Rudra was not shocked to hear that his defense technique was utterly trash , he was aware of the fact that it was.
Hence not taking the criticism in a bad way , Rudra cheerfully replied " Yes , and im eager to learn archangel sariel".
Sariel approved of Rudra's attitude and decided to teach Rudra from the very basics.
The problem with Rudra's fighting style was that Rudra was not ' Trained ' by professionals as a teenager and his fighting style was pure and natural.
Unlike the current graduates from the elite academy who learnt proper hand to hand combat and advanced martial arts from tutors, Rudra's entire fighting style originated from him playing Omega over two lifetimes.
Being a bottom feeder once , Rudra naturally was aggressive in his second life which led to his fighting style being full of big flashy moves supplemented by a lot of tactical moves , however there was no pure foundation to his attacks. No form , or theory.
Sariel noticed this flaw and started from the very start for Rudra. The archangel said " Your first and biggest flaw is that you take attacks head-on.
Come here and raise your hand. Let me punch it once ".
Rudra raised his hand , and Sariel punched him with a little force so that his palm stung upon contact.
Sariel said " Good , now pull ur hand back when I'm about to hit it ".
Sariel punched once more , however this time Rudra pulled his hand back a little and although the punch landed on his fists once more , the force of impact was much less.
Sariel said " Feel that? , The very basic of defending against any attack is the motion of jumping back!
If an energy blast that you can't handle is coming your way , then you better start running back!
If you want to parry a strike , move in the direction of the strike and pick your time to parry .
Move in the line of the attack fast enough , and it gives you a far more advanced position to counter it and soften the blow versus you standing still and letting the attack land.
So , for the very first lesson , i want you to practice running back when you see an attack you can't handle and for that we will first have you do backward running drills .
Since we have very limited time , we should start right away ".
Sariel's words enlightened Rudra , it was completely true!
If a swordsman was coming towards Rudra to thrust a sword in Rudra's gut , but Rudra was moving backwards while facing the swordsman at the same speed , then the swordsman would technically never be able to stab Rudra in the gut!
It was such a basic and fundamental principle , however it was something Rudra never incorporated in his fighting.
Even if he did not outrun his opponent , simply moving along the line of attack gave him extra time that he needed to parry or dodge it.
Rudra started to vigorously practice the backward running drills that sariel pawned off on him , as he found out that he did not have nearly the amount of spring in his step needed for such a drill.
He could use ' Cloud Feet ' to make up for the deficit , however this was a learning drill and Rudra would not gain much if he cheated here.
Doing it rather hard way , Rudra failed to generate the necessary speed , at times fell flat on his bum trying to go too fast while at times ran at an awkward posture that made him prone to other attacks and failed time and time again.
Sariel was patient with Rudra and gave him necessary nudging to keep the whole learning curve as smooth as possible, and unlike Raphael who left Rudra to his own devices to train , sariel actually cared enough to be with Rudra 24X7 to tutor him non-stop.
It took Rudra a full 4 days till he could actually master backwards running properly and it was then that sariel added weight training to the regime so that Rudra could gain the extra Agility he needed in a practical battle.
For the next 2 days , Rudra farmed agility like a madman and his agility stat went up by 2400 points as a result. However while it was nowhere satisfactory enough Sariel had to move on as there were more lessons to be covered.
Hence on day 6 , Sariel started the second lesson , the art of parry and counter . Sariel said " You have a beautiful move in your arsenal the Full counter . However what perplexes me is why do you know such a complex move but not the most basic counter out there ?
When i come at you with a twig and you engage with me , it should essentially be counter , counter , counter at all times so that you don't waste stamina and parry the opponent with his own momentum.
Especially for physical moves , it's important to preserve stamina and drain your opponents.
Here , the skilltome for counter . Learn it , we shall practice this one next ".
Rudra quickly opened the skill-book and learnt the skill counter. Sariel made it sound like it was nothing however in reality it was a damn tier 4 skill !
[ Counter ] ( tier 4 ) ( legendary) - A skill created by the archangel sariel as a gift to mankind , the counter is a way to use the enemy's own momentum against them while parrying an attack.
Restrictions - You cannot be two tiers below your opponent , and the strength difference cannot be over 3 times.
Reset time - None
Rudra was grateful for the skill , and immediately started to practice it with sariel.
The best part about the skill was that it had no cooldown time and could be used as many times as required , which worked exceptionally well for Rudra as he found that by incorporating such a simple move in his arsenal he now created far more openings in his enemy's defense than without it.
By day 8 Rudra mastered the second phase showing his brilliance in learning combat based moves and impressing sariel , as the archangel moved to the hardest phase three of the training.
/// Bonus chapter for the supergift by Cervantez91 , please thank him in the comments for this one ///