Sparring is Beating

"Shall we begin?" Zephyr said with a smirk that sent a chill down my spine. That smirk wasn't a bluff it spelled trouble.

As the words left his lips, an overwhelming torrent of mana surged from him, far surpassing anything he'd shown before. The sheer magnitude of it forced me to brace myself, knowing an attack was imminent.

One moment, Zephyr was a good distance away. The next, he was right in front of me, his fist drawn back.

"That's going to hurt," I thought as his punch slammed into my chest, hurling me back into the wall with a deafening crack.

"Damn it! Damn it! Was he holding back earlier?" The thought echoed in my mind as waves of pain coursed through me, though my bones, miraculously, remained intact.

"That wasn't even half of my power," Zephyr remarked casually, settling back into his stance. "Brace yourself, and don't blame me when I give you the PTSD of your life."