Chapter 74

The song has long ago ended, the sounds of people cheering and the rattling of the cage tried to occupy my mind.

I was still thinking about what to do when I heard the announcer screaming that the fight begins. I stood in my usual stance and started going after the middle of the ring.

The fight began, yet my opponent was still standing in his corner. What was he thinking about?

Even though he didn't look as intelligent, there was probably a reason why he acted like this. Learning from my previous experiences, I tried to stop underestimating my opponents.

Finally, as he saw that I had no intention of closing the distance even further, he smirked and raised his hands.

His hands up and his chin tucked. His front leg was raised ever so slightly.

Muay Thai?

After he slowly and leisurely made his way towards the center, he greeted me with a low kick I managed to avoid.

"HU!"

A super heavyweight, Muay Thai practitioner. While I made circles around him, thinking of what to do, he was standing still.

I decided to leave all the unnecessary thinking aside and start working on the fight.

Moving around, I quickly struck him with a low kick of my own which he managed to block by raising his feet.

If I remember everything correctly, I should wrestle him to the ground, and that way, I would have the advantage.

Deciding on my course of action, I started acting. First, I needed to distract him. Closing the distance with him, I threw another low kick that he blocked with his shin.

"HUP!"

With my upper body leaning forward, I threw a quick long jab to avoid coming into his zone of control. Trying to evade the response, I threw another punch, and the moment I saw his hand moving, I instantly jumped away.

Aiming to be agile, I lightened my punches and shuffled around. Looking at me, he cackled.

"He-he."

What's so funny? Seeing my silent question, he grinned at me.

Trying to leave all these thoughts behind, I shook my head once and decided to engage once again. Moving closer, I threw another quick jab, yet the moment my palm was near his face, I felt a heavy strike connecting with my thigh. It made me stumble backward. With my stance crumbling in the process, my opponent took a step forward. His hand was aiming at my head, and it was a fully clenched fist.

There was no way to avoid this in a conventional method. Bracing myself for this punch, I stumbled further back and started falling.

It all happened in a second. I failed my attack while he launched his own. Yet his low was so powerful it made me fall down, making me avoid his punch.

Honestly, falling down wasn't as painful as getting punched in the face. But, it was something I didn't expect, so I was surprised by the outcome.

As he stood above me and looked down, he took a few steps back. Did he want me to get up?

Standing up, I took my stance, and after I did so, he started moving. While maintaining his stance, he was slowly, step after step moving towards me.

Fuck it, let's get into a proper exchange.

Accepting his challenge, I took my stance and waited for him to close the distance.

The moment he was in my strike zone, I launched a barrage of strikes. I used the full power of my core. Utilizing my upper body, I punched him with the base of my palms straight in the face.

"HUP!"

"UGHK!"

However, he absorbed every punch as if it was nothing, and with a single step, he made an absurdly powerful knee strike to my stomach, making me grunt.

As I involuntarily bent, he punched my face with a short but heavy side swing, connecting with my cheek.

Feeling the power behind his every strike, I choose to take some distance and dis-engage. With my head ringing, I ducked to his side and moved diagonally backward.

Feeling the ropes behind me and the fact he didn't pursue me, I decided to take a breather.

I was slowly getting into this fight. The sound of the crowd around me was dying out. The only things I heard were my breathing and the beating of my own heart.

Walking around my opponent, who took the center of the ring, I slowly peppered him with kicks and punches. Quick, sharp lows, or fast not accentuated jab-like slaps.

Trying to scatter his attention and make him move, I was circling around him but not engaging in close infighting.

When I finally decided to close the distance, I braced myself for the upcoming impact.

Moving in, I barely managed to avoid a straight punch and suffered an uppercut to my gut. Yet I managed to catch his front leg that was raised. Taking hold of it, I tried to raise him up ever so slightly to sweep his second leg in the next moment.

However, it proved to be much more difficult. He weighed a ton.

As I was still trying to make him fall, I felt a rain of elbow strike hitting the back of my neck, shoulders, and upper spine.

Finally releasing him as I tried to avoid further elbowing, I made a wide swing. Using all the distance from below up to his chin. His chin, being tucked, prevented me from doing enough damage to him, but at least he let me take some distance.

Rubbing my shoulders, I looked at his face that now had a hematoma because of my punch.

Fuck! What to do?

However, my opponent didn't give me any time to think. Slowly closing the distance, pressuring me with his stance.

Fuck it, I would simply go for an exchange and then take him down.

Moving back into my stance, I welcomed him as he moved closer and shot a straight kick right into his stomach. As I made him stop in his tracks, I closed the distance with a combination of three palm strikes.

Eating all of them, he simply stretched his palm forward, blocking my vision as he continued moving.

