Those who had seen Alfred in the few weeks he had been here smiled at the big kid's clear arrogance, and skilled newcomers saw through his facade of innocence.
Alfred caught a glimpse of his master, noting his expression of amusement directed at him, not the big kid.
'Damn, am I that bad of an actor?'
In fact, he was. As the big kid approached, Alfred stood straight as an arrow and his muscles were completely relaxed. His white braid fell down his back and didn't sway one bit in a display of control over his body along with the lack of wind in the colosseum, but his eyes moved extremely fast.
To an experienced eye, these subtleties were picked up on not as being "frozen in fear", but instead more as a lion looking down (in this case up) upon an approaching and unsuspecting young boar.
Once the boy reached a reasonable distance, Alfred exploded.
He surmised that HSM wouldn't be needed in the fight, and was only using it earlier to gather information.
The boy hadn't had time to react to the spontaneous movement, and was thus caught off guard by the leaping roundhouse kick that landed cleanly on his jaw.
To his credit, the boy didn't black out from it, but it sent him reeling. Alfred showed no mercy and kicked his knee straight on with full extension, breaking it backwards. This immense pain snapped the boy back, only to receive a clean front kick in the jaw, finally putting him to sleep.
Both strikes made audible claps that took the attention of the more unfocused individuals within earshot, and the impact his head made with the ground made the relatively uninitiated or compassionate cringe.
Alfred shook his head after the body disappeared, 'That kid was easily within at least the top 150, if not top 100 of this group. If he had a better mindset or instincts, there was no way he would have gotten eliminated within the first 20 people.'
Alfred looked around, noticing the others who had escaped didn't want to engage, he began circling the near pile up going on in the middle.
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Most of this event was generally uneventful for Alfred. During his circling of the middle scuffle, some who were high off easy wins or blinded by bloodlust charged or strolled over to Alfred, only to receive instant and ruthless strikes to anything unprotected and vulnerable… including… that…
By the time he had circled around thrice, Alfred counted 104 slaves left.
'I'm done with this. I need practice.'
With his decision made up, he shot forward towards the nearest individual.
It was a boy close to his size from the Wolf continent. The most striking thing about him wasn't his appearance, but the fact that a girl that looked almost identical to him was standing right next to him.
Alfred activated HSM, knowing he wasn't good enough at multi-enemy combat enough to win without it.
They reacted well, sending a kick and a punch that blocked off most of his advances. That is to say, most of them.
Alfred stopped on a dime and weaved his head back close enough to the girl's sudden kick for it to wipe the sweat off his nose. He shot forward with the same vigor as before and landed a clean hook in the boy's liver. This ruptured the organ, leaving him rapidly curling up into the fetal position. As he wasn't knocked out yet, his body didn't disappear, but something else did happen.
The girl was attempting to get Alfred off the boy with a straight kick, but Alfred already saw this a mile away and stepped through the kick. He wrapped his arms around her neck and proceeded to send three successive knees to her face, easily putting her out cold.
He quickly spun around as the body disappeared from the colosseum and soccer kicked the kid in the jaw, sealing his fate.
A few others had closed in to capitalize on the victor's probable injuries. Sadly for them, Alfred wasn't injured, and even less so was going to give them time to react to this fact.
He charged the closest individual, a relatively short and stocky slave from the Stag continent, who reacted by attempting to initiate a takedown, shooting for his knees.
Alfred, despite not expecting this, was obviously not caught off guard despite his deactivation of HSM, as his reaction speed at this point was close to instant.
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Alfred instantly changed his approach to a flying knee at full speed, cleanly taking out the kid.
Had he not done this, he would have been in decent trouble, as he had learned not one ground technique once in his life.
What if's, however, don't matter if you are dead… or in this case if your skull is caved in.
Alfred spun around to find everyone had backed away from his vicinity. He noticed two kids in a scuffle near the far edge, which quickly fell into a chaotic scramble on the ground. The others seemed either too worn out, scared of getting knocked out this late or uninterested in such a skilless bout, so they stayed away.
Alfred, on the other hand, wanted to get to his practice, so he got into a three point stance, tensed his muscles, and exploded.
The distance was closed extremely fast for someone his age. At this point, the majority of kids including Alfred could already output close to or exceeding junior olympian levels of strength despite being upwards of 9 years younger in Alfred's case.
Thus, he closed the nearly 80 meter distance in almost eight seconds flat.
Once there, he put all his power into a kick right to the kid on top's head, snapping his neck back at dangerous speeds.
His body almost immediately disappeared, as if the officials were waiting for it to happen.
The moment the slave disappeared, a deafening bell rung from an indeterminate area, signaling the end of the event.
