Martial Arts Worlds - Chapter 438

Chapter 438: Activity With Highest Possibility of Pain
With rageful eyes, Jaden watched as Ren ran off like a leprechaun after his pot of gold and felt angrier than he had in a long while.

At that moment, Jaden turned to the tree, snapped a thick branch, and threw it in Ren’s direction, narrowly missing him.

“Oh! Is that allowed? Jaden is using weaponry!”

“Uh… I am not quite sure.”

“If the temple priest isn’t stopping the fight, I suppose it’s allowed!”

Many eyes landed on the temple priest, but he looked nonchalant and ignorant even, as if he were pretending not to see anything.

It was somewhat against the rules, but he didn’t care about it, as he could feel the martial gods being displeased about the current fight.

They wanted to see blood and proper fighting, but Ren just running away like a coward was not what they expected.

It’s what the temple priest thought, at least.

Splash!

Ren splashed through a low stream and stopped at the other side.

He looked at the water and the smooth rocks beneath the surface—they looked really slippery.

At that moment, Jaden came running in with a reddened face, saw Ren waiting for him, and without thinking twice, he jumped into the water, but then his feet slid out from under him.

His eyes widened in shock, and he fell on his back with a loud splash, drenching him from head to toe.

“Why are you taking a bath? We are fighting, are we not?”

Ren asked with a smile.

“You…”

Jaden jumped to his feet, and with a scream, jumped after him, but Ren turned around and ran away.

With the drenched clothes weighing him down, Jaden chased after him, but the bloodied knees were making it quite difficult.

“Ren is trying to make Jaden angry so he stops paying attention to his surroundings!”

Aoi said out loud in surprise.

With a wry smile, Kiernan watched the cat-and-mouse game unfold.

It was quite a ridiculous scene.

Sitting on top of the temple’s roof, the members of Wraith Dojo watched Jaden tripping and stumbling across the forest.

“What the hell is Jaden doing? A pathetic show.”

Lucas Oliveira shook his head.

“Jajajaja~ He is getting very manipulated.”

Li Wei giggled.

“I don’t blame him—Ren is an extremely annoying opponent to deal with.”

Rein Schneider said coldly.

Separated from them, Maximilian walked down the forest path and arrived at the low stream that wound its way through the lush greenery.

On the other side, he was able to see Jaden chasing after Ran like a rabid dog, his eyes burning with determination.

“…”

Maximilian sensed something and looked over to the tree, where he met Kiernan’s firm gaze. His gray eyes looked at him like they were studying every movement of his.

‘Low Stage Martial Master—Threat: Nonexistent.’

Maximilian thought to himself and turned his gaze away, looking back to the cat-and-mouse game, which didn’t show signs of stopping.

Jaden’s screams echoed throughout the forest.

“Stop running!”

He inched his hands close to Ren’s back, but like many times before, he crossed over to the left, weaved through trees, and escaped into a thicket of bushes.

Jaden ran after him with gritted teeth, but when he smashed through the bushes, he noticed that there was a steep hill that he didn’t notice.

His feet slipped on the loose gravel as he tried to stop himself from tumbling down, and he fell backward onto the ground.

“Ouch…”

He groaned in pain, rubbing his back, and looked back up the hill, where Ren was just waving his hand at him with a silly smile.

‘He knows this forest very well. He knew that there was a steep hill just behind those bushes.’

Jaden thought to himself in anger.

It was true.

Ren spent his childhood in these forests, playing with his sisters and brothers—playing cops and robbers.

He had scraped his knees and injured himself while running these woods enough times to get a deep familiarity with every nook and cranny.

Back then, he hadn’t yet become so fearful of pain.

“Are you proud of fighting like this? Is this what you really want? You’re embarrassing your ancestors!”

Jaden screamed and slowly started to climb back up the hill.

“I don’t care about pride. I care about survival and what’s best for me.”

Ren said and started walking away, but then Jaden reached the top of the hill and ran after him.

“Get back here!”

He shouted.

However, Ren wasn’t running anymore; then he stopped and turned around to face Jaden, who swung his fist straight at him.

At that moment, Jaden’s feet landed on the ground in front of Ren, but then the floor of the forest gave way under him and made him drop down to the dark hole.

He happened to land on his right leg, its ankle twisted, and he let out a painful scream.

“Aaaaaargh!”

Ren looked down at the hole and said.

“Yeah, painful, isn’t it? One summer, my sister and I were here to play around in this forest. It was all giggles and smiles until I fell down this hole and broke both my legs.

“It was the worst pain I had ever felt, and while my sister went to get help, I was down in this hole, weeping and suffering from the pain.

“It was the turning point in my life—I never wanted to feel pain after that. I stopped doing activities that might result in me hurting myself.

“And you might ask—why do martial arts then? It is the activity that has the highest possibility of hurting myself.

“Well, I was hoping to get rid of my fears. As you can see, I am not there yet.”

Ren said with a wry smile and saw people walking over to see Jaden stuck in the hole with a twisted ankle.

“…”

With a silent expression, the temple priest stopped by the hole, saw that Jaden was in no condition, and said.

“Match is over—winner is Ren Saelim.”

“Wait, I can still fight! I am not fucking done!”

Jaden screamed, but when he tried to stand up, he crumbled back to the ground in pain.

After they helped Jaden up from the hole and took him to the infirmary, a score appeared on the scoreboard.

Yokai Dojo—1.

Wraith Dojo—0.