. Sharing, first Directional Shifts, where three fighters changed angles at the same time. Then second the Synchronized Weight Transfers, where one fighter stepped back as another stepped forward to maintain pressure and finally, Coordinated Momentum Cuts, where the entire squad halts instantly to confuse the enemy. These weren’t just techniques, they were communication. Silent communication. The kind Sagiri still lacked entirely.

He closed his eyes for a moment, letting the information settle. His bones ached, but his mind clung to every detail. These techniques would decide how well he performed in practical combat in three months. He couldn’t afford failure. He closed his eyes and fell into meditative slumber to let the archive rewrite the new information.