Chapter 33: Test of Mind - Prelude

'There are so much more to the art of movement than swinging the clubs like a nut head...'

Right after selecting the club martial arts practice library, the projector then scans and take in the body figures of Rydel's entire body. Then a three dimensional replica of him would be projected onto the gym floor, demonstrating the techniques and the sequence required. There are a few options afterwards regarding how Rydel wants to proceed with it, he could either learn it through the conventional look and copy way, or having the replica being projected onto his body, and him trying to match every single movement of it.

Rydel chose the second option, and it is certainly easier than trying to figure out which hand is supposed to be in front at which time as he spins around and redirects the momentum of the clubs through shortening the levers and changing the torso angle at critical times. Initially, he would always be out of sync with the projection, but after a day or two, he has finally started to match it stride for stride and strike for strike, for at least the rudimentary movements.

Then, some dummies are brought out for practice, and they were specially pinned down at the foundation so Rydel's massive swings will not hit the dummy right out of the gym. Though as he got rapidly better and better thanks to the rapid learning process, he can visibly see cracks forming on the gym floor as each knock leaves a significant dent on the surface of the Dummy.

The basic strikes are simple, and there aren't many variations to it. It took only until the end of the first day for Rydel to apply some proper power, and the end of the third day for him to incorporate some of the combination attacks, absolutely pounding away at the dummies. Rydel didn't say this to anybody, but the loud bang when the club makes contact with the dummy gave him a sense of strange satisfaction, as if he is letting out some steam he didn't even know he had hidden within him.

By day five, he was able to master down some of the basic practice routines, though unusable in actual combat, a routine allows him to keep on honing in the key critical skills he will need when it comes to actual combat as well as retaining his fine movement and body control. Clubs may not be the most popular weapon of the past, and certainly not one elegant enough for the performance stage, with enhanced physicality and strength, Rydel is able to output a ridiculous amount of power with his strikes. If he could punch a hole in multiple layers of metal with his bare left fist, then imagine what he could do with a solid club swinging at blinding deadly speeds.

While Rydel is pounding away at the dummies and making as much noise as he could, Valerie was not being so subtle either.

The practice whips was manufactured only minutes after she selected the weapon on the system, and the very first thing she did was accidentally whip herself in the arms. Despite the two levels of reinforcement she had gone through, the casual swing of the whip with her improved strength outputted so much power that it broke through the layer of protection of the physiological enhancement, and almost tore through that from the nanotechnology enhancements too. Thankfully the drones gathered just in time and minimised the damage to her arm, but the pain is still almost crippling, for at least a moment.

The shear amount of damage shocked her, but the pain only serves to excite her even more. Imagine what kind of power she would be able to deal out once she has mastered the skill and are able to truly unleash the potential of the whips! The next few days, she simply started utilizing her body in each swing and attack, first honing in the motion and timing of each swing and whip, and then started increasing the power and speed of movement.

After that, the angles of attack and swing started varying, and she has already started practicing holding a concentrated shield on her off hand. Concentrated shields works exactly the same way as a personal shield generator, but it is contained within a concentrated area and is impossible to short out by charged Aquarian blades given the closed nature of the shields. It functions as a physical shield, without the weight, though weight wouldn't be an issue for her regardless.

After three days, she was able to string together multiple whips in the same place extremely quickly, and the shock waves generated by the tail of the whip travelling at supersonic speed has gotten so loud that Rydel had resorted to wearing ear plugs whenever they are training together.

Lots of improvements were made by both of them by the time Gold returned after five days.

He seemed slightly tired, though still willing to oversee the training for the two. After seeing the demonstrations as shown by the two, he gave them the mark of approval.

'You are making very good progress.' Gold said, 'now, you could started training with some combat practice droids, and start using your skills in more real time fighting scenarios. While you are doing that, let me teach you some of the other skills for using the nanotechnology enhancements.'

Then, he stood and raised an arm forward, closed his eyes and concentrated. Rydel and Valerie watched closely at the tip of his arm, and saw waves of movement underneath the surface of the skin before it slows down and hardened.

'This is the drone shielding technique.' He explained, 'I haven't been one to practice enough on this since I spent most of my time working on my swordsmanship, but you can command the drones to from around certain areas of your body and make it stronger. For some, this comes naturally, but it can take immense concentration and will, and might not be the most useful in actual combat situations.'

Valerie looked down at her arm, and looked at the new scar she gave herself on day one.

Gold did offer to be the sparring partners for the two of them back then, but neither Rydel and Valerie took him up on the offer. There are still so much room for them to improve despite the rapid progress both of them has been making, plus the drone shielding technique that could come in extremely handy, regardless of what Gold's opinion of it is.

