Chapter 75: Just Another Day at the Academy as Student
Next morning… or rather, it was almost afternoon when Ray sent back to the academy by Italian government after being arrested as suspect of terrorism activity within their sovereigns territory. He was released after his IS was checked and found out isn't the suspect since he didn't have any rocket or missiles weaponry similar to ICBM. However, he was dead drunk when they found him, along with a large pile of what later found out to be jars of alcohol drinks.
Ray was released without much problem as he didn't break any law except travel illegally but as an IS pilot and a world best one, he didn't give much problem and was only given a first warning.
(The world's best is only known by the government, not the people.)
When he arrived at the IS Academy, Chifuyu and Maya were there to invite him and even rolled out the red carpet to the counseling room for questioning by the teachers.
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"Sit down and flip to page 243, about the IS thruster system. You already caused half an hour delay for the class. So, better stop causing more trouble for us and wasting your classmates' precious time."
"Yes, teacher Orimura." Ray replied and walked groggily to his seat as he was still dealing with the hangover and headache. He is cursing at Tabane for forgetting about him and didn't wake him up at 6 am as promised before they decide to get wasted.
With a satisfied nod from Ray's obedience in class, Chifuyu handed back the podium to Maya to continue the class. Meanwhile Cecilia, Laura and Houki are secretly eyeing Ray occasionally through the class.
Although, he forgot to mention why Lancelot no longer accompanied him. So, before the duel, nobody except a few that know Ray's ability to pilot IS and he had an excuse to bring Lancelot. However, when it was revealed. The board member of the academy decided Ray is capable of taking care of himself and now Lancelot isn't permitted to accompany him in class but other than that he can follow Ray wherever he wants to.
When the bell rang, Ray immediately snapped out of his UI and moved out of the class and made his way to the cafeteria to get food. Lancelot is still in the mansion which means no one is making him lunch. He was starving after waking up and had no chance to eat until now.
Cecilia didn't even have a chance to tell Ray to wait as she made sandwiches to share with him. Houki also had the same thought too since she is carrying two bento boxes in her hand but by the time she pulled the lunchboxes out, Ray already vanished without a trace. At least Laura didn't need to worry about her meal. Though she had yet to learn the horror of Cecilia's cooking, she might had her chance today.
Meanwhile in the cafeteria, Ray is inhaling bowls of fatty broth of Tonkotsu Ramen to wash away his bad hangover that he endured during the class. Then he washed it all down with a few refreshing, chilled and tasty mango puddings. The other students look at him in shock that he is able to finish what he ordered. Though his appetite can be attributed to the food he ate which was made from Toriko world's ingredients. His cell is slowly adapting.
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When the lunch break ended, he received notification that informed all students of class 1-1 to meet in the arena for IS combat class. He skipped the locker room since he can change his outfit through the system inventory. He also didn't want to wear the provided combat uniform which somehow had an open navel area for no other reasonable reason but aesthetic according to Maya.
It's like wearing a business suit instead of a proper Kevlar vest to a gunfight because it looks cool. Ray instead chose a sleek black full bodysuit made with a thin layer of silk on the inside for comfort and outside layer is carbon fibre composite material that probably could stop a 9mm bullet point blank at most but better than whatever the academy prepared for him.
When he arrived at the arena, there were only a few classmates that arrived with the majority still changing. Maya and Chifuyu arrived soon after to bring in mass produced, training Uchigane and Revive for the students that didn't have IS. Both teachers are wearing jogging suits appropriate for the activities that are about to take place with only Chifuyu carrying a bamboo sword on her back.
Another few minutes passed and all students arrived and each of them that didn't have a personal IS picked between Uchigane or Revive before splitted. The one that chooses Uchigane will be trained by Chifuyu while those who picked Revive will be trained by Maya.
When it's Ray, Cecilia and Laura's turn, they have their own personal IS and Chifuyu decides to let Cecilia and Laura have a mock duel to assess their ability. Since both of their IS have almost similar combat systems which are long and mid range combat. Except Laura can also do close range with the help of AIC(Active Inertia Canceller) and six wired daggers.
"What about me, Chifuyu sensei?" Ray asked as he wasn't assigned any task.
(Sorry about the sensei and teacher thing. I'm not used to it and it feels weird that I sometimes forget to use sensei and used teacher. But meaning still same.)
