It wasn't the first time that Mark Victor had sighed, "You are simply a natural close-combat card artisan. I really don't know why you became a card master in the first place."
The thorns were like rain, and the glowing shields rose and fell one after another, emerging in an endless stream. The concentrated pinging sounds left a shower of light in midair as the energy was annihilated.
Under his oppressive training, Chen Mu had shown an unprecedented potential.
He had seen in Chen Mu what a genius was!
The so-called young geniuses he had met before could only be counted as dregs of inferior quality.
Apart from his talent, what Mark Victor admired most about Chen Mu was his calmness and perseverance.
He could be like a man of iron, running or flying all day without tiredness.
And he could always make the right response at the most critical moment.
He couldn't imagine that kind of calmness coming from a novice who had only been studying close-combat for twenty or thirty days.
In the training room, the two shadows were as fast as lightning, flying across the field.
And he still had one more thing in his hand, the card for Bo Wen.
He already had a rough idea of what to do with the card, and it would probably be completed by the time Mark Victor had finished his confrontation training.
Three days had passed, and Mark Victor's commission had been smoothly completed, which meant that Chen Mu's confrontation training had officially begun.
It was clear that Chen Mu was unfamiliar with the card.
He believed that as time went by, Chen Mu would become more and more familiar with the card, and more and more familiar with its energy composition, and its power would certainly increase substantially.
Chen Mu could only use his own brain, believing that Mark Victor certainly had his reasons for doing so.
So, Chen Mu would confront during the day, and at night he would carefully review and summarize his experience, and then try to see if there was any other way he could go further.
And the next day, he would experiment with the method he had thought of the night before, to see if it was feasible, and to see if there was any room for improvement.
If there was still time, then he would continue to complete the card for Bo Wen.
Chen Mu squinted, thinking about the inhuman pain of those last few days, and sighing to himself that he had finally managed to hold on.
At the same time that his body was rapidly thinning out, his temperament had also begun to quietly change.
His previously clear eyes seemed to have been covered with a faint layer of black.
He was getting used to the dark at an alarming rate.
The dark was no longer strange to him, but on the contrary, he was getting more and more fond of being in the dark, which made him feel more comfortable.
Even the Demonic Woman probably didn't expect him to make such rapid progress in this area.
Mark Victor immediately increased the frequency of his attacks, but what he didn't expect was that the five Pixies also increased their speed.
Chen Mu had been practicing breath control with all his might for a week.
During the seven days of practice, he endured the severe side effects.
Due to the continuous vomiting, his physiological functions continued to decline, and he looked like he had lost a lot of weight.
He wasn't strong to begin with. Now that he was skinny, he gave off a feeling of weakness.
Seeing that Chen Mu's "illness" was still continuing, Mark Victor said a few words of comfort before accepting a commission.
It would probably take him another three days to return.
Two and a half minutes, 150 seconds, in the eyes of ordinary people, was a very short time.
But as Chen Mu saw it, it could do a lot of things.
A hundred and fifty seconds of breath control was enough to change the situation.
He had tried to use the techniques he had learned from Mark Victor in the state of breath control, and no matter which one it was, the power was unprecedented.
That gave Chen Mu a lot of confidence.
The timing of the dodging, the timing of the attack, and the judgment of the situation were all very different.
After a few days, Chen Mu felt as though he had been reborn, and his movements were finally showing the flavor of a professional card artisan.
There wasn't the slightest superfluous movement in his hands, which had been forced out by force. Mark Victor's twisting thorns were so terrifyingly powerful.
Not only was its attack powerful, but it was also terrifyingly flexible. If there was any pause or hesitation, it would be like a python smelling blood, and would certainly be able to accurately seize that gap.
You didn't have to hope that it would miss out.
A genius youth with a magical close-combat card. That combination filled Mark Victor with anticipation.
Chen Mu's nerves were always on high alert, not daring to relax for even a moment.
In front of such an ace as Mark Victor, any relaxation would be extremely dangerous.
It was his first time encountering such a weird close-combat card, and the more he fought, the more frightened he became.
If he wanted to break through the defensive circle formed by those five little thunderballs, he would have to raise his attack to about sixty percent of his maximum power. Only then would he be able to shatter the perfect pentagonal energy light shield and cause some damage to Chen Mu.