For the next two weeks, Rydel and Valerie grind their days away training with combat droids. They can set the difficulty of the combat practice droids by how strong, durable and skillful they are with their weapons, and in this case both of them selected blades as the droid's primary weapon, and the first few fights went to Rydel and Valerie without any hiccup. As the mastery level of the combat droid increases, it became increasingly harder and harder to pierce through the droid's defense and land a successful devastating hit.

Most of the fights are finished extremely quickly, either Rydel overpowers the droid's defense and shatters it in one swing, or the droid pierced through Rydel defense and poked him hard in the gut with the practice blade.

With more time and practice, Rydel has finally understood why the footwork as shown in the tutorial are as they are, and the first time he used it to evade a direct charge and piercing attack from the droid by spinning around him, Rydel got so excited that he mistimed the counter attack and was immediately cut down after missing the crucial opportunity.

The rapid recovery boost coming from the enhancements is arguably the best feature given. With little physical fatigue being built up, Rydel and Valerie could train as often and as hard as they wished, with mental fatigue and boredom being the only limiting factor holding them from training none stop. This is one of the key reasons why performance enhancing drugs were such a popular choice by elite athletes in the modern era, not just for their impact on maximum power output or maximum sustained endurance output, but also for the improved recovery benefits, allowing them to do exactly what Rydel and Valerie are doing now, training harder and more often.

Despite having the recovery process and learning process made easier for them, hours still needed to be put in, and mistakes still needed to be made. The enhancements may mean you can learn movements a bit quicker, at the end of the day the person himself/herself still has to be the one making all the decisions and controlling all his/her body in combat. And it's the brain that Rydel and Valerie are training throughout all of the long grueling training days.

Valerie's whip turns out to work a wonder against blades, as she will be able to manipulate the location and trajectory of the hit as she pleases, speeding up or delaying the timing of the attack and when it lands. The extended reach made it extremely hard for the combat droid to even get close to her. Though she didn't slack off on her normal short dual wielding blades practice also, and could use that when needed in close quarter combat.

And after three whole weeks of training, eating and sleeping, they have finally overcame the effects of the relearning process and started improving at a rapid rate, closing in to Gold's level an inch at a time. And after a long wait, Valerie finally brought up the possibility of challenging Gold for a quick practice sparring match.

'Well, I think I will pass haha...' To her surprise, Gold refused the challenge, as he looked over at the wrecked combat droids piled up at the corner of the gym floor, 'I doubt my suits and armor could handle the damage from the whip itself, may I suggest trying to fight against two droids at the same time for better practice option?'

With that suggestion, Rydel and Valerie's eyes lit up with excitement, but fighting one against two in melee combat turned out to be exceedingly difficult, as Rydel was forced to constantly 'keep his distance', which is a glorified version of constantly running away, and Valerie not being too different.

'You know, I think it is time we started preparing for the Test of Mind now.' Valerie said after finishing yet another hard day of practice, 'there is a point of diminishing returns for practicing against combat droids, and I think it's probably wise to take a little time away from it.'

'I agree.' Rydel said, finally sick of being stuck inside the gym floor for eighteen hours at a time. And with that, they sent in a request for the Test of Mind, and it seemed like the Absolute Academy has already been paying special attention to their activities, and the approval came through rather quickly and a time and place was selected.

A brief will be conducted through the use of a AI program, so Rydel and Valerie simply chose a time and got together to watch it.

'My room is definitely better than yours, so come to apartment block SL before dinner tonight!' Right after their training session is finished the day they got the reply from the headmaster, they locked in a time to get the brief over with, and Valerie had finally attacked Rydel's bed room despite having been there for the nights numerous times.

'Oh come on, it's pretty decent for a free room.' Rydel protested as he had not been to the other end at all since they have gotten together.

After taking a shower and making sure that his hygiene is up to Valerie's high standards, Rydel had finally left his very own basic apartment block, which he has been spending less and less time in, towards her apartment block up the hill.

There had never been any reason for Rydel to come this far, so this is an entirely new experience for him. The entire apartment complex is built on a slight hill, and it became increasingly easy to tell whether the buildings they are currently living in is built first, as the newer buildings looked considerably nicer on the outside, and through the windows, Rydel could get a glimpse into the spacious living rooms for the en suite studios. But according to the address itself, Rydel still is no where near Valerie's apartment.

After another ten minutes of strolling, he had finally reached the blocks that starts with S, and found Valerie's 'Apartment'. Even though he should have known better by now, having been to Valerie's apartment back on Wolfana a few times, Rydel still wasn't expecting the extravagant luxury house that stood proudly near the top of the hill and overlooking the entire academy, with an added bonus of a daily viewing of the Academy Sun set.

The front gate slid open as a muffled voice came through the speaker, but it kind of sounded something like, 'come in, you peasant.'

