Training Begins!

Waking up at 10 am is not usually what I would consider a good start to a weekend. I was excited though, so I hardly noticed how much earlier I had woken up than usual. I quickly got dressed and then went downstairs and made myself a quick breakfast of fried eggs and bacon. My dad was still asleep, he tries his best to get the most out of his weekends, so it's not surprising. Regardless of why, he wasn't awake so I just texted him that I was leaving now, grabbed the keys, and went to the car.

The drive to Prometheus Inc. was nothing special, the only notable thing I noticed during the drive there were some emergency vehicles heading to who knows where. Whatever it is, it didn't concern me. I got to Prometheus Inc. at around 10:50 am, so I was a little early. I felt a little proud of that achievement, hopefully, Sean will notice my punctuality.

I walked into the building and was a little surprised to see Sean waiting for me. I was expecting to have to wait like I did last time, but I guess he wanted to start training right away. I went up to Sean and initiated a conversation.

"Good Morning Boss." I greet him.

"Good Morning to you as well, Dawn. We'll begin immediately, follow me." He replies. I follow him to an elevator, and he presses the call button. After a minute or two of waiting, it arrives. The elevator is empty and we walk in. Sean presses the button to send us to the 3rd floor. The elevator is pretty fast, and we end up there in about a minute. It opens up to reveal...one really big white room.

"This is where you'll be training physically." Sean says. I don't see any workout equipment or anything, but I'm sure Sean will whip out some random bullshit like he did last time to justify using a room straight out of a psyche ward for physical training. I just give him a look that says "Really?" before looking back at the room in front of me. Sean notices and opens his mouth to speak again.

"You'll see." A few seconds after he says that what I can only describe as a rip appears in the air. It slowly expands and begins crackling with some kind of blue energy. Once it's about the size of a door, it stops expanding. I look in shock and confusion at it before looking at Sean. He seems unbothered by this occurrence, so I calm down a little bit. If this was something dangerous, Sean would've reacted by now. I look back at the rip and notice it has started to shimmer a little bit.

Soon, a foot comes out of the tear in space, and another. A man has walked out of the tear. He has blonde hair and blue eyes and is clean-shaven. He's wearing black cargo pants, matching combat boots, and what I assume to be some kind of combat vest, which is tan in color. The vest covers up his entire torso, but I assume he's wearing a short sleeve shirt since his muscular shoulders are showing. As soon as the man is fully outside of the tear, it vanishes with a crackle.

"What. The. Fuck." I exclaim. This all happened very quickly, and I was still kind of in shock at what I just saw.

"Was that magic?" I ask Sean.

"Yes kid, it was. Now let's greet our guest." Sean says. After that, we walk up to the strange man who just appeared in the training room. Sean greets the stranger first.

"Hey Rom, meet the newbie." Sean then looks at me and speaks.

"This is Romel Messenger, he'll be your primary instructor. Say Hi" Sean says kind of lazily. Tch, and he said he's supposed to be in charge of me during my internship. It's day one and he's already delegating! Although after that entrance, I can't say I'm displeased with his choice of teacher. Needless to say, I'm very excited to learn to do whatever it is Romel just did to get here, and whatever else he can teach me.

"Hi Sir, it's nice to meet you." I lend my hand out for him to shake. He accepts it and gives me a firm handshake. He responds to my greeting with one of his own.

"Drop the sir, it makes me feel old. Just call me Rom like the real old man here." He says, taking a look at Sean in the middle of his statement. Sean's eyebrow twitches at the 'old man' comment but other than that, he shows no reaction to it. I chuckle at his statement and reply.

"If that's what you want me to call you, that's what I'll do." After I say that, he nods and then looks at Sean.

"So what do you want me to teach him? Just the basics?" Rom asks Sean. Sean nods.

"I want him to be able to start working by the end of the week." Sean says. Rom nods and then replies.

"Alrighty. Well, we'll start immediately." Rom then gives Sean a mischievous look.

"That means you can go do whatever it is you do now." Sean rolls his eyes and heads back for the elevator. Once he's gone, Rom looks at me and starts to speak.

"Alright kid, there's a lot of things you could do for Prometheus, we have a great many positions and almost all of them could use some extra help. But I will give you my suggestions first. Your magical potential is outstanding, so I would suggest you for a combat role, such as a Task Force Member or Hunter. In case you don't want to fight stuff..." I cut him off and excitedly shouted.

"I'll take the combat role!" Rom gives me a smirk and then begins to speak again.

"You want some excitement, don't you? I'll warn you now though, whatever is going on in your little head probably isn't true. It's not something to be taken lightly, you will watch others die, you will kill, and you may even die yourself. Is that something you're willing to do?" Hearing this shakes me out of my excited delusions a little bit and I begin to second-guess myself. The prospect of fighting monsters with magic was still exciting, and I would assume I won't be killing other humans, so I'm not very concerned about the killing part either. However, dying is not something I look forward to, and neither is watching others die. I'm not entirely sure if that's something I'm up for. But at the same time, he said I have a lot of potential in this field. Maybe it's possible for me to prevent my team members from dying. I think that if I work hard enough, and train hard enough, I could very well keep everyone I work with safe and sound. After a little more deliberation in my head, I decided to answer Rom.

"I am willing, as long as I don't have to kill other humans." I say to Rom. Rom adopts a serious expression and then answers me.