"You can have self study. I doubt there is anything I can teach you other than fighting style. Even that is difficult as we both have different preferences of style." Chifuyu said after giving his face a look and returning her eyes to Cecilia and Laura.
Ray shrugged and walked to a corner of the arena and did as told by Chifuyu. It isn't hard as he can use his AI to simulate an opponent and environment, virtually for him to fight against. The opponent will appear in his HUD when he equipped his armor but others will only see him fighting against thin air. As for his opponent, she is none other than Roseweisse because he spends a lot of time practicing his martial arts with her or Xenovia. However, he only fought against Roseweisse with IS before because Xenovia's IS completed after Roseweisse, which was a few weeks before he enrolled into the academy.
After wearing his armor only, as his mecha still unresponsive, Ray equipped the Holy Moonlight Sword as his weapon to fight the virtually simulated Roseweisse. With his stance, calm like a river and adapting like its flow, he begins his clash against the simulated opponent.
Ray's technique is very hard to learn normally as it isn't even a proper technique but rather a technique he created for himself that adapted to his advantage with cybernetics, implant and AI assistant. He can predict the incoming attack with those help, to read the flow of the battle and adapt to it. He can decide multiple steps ahead of his opponent because his mind can relegate those former tasks to AI and cybernetics while his real mind is formulating his next moves.
Although, it's not an unparalleled technique either because he isn't looking into the future but instead just calculating the trajectory. This technique is weak against opponents that use a lot of feint and fluke. It is up to Ray to assess the strike if they are real one or just bait. Ray's AI can also help but it is still learning and far from perfect yet to even achieve 5% accuracy in differentiating between fake and real strike at this moment.
Meanwhile Chifuyu is looking at Ray with raised eyebrows. It's not uncommon to train using simulation but those are way used by beginners because it takes a lot of computation power to stimulate an opponent with IS because of how complex the machine was. There was also the problem of AI not advancing enough that ended up making the simulated opponent very predictable and easy to defeat as they can only follow set patterns instead of making new fighting patterns on the go.
When Ray stopped his simulated duel, Chifuyu went and asked him what he was fighting against, Ray casually replied it's a simulated opponent based of Roseweisse. Chifuyu was shocked that there is someone else even better than her in IS piloting so she asked Ray to show her the duel which Ray agreed and hooked up his HUD visuals to a tablet and proceeded with another round of duel. Maya and the other students flocked Chifuyu to get a glimpse at the duel and to their shock, Roseweisse fought like someone raised and bred to be a warrior. Which isn't wrong considering Roseweisse is indeed a Valkyrie strong enough to qualify as Odin's secretary/bodyguard.
A super high pace combat that even a slight carelessness can warrant a death which is what they witness on the screen that Chifuyu is holding. The simulated Roseweisse unlike Ray, is ferocious like a lion but as keen as an eagle with each strike that always aimed at Ray's gaps. Meanwhile Ray flowed like water, unfazed by the ferocious attacks, he dodge and evade with little movement between each attack and maintained a close distance to his opponent to sink his claw on his opponent's body. The longer the battle drag, the more he adapted to his opponent and the higher the difficulty spiked to compensate for what he adapted to.
Like a dance of death they watch. This is no longer a duel of IS where the duelists have time to strategize and slowly chip away at their opponent's defence and wait for a moment of decisive strike of victory. The normal IS duel is as such because of the energy factor. Meanwhile the two didn't care about the matter of energy probably because it's a simulation but it's undeniable the way they fight is like two juggernaut duking out on each other without care about anything else.
Everyone who watched had their breath hitched when Ray accidentally slipped his focus because he reached his limit of skill. He was stabbed by a lance when the difficulty suddenly spiked again and simulated Roseweisse suddenly undergoing a Shift on her IS that opened up a metallic wings of feathers and barraged him with those feathers to distract his sight. He proceeded to block the feathers from his head using the flat side of the Holy Moonlight Greatsword but blocked his sight of Roseweisse and a lance stabbed into his gut and nailed him down to the ground as the expressionlessly simulated Roseweisse stared at him and the environment collapsed into data to signified the end of the duel.
It might be a simulation but he still feels the pain and it hurts like hell to get nailed to the ground by a lance on the gut. Ray then opened his armor's helmet and sighed as he lost at the same level of difficulty again. Which means he is stagnating and needs to improve his method again.
"So, how is it?" Ray asked cluelessly at the speechless crowd.