He was convinced that the sallow youth was worth that kind of anticipation.
But what really surprised Mark Victor was Chen Mu's close-combat card – the bipolar thunderball card.
The five little thunderballs were as though they were alive, full of intelligence.
When he first saw them, Mark Victor didn't think much of them.
However, the confrontation training that followed really gave him a huge shock!
Every time his energy thorns got close to Chen Mu, those five thunderballs would be like five little fairies, suddenly swooping in.
A perfect pentagonal glowing shield appeared out of thin air in front of the energy thorns, forcibly blocking them.
Compared to Chen Mu's discomfiture, Mark Victor was naturally leisurely, calm and unruffled.
But under his seemingly calm expression, he was extremely surprised.
He was looking forward to Chen Mu's first battle, looking forward to Chen Mu's glorious future, looking forward to him using his stunning talent and power in front of the world to conquer everyone!
Ever since the confrontation training had started, Mark Victor had never given Chen Mu any more pointers.
What he had asked of Chen Mu was that he should find his own way.
That was the fourth day, and he had already started to get used to Mark Victor's superb change-of-direction rhythm.
The results of his close-range dodging were also quite outstanding, and once he got used to Mark Victor's rhythm, the shape of the battlefield immediately began to change.
Of course, Chen Mu still didn't have the possibility of beating Mark Victor, but he could already keep up with his adversary's figure.
It wasn't like at the beginning, when his adversary could easily shake him off with a few changes of direction.
The only thing that hadn't changed was the side effects.
That was just the right time, and he planned to quietly leave at that time.
Switching to the "weak water" pen set before leaving the base would naturally be something that would make him very excited.
So, he simply used those three days on card making. Time couldn't be wasted.
Apart from that, he still had a small wish.
If he left the base, there would be very few opportunities to run into Mark Victor again.
And that promise of his was so far away that the possibility of it being realized was almost zero.
Since he couldn't get rid of Chen Mu, the content of their confrontation immediately changed.
Chen Mu also started to appreciate Mark Victor's valiant attack. In order to prevent him from dying in the confrontation, Mark Victor only dared to maintain the power of the twisting thorns at about thirty percent. But even then, Chen Mu was still battered and exhausted.
During that week, Chen Mu would vomit more than seven times a day, sometimes to the point of exhaustion, but he clenched his teeth and persevered.
Time was too important to him, since the longer he dragged it out, the less likely he would be to succeed.
And in the seven days of continuous use of breath control, the longest he could maintain the state of breath control was three minutes.
Generally speaking, two and a half minutes was no problem.
During the remaining three days, Chen Mu didn't practice breath control, since the side effects it had on his body were too strong.
Even though its power was shocking, Chen Mu still maintained restraint.
If he practiced without restraint, he suspected that he would very likely die before he could even leave the base.
What he needed was to escape safely, and not to die in the midst of his training.
During those three days, he had gradually restored his physiological functions.
The price he had paid was huge, but the gains were equally huge. By then, he could already control the time he could enter the state of breath control for less than three minutes.
That was to say, he only needed three minutes to be able to enter the state of breath control.
He was quite satisfied with that amount of time.
Chen Mu's heart was full of gratitude and reverence toward Mark Victor.
He had imparted all of the skills he knew to Chen Mu without holding anything back, putting in a lot of effort.
Chen Mu, who was used to the warmth and coldness of the world, couldn't help but feel a surge of warmth every time he thought about it.
So, before he left, he hoped he could give Mark Victor a little "gift."
Mark Victor's speed couldn't be considered very fast, but he was unusually slippery, and his changes of direction were superb.
Chen Mu had no way to catch up, and his face was covered in dust during the first day's confrontation. Never mind hitting his adversary, he couldn't even touch the hem of Mark Victor's clothes.
It was a good thing that Chen Mu was very resilient, and became more courageous in the face of setbacks.
His state of mind was also very calm, since failure was a very normal thing for him.
Since it was normal, he naturally wouldn't be discouraged.
The darkness was a kind of atmosphere, and he had already started to like that kind of atmosphere.
He put the "big mud fish"'s excellent turning performance into full play, and he was getting more and more familiar with that kind of flying style.
On the sixth day, he was like a shadow, firmly following behind Mark Victor.