Eon managed to fall back just before the hand hit him. The palm of the orc gave off a strong wind that ruffled Eon's hair, missing him by about a foot. Eon awkwardly scrambled eight feet backward along the floor, huffing with adrenaline. This orc, while slower than the original skeleton, was obviously much stronger.

Eon sat back and thought about how to approach the orc. The orc meanwhile, seemed to be getting agitated. It began snarling its teeth and hitting the floor, seeming to want to discover a way out. Despite the pounding orc causing the floor to vibrate, the stone didn't even scratch, proving this room to be quite sturdy.

Suddenly the orc looked at Eon and began pounding its chest. It began to chase Eon by dragging its knuckles across the floor. The orc's behavior was truly ape-like, Eon felt.

Fortunately, Eon had already begun moving to the far wall, so he had a head start. They both had similar speeds, and Eon ran until he reached the wall.

Eon's training already began to show some results despite the small time spent doing it. Eon was able to use a bit more of his strength and his movements were more controlled thanks to the potential potion and initial usage of the bodily revelation technique, but it was still a far cry from enough to be able to rival the orc's strength. Eon thought he had discovered one thing which the orc lacked. It had little dexterity.

The movements of the orc were extremely brutish and straightforward. It seemed that it relied on brute strength to survive and lacked any elegance or control in its movements, the skeleton was a much more terrifying opponent in this aspect.

The orc was making the same mistake Eon initially had while fighting the skeleton, it was putting too much power behind its movements, which wouldn't allow for sudden changes and reactions during or after moving and attacking. This left an opening for Eon, one he was trying to capitalize on.

The orc caught up to Eon and swung at him like it was trying to swat a fly, if the blow connected Eon instinctively felt his head would look like an exploded watermelon. Eon rolled forward and stabbed his sword upward, driving the blade into the orc's elbow. The orc squealed with pain and swung its arm, causing the sword to snap in half and Eon to go flying backward.

The landing was not a soft one and Eon was sent tumbling across the hard stones, breaking several bones, and receiving many nasty cuts and bruises in the process. Once again, Eon was quite badly hurt, but it was worth it. The orc squealed with pain as it tried to pull the still-embedded piece of the sword out of its flesh.

Grunting, Eon stood back up and charged toward the back of the distracted orc. The injuries he had received would likely begin to hurt soon, and if he didn't finish this quickly, the pain would probably debilitate him which could only mean death in a place like this.

Eon slashed at the leathery back of the orc, causing it to squeal with surprise and anger. It swatted at its back but Eon had already moved to the side of the orc with the embedded blade and plunged the jagged end of the hilt between the orc's ribs. It squealed again, this time not only with pain but also desperation.

The orc tried to rotate and swing at Eon again, even more ferociously and erratically than before. Eon grimaced and swung his bloody hilt at the face of the orc. While its face was still significantly out of reach of the blade, that wasn't the point of the swing.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

The hilt curved through the air, and the blood which saturated the surface of the blade flew off into the orc's eyes, blinding it! Eon ducked forward under the overextended arm of the orc and raced up to its chest, leaping forward and driving the remaining 8 inches of jagged-tipped hilt directly into the throat of the orc!

Bracing his booted feet against the orc's tough belly, Eon yanked the blade down as hard as he could manage. The hilt made a disgusting squishing noise as a flood of blood washed over Eon. He had managed to drag the hilt down through the orc's throat and part of the chest before it became completely stuck.

Eon let go and fell back flat on the floor before the incoming palm crushed his torso. The Orc slapped itself trying to hit Eon, but it only succeeded in driving the hilt of the sword deeper into its chest.

The orc tried to squeal, but the flood of blood filling its throat and lungs prevented any noise except a horrible gurgling to escape. Eon motionlessly and silently lay flat on the floor in front of the orc as it swung its remaining good arm around, futilely trying to grab a hold of the one who had done this to it.

After 10 seconds of its death throes, the orc's eyes finally dulled, and it died. Unfortunately for Eon, it collapsed on top of him, breaking several of his ribs and aggravating the injuries that he had already sustained from when the orc threw him. Screaming, Eon could only wait until the system removed the corpse as he didn't have the strength to move it himself. Finally, after many long seconds, the corpse had disintegrated enough for Eon to push it to the side.

The healing sparks, as Eon named them, had already begun their work as soon as the orc had died, mending bones, stitching tissues back together, and creating new blood for Eon's heart to pump. Eon laid back with relief evident on his face.

‘While this battle was very difficult, it was quite fortunate that the orc had a fairly glaring weakness for me to exploit. If the orc had even a little control over its movements, my chance of attaining victory would have been quite slim indeed.’ Eon suddenly felt very exhausted, though as usual it was gone after a couple of seconds. He looked in the main menu where his information was stored.

[Species: human(unevolved)]

[Bloodline abilities: N/A]

[Status: healthy]

[Cultivation: mortal]

[Judgment of potential potential: low]

[Overall rating: The host is one of the weakest beings possible. The host is a failure of life, totally lacking any strengths or redeeming qualities. This, as well as the extremely lacking potential of the host, leads to the conclusion that the host is severely below average in almost every department, he is among one of the absolute weakest sentient beings in the universe, being average at best even by Earth standards. If the host were to begin cultivating outside of the tutorial, it is quite likely that they would die in obscurity without any accomplishments of mention. -system administrator]

Reading through this, Eon winced from the cruel dissection of his strength. Based on the fact that the skeleton was the lowest calibration that the system was equipped to handle had already planted some doubts in his mind. This was just painfully direct confirmation of those fears. Still, did the system administrator have to be so harsh about it?

'But, what does it really matter?'

Eon would be lying if he said that seeing such an evaluation didn’t feel dismaying. But this wouldn't stop him. He had already felt the joy of increasing his strength and fighting experience with the fight with the orc, the him from yesterday would have died without being able to even hurt the creature. But now, Eon was able to kill such a monster. He created his own path through his own strength and effort.

Eon felt that this would be much the same. The task may be daunting for one as talentless as him, but that is also why Eon would take it a day at a time, striving to reach just a bit further today than he had reached yesterday. Even if he did die in obscurity, it wouldn’t matter so long as he tried his best.

Or at least, that was the ideal he gave himself and that he was trying to live up to. Life was never so simple, there were always distractions and setbacks, this being one of them.

For now, Eon pushed a button on the bottom which said [delay tutorial -> 15 tokens]. He had 20 tokens from the supply package, and another 5 from slaying the orc, so he was left with 10 tokens after delaying the tutorial, which bought him an additional 30 minutes. It was time for training.