Chapter 121: Experience Gained

"This was extremely exhausting...I can’t believe we did this badly" Charlotte mutters as she sits down on the floor, all the other Zenith students also making small complaints except Ashlyn.

They all tested their weapons in the simulator, and it’s nowhere near as easy as it seems, for Tanya, her body became extremely hot and she couldn’t stop sweating and getting tired, because her weapon did indeed increase the number of times she fired heat beams and their power, but that also means the air around her becomes much hotter on a frequent basis.

For Eirwen, the amount of effort she has to put into creating a single ice grenade is relatively large, and throughout the entire simulation she only managed to make two hundred of them before nearly passing out, which in terms of total area of effect doesn’t even properly cover a single block, while her power in general could cover an entire city without requiring much effort from her.

As for Edith, the smell of the chemicals made her nauseous and dizzy, and Rouge’s weapon threw her far away with a single use, knocking her unconscious when she hit her head against a wall, while Charlotte had to create so many fissures in space for her weapon to be useful that in the end she hit her own back dozens of times after losing track of the trajectory of the shots passing behind her.

None of them used their weapons well, because they really do enhance certain things, but they require experience that they don’t have, and if they had been used outside the simulator, most of them would have been injured.

’Did the teacher know we wouldn’t be able to use these weapons properly, and that’s why she sent us to the simulator?’ Charlotte wonders as Tanya thinks something similar.

"Did you at least learn anything useful from this? I have to say I learned a few useful things!" Charlotte asks, grabbing a bottle of water and dumping it over her own body, she is practically dying from the heat because Tanya made the simulator’s air completely hot.

"I learned that I’ll need to prepare the grenades well before a fight, or prepare a minimum number of them...haa...I’m so tired...the simulator’s exhaustion is still lingering" Eirwen mutters as she lies down on the floor, completely out of strength.

"I learned not to open a bunch of chemical bottles at once...the smell is nauseating, and my eyes were burning in the simulator" Edith puts a hand over her mouth, trying not to vomit, the smells still fresh in her mind.

"...S-Someone s-should carry Rouge to the infirmary, e-even if it’s just the simulator she doesn’t look so good, i-it must have hurt a lot when she hit her head" Ashlyn mutters as she looks at Rouge lying on the floor, breathing somewhat heavily, Charlotte looks at Ashlyn, the simulator has already provided her with the assembled rifle.

Ashlyn’s only problem was the weapon’s recoil hitting her in the eye, which is easy to fix, she just needs to adjust the position better next time and hold it more firmly.

"You’re so lucky!!! Your weapon barely has any drawbacks!! You should be the one to carry Rouge to the infirmary" Tanya says, pointing at Ashlyn, Tanya was one of the ones who suffered the most, and in real combat she could die.

Although her problem is also easy to fix, she only needs to slightly reduce how many heat shots she generates, and avoid standing in the same place where the hot air is or staying near where plasma forms, something she instinctively realized.

"..." Despite everything, none of them complain about the weapons themselves, Eirwen’s ice grenades generated instant zones that reached 90° and 110° degrees Celsius below zero, with a speed that allows her to immediately start launching good attacks.

Tanya’s heat rays became at least 5 times stronger, and although she didn’t test the radiation because she doesn’t use the variants of her power well, she still had a considerable increase in destructive power.

Rouge’s knife also proved to be powerful, even though it knocked her out of combat after a single use because she underestimated just how powerful the recoil of a pressurized air cannon was.

The ones who showed the least improvement were Edith, who got sick, but in her case it was only because of the smell of the chemicals and not because the equipment was bad, and Ashlyn, who doesn’t know how to properly use a weapon and only managed to fire a few shots and didn’t know how to reload the rifle.

"Charlotte, what did you think of your weapon? You hit yourself way too many times with it..." Eirwen asks Charlotte, thinking that perhaps she feels bad about her weapon not being "as good" as the others, so she prepares herself to comfort her if she complains.

"I actually liked it, it’s impressive, it’s just difficult to know how a shot will pass behind my back, the sensor only draws lines toward wherever I’m looking, so I have to learn to memorize where each line was traced so I know where the shots pass behind me" Charlotte really did like it, she has one of the most efficient weapons in direct combat compared to the others, and she only hurt herself because of her lack of experience.

"And Eirwen, did you like yours? It looks amazing" Charlotte asks Eirwen, thinking about the incredible applications of the ice grenades.

"Yeah, it’s really strong! I think you could even kill monsters instantly just by throwing the grenades at them, it looks like the limit is 120° degrees Celsius below zero before the capsule stops working" They begin talking about the training, trying to figure out how they’ll work as a team considering each of their new weapons, since they’ll need to be careful not to hurt one another.

...

...

...

"Nadir, what a surprise, you’re calling me" I say with a small smile as I see Nadir in his commander’s uniform, it looks like he’s going to lead an important mission.

’He looks really handsome in that white uniform...though I liked the black one too’

"I’m calling because the island is going to pass over a ruined city, so we’re going to stop there, it’s a large city, 3,000 soldiers will be going down to collect resources, so I won’t be able to contact you"

"I thought it would be a good idea to say goodbye to my girlfriend, after all, it might take a while, and I won’t even be able to send you messages" He uses a tone that makes me give him a sarcastic smile.

"...Girlfriend...we’re not dating, idiot..."

"Hahaha, sure, then what are we, Zenith? You and I confessed to each other, I love you, you love me, we both love each other, we both made that clear, so how about giving this relationship a name?" He has an idiotically happy smile on his face as if he had won something.

"Do we really need to give this a name? Don’t you like how things are?" I ask him somewhat seriously, he’s the one who likes stable things the most and doesn’t really like changes, so why change what works right now?

"I do like how things are, obviously, but do you? Don’t you want something more? Wouldn’t it be better to make it official? I’d do anything for you, but if you don’t want to, we can leave things as they are"

"..."

"As a commander, you can’t date until you retire...you know that, Nadir..."

"Those are just stupid rules, Zenith, there are commanders who are married! And that rule is only between members of the same team, when we were both commanders, we really couldn’t date, but did you forget that you’re out of the military? Now we can officially and legally date" He’s right.

"Or maybe you’re simply afraid of the idea of making something official and having our relationship change? Zenith, dating is just a label, you and I already act almost like a married couple, nothing is going to change just because we gave a name to what we have"

"Haa...fine! We’re dating then, but since you want to make this official, when you get back from this damn mission, bring me lots of boxes of lollipops, I ran out of mine and I was already going to buy some more!"

"...Your addiction hasn’t changed..." He shrugs while shaking his head negatively.

"Look who’s talking, so that awful dark chocolate you like isn’t an addiction too?"

"Hahaha, you got me, all