21 Engilde

Did she jump all the way from there towards me? How?

Baffled I stared at her almost a moment too long. I tried to escape by stepping backward, but she still managed to hit me hard enough to send me tumbling to the ground. I rolled and got up immediately. Gasping for air as an intense pain waved over my body from the point of impact. I immediately was looking her way to see, if she would do a follow-up attack. And sure enough, she jumped at me again.

Are all villagers only one-trick pony? No, they are not! But if it works why change it?

I breathed out, trying to dismiss the pain that was still hampering my breathing. I retreated even further back to create some breathing room for me and sure enough, she did not hit me. It really is quite wonderous what you can do if you are not standing still... baffled. This would be my second fight, so if I manage to win, maybe mother will be satisfied? Oh my God! She is jumping again! Dodge! Come on!

No! I shouldn´t dodge all the time! Think! What should I do in such a bizarre situation? I lept to the side as she came crashing down avoided her swinging arms and took some distance away from her yet again.

Normally I would hit her while she jumps towards me with my foot. easy target and all, but... I get the feeling that would be a very bad idea in this case. After all her momentum is far greater than the jumps in my former life were. And there nobody was stupid enough just to jump at somebody. I need to get close that should prevent her from jumping again and then try and hit her just like I did to Zawit. Or something similar...

She is jumping again! Doesn´t she get tired? Alright! Dodge! Then counterattack!

I once again managed to get away from her landing zone and her wildly swinging arms. I ducked under them and got close to her body. And began hitting her with my fists.

Yeah, I do know what I said a few moments before, but my fists are trained cause I did hit mother all the time and secondly there isn´t a chance to injure my fists as long as I don´t hit the face.

So I am aiming for less guarded areas and nerve centers or pathways. For example, the solar plexus is one of the major nerve centers, even though there is quite some muscle in front of it I should do some damage there. Or I try hitting under the armpit where no muscle should be. There also are sensitive spots on the upper arm and the leg and of course the neck. There I could do quite some damage.

I got really close to her. I could almost hug her, but I should be careful of her trying to hug me and I methodically avoided her arms and hit her on those parts when I could. Sometimes with my fist and sometimes with elbows if I was close enough.

Surprisingly enough she did not try and get away from me in order to jump again. But she kept trying to hit me in very close quarter combat. Swinging wide and not that fast it was easy for me to hit her and do some damage. Even though it doesn´t look like I am doing much damage.

If it is her maybe I can try something out, that did not work on mother and wouldn´t work on someone as strong as Zawit? It is a gamble, but Engilde doesn´t look strong enough that it wouldn´t show any effect...

Let´s try it.

The next time Engilde tried to hit me with her right arm I as always avoided the strike, but this time I grabbed her forearm with my right hand. The arm was pulled back and - of course - me with her. but when her arm bent back I put my left arm between her forearm and upper arm and gripped my own right arm. Then I took a step back with my left and put pressure on her arm at about a ninety-degree angle.

The self-defense I learned had many disciples aside from hitting, falling, and throwing. And this was one of them: levers. This is an arm flexion lever designed to bring an opponent to the ground. And the funny thing is it is mostly used when the stretched arm lever fails because the arm is pulled back just like Engilde did just now. Of course, you can avoid this lever, you simply need to stretch your arm once again or push my arm with their left which does stretch their left arm... well for that you would need to know how to avoid it. Most people would try and support their arm with the left hand and that is why I stepped back to bring her arm in a round motion back. The other arm won´t reach.

When I locked arms with her and put the pressure on, I could see Engilde´s face crunching up, trying to resist the lever with pure force. Her eyes were desperate and her strong muscles flexing and bulging. I myself wasn´t in a good shape either as I was desperately pushing down on her arm the places she hit me earlier still hurt like hell and took the breath out of my lungs. Her left arm desperately tried to hit me and she did hit a few painful hits before she lost her balance and tumbled to the ground. Since I still had her arms in my grasps she did not fall far and fell right in front of my feet. During the fall I released the lever and only gripped her arm with my right. When she fell I already had my leg up and ready. I pulled her arm and at the same time kicked downwards with my foot to her face.

Here is a reminder to everyone. Don´t do that! In my old world, this is definitely where self-defense stops and the assault begins! Don´t hit an opponent when he or she is on the ground and helpless and definitely do not use your feet to do it, okay?

Engilde did bring up her left arm to guard her face, but I simply kicked her hand into her face instead. Once, twice, thrice I managed to kick her before I was stopped by Elder Irvin.

"Enough."

He growled at me gripping my leg with his hand.

"Didn´t you hear me? I already said to stop several times."

His eyes were burning with anger as he pulled me away on my leg and basically threw me to mother.

"Cool your head down and pay better attention to the commands given to you."

He turned around and gave a grim look to the rest of the audience.

"Arn wins this round, but remember: Keep a cool head even in the most heated battleground. We don´t need loose cannons who will pit the whole village to risk, but we need warriors who attack when told to attack and defend when told to defend!"

Did I really not hear him telling me to stop? Did I actually really lose control just now? Everything felt so clear and completely in control, so... did I... really?

When Elder Irvin's voice reached my ears my face burned with embarrassment once again.

Wait a moment! You know how to defend? I always thought defense meant to attack in your language!