"Yes," Shang answered as he slowly stood up.
Shang had always wanted an evaluation from a neutral party. After all, he could evaluate himself only to a certain degree.
And on top of that, Shang had already been given some feedback just now.
His headwound was proof of that.
'I didn't notice such a huge vase coming towards my head. Now that I think back, I can remember hearing the column shake, but I simply filtered it out as irrelevant information.'
'I guess that's the Vice-Dean's way of showing me that I ignored my surroundings. I can get why that is a bad habit on a battlefield.'
"Alright," Soran said as he sat back down in his chair. "Then, let's talk about your sword techniques first. Mervin?" Soran asked as he looked at the older man beside him.
Mervin nodded and looked at Shang.
"Horrible."
Silence.
Shang was waiting for more, but nothing more came. "Could you elaborate?" Shang asked.
"Your movements are fast, but that's it," Mervin answered. "You plan your next strike very well, and you unleash your strike with quite some speed, but there is no after. You fight like you only think about the current strike and not the one after that or the one after that."
"When something goes wrong with your current attack, you hesitate and pause for a moment because you're unsure about what you should do next. In essence, you are planning your attack only when it's already time to unleash it, not beforehand."
pᴀɴdᴀ nᴏveʟ "Another thing is that your attacks have no nuance. Your attacks are all very straightforward and honest. What the enemies see is what they get. You don't use feints, and you don't use your sword to manipulate the enemy's perception."
"Lastly, your only goal in attacking your opponent is to kill them. However, that is the end goal, and it can't always be achieved with one strike. Oftentimes, you have to achieve multiple subgoals in order to finally take your enemy's life."
Then, Mervin stood up and walked past the table.
The other two smiled a bit when they saw him get up of his own volition. Obviously, the youngster had woken up Mervin's teacher instincts.
Mervin took out his sword and held it in front of him as he looked at Shang. "Can you take me out with one attack if I had your physical power?" he asked.
Shang looked at Mervin. "No," he quickly answered.
Mervin's sword perfectly isolated him from everything in front of him. At first glance, he didn't seem to hold his sword in any special way, but Shang felt like Mervin's defense was impenetrable.
"Why not?" Mervin asked.
"Because of your sword," Shang answered.
"Can you get rid of my sword?" Mervin asked.
"Difficult," Shang answered.
"So, what would you need to do?"
Shang's brows furrowed. "I would need to keep attacking you and shake your balance until I get the chance to either directly strike you or get rid of your weapon."
Mervin nodded. "Correct," he answered. "I noticed that you realize these things rather quickly in a fight, but you don't realize them immediately. You first have to try something before you know that it doesn't work."
"You are essentially a beast in your fighting style," Mervin said as he put his sword away again and went back to his chair. "You are fighting honest, direct, and without a plan, just like a beast."
"The good thing with that style is that many enemies might become overwhelmed by your sheer killing intent. After all, your attacks very directly show that you are there to kill them and that you are not messing around."
"However, that style only works on inexperienced soldiers. Someone that can actually keep their calm in a battle will be your downfall. They will notice your very simple attacks and goals, and they will lead the battle into a losing direction for you."
"Imagine you attack your enemy, and they block. Then, they attack, and you block. Then, you attack again, and they block. And then, they attack. Suddenly, you are with your back to a wall, and blocking from your current position is difficult. You would much rather evade. However, you can't evade due to the wall."
"Without planning and without paying attention to the surroundings, something like that can happen to you," Mervin said. "The enemy follows their plan, and they will push you into an unfavorable position. As a warrior, you have to be able to see these things and plan around them."
"You fight like a beast, but you are a human. You are not using our strongest weapon, which is our superior mind."
"Nearly all of these things can be easily fixed by learning a couple of sword techniques. After all, these techniques are specifically created to avoid such situations. There are attacks that are perfect to use if you feel pressured. There are attacks that are perfectly suited to pressure your opponent."
"By comprehending all these techniques, you will subconsciously already plan against your opponent."
"But as it stands right now, your sword techniques are only fit for slaughtering beasts, not humans, and a warrior that can't fight humans is a warrior that won't live for very long."
After that sentence, Mervin became silent.
Shang listened intently to Mervin's barrage of words with burning eyes.
Yes, this was what he was here for!
Feedback!
Teachings!
Mervin was completely right in everything that he said!
Shang hadn't truly fought a powerful human yet, but Shang could very well imagine how such a fight would go down. It would probably go down exactly as Mervin predicted.
Humans were using many tricky techniques that Shang wasn't used to handling. A good example was Soran's swing with his spear. Soran had seemingly attacked Shang's face, and Shang had reacted. Yet, Soran had actually attacked Shang's torso.
One had to remember that Soran had made his body two levels weaker than Shang. This meant that Shang was much faster than Soran in this situation.
The most impressive part was that this strike wasn't even very hard to pull off. Shang could imagine such a strike to be a basic technique of a spear user. It wasn't some heavenly technique that one could only comprehend after having been a warrior for decades.
It was a simple application of a weapon, and if it were an actual battle, Shang would have been in life-threatening danger.
By whom?
By someone two levels below him.
Why?
Because Shang hadn't fought humans yet, and because he hadn't learned from humans yet.
"Thank you for your teachings," Shang said with respect as he slightly bowed in respect.
Mervin only snorted. "Don't mention it. I just couldn't watch someone fight this atrociously."
Then, Soran looked at Shang. "Are you fine with that feedback?" he asked with a smile.
Shang nodded. "Yes, just these few words have highlighted many of my mistakes and bad habits."
Soran nodded. "It's good that you have such a mindset. Honestly, it's rather rare to see someone have such a mature mindset at your age."
Soran chuckled a bit. "It's almost like you're already in your 20s."
Shang didn't answer.
"Anyway, let's talk about your mentality," Soran said.