"If you think we can use magic, what stops bad people from using it? We are not the only organization of humans, there are others and not all of them have goals as benevolent as our own. There is a possibility that you will have to kill other humans, in order to protect the world. Are you still willing?" I'm not sure I will be capable of killing them, but that's what my team is for. Whatever team I get assigned, I hope they are willing to either do it for me or help me get a less lethal solution to the issue. Nonetheless, I think that if I absolutely had to kill someone to protect the world, I could although it wouldn't be easy on me mentally. I started thinking about my father, if someone were to try to harm him, I would definitely try to kill them. If it's to protect the people I care about, I am willing to do anything. I decided then, that I was willing. All that was left was to communicate this with Rom.

"Yes, if it's to protect the world and those I care about, I am willing to do it." I said with confidence. Rom smiles at me and nods.

"Good. Remember your reason at all times. It's what will keep you grounded. Now, I'll start off by explaining the threat levels Prometheus Inc. has created for the various creatures and monsters that roam this world. The threat level of a creature is decided by three things: destructive power, special abilities, and intelligence. All of this is based on observation throughout the years, conducted by our combat teams, and is subject to change. To put it simply, never rely completely on the threat level of a creature to determine how dangerous it truly is, we're not perfect and on the occurrence you encounter something we don't know about yet, we want you to be ready. You get all that?" I nod at him and he continues.

"Alright, we'll start from the bottom up. The weakest level is the 'Human Level', anything in this level can usually be handled by your average Joe, assuming they're armed with the proper weapons. Needless to say, they pack little to no destructive power, usually one or two special abilities, although sometimes they don't even have that, and they're usually not sentient. Just think of things here as more aggressive animals, an example of something in this threat level would be a Wendigo. The next threat level is the 'Building Level', this is the highest level of creature local militaries will attempt to deal with before we're called. These creatures usually have the destructive power to destroy buildings on their own, usually via a special ability, and can be quite cunning. It's at this point that you will start to see sentient creatures, a higher-level Vampire is an example that would fit in this category. After that, we get to the big shots, 'Town Level' is a creature that can wipe out a whole town. Anything hostile at this level will usually be immediately taken down by an elite team from us immediately. Expect creatures at this level to be highly intelligent, powerful, and have numerous special abilities. An excellent example of this tier would be an average demon, should it somehow manage to bring its physical body to our world." At that point, I stop him to ask a question.

"What does the physical body thing have to do with a demon's threat level?" I ask him.

"Good question, it's simple. When a demon possesses someone, it can't stay in our world for long. The human body simply can't handle its power and begins to break down, and even should the human body handle its power, it's still a human body and can be taken down by human means. But should a demon bring its physical body to our world, it doesn't have these problems, the body of a demon is very durable, and it doesn't have to worry about holding back its power, making it far more dangerous." I nod at his explanation, signifying that I understand what he meant.

"I'll continue unless you have any more questions?" I shake my head, and he continues.

"The next level is 'City Level', anything in this level should be considered a walking nuke, and they usually have some kind of fancy title. Anything at City Level is usually well known in the supernatural world, so thankfully we can keep track of them. There are not a great deal of City Level beings, but in general, they are intelligent, more so than any human, and have lived for millennia. There are still rare cases of non-sentient city-level beings, but they are all in hibernation and are being monitored at all times. Pray you never encounter something at this level or above, but an example of something at this level would be a dragon. The next and final level is the Special Level. Anything at the Special Level should be considered on the level of a god, plain and simple. We as an organization, would have to mobilize all of our forces to take down a single Special Level being, and even then we might not win. The weakest Special Level being could turn the entire continental United States into an uninhabitable wasteland. We know of a few special-level beings, but we struggle to track them. The most well-known special-level being is a being who goes by the name 'Odanis'. It often appears as a human female with white hair and red eyes, but don't be fooled by its appearance, it has influenced events throughout history with often negative results for humanity. Odanis was behind the incident at Krakatoa and is the reason Prometheus Inc. was founded. Thankfully, it hasn't been seen for a few decades."

This is when I started to get a little scared. Hearing about creatures that can destroy entire cities and countries by themselves was a terrifying thought, but hearing about how rare they were after, comforted me a little. I noted the higher-level threats in my head but felt like I could afford to look over them slightly, due to their low numbers. I probably won't encounter one for a long time, if at all, thankfully.

"Right, now you know the threat levels, how about we unlock that magical potential now." My interest was piqued.

"What do you mean unlock it?" I asked him.

"Well, humans aren't really a magical race as you may have guessed, those who have magical potential are unable to use it unless they have it unlocked. The easiest way to unlock it is direct exposure to other magical energy." Rom's right hand begins to glow blue.

"Is this gonna hurt?" I ask him nervously.

"Not at all, don't worry." Rom reassures me. After saying that, Rom walks up to me and places his glowing hand on my chest. Immediately I feel a surge of warmth around the area where Rom's hand is. Soon after, I feel energized, I can only compare the feeling to downing gallons of 5-hour energy. As quickly as the energy appeared, it vanishes and I feel normal again.

"That was...intense." I say, feeling a little out of breath from the whole experience.

"As expected, but no pain as I said, am I correct?" Rom asks me.

"Yep, no pain." I answer him.

"Good. Now let's start on the basics of using that magic of yours."