himself. The massive fist sailed past Elias's ear, the wind of the strike ruffling
his sparse white hair.
Victor's momentum carried him forward, stumbling slightly as his punch
met zero resistance. He recovered quickly, his frustration instantly boiling
into rage.
24... 23... 22...
"Lucky dodge, old man," Victor growled, squaring his shoulders. He
stepped in closer, unleashing a rapid combination—a left jab, a right cross,
followed by a devastating left uppercut designed to lift Elias off his feet.
What followed was a display of physical poetry that left the entire gym in
stunned silence.
Elias moved like water flowing around a jagged rock. He didn't block the
strikes; blocking would mean absorbing the force, and Victor's force would
shatter his brittle bones. Instead, he deflected and evaded. As the jab came in,
Elias shifted his weight slightly, letting the punch slide over his shoulder.
When the cross followed, a gentle tap of Elias's palm against Victor's forearm
redirected the blow inches from his chest. The uppercut, terrifying in its
upward trajectory, was met with Elias simply stepping a half-pace backward,
perfectly out of range.
Victor was swinging with everything he had, grunting with exertion, his
massive muscles straining against his skin. But he was fighting a ghost. Every
strike he threw missed by millimeters. It wasn't just that Elias was fast; it was
that he was precisely where he needed to be, and nowhere else. He wasn't
reacting to Victor's punches; he was anticipating them, reading the subtle
shifts in the giant's shoulders and hips before the strikes were even launched.
18... 17... 16...
Panic began to seep into Victor's rage. He had never experienced
anything like this. Fighters ran from him, or they tried to block and endure,
but no one had ever stood right in front of him and simply... not been there.
His lungs burned, the adrenaline dumping into his system causing his
movements to become frantic, sloppy.
Chapter 6: The Janitor's Strike
Victor felt a sensation unlike anything he had ever experienced in the
cage. It wasn't the blunt force trauma of a punch or the tearing pain of a joint
lock. It felt as if a bolt of cold lightning had been injected directly into his
nervous system.
The right side of his body went instantly, terrifyingly numb. His massive
arm dropped to his side like a dead weight. The leg that was mid-kick
suddenly lost all structural integrity, turning to jelly.
His forward momentum, combined with the sudden, catastrophic failure
of half his body, sent him crashing to the canvas. He hit the mat face-first with
a sickening thud, a two-hundred-and-forty-pound statue abruptly toppled
from its pedestal.
The silence in the Apex Academy was absolute. The hip-hop music had
been shut off by someone at the sound desk. The only sound was the hum of
the overhead fluorescent lights and the panicked, ragged gasps escaping