Chapter 22: Chapter 22: Post battle discussion

"So, do you believe that you will do just fine now?"

Samuel and Elizabeth were back in their little hut, unaware of the mess they had left in their wake. It was a small miracle that nobody knew he had hired a private hut to stay in, it was not even one of the fancier ones which had kept them relatively hidden and now acted as a haven from the upheaval.

Now Samuel was going to have a proper conversation with his disciple while he took care of her body. He started by bringing out the bathtub he had hidden away in his spatial storage ring. Then he channeled his essence fill it with steaming hot water. Then he started mixing in medicinal herbs along with his own special blend of alchemic liquids. Finally, he added one of the world seeds he had on his person to finish the process.

All the while he kept up the conversation with his disciple

"Yes."

He could see Elizabeth beam at him at the question.

"Good, good."

 He could now get to the real crux of why he brought it up in the first place. Elizabeth already had some confidence in herself.

"Now let us move to things that you could have improved. Can you name me a few?."

He said, with a pleasant but stern expression.

"I stuttered and let her take the first blow."

Elizabeth was immediately at attention and answered very swiftly. Good, she already knew where she was lacking which was the first step to learning how to improve. But there was more, and he wanted to see if Elizabeth knew more of her faults. 

"Anything else?"

"Um... I used too much power when I did not need to?"

"And?"

"Um... I relied too much on my breakthrough destiny and gave up my trump card?...."

*Sigh*

Samuel finished what he was doing and moved to undress his disciple. Ever since the day he had pushed her past her limits it had become a ritual for the master. He found it easier to analyze her body by having his hands on him and she liked him doing it, so it stuck. This intimacy should also lessen the blow of what he was about to say, at least that was his hope. 

"The last one is not necessarily a bad thing. While true you were given an advantage, not using it when necessary is just bad. In an actual battle, you have to use everything you have to win, otherwise, the outcome is usually death. You could argue that you could have kept it hidden to use as a trump card but I would still stand against it. In legitimate tournaments you are at no risk, so showing off most of your strength so that others may develop and use counters against you is not a horrible idea. It is a good way to find faults in your system and find ways to fix them. There are good arguments on the contrary, and I will agree, but my way stimulates more growth, which I like. No, your biggest fault is that you forgot your training and simply used brute force to power your way through your opponent. It might sound counterintuitive but there was no strategy or elegance behind your moves, only the last move had any semblance of coordination. In the initial engagement, a simple ice armor would have completely stopped her in her tracks and could have left her open for a follow-up. Remember, holding initiative in combat is important because then it is you who decides the pace, in that battle even though you were a stronger fighter all of your moves were reactionary."

Elizabeth was frowning slightly but was too into enjoying his hands massaging over her now nude form to say anything in exchange.

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"But it is ok, you are still new to fighting. The environment before you met me also isolated you and finding sparring partners must have been difficult. That is not your fault. In fact, I should have added more of a personal touch and personally taught you how to fight, not just get you to practice how to control your power. The whole point is to become stronger, and not being able to deploy proper strategy in the heat of combat is definitely a big hole in that plan... In fact, for the little time that has been invested, you were marvelous. You did not freeze up and just hand her a win but had the sense of presence to react..."

Something clicked in Samuel's superactive brain while he was saying all this out loud. Elizabeth had no training or experience whatsoever, normally after coming to the sect the interaction with their peers dealt with it, at least that was what Samuel believed. But Elizabeth did not even properly get that... Samuel had just thrown a child with less than a year's worth of any actual training into one of the biggest challenges in the sect. Forget about the fights, she had no experience with dealing with all the internal politics that were always at play with the other

"... Maybe we should drop out of this tournament..."

He unconsciously mumbled

"Eh! Why!?"

This brought Elizabeth out of her relaxed reverie very quickly.

"I was a bit too hasty. You are still a babe in all this and are not ready to handle the type of pressure this tournament can put on you. It is a setback but a small one. We should come back next year when you are better equipped."

Samuel was being very serious, he could deal with the loss of reputation it would cause him. He was more worried that he had completely overlooked such a key aspect of Elizabeth. His inexperience with social norms was once more rearing its ugly head.

"No! I want to continue! You just said that tournaments are a good way to learn and I agree.  Maybe we can discover many more things about me that will help further my path of cultivation."

Elizabeth became the one who pushed back in this instance, she wanted to continue the tournament challenge.

"Maybe...but..."

Samuel was still skeptical and wanted to argue but the man was weak to the woman named Elizabeth and her desires. In his head, the young teenager knew what she wanted, especially given how she bulldozed into his life. What he did not realize, or perhaps could not realize because of his past and how removed he was from a normal teenager was that teenagers could be stubborn and do things that often ran counter to what was good for them.

He gave in very easily, especially after another push from Elizabeth

"I want to see how far I can go! I want to see how far I have improved from where I was."

One has to remember that the last fight was the first time Elizabeth had won anything in her life, and the feeling of being cheered on was extremely intoxicating but neither master nor disciple realized just what sort of quagmire both of them were falling into.  

"Oh. Well alright. I guess we can stay for a while longer."

And thus both of them walked a harsh and unnecessary path.

 

 

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