"Is this what you practiced against, normally?" Chifuyu asked with her expression returned to normal immediately.
"Not really. I usually practice with her face to face instead of using a simulation. That way is more difficult because she is more unpredictable with the array of skills and techniques she has." Ray replied and only a few like Chifuyu, Maya, Cecilia, Laura and Houki understand who he is mentioning. The rest were confused but didn't speak up as Chifuyu is still talking to Ray.
"Is she normally fighting at that level?" Chifuyu asked again but there was a hidden dangerous glint in her eyes.
"No, not really. She usually holds back a lot on me unless we both decide to go all out to measure my progress. Other than that, she usually will not go that far to stab me in the gut." Ray replied while reminiscing about the time he spent with Roseweisse to train him into a better fighter.
"Usually will not?! Does that mean she mortally injured you before?" Chifuyu noticed the way Ray explained that meant he had suffered such injuries before.
"I don't see why it matters. It's neither fatal nor causes permanent disability. That isn't as bad as having a limb ripped off at le-" Ray shrugged and then remembered when his limbs were chewed off by a dragon clone before and that is way worse than mere stab in the gut or any stab wound. But he forgot that part he was not supposed to tell anyone and he slipped.
When Ray looked at Chifuyu's expression, he could already see shadow casted over her eyes and her body shaking from anger. Her iron grip on the tablet managed to crack the screen.
"She did what!" Chifuyu's anger immediately boiled over that Maya was hyperventilating and calming Chifuyu down when she is the one needed to calm down.
"She managed to rip my arm in the simulated duel." Ray quickly lied and covered up the slip he caused.
"How can a simulated duel hurt you?" Chifuyu asked confusedly since normally, a simulated duel is used precisely to avoid injury while training a pilot. They are basically piloting IS in VR for the others unlike Ray.
Ray's AI can stimulate his brain signals to trigger certain pain receptors via his implant to add realism to the simulated duel. He isn't injured but he feels the pain, basically.
His reply to Chifuyu is pointing at the back of his head. He explained he wanted realism and used 'them' to make the duel feel real to get the full benefit of the duel. After his explanation, Chifuyu's face softened immediately and nodded as she accepted his answer.
"I see… but you will let Maya sensei give you a thorough examination after this to check if there are any side effects." Chifuyu regained her stern persona after her character broked moment ago. She ordered Ray to get checked by Maya to see if the artificial pain stimulation had any side effects to his body.
"Okay, Chifuyu sensei." Ray accepted without complaint and was dragged away by the suspiciously excited Maya as Chifuyu stayed back to conclude the class session.
While being dragged, Ray heard Cecilia, Houki and Laura ask permission to follow Ray but was denied by Chifuyu because they needed to be on time for the next class.
"Excuse me, Maya sensei. But why are you blushing?" Ray looks deadpanned at Maya hiding her face from Ray while pulling him toward the infirmary.
"W-what! No, I don't. I'm just excited.. Yes! I'm excited to finally get to study a male patient. That's all." Maya said with a faked excited tone as she walked faster.
"Should I remind Maya sensei that reaching your claws on your students can get you arrested? I am still 16 years old after all and sensei is 20." Ray said with a hidden chuckle as Maya immediately stiffened.
Ray looked at her, anticipated she would become flustered or panicked but she didn't and instead smiled brightly while looking at Ray with her eyes narrowed to slit.
"Ah, Ray probably didn't know but the age of consent was lowered to 16 in the recent year." Maya said while her grip on Ray's hand became a death grip that wouldn't loosen.
"Wait, Maya sensei. I was joking just now. Help! Help! I need an adult!"
"Ara, aren't I an adult?" Maya said playfully. "Now, let's not let Chifuyu sensei wait for us too long. We can get started with your prostate exam." And Ray was dragged into the infirmary room which the door immediately shut closed and locked.
The myth said, even after years passed. The anguished wail of a male student and banging on the infirmary door can still be heard and became the eight urban legends of the academy.
(Toshi Densetsu 😏)
Though in actuality Ray was thoroughly educated to not tease the woman named Maya Yamada. Then Maya gave him a proper full body check that was made possible with futuristic technology that can also examine his internal body without need of specialised facility and machinery. All Maya needs is some kind of scanner-like device and a few sensor electrodes. After that, he returned to the classroom and resumed his routine as usual.
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