Many observers, particularly the soldiers and warriors among them, grew disappointed at the Dark Apostle's performance.
His lack of skill in unarmed combat, knife fighting and general combat became painfully evident.
His shortcomings hadn't been as pronounced in the last 3 duels due to his heavy reliance on technology, but now that he had lost almost all of his gear, there was no way to hide them anymore.
His flaws became incredibly obvious to those who knew a thing or two about actual fighting!
Sure, there were still plenty of people who understood that their prospective new leader was not supposed to be able to match a professional soldier in the art of combat.
The Dark Apostle was supposed to be a mech designer after all. He was also fairly young. It would have been unreasonable to assume he could match the Oscillating Fist in terms of martial prowess.