All of the exit doors opened up and dozens of soldiers rushed out to usher the slaves to their proper locations.
Alfred spun around to exit, not failing to recognize the gazes on his back. One in particular was very brazen with his staring. He looked familiar, although he knew for a fact he hadn't seen him before. A wide smile was plastered on his face, but Alfred saw only obsession in his gaze, not admiration or happiness.
Alfred sped up his walking speed.
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Alfred was immediately allowed to leave the SE once his event finished, so he naturally made a b-line to the enclosure, not before retrieving the Grimoire from Cysandoth.
Alfred had chosen Nidas' Cobra to learn next for the sole reason that it seemed less time consuming to learn when compared to Continuous Remise.
Eventually, a few hours into his training, Cysandoth returned.
As expected, he brought criticisms and suggestions with him in regards to his event.
"There were 7 instances where you made a considerable blunder, Öthe" he said. "The first was your initial escape."
Jumping back may save your life in the moment, but in most instances against a proper enemy who is targeting you, it will get you killed, or at least injured," he took a pause.
"In those instances, and whenever possible really, keep to the ground. With our footwork, we can easily redirect our escape if a foe reacts properly, or has another attacking you from behind."
Alfred stood there in silence, but eventually nodded.
'In that situation, it was fine, as nobody knew who I was, what was happening, or was considerably faster than me. Had I been a target, like he said, I could only pray they weren't as skilled as I am.'
"The next three are really just one. This is your acting like a thunderstruck weakling to bait the big kid in," he said.
Alfred immediately nodded.
"Your posture was too perfect, your gaze was too purposeful, and your facial expressions weren't proper. Even the slightest of changes in expression are noticeable to even simple Competent martial artists, which make up the majority of the population."
"How should I change it?" Alfred asked.
"... well… It's sort of complicated. From the day I've met you, your facial expression hasn't truly changed except for when I attacked you. In short, you're too robotic. To look distressed, scrunch your eyebrows up-" he demonstrated, "-and inward" he said while pointing to his face.
Sure enough, Alfred recognized a distressed look.
Alfred mimicked him, and he snorted and said "Good enough."
"You have an advantage for the body language part, as you are a girl. Mimic me:"
Cysandoth scrunched his shoulders inward and put his hands up to his mouth.
"This is a decent universal surprised/fearful position you can put yourself in, and should be decently convincing too, so long as you use it in the proper situation. It also has the benefit of putting your arms close to the defensive position."
Alfred nodded in understanding. Everything Cysandoth said was true, but more surprising is that Alfred knew deep down that he could have come up with that himself, but he didn't.
'What the fuck is wrong with me? I know I wasn't super sociable on earth, but have I really lost all my skills in less than six months? Or was it something else that…'
He shook his head, cutting off his thoughts. Although he was no psychologist, it didn't take one to guess that the torture might have something to do with it. Although, once he becomes truly powerful, stuff like this isn't something he'll need.
Cysandoth listed off a few more mistakes, like how he let the short and stocky Stag continent slave get that close to a takedown, and that if he were more skilled, Alfred would have been knocked out right then and there.
After the rest of the criticisms were given, Cysandoth let Alfred go back to the training.
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It had been a while since Alfred last went to clean himself, and he would have skipped today if not for Cysandoth forcing him to go.
Thankfully, he had let Alfred finish mastering the technique beforehand.
While making his way down to the bathrooms, Alfred had passed many Bear continent slaves, startling them in the process due to his relative silence even while sprinting.
He slowed down once he got near the bathrooms.
Surprisingly, it was quite lively there (on the male side, as the female population in the colosseum, more than could be counted on two hands, were far too spread out to build any considerable crowd.
Alfred felt a few gazes lock onto him as he entered the bathroom, but the utter lack of a line made his entrance swift.
Alfred avoided looking at the other women and went straight to a shower near the middle of the room. He swiftly cleaned every nook and cranny of his body, even undoing his braid to properly soak his hair, remembering to ask Cysandoth to braid it once he got back.
After completing his bath, he noticed an apparent lack of blemishes or split ends on his body and hair respectively (other than a few scars on his back from the beatings the original body's biological father gave it), so he looked to the other women in the area.
Their skin and hair was even more perfect than his. 'Although correlation is not causation, I assume this is because of äura,' he surmised.
Alfred put his clothes on and exited the bathrooms.
Waiting outside the door was a group of boys, the majority of whom were part of the 100 survivors of the event earlier on in the day.
For time's sake, Alfred immediately shot down the hall without giving them the time of day. He heard a few shouts behind him, but he had already lost them by the second corner he turned.
Alfred made a mental note to stay permanently aware for the rest of the tournament.