Chapter 36 | Exhilaration

Leon and Nyra took off sprinting at the signal. Nyra's reflexes were much faster, and she gained a lead at the start. He saw her dive headfirst into a crawl, positioning herself right under the first wire, her movements fluid and precise.

Leon soon followed, but misjudged the height, nicking the wire with his calf.

BZZZZZTT

"UGH!" He jerked his leg back as electricity coursed through him.

It was only a jolt that scared him more than electrocuted him, but he was now aware and made sure not to touch any other wires as he made it through the low crawl. When he got up to sprint to the wall, he could already see Nyra's back swinging up on top of the first wall.

Something in Leon had triggered. He didn't know what he was feeling, but he didn't like seeing Nyra's back pull further away. He sprinted and jumped as high as he could, grabbing the wall. 

His jump didn't have as much height as the other Fulgari recruits, but he was able to pull himself up with only a small bit of effort with the mana still coursing through his body.

The sensation was extraordinary. Where once his arms would have strained and trembled, they now pulled his weight with surprising ease. His muscles felt responsive and powerful, fueled by the mana flowing through them.

At the top of the first wall, he grabbed the rope, putting hand over hand and walking his feet up the wall. He focused on Nyra, who had turned around to look down at him. 

Although he could no longer see her eyes through the tinted visor, he imagined she was still smirking underneath it, taunting him to keep up.

His breaths were becoming labored, but he didn't notice. His mind was just on catching up to Nyra, the challenge driving him forward when physical limitations might have otherwise held him back.

When he noticed Nyra slowing at the balance beam, he didn’t pause after finishing the rope climb.

It's my chance to catch up.

As he stepped onto the balance beam, the machine at the end whirled to life. The first shot came, a dark projectile getting bigger as it closed in on him. He ducked, sliding underneath, not wanting to slow his momentum. 

Soon after, a second projectile came that he couldn't dodge the same way.

Time slowed.

He didn't know if it was the adrenaline or the CRI or maybe both, but when the time slowed, his mind seemed to be able to see and feel everything in extraordinary detail. 

The ball inching closer toward his shoulder, the sweat beading on his forehead, his muscles expanding and contracting as they pushed his body forward, and the mana circulating in his system, fueling the effort.

He thought he could hear Nyra's labored breath, the twitch of her muscles as she dodged a ball. The sun's heat as it slowly rose on the horizon, casting long shadows across the course. He focused back on the ball that was a few inches away from hitting his right shoulder. His body reacted as soon as he thought of it, responding with speed and precision that felt almost supernatural.

He shifted his weight onto his left leg and pushed off with his right, spinning just in time. The hard ball whizzed past his shoulder, missing by mere millimeters. In that moment, he felt something new. An intense sensation so unfamiliar it threw him off, even in the middle of danger.

He felt exhilarated.

Pure, raw exhilaration surged through him, unlike anything he experienced before. Not the desperate relief of escaping a debt collector, nor the grim satisfaction of securing enough food for the day. This was something else entirely; joy in motion, the thrill of mind and body moving as one.

Then—he felt a sharp pain at the back of his head. 

His legs, mid-spin, lost footing as another projectile he hadn't seen struck him. His balance failed and he began to fall.

Even as he fell, time seemed to still move slowly. He saw the beam he had just been on, having only finished a third of the way across. 

THUD

"AGGGGHHHH!" Time returned to its normal speed, and he felt a sharp, searing pain in his left shoulder where he had landed awkwardly. The impact had driven the joint out of its socket, sending waves of agony through his upper body.

An assistant instructor came to his side and stuck the soft rubber stick into his mouth.

"I'm setting your shoulder back. make sure you don't bite your tongue," the assistant said calmly, as though dislocated shoulders were as routine as breakfast. He grabbed Leon's shoulder and with a quick tug, reset the joint with an audible pop.

Leon felt instant relief as the bones realigned and the sharp pain immediately dulling to a deep ache. His body's enhanced healing was already beginning to work, nanites rushing to the injured area to accelerate repair.

"Go to the side of the obstacle course and wait with the rest," the assistant instructed as he packed the first aid kit and went to help another recruit who had fallen.

While his shoulder no longer had the sharp pain, it still felt sore and ached. Surprisingly though, he was able to already move it around with minimal discomfort as seconds pass.

Must be the nanites and mana, he thought, marveling at how quickly his body was recovering.

He clenched his fist twice and rotated his shoulders to see if there was anything wrong with it. Satisfied that the injury was already well on its way to healing, he walked to the side and sat on the ground among the other recruits who had finished or failed the course.

He glanced at Nyra, already halfway down the net on the next obstacle. The one he would have been on if he hadn’t failed at the beams. She moved with confidence and grace, clearly in her element. Unlike some of the other recruits who were competing for higher rank, she seemed to enjoy the challenge.

He scratched his head in frustration. Not because of the failure he had just faced, this wasn't the first time he had failed at something. It was the frustration of failing when he had felt that surge of exhilaration.

He didn't even remember if he had felt exhilarated about anything in the Lower Levels. Down there, all he felt was anxiety and the constant pressure of survival.

This—this feels different, he thought while staring at his fist, clenching and unclenching it. 

