Martial Arts Worlds

'I never expected the need to push myself to this extent against some nobody mushroom-gatherer, haha.

'Indeed, humanity's best talents have gathered in one place, so I shouldn't expect an easy outcome from any match.'

Karmea thought, spat the blood out of his mouth, and then pressed his tight-muscled arms against his chest.

The cold wind of the night breezed past the thick branches, waved the leaves in the wind, and blew Tavrin's Flow State smoke against his face.

The blood flowed in Karmea's arms—he had finished his warm-up—and then pressed onwards.

Karmea came in hard, shoulders low, and drove Tavrin close to the thick trunks of the trees—the space to move was limited—but Tavrin decided against backing away.

As Tavrin's spine brushed against the sharp trunk, he leaned forward with his head low, and if any boxing coach saw that, they would think it was over.

Lowering your head in a boxing match was one of the greatest mistakes one could make!

It left him all open for Karmea, and of course, his punch came in an arc that headed for his temples.

It was aimed to be a knockout blow.

However, with a confident smirk on his face, Tavrin ducked the arched punch, shot his left hand forward, whacked the chin above, and snapped Karmea's head back.

It was another chin punch, and those were really starting to hurt Karmea, as each of those hard punches was just worsening his balance.

Karmea tasted the metallic taste in his mouth—it was a familiar taste—and it didn't bother him in the slightest.

It just pushed him to try harder.

With the crack of his fist, Karmea started bouncing on his heels, his chest rising and falling, and his eyes narrowing to slits.

With a long stride forward, he brought his broad frame in front of Tavrin—he was a head taller and twice the size—which influenced Tavrin, forcing him to turn back a foot.

It wasn't what he wanted to do, but he did feel kind of intimidated, and he didn't want to stay any closer than necessary.

Karmea's fist shot forward—the range of his arm took Tavrin by surprise—it was about the same range as the longsword.

With him standing at the top of the youth boxing world, he also had the body that was blessed by the boxing gods of the old dynasty.

It would make any young boxing talent envious.

Tavrin brought his guard high, catching the storm of punches on forearms and elbows, each blow rattling bone.

It hurt like hell, and Tavrin felt the bruises forming with each impact.

With that, Karmea came in with a right hook—a poor choice—it gave Tavrin enough space to duck under the hook, and he countered with a jab to the ribs, right between the solar plexus.

THWACK!

As if his body were a furnace, Karmea's body started heating up from the inside out, and the pain spread like wildfire throughout his torso, making each breath feel like a knife in his chest.

Tavrin stepped in, unleashing his familiar brutal combination that he had trained in the old boxing gyms of the Dark Countries.

Left to the ribs, right to the jaw, and another left high, which made Karmea's knees dip under the pressure.

It looked to be over!

At that moment, as Tavrin's fist came ahead, Karmea blocked it with his left, then stepped in, and pushed Tavrin backwards with a powerful shove to the chest.

He just needed a moment to catch his breath, so he wanted to stop Tavrin's momentum right there.

With a deep breath, Karmea raised his right fist, got closer, and punched straight.

When his arm straightened into a punch, the range shortened significantly, and Tavrin rolled his shoulder in front of him.

The shoulder bumped against Karmea's fist, absorbing the impact, and yet, the pain shot through his shoulder and through his arm.

It was the punch of the greatest youth boxer in the world, so of course it wasn't going to be light, but Tavrin didn't expect this.

The shoulder got brushed aside, and Karmea saw that as a perfect chance to keep going with another furious combination.

The left hooks, right jabs, and uppercuts were coming at Tavrin from all angles, but with his Flow State, he weaved through each strike.

But he couldn't keep his ground and, once again, went onto a back foot, and then his left leg touched a gnarled root below him.

'Shit…'

Tavrin dropped his gaze to the gnarled root, lifted his leg over it, but that one second of moving his attention elsewhere was the worst mistake he could've made.

If any former opponent of Karmea was seeing that, they would be screaming, 'Don't you dare to look away from him, you idiot,' and for a good reason as well.

Karmea's hard fist drove into Tavrin's cheek, pushing through so that even his teeth were clattering like a pair of dice in a cup.

Thwack!

With a fleshy sound of thwack, Tavrin's head got snapped to the side, and his eyes shook with his vision turning hazy, as if he were inside a steam sauna.

Everyone in the boxing world had described Karmea's punches as fast as tribulation lightning, as hard as Korkosh Steel, and as deadly as the sting of hell scorpions.

And that was with the boxing gloves on.

And none of them were willing to find out just how hard his punches were without boxing gloves on.

That one punch was all that it took to end the match, and Tavrin dropped to the forest floor with his eyes rolled back into his skull.

The smoke of the impurities got sucked back inside his body.

"You were a mighty opponent, I must say."

Karmea said, crouched before Tavrin, and sent him another fight invitation, which he forced him to accept.

And thus, from Tavrin's five hundred points, he took about four hundred and fifty but left him about fifty as a sign of respect for his strength.

"And I shall take these."

Karmea picked up his saggy bag of mushrooms, as delivering those would get him another two hundred fifty points.

Whistle~

With a whistle of a tune from his childhood, he walked out of the dark woods of the night.