After deciding to eat his fill whenever he became hungry, Ackster even decided to ask the kitchen assistant he had chosen as a target to bring food to his room at regular intervals so that he didn’t have to leave his room. Hopefully, it would give off the impression that Ackster decided to hole himself up in his room and binge-eat until the day he died in glorious battle against The Hero.
At least others would believe that Ackster wasn’t doing anything suspicious. In reality, he was going to get used to his skill during the day and then sneak out of the estate and the city during the night.
Since he didn’t even know how strong the passive effects of his skill were, Ackster began by simply moving his body around a bit and doing some bodyweight exercises. With how poorly trained the original Ackster was, he thought his breathing would get heavy after a while. But it seemed like the original Ackster was stronger than the author gave him cred for since he could do twenty pushups continuously without even beginning to get tired.
Of course, in a fantasy world with swords and magic, doing twenty pushups was hardly more than a useless amount of strength. However, the closest the original Ackster came to working out was when he beat one of his victims. That he had still managed to attain a physique greater than the average man said something about how powerful his skill was, despite its underwhelming name.
As the name, Strong Body hinted, Ackster’s skill did indeed give him a strong body. It also improved his rate of regeneration, his metabolism, and his senses. And those were only the general things the author bothered to mention in passing as he quickly explained how the original Ackster completely wasted his skill’s potential.
The original Ackster hadn’t trained his body or his skill at all, so most of the skill’s effects were about as good as when the skill first awakened. The skill in its current state was far from what it could be, but Ackster wasn’t discouraged. If anything, he looked forward to seeing the hidden potential the author spoke of whenever he mentioned Ackster Phileam. But first, he had to fake his death and evade The Hero. Only then could he begin taking his life in this world with a more excited attitude.
After confirming that pushups weren’t an issue for his body, Ackster began doing more strenuous exercises. He did a handstand with his legs resting against the wall. And when he noticed how that also was relatively easy, he switched over to doing it without having his legs against the wall.
That was when he noticed that his body didn’t only possess considerable strength. It also had a good sense of balance. And when Ackster switched over to doing single-handed handstand pushups without resting his body against anything, he also noticed how easily his body adapted to new movements. He could swear that the original Ackster had never done a single-handed handstand in his life. And Ackster sensed how poor his balance was since it felt like he was about to fall over from the breeze a fly created. But it was only like that at first. The longer he held the handstand, the easier it became.
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And it wasn’t because he simply put his body in balance after doing the handstand for a while. The next time he got up in a handstand, his body almost instantly moved into a perfectly balanced position by itself. It was as if his body remembered how to move after only doing it once or twice.
Ackster sat on the floor in stunned silence. The author really hadn’t been joking. Ackster Phileam would have been broken if he had a different mindset. If Ackster Phileam had possessed the same hellbent determination as The Hero, the world and the novel might have had a vastly different plot and ending.
Of course, Ackster couldn’t confirm whether the skill would continue to be as powerful as it developed or if its potential would slowly die down as it leveled up. Simply being able to move around with practiced movements and having a slightly stronger body than the average man would be only useful if he wanted to fight against goblins.
And The Hero, especially later in the novel, didn’t even need to look at goblins to kill them. Even now, at the beginning of the novel, The Hero vastly overpowered monsters on the same levels as goblins.
If Ackster’s skill fell off after bringing Ackster to a certain degree of strength, it would be quite a scam. But that didn’t matter to Ackster.
It would be tragic if his skill wasn’t as filled to the brim with potential as the author said and only seemed full of promise in the early stages of its development. But Ackster’s immediate concern regarding The Hero and the death battle didn’t have Strong Body as the solution.
And Strong Body as it was now would be more than enough to help Ackster sneak out of the estate and outside the city where he would find the solution to his death sentence.
If Strong Body, for some reason, turned out to be filled with false potential, it would make things more difficult for Ackster in the future. But with his knowledge as a transmigrator who read the original novel and all the bonus content, Ackster was confident that he would be able to secure a future for himself.
Ackster clenched his fists as he prepared himself for potential and guaranteed hurdles that he would have to face after successfully faking his death in the battle against The Hero. But he had to first make sure that he would succeed with the first and nearly insurmountable hurdle, which was the death match.
And for that purpose, Ackster continued getting used to his body, testing its flexibility, balance, and strength until he got hungry. When he felt like he had to eat or risk his stomach rumble loud enough to make the maids tremble in fright, Ackster left his room and went to the kitchen.
At that point, Ackster learned that it was soon time for dinner and that he had missed lunch completely. But he didn’t care and just blamed the kitchen staff for it before ordering them to send the meals to his room instead. He ignored the obvious signs of joy that his decision elicited from the kitchen staff.
After grabbing two plates overflowing with food, Ackster returned to his room and devoured the food before continuing his exercises. And when dusk fell, Ackster began sneaking out of the estate.