Trying to somehow continue punching, I was also trying to move away from his palm. That was when he returned a stiff, straight punch that landed square on my face, probably breaking my nose as I felt the dampness over my upper lip. It felt as if he poked me with a spear right into the face.

Taking his stretched hand back, he went after my head with another punch, but I ducked sideways.

While he was still swinging, still ducking, I clenched my fists and punched him hard, right into the sides of his torso.

He answered with a knee that I barely managed to block with my hands. Still, the force was enough to make me fall flat.

As I was on my back, I saw his face that now looked more serious. The grin he had had long ago gone. A second later, I saw his leg raising up as he tried to do a vertical split.

Shit.

Rolling sideways, I hastily tried to stand up as I evaded a huge stomp kick. Slipping away, I managed to stand up while he simply turned to my side. He was still in his high stance.

Though I landed a few stronger punches, he was still unfazed. I heard that those who learn Muay Thai are tough, but I thought it was an exaggeration. Now I experienced the truth. This bonehead was as tough as rock, and sadly my name wasn't Chris, so I couldn't do much with simple punches.

I needed to somehow break his stance.

I was still unable to do anything and wasn't able to attempt a good takedown. I tried to think of a way to push him down, but nothing came to my mind.

Standing up as I faced the upcoming danger, I decided not to immediately throw punches when I saw an opening. I decided to wait for a second or two.

He threw a low kick that I managed to block by raising my shin up. After his failure, he once again stretched his hand to cover my point of view. This time I was ready and tried to circle him around, escaping this obstruction.

As he was still maintaining this position, I had a wild idea sparking in my mind.

Continuously moving sideways, I made a sudden leap forward. Using his stable hip as support, I pushed myself even further upward with my left leg. With my hands grabbing his head, my right leg was already hooked around his shoulder.

It all happened in a second. He was still trying to move with both his feet tied to the ground and then I jumped into a flying armbar. Moving my hands, I tried to make him tap out by bending his arm at an unnatural angle.

"GAH!"

Applying pressure to his hand, I waited for him to give up. However, nothing like that happened. Instead, his free hand moved towards my eye, and when it was about to gouge my eye, I released him.

As I dropped down and now was on my back, he suddenly made a huge kick to my sides. I tried to avoid it, but it still managed to graze me.

Rubbing my ribs as I stood up, I didn't think he would proactively go after me, which he did.

I was still recovering when he went after me. Maintaining his high stance, he made a kick to my thigh and combined it with a stiff straight punch. Though his kick connected, I managed to swat away his punch. However, his next move surprised me. As his other arm was damaged, he couldn't make long punch combinations. Instead, he moved his upper body forward and headbutted me.

I saw stars and sparks flaring up in my vision. The world started shaking as I began blocking his punches and strikes, I tried to recover.

He hit like a truck as I tried to survive his slow but methodical onslaught.

"UGH!"

"GHH!"

"HNG!"

A punch to my gut, a knee, a low kick that almost made me fall down.

I tried to move away from him and move my upper body. With my chin tucked to my chest and my forearms covering my face, I tried to regain my footing and breathing.

Yet there was no way for me to endure this for so long.

I was still feeling groggy when I started striking in return. After a wide punch, I slapped his chin with all my might, shaking him ever so slightly.

As he suddenly held my neck with his arms he started kneeing me again and again. Feeling my ribcage creaking with each and every strike he made, I answered with some dirty boxing. Trying to land at least a single strike on his chin.

Both of us apparently grew tired of this status quo after exchanging more than twenty blows.

As he tried to elbow me when he let me go, I dodged and struck his kneecap, forcing him to back down.

As I got some time to take a breather, I made some distance, moving in a circular motion away from my opponent. While he once again took his stance, following after me slowly.

He was breathing roughly now, just like I did.

This whole fight was weird, but right now, I couldn't understand what exactly was off. I was still recovering and tried to look at how I could knock this dude out.

One of his arms was out, but he was still going after me as if nothing happened.

I needed to choke him out.

Jumping away from him yet again, I looked at how sweaty he was and remembered how he went after my eyes.

So I needed to knock him out.

How?

My mind was still muddy as my opponent yet again towered before me. Looking at him as I dodged his punch and a kick, I still didn't know what to do.

Backing down and feeling the ropes touching my spine, I looked sideways.

Looking at the front, I saw how this heavyweight was limping slightly. It wasn't even an idea when I started my next action. My body simply moved on its own.

As I ducked down, my leg swept his front one. He didn't expect this, and his stance finally crumbled.

While he didn't know what to do, I was already up. My legs, moving reflexively, as I dashed forward.

He had trouble standing up using a single hand as support. Nevertheless, even if he had two hands, it was too late. To fully connect with his opened-up chin, I leaped up and put my knee forward.

A moment later, there wasn't any roar or grunt. No loud sounds or anything like that.

The thing that changed was the fact that I was the only one standing in the ring.

As simple as that.