Power Strike

SKILL SELECTED!

UPDATING BODY!

I felt the muscles in my arms tighten. I wince but it wasn’t as bad as when I unlocked my class. “Power strike? Stretch your arms it will help them recover faster.”

I stretch my arms and then we head inside. My father points to the sinning room chair. “Sit, I have a surprise for you.” He goes to our chill box which we have because his job pays quite well. I watch him pull something out of the chest. My eyes light up seeing a cake, he would always do something special on my birthdays but never a cake. He always seemed to have something against them, too unhealthy, too sweet, too expensive despite us having more money than anyone else in brookshire.

I grabbed the fork and for fun I used power strike and stabbed towards it. I feel a chunk of what little stamina I have left power my arm. My fork goes straight through it and jams deeply into the table. The impact goes up my arm as bits of the cake is launched in the air. Some splatters on my dad’s face, I can’t help but laugh. “Sorry, I was excited. I didn’t think it would create that much force.”

My dad has a little smile and scoops a bit off his face. “Not bad I suppose and as long as it made you happy I don’t mind the mess.” I start to dig into the cake, it has some fruit and a creamy flavor to it. If I had to guess they used umbers for the fruit and maybe mixed the fruit with some milk or something to get the frosting. They grow on the trees in the village so it doesn’t surprise me that they picked this fruit and I quite like umbers anyways so I am not complaining.

My dad makes a simple meal for us of some roasted meat and veggies. He says the magic cooking equipment is necessary so that he saves time and can train and patrol more but he doesn’t fool me. He just likes to cook and doesn’t have the time, plus I see him get excited whenever he finds a new cooking tool or device.

The next morning I get up and after breakfast we stretch and go through my techniques. The main goal being to get used to my improved muscles. With some more time to adjust and a night to rest I definitely feel more powerful. Each movement carries just a bit more force than it would have before I got my class. After a bit I felt pretty warmed up and my father agreed. “We will now have you practice your skill by activating it while attacking this tree.”

He say patting the tree in our yard. I take a stance and swing my sword activating the skill. I don’t fight it and let it flow through me, my sword slams into the tree embedding itself and causing a bunch of leaves to fall. I pull back, ready myself and do it again. I do this four times before I stop exhausted. “I feel like I have been exercising all day but with just my arm.”

My father nods, “You practically did in a sense, it is one of the advantages of active skills as you can train your body with them. You will swap hands after you recover in a few minutes. We will have you stretch between each set.”

I fall into a pattern of using my new skill four times then stretching for ten minutes. Each time swapping hands so my arms get equal training. My father trained me enough with my left hand that I was partially ambidextrous. I was still much better with my right but I could probably trick an opponent by using my left and swapping mid fight.

By the end of the day my arms felt like cake. Loose, wiggly, and much too soft to stop even a dull spoon. I sleep well and the rest of my week goes much the same. I can feel myself gaining progress, I can now use the skill six times in a row instead of four. My swings are imbedding deeper into the wood as well but that just might be because of the damage I have done so far.

At the end of the week I am staring at the tree like an enemy that refuses to go down. I grab the sword with two hands, the hilt barely long enough to work. I focus and use power strike in not one but both arms. I feel the power build but I keep going until I feel my arms shaking. Then I take a calming breath and swing not with anymore added force but cleanly so that the arc of the blade is as perfect as I can achieve.

The blade swings through the air rapidly and hits where I have cut the deepest before. The cut was almost halfway already as my blade wedges into the wood and keeps going. I feel the sword get stuck just before clearing through it. But I hear the tree creak, it slowly starts to fall and quickly move out of the way. My father peels his head out through a window and grins, “That has to be worth an achievement.”

LEVEL 2 ACHIEVEMENT GAINED!

LEVEL UP!

SELECT A SKILL

Advance: Take ten steps forward with building momentum.

Offensive footwork: passively helps you maintain and memorize how to move to assist your fighting when on the attack.

Cleave: Swing through your opponent, to hit another in the same blow.

Reading them to my father he says, “Advance is good, especially if you use a shield. It will give power to your steps and make you hard to stop. It builds you to being an unstoppable force as you push ever forward.

Offensive footwork is a passive that works in the background. The people that have these move like the are made of water possibly despite not having any active skills. The offensive part means it won’t directly help you with defense but it will still help where they overlap considering knowledge retention.

Cleave is very similar to power strike, they basically do the same thing. The difference being that power strike is trying to put as much force into your strike to hurt the target in front of you and cleave adds in some precision to aim your attack precisely so that it at least cuts two or more targets. It is possible to do them together but it will probably take you at least a year to manage such a feat. Using multiple skills is hard to get the grasp of and more so when they activate in the same body part. When you do however you will be a menace killing two for every swing you can empower.