The sun was at its highest point in the sky as two people stood across from each other in a backyard.
Nova looked at Jack who had a fairly serious face and said, “I just finished the last one. How did you know?”
“Heh,” Jack grinned. “It’s simple. Everyone heard that yelp you let out the other night, and when you came to the party you looked like a ghost. I can already imagine what you went through in both situations. That said, I didn’t expect you wouldn’t take any breaks between the books and that you’d manage to learn the movement technique so quickly.”
Since his friend had already figured it out, Nova went straight to the point and asked directly, “Why are you here?”
As busy as Jack was, the only reason he’d come find him during the day and cut time from his training was if there was something important to talk about.
“Now that you’ve learned those three books, you should start training with us. The sooner you start the better, and the other two also want to see your current progress. After all, we have less than a year before we enter the portal.” Jack sauntered toward Nova, a slight smile hanging on his lips.
Nova’s eyebrow rose slightly. “That’s it?”
The question threw Jack off script, and a crack appeared in his confident attitude.
“What do you mean, ‘that’s it’?” he asked.
“I thought it was something serious, but it turns out it was nothing much.” Nova sighed. Then his gaze sharpened and he smirked. “Take me to where you guys train. I really want to get a good look at your current strength too.”
Seriously, this dude never rests. Jack looked at him weirdly for a second.
He had expected Nova to start training at least the next day, but after just finishing the last of the three books, he still wanted to train. It made him wonder if training was that fun but, after thinking about it, he rejected it.
Training isn’t fun.
“If you say so,” Jack muttered. “Follow me.”
/////
In a building adjacent to the one housing the Lesser Orange portal.
Erevan was sitting quietly off to the side, his eyes fixed on the figure of a man in white training clothes standing in the middle of the area. Ice covered the ground around him, creating a stark contrast between his frozen zone and the untouched floor where Erevan was.
That man was Slade.
His cold temperament perfectly matched his current surroundings.
Amidst the ice, there was a figure that stood out like a sore thumb.
Its body looked ethereal and featureless, with no face to speak of, but based on its build, it resembled that of a middle aged man. Despite its ghostly form, every blow it landed was very real, making the inside of the building tremble.
If not for the expensive materials the building was made of, it would’ve long since been reduced to powder. The only question was how far the destruction could have gone.
As Slade and the ethereal middle aged man fought, Erevan was deep in thought.
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He’s improved a lot. Now he can even hold his own against a Grade 0 with a level in the 150–200 range from our world. With this kind of strength, fighting natives in the portal shouldn’t be too hard, but against others like us from different worlds… it’s still not enough to guarantee a win.
When his thoughts reached that point, he couldn’t help but wonder, Am I rushing this too much?
He’d imposed a deadline on himself to clear the Lesser Orange portal on Earth, a feat that would allow him to prove his worth to his family.
But to achieve that, simply clearing the portal wasn’t enough.
Time also mattered.
Who would care if he cleared a trial portal meant for new civilizations after 30, 40, or even 50 years?
Nobody.
They wouldn’t even bat an eye, such a result would be expected.
No…they might even berate him for taking so long.
It would be like an adult who’d gone through university suddenly going back to elementary school to compete with children.
Would anyone see him as some kind of genius?
Obviously not. In fact, quite the opposite.
By the same token, despite Erevan having left home when he was only a child, as a native of an advanced civilization, he would still be judged based on that identity.
This was the main reason he had planned to enter the portal only 13 years after the apocalypse began on Earth.
He needed to be the child who skipped grades and competed with adults at the university, the kind that would awe the people back home.
I’ve already made up my mind about this long ago. Now isn’t the time to second guess myself. What I need to do is prepare myself as much as possible.
While he was thinking that, a sharp crack, like ice splitting in half, rang out.
In the middle of the area, Slade’s finger was pointed at the figure’s chest, and from that point dozens of fractures branched outward.
In an instant, they spread across its entire body, leaving not a single intact spot.
Then—
Crack.
The ice shattered, and the figure dissolved into motes of light, as if it had never existed in the first place.
Clap, clap.
Erevan stood up and clapped his hands. “Good! How do you feel?”
Slade didn’t answer immediately. He steadied his breathing and, only after doing so, shot Erevan a side glance.
“Not enough,” he said.
Erevan didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
Before he could say anything else, he heard the door opening and his head swivelled toward it.
Slade also turned.
“I brought new blood to this place.” Jack slowly made his way inside.
Nova followed closely behind, a curious look on his face.
The prerequisite to train here was to learn those three books, which made him wonder what kind of training they were doing.
He was bound to be disappointed, though.
Slade was just standing still in the middle of the room, and Erevan was off to the side, acting like a spectator.
‘What are they even doing here?’ Nova thought.
“You’re already here?” Erevan said with a hint of surprise.
It hadn’t even been a week since Nova arrived, and Jack bringing him here could mean only one thing.
He’d learned all three books.
That was hard to imagine. Erevan knew very well how taxing and exhausting two of them were, while the third focused on comprehension, which, in many cases, was even harder than enduring pain.
Nova was about to speak when Jack chimed in. “Indeed. Isn’t he amazing? I’m already looking forward to seeing how far he can go.”
It was then that Slade walked toward them and said in his usual cold tone, “It’s free. He can go.”
He pulled out a chair and sat down. The entire time, he hadn’t spared Nova even a single glance.
Erevan turned to Nova and asked, “Don’t mind him too much. Do you want to give it a try?”
To be honest, he was also eager to see how far the latter could go. Having lost more than eight years… what was his current strength?
“Give a try to what?” Nova asked. Jack hadn’t told him anything on the way, so he had no idea what this training was about.
Erevan glanced at Jack, his gaze clearly asking whether he’d explained anything to Nova, but Jack simply shook his head.
Sighing, Erevan calmly explained how the training here worked.
In short, an array used to simulate warriors covered the whole building. The warriors it could simulate depended on the information stored inside and the quality of the array itself.
This kind of array was used by more advanced civilizations to help train their people and, as a widespread training tool, it included a failsafe. The summoned warrior would never deliver a killing blow but would stop right before doing so.
This allowed the trainee to fight without holding back.
Though, such training method also came along with a very serious negative.
If someone relied only on this kind of training, they wouldn’t get very far.
An opponent that never struck to kill could only train average warriors, true warriors were meant to be forged through real battles.
When Nova heard the array’s functions, he was dumbfounded.
“Arrays can do that too?!” he instinctively exclaimed.
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