Chapter 1519 (2/2)

First, tomorrow was the first scrimmage battle between Drill Sergeants. To his own surprise, Randidly found that… despite the current plan to exhaust the recruits before the match and make them lose, he felt an impulse to change his strategy. His memories of the few other Drill Sergeants that he had met meant… Randidly really didn’t want to lose.

In addition, there was the impending meeting with Commandant Wick… who would no doubt have opinions on the outcome of the skirmish.

But Randidly shook his head decisively as he put another piece of roast hog into his mouth. The whole point of the Darkstar Coin demonstration and this first skirmish was to light a fire in the hearts of the recruits. Hopefully, this display would spark some enthusiasm toward physical training. It wasn’t enough just to follow the program. They needed to push themselves.

Of course, Randidly didn’t think they would approach his Nether Brawn; he could easily overpower a Nether Gatekeeper at this point. He had left the System limit far behind, making him likely to be one of the most physically powerful individuals in the Nexus. And Randidly wasn’t going to force the recruits to take his Path to break through the System limit. But getting them closer would help them survive. And make it vastly easier to handle a Nether Gatekeeper.

For now, Randidly could only wait to see whether the Darkstar Coin would have the desired effect. Heiffal would observe the recruits over the next several hours and report back whether there was any noticeable change.

In the meantime, Randidly wondered if he should prepare anything for Commandant Wick’s visit. Either as an extra indication of his competency or as a way to distract Commandant Wick from his true capabilities. Specifically, he wondered if he should think of a scapegoat for the Engravings that Neveah created. He somehow doubted Commandant Wick wouldn’t have questions regarding this individual. In that regard, Randidly sent a question to Lady Iellaya, asking for her advice.

The fact that Commandant Wick had requested the meeting rather informally meant that Randidly felt less of an impetus to do either. But Randidly knew himself well enough to know that this was partly his own desire to continue his training, rather than preparing for this social interaction. Shaking his head at his own bad habits, Randidly walked to his window and looked out over the training area.

A storm was brewing to the East, driven partly by Randidly continuing to apply the gas to growth in the recruits' gardens but also in response to the recruits' emotions after the earlier demonstration. Their introspection and gloom became ambient with the advent of their understanding of emotions as images, even if they hadn’t quite realized it. So the heavy cloud cover was a partial reflection of their current mood.

Which was fine; if they were content after watching Randidly crush five Overseers that had been repeatedly thrashing them for the past week, he would be concerned for their futures as soldiers.

Randidly let his eyes unfocus as he looked out at the clouds and instead peered toward the flows of Nether that had become part of the fabric of the training area. The dark energy glided from individual to individual right now with a feather-light touch, passing so peacefully through them that none seemed to notice it running through them. Randidly wondered whether they understood exactly how much the fabric of their physical body was being altered by hosting, even if briefly, Nether.

Although the truth is, I don’t really understand the long term effects either…

Congratulations! Your Skill Nether Sensation (L) has grown to Level 322!

What was interesting about the current flow was that it wasn’t returning to Randidly in the same cycle as it had for the past several hours. He could see significance building below as the Nether spun through everyone and then back on itself, but it didn’t yet return to Randidly. The more Randidly observed this, the more he realized that this was a characteristic of Nether, rather than some defect of the system he had created.

The Nether below was building to something within the hearts of the recruits and returning to Randidly would somehow spoil it. Or perhaps it was better to say if he harvested it too early, it wouldn’t be ripe. So the Nether had shifted organically, becoming something akin to an echo chamber for whatever significance the recruits would eventually subscribe to the event they had just witnessed.

Randidly rubbed his chin. If I make a Nether Class, the ability to organically change would need to be a part of it. Having a rigid structure like a Class wouldn’t work; in fact, perhaps the whole concept of Levels wouldn’t quite capture the growth of Nether…

Before Randidly could consider that concept too deeply, he received a reply from Lady Iellaya: Do what you think is best. But know that Commandant Wick is famously unimpressed with demonstrations and even more famously critical of a subordinate that doesn’t understand the importance of impressing his superiors.

Randidly read that message several times. It didn’t seem to become any more helpful on repeated perusals. Basically, Commandant Wick was the ‘damned if you do, damned if you don’t’ type. Which left Randidly shaking his head once more and walking back to the smoked meat on the table.

As he popped another piece into his mouth, he raised his head and peered almost directly upward into the sky. Revelation energy flared to life around his eyes as he peered as far as his insight would allow into the future. For the first minute, he peered forward at what he should prepare for Commandant Wick, but after that, he shifted his attention. Because while tomorrow was the Drill Sergeant Skirmish and then the visit from Commandant Wick, the day after that was the day that Vualla would be deployed to the Fifth Cohort.

Congratulations! Your Skill Revelation of the Atramentous Threshold (T) has grown to Level 333!

Which meant that soon he could attempt to safely contact Vualla again, but also that she would be exposed to danger. Randidly pressed his lips together. But then a thought occurred to him.

He reached into his Alpha Cosmos and contacted his hitherto idle Riders. He had vague plans on making them help with the training, but he already had enough assistance with that, due to Heiffal’s soldiers. Meanwhile…

Perhaps Vualla could make use of them. They had some experience fighting the weaker Nether Beasts, after all.