Then, the door opened, and Valerie wearing some casual clothing gestured for Rydel to come in, and Rydel obediently took off his shoes without her saying anything. Surprisingly, the interior house is decorated remarkably similar to that of the apartment of Wolfana, and Rydel suspected that this might have been something the Black Wolf left behind for his girls. Speaking of the girls, the TV within the living room is playing, and a girl with black hair is sitting on the couch watching TV.

She turned around, saw Rydel and frowned at him. Rydel returned with the wave of a hand and a smile that was cut short.

'Don't mind my sister.' Valerie rolled her eyes as she shuts the door, 'I printed some food, but before that, let's get the brief done with.'

'You know what, this place is really really nice.' As Valerie lead Rydel towards a room separated by glass with a dining table in the middle and turned on the sound-blocking shields, Rydel has already looked all around the house and took in the luxury with his eyes as much as he can, 'how come I never got invited here before?'

'Well...' Valerie pretended to be busy with her hands setting up the projector by pressing a single button on it, 'your place is closer to the academy facilities.'

'What?'

'This video contains the briefing for the Test of Mind, please listen carefully.' The mechanical unnaturally calm voice of a female artificial intelligence cut Rydel short, 'The Test of Mind is designed to assess your suitability to with hold and control an immense amount of power, both on a mental control and fine tuning level, and on a philosophical level, as in whether your belief system coexists with what the Absolute Being's mission is. You will be able to progress onto the levels where artifacts of immense power, or manufactured copies of them, will be given to you, and you will be performing missions as given by the organization for our ultimate goal. Failing this part will only prevent you from reaching the levels of the artifacts, and the nanotechnology enhancements will not be taken away from you.'

'Rold, please head towards this given room at the specific time printed below.'

Rydel noted down the time, and it's just one of the rooms in the fifth floor of the academy main building. His Test of Mind will come tomorrow.

'Valerie, please head towards this given room at the specific time printed below.'

Valerie also did the same, and her room is on the same floor, though the arranged time and location differs for the two by three hours.

There is no further information given, and Rydel and Valerie simply sat in the quiet dining room and thought about the whole thing.

'You know what...' Rydel thought to himself as a smile creeps up his face, this is exactly one of the reasons that he is here. It is to find out what exactly the organization plans on doing, and it appeared to all will be revealed tomorrow. For the first time in the tests, he actually looked forward to it, 'this is getting really exciting.....'

'What?' Then, Rydel looked up, and Valerie is completely frozen, with lines of nervous sweat forming along the crease in her forehead and dripping down along her cheeks.

'A philosophy level? What kind of shit is that!' Valerie yelled, 'how am I supposed to pass this test when all I wanted is to beat Gold and get the artifact back!'

Then, the two paused for a good moment and had a long look at each other.

'Um, why couldn't you just challenge Gold?' Rydel asked the obvious question, if getting the nanotechnology enhancement is all Valerie needed to close the gaps in combat power between Gold and herself, then would there be any point for her to continue on with the test?

'It doesn't work like that anymore.' Valerie shook her head, 'Gold challenged father openly, and it is outside of the normal procedures. Father, being the owner of the artifact, could make his own rules, and he decided to use this fight for his own pride and political influence... The Academy made sure to never reveal the actual locations of the artifact users unless it's part of the Test of Brawl.'

'Trust me, I asked.'

'I suppose you just have to make a point that you will stay in the Grey Wolf's region?' Rydel tried to think of a solution out of this, since a simple revenge for motivation might not be enough for whoever's running the Test of Mind to let her go. There has to be a sort of benefit for letting the pair progress on from this point.

'I...I will figure something to say later.' Valerie bit her lips as many thoughts came and went in her mind, none of them useful enough to pass what felt like an entrance interview for being an artifact bearer.

Then, the pair simply had a slightly awkward dinner with Valerie's sister also sitting at the table and being completely oblivious to Rydel and Valerie's chit chats. After the food, Rydel then left, knowing that Valerie will have lots of thinking to do for the night.

Going forward fifteen hours in time, and Rydel found himself standing outside the door of the designated room for the Test of Mind. The room behind him was one of the computing rooms from what he can recall, with excellent air conditioning and dark black out curtains that prevents anything from going in or out of the room. There is no a single hint of sound in the room, and when the time is up, the automatic doors slid open, and a cold jet of air poured out.

The light was on all that time in there, and instead of lines of projectors, separated work spaces and a few deep diving pod at the back, there is only a chair and a desk being positioned in the middle of the room. Rydel certainly isn't expecting that.

The front doors slid shut the moment Rydel cleared it, and the light buzzing sound of a projector being switched on filled the chilly room. Rydel turned, and saw the projection of a male on the other side of the table, his faced obscured by a shadow. Despite not being able to see his facial features, Rydel could tell that he is looking right at him.

'Please, take a seat.' The man gestured towards the empty seat across the table, 'you have come a long way, haven't you, Rydel?'