He could feel the mana still coursing through him, and it felt addictive. Not just the power, but the clarity and the sense of possibility it brought with it.

The rest of the morning went by quickly after his fall. After everyone completed a turn at the course, they were instructed to return to the dining facility to grab breakfast and shower.

Afterward, they had lectures on the Imperial Army's history, rules, and regulations. The content was dry, but Leon found himself able to absorb and retain the information with surprising ease. Another benefit of his enhanced cognitive processing.

At lunch, they returned to the dining hall where Leon consumed a large meal. His body needed the energy to heal faster and adapt.

"Do you want the rest?" Nyra asked, looking at Leon's lunch tray with the half-eaten grilled chicken leg.

"Go ahead," Leon pushed the plate toward her, which she promptly took.

GULP

She devoured the remaining chicken with enthusiastic efficiency, barely pausing between bites. Despite her intensity during training, her appetite didn’t seemed to have diminished.

"How can you have the appetite when we have the saturation chamber next?" Leon asked her.

"Don't look at me like that. You already ate a whole chicken. Besides, you're just afraid because you've never been to one," Nyra said, glaring at him.

"I have been in a mana chamber before. It hurt like hell, and scientists wanted to turn me into a lab rat," responded Leon, remembering the assessment chamber and the painful exposure to concentrated mana.

"That's not the same. The saturation chamber we should be going to just helps gather the mana easier and concentrate it inside. It doesn't force the mana inside you like the assessment does."

"You have been in one?" Leon asked, surprised by her confidence.

"No, they are only for Fulgaris with nanites, but I knew a friend who did," Nyra said while licking her fingers clean, not a trace of the meal left behind.

"Let's just go," grumbled Leon as they left to form up with their group at the mana saturation chamber.

The chamber was housed in a low, dome-shaped building with thick walls and no windows. As they approached, Leon noticed the subtle hum of powerful machinery. The air around the entrance rippled, like heat waves rising from hot pavement, but with a faint blue tinge.

His CRI seemed to respond to the proximity, a slight tingling sensation at the base of his skull, as though it recognized a kindred source of power. The nanites in his bloodstream stirred with anticipation, ready to receive whatever the chamber had to offer.

Warcenturion Victor Vauhn’s POV

The middle-aged Warcenturion was sitting in an office. The desk was empty aside from a terminal that was not projecting anything visible. Victor tapped on the desk, contemplating the report he had just received. His eyes glowed with blue as he looked through the files that were projected into his visual cortex by his CRI.

The recruits had just finished their time in the saturation chamber. He was looking at the files of the two he had sponsored to attend the Elite Track.

Was I wrong?

He remembered the disappointment he had felt in the morning when he saw the two outside the formation and knew it was a punishment–on the first day no less.

It was not the strong start he had hoped for from his personally selected candidates.

The Warcenturion had made a gamble, sponsoring an Ordari recruit, which was uncommon, and much more so sponsoring a Nullari. He had been given a special privilege of sponsoring without authorization given that he was part of the Obsidian Order, but that came at a cost. 

If the recruits he sponsored did not meet the standard of Elite Track at graduation, he would lose his privilege, and his pay would be docked until the cost of the CRI and nanites used during the operation were recovered.

The girl is meeting expectations in the course and the chamber, at least, he noted, reviewing Nyra's performance metrics.

He read through to the next file, and his eyebrow raised.

The boy is below average for Elite Track, but that's to be expected of someone formerly Nullari. His body still hasn't been changed by mana, and that will just be a matter of time. But—

The Warcenturion was reading the file that had the data log of the archives. It showed who had accessed certain files recently. He was focused on only one log:

Neural Attunement Protocol - Aether Flow
Last accessed by L. Ezra

Victor Vauhn frowned, his brow furrowing deep. Aether Flow was flagged to not be a method typically assigned to new recruits, especially not to those recently augmented. It was a protocol designed for veterans with years of experience managing their mana flow.

I don't know anyone who was recommended this. The body can't possibly handle the stress of the parameters the CRI and nanites output during combat.

Victor was even more confused about how a mana method like it was even created in the first place. Using his authorization, he accessed the backend to see what the parameters were. 

The theory was sound if the body had great potential to absorb raw mana, that's what had interested him in the boy in the first place, but naturally absorbing was different from this. This, in theory, overclocked the nanites as well. Both the nanites and body would have to be perfectly synced at all times during combat mode to sustain the load.

The dumping of excess mana during full bursts into the body as heat doesn't sound optimal at all, he thought, concerned about the potential consequences.

The Warcenturion wondered if the side effects were the same as how mana overload past normal mana sickness could cause the cells in the body to disintegrate. A gruesome and painful death that he had witnessed too many times on the battlefield.

He shook his head, throwing the thoughts to the back of his mind. He had a full training dravora to run, and he couldn't focus on just one recruit, no matter how unusual the circumstances. 

Still, he made a mental note to monitor Leon Ezra's progress more closely. The boy had shown enough potential to warrant his sponsorship, now he needed to ensure that potential didn't lead to destruction.

He closed the files with a thought, the blue glow fading from his eyes as he returned to the present. He would watch and wait. If necessary, intervene before permanent damage was done.