It was the first time that Lyren felt that he had really flirted with death as he watched the sword aiming for his forehead and his mind's eye instantly activated and he could clearly see the sword heading for him. It appeared to come too slow but there was a problem.
Even if his perception increased and he was able to actually calm down as he watched the sword drift towards him, he could not move. No, he was moving but he was moving too slow such that he realized that the already slow sword would reach him before he could even dodge.
His eyes had suddenly improved but his body was still not agile enough to keep up with his eyes. But he was not going to give up in this situation. He forgot the pain in his biceps and tried to move his head backwards as the sword drifted closer.
'I am not gonna make it…' Lyren thought as he gritted his and he realized there was still away out if he could bend his knee, even his slow reaction was going to have been improved though for a while.
And that he did as fast as he could and it was unbearably slow. The sword finally reached his forehead and it was just in time as his head bent slightly back just enough for the sword to graze past his forehead leaving a shallow cut.
He fell backwards supporting himself with his already useless arms increasing their pain. Unable to hold him up, he hit the back of his head resulting in a splitting head ache.
He heard the sword fall with a clang behind him. He wanted to lift his head but he couldn't. The pain assaulting him could not let him even think. His mind's eye hurt probably because he had over-simulated it just now.
And then, he felt a trickle running sideways from his forehead. It branched several pathways some going towards his hair and to the ears as another one went towards his eyes. His tightly shut eyes flinched as he listened to the pain thrumming in his head.
His brain was begging to shut down but he did not want to. If he shut down now, there was no telling if he was going to bleed to death or not. Also, there was the mystery of how deep his wound was. The trickle was obviously his blood and it did not seem to be in a haste to stop bleeding. Not anytime though.
To make matters worse, there was nothing he could use to do basic first aid on himself. Even if there was, it was another mystery whether his arms were going to cooperate. He really wanted to cry like a child at the moment but there were no tears.
He wanted to beg the guardian to help him but he could not waste his second chance of seeing them on such a trivial request and so he decided to hold on and wait for the bleeding to stop. He had lost count of the number of times his ears kept ringing after an accident but this time it was really extreme.
And as the ringing quietened down, he realized he had been unable to keep his consciousness as he drifted into an abyss for god knows how long it was going to be.
***
"You are not worthy."
Lyren's blood shot eyes suddenly flung open as he screamed out loudly like he was trying to tear his throat again. Even when he was dying of hunger, he had been able to keep running and reach this place. If that had not killed him, he was not going to die here then.
He sat upright as he reached for his shirt and used it to cover the wound on his forehead. The muscles tried to protest but they too obliged and as Lyren finally stopped the bleeding, he was panting and the hands pain returned but all was good.
He could actually pass out with confidence now. Pass out? Why did he have to pass out? He gritted his teeth and decided to remain awake. And as things stood, he was feeling a very great urge to go back into the technique which he did without minding the pain that assaulted his mind's eye.
VANTAGELESS BLADE
The words filled his internal vision. He stared at the words and instantly, he saw the first person of the sixteen move. Their sword swung twice curving out a single word that came flying at him and striking his mind's eye sending him out and unconscious instantly.
***
The next moment he woke up, Lyren felt somehow refreshed but only he knew that he had actually been out for a long time in order for him not to feel any pain. He tried to move his hand and feel if they were working and to his relief, his entire body was back to its functionality.
But there was one slight problem which he did not want to address yet. The sword cut. He raised his right hand and felt the shirt he had used to cover the cut was still there. He slowly unwrapped it and carelessly pulling out the shirt led to the already healing wound become raw again.
It appeared that the blood had stuck on the cloth and it had formed the dead skin by sticking on his shirt. This left him a dilemma whether to wait for the wound to heal with the shirt on it or just risk the pain already since he had already started it. But the pain filled him with dread.
If he removed the dead skin, he was going to have to risk dealing with permanent scars in the future. But practicing the sword with the cloth on his forehead was going to be such a drag and it was probably going to be affected by his sweat.
Gritting his teeth, he slowly removed the shirt making sure not pull with ferocity so as not to cause more damage. It took him a really long time but when he was finally done, he felt some warmth trickle down to his nose bridge and to the nose then it started dripping to the floor.
He wore a serious look as he had ended up tearing part of the healing skin again but it was worth it for him. It did not take long before the bleeding stopped. He could only hope that any infectious bacteria that once live here was gone after starvation all these years.
As he thought about it, removing the shirt was the best decision. He had done well stopping the bleeding but the shirt had been won by him for months and he had removed it only when the sweat felt intolerable. It definitely carried toxins that could cause more damage.
He looked at the part where the blood had stuck on to and saw the dead skin and the final part which had some fresh skin. He slowly put the shirt away and thought of the fact he was going to live with a scar from that moment onwards.
There was some pride of him having a battle scar but there was also the lesson that doing something through will power alone was the cause of his current predicament.
It was actually not bad to have will power but what if his final attack failed? Would he ended up in the mercies of his enemy? He decided on being the perfect version of himself so as to avoid situations that were out of is control.
Then he recalled the final act in his desperation of going back into the technique. Any sane person would not dare to go back in there but he had a feeling that those were the right conditions for him to get back there. He had ended up hurting himself but he had also reaped his reward.
First, he had seen the sword being swung and also, he had been rewarded with a word. Following this trail, he realized that maybe each of those people each had a different word and they formed a sentence together. This meant that if he wanted to know the whole sentence, he had to survive the assault of the sixteen people.
He had survived the first person and when he recalled the word he had seen, he felt a sharp chill as it formed in his mind.
"Exactly what you would expect from such a high level technique…"