Shifting his gaze back to the journey across the East Ocean toward the Sardinia Female Country, it was now the twentieth day that Fisher had been sailing on board the Flying Fish. The farther north they sailed, the denser the gloomy weather on the sea’s surface beca, patches of frost and dark clouds forming a grey palette that sketched out half of the sky and painted the essence of the Northern Realm.
In traditional legends, the entry into the Northern Realm was described as "crawling forward under the axe and cleaver." The Realm was cold and the winds fierce, bringing along many variables and dangers to navigation.
Even if one didn’t encounter danger at sea, a Captain steering a ship while looking up into the thick, viscous-like grey clouds would inevitably feel a sense of trepidation. Thus, in the ancient Sardinia Female Country, navigating the seas was always the ultimate test of a woman’s courage.
However, the Flying Fish, being a steamship, was rid of such worries. As long as the Captain did not retreat, it would not turn back, especially now that it was steered by a warrior from Nali, who always admired the snow and winds of the Northern Realm without an ounce of fear.
On the deck, a man with his upper body bare was stretching his limbs, simultaneously making an extrely peculiar motion that resembled the power-laden stance of the demons from legends.
This was Elliog’s Demon Battle Technique, Volu One. It primarily aid to maintain body coordination and emphasized enormous strength with limited technique, which was very suitable for a beginner like Fisher.
His bare torso was extrely hot, so much that it began to emit wisps of steam amidst the icy skies and snowy earth; he breathed heavily, arranging his movents and then suddenly took a deep breath. His palms spiraled forward, propelling the cold air around him into a vortex.
"Boom!"
The force coursed outward, the fierce airflow extending into the far reaches of the sky before slowly dissipating into nothingness.
"Volu One is almost mastered. The thods Elliog provided are indeed effective. If only they consud a little less physical strength..."
In Elliog’s eyes, "battle" was not simply about physical collision and victory; the most crucial aspect was montum. The essence of fighting was a process of "maintaining one’s own montum while disrupting the opponent’s," hence the training was divided into two parts.
Any form of attack, defense, or movent could compromise one’s own montum. Minimizing the impact of these actions was the focus of the first part of the training.
Every attack could weaken the opponent’s montum. How to strike, where to hit, and when to hit to maximize the damage to the opponent’s montum was the focus of the second part of the training.
Although the explanation was quite rough, Fisher had found this innate talent-based training frustrating before. But onboard the Flying Fish, he felt rapid progress, a result largely due to Emhardt’s assistance.
"Emhardt, how was my movent just now?"
At this mont, looking at Fisher lying exhausted on the deck, Emhardt, who was probably distracted by a dozen different things, frowned as he sat in the Captain’s Room. His eyes alternated between the instrunts and the navigation course, and without even looking back, he cursed,
"What else can it be? You’ve practiced a single move hundreds of tis—if you can’t get it right by now, you might as well jump ship! Damn it, why are you so sharp when it cos to engraving magic and as dull as wood in hand-to-hand combat? Such a waste of your good constitution!"
Indeed, Fisher had discovered that as long as he had Emhardt record the details of Elliog’s battle thods, he was able to accurately determine whether his movents and training thods t Elliog’s standards. During this ti, aside from being a bit foul-mouthed, Emhardt was really like Elliog remotely guiding Fisher through his combat training, and his progress was very swift.
It was only now that he truly felt his physical fitness and combat style fully t the Eighth Rank and even the Ninth Rank level. He was more than capable even of facing a grown Dragon-man Species or the previously unripe Moli of the Whale-man Species empty-handed.
Fisher took a long breath before heading outside the Captain’s Room, draping his shirt that had been hanging on the railing over himself, and also glanced at Emhardt who was peering from inside, asking,
"Good, where are we now?"
"At the Phoenix Sea... wait, damn it, I quit! These past twenty days, it’s been just looking at the instrunts and confirming the course, while you’ve been bouncing around the deck like a monkey, calling it combat training and looking ugly doing it! I’m done, do whatever you want, let go!"
Fisher, with a face full of speechlessness, pinched the eloquently cursing Emhardt in his palm, ignoring his struggles as he walked over to the chart table. There lay a golden compass, the very one carried by the old man before,
"I’ve already set up the magic for you; you just need to stay here and keep watch... the Phoenix Strait, eh? It seems we’re about to reach the Sardinia Female Country."
"Easy for you to say! I am a book, not your crew! I need rest too, you’re more disgusting than the factory owners in the factories outside of Nali. You go to sleep and expect to keep watch! You... are you even human?"
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