A Powerful Martial Artist Reincarnates as a Nun Knight - Chapter 5

And so, the meeting with Bishop Joannes Bettel ended on a rather cold note. After being shown her room and politely seeing off the departing bishop, Sophia let out a faint sigh once he was gone.

“As I’ve felt since my past life, social graces and politics are truly difficult.”

For someone as capable as her in most things, she was rather inept at considering others’ feelings. It had been that way since her previous life as a man, and with those past memories carried over to this life, how could the present be any different?

She did make some efforts to improve, but excluding matters of strength, other people’s mentalities seemed too frail and delicate by her standards of having exceptionally thick nerves. She even had the absurd thought that perhaps tofu or quark would be sturdier instead.

Lamenting this, Sophia soon decided to stop the unproductive worrying. Her lack of communication skills was nothing new, nor something that could change overnight or in a day.

Rather than that, it would be better to contemplate something more constructive – things like pushing herself to greater heights and higher realms, for instance.

The primal desire for ascension carried over from her past life remained unchanged in this life, not diminished or corrupted in the slightest but rather driving her even more strongly.

To be honest, she needed neither power, honor, wealth, glory, nor anything at all. While she wouldn’t dislike receiving empathy or consolation from others, she felt no particular thirst for such things. Her sole thirst was for personal strength – greater power, the force of clenched fists and blades. That was her sole focus.

It was a bit paradoxical that she instinctively rejected anything distorted or impure in this regard with firm resolution. But what could be done – the heroic nature she was born with since her past life had been thoroughly specialized in that direction.

Various symbols manifested in the meditating Sophia’s mind.

The pathways of the eight extraordinary vessels and twelve meridians centered around the three dantians; the distribution of the 88,000 chakras throughout the body centered around the seven major chakras; the “Mark of the Anointed One” engraved on her crown; the “Geass” engraved all over her body; the stigmata of “Knighthood” and “Tribulation” carved into her flesh.

Finally, the astral neural network cultivated through reverse brain cultivation and astral muscle channels cultivated through reverse muscle cultivation overlapped and projected on top.

For Sophia, whose concentration had reached its peak, the symbols in her mind were practically the same as directly observing her physical body. She began gradually imposing astral loads on her body, meticulously examining how organically and integrally her body responded, measuring its limits.

In response, the muscles, bones, and inner energy of her physical body swelled greatly, straining with power as it reacted to the astral loads imposed in her visualization. Sweat beaded on her furrowed brow as her closed eyes formed the “inner celestial character,” steam rising as the perspiration continuously evaporated from her heated skin.

Eventually, her visualized self began performing martial arts ingrained in her body, refining the techniques. Not just her physical reactions, but assuming astral opponents, she ceaselessly honed the techniques, discerning their essence and peripherals.

The martial arts Sophia had mainly cultivated in her past life were based on the curricula of modern mixed martial arts and military/police CQC, encompassing related fighting styles. She didn’t neglect training in traditional martial arts or ancient martial arts either, but that was solely to research ancient mysteries, not out of dedication.

This was an inevitable choice, as there was a stark difference in terms of combat practicality, rationality, and overall completion of the curriculum and training system thanks to the systematization and scientification of modern styles.

However, directly transplanting the complete forms of her past life’s martial arts to this world posed some difficulties.

Factors like the existence of battlefields closer to ancient-medieval times, or the existence of reverse brain and reverse muscle cultivation methods, or the presence of demons, magical beasts, and other monsters – these were such difficulties.

The main reasons mixed martial arts and CQC could be considered complete martial art forms stemmed from the environment at their inception, where a human’s true enemy was only other humans. Battlefields saw less use for long bladed weapons, with short-range gunfights taking precedence as the mainstream under the primacy of firearms.

But in this world, a human’s true enemy was not other humans, but “demons.” Even setting demons aside, there were still plenty of beasts and monsters that threatened humanity.

Moreover, the very existence of “reverse brain” and “reverse muscle” cultivation methods caused fundamental disparities in physical specs between humans, far exceeding the differences accounted for by weight classes compared to Earth’s physical limitations.

For such reasons, Sophia’s decision to rewind the clock of martial arts was a rational calculation.

First, Sophia chose the ancient European longsword fencing styles.

Lee Bum-seok had already mastered the German fencing lineages largely classified under Johannes Liechtenauer and the Italian fencing lineages classified under Fiore dei Liberi to an expert level in his past life. To initially adapt to the similar weapon development level of the medieval European world of her past life, Sophia began laying the foundations of her weapon arts centered around her past life’s longsword fencing.

Next, the martial art Sophia chose was none other than Tai Chi Chuan. She chose Tai Chi Chuan firstly because it was fundamentally a style similar to combat wrestling, and secondly because it was suitable for learning to apply physical balance, coordinated meridians, and qi manifestation to fighting.

The crude techniques and lack of rationality due to its pre-modern origins were actually advantages for Sophia in this vastly different battleground environment where she had to rebuild from the foundations up. An underdeveloped style was a far more advantageous starting point than one with a semi-refined but incomplete technical system.

Lastly, she chose the Japanese jujutsu styles. Originally developed for fighting with long bladed weapons, jujutsu featured small movement techniques to subdue opponents from a set distance – a form of small wrestling. Sophia intended to fill the technical shortcomings of Tai Chi Chuan with jujutsu.

Sophia’s attempts showed tangible results to a certain extent.

Even if there were some mismatches due to environmental differences, the martial arts of Earth were still honed over generations based on a degree of rationality, building up techniques and training systems through combat testing and verification. They had also undergone further refinement and supplementation through modernization and scientification.

On top of that, her experience cultivating the completed forms of mixed martial arts and CQC in her past life did not go to waste. Relying on that past experience, Sophia diligently and repeatedly verified which techniques held practicality and compatibility with the means available to her and the foundations of her martial arts, not missing a single day.

The result? As you can see, Sophia had become the youngest officer-level operative of the Paladins, the Order’s strongest military force organized to confront demons on the front lines. She had even recently gained the ominous nickname “Light’s Executioner,” whether she liked it or not.

It was in the midst of such arduous cultivation when it happened.

Suddenly, Sophia’s form, seated in meditation with closed eyes, vanished from that spot.

Pafff!

With a faint sound, she had appeared in front of the window. The Sophia now in front of the window slowly opened her eyes as she quietly retrieved the index finger she had stuck into the wooden window frame.

As Sophia extended her hand after opening the window, the corpse of a dead nightingale was pulled into her grip from afar – the “Soaring Ether Summon” technique combined with a guiding talisman spell. The nightingale had a finger-sized hole punched through the center of its head and was dead.

From the nightingale’s corpse, Sophia could sense traces of a familiar talisman spell composed of demonic power.

“Damn that vile whore must have sent it.”

It seemed Erzsebet had detected Sophia’s arrival in Strasbourg and sent this spy demon to monitor her movements. To put it bluntly, this was Erzsebet’s mistake – she had only confirmed to Sophia that she was indeed in Strasbourg.

Sophia’s lips curled up in a slight, sinister smile, revealing her fangs. It was an extremely aggressive and vicious grin.

Though she strived to deny it, Sophia felt truly alive when clashing with demons and their followers. It stemmed from the joy that there existed a place where her strength was truly needed.

On Earth, there were far too few places requiring Lee Bum-seok’s strength, and what little did were mostly unofficial cases like the occult or inappropriate violence. But in this world, the duty of exterminating demons was highly official, righteous, and above all, a field that required her power.

Sophia eagerly awaited the commissioner of Strasbourg bringing the information she had requested, hopefully soon. And even sooner than she expected, the very next day, Commissioner Paul Hiltmann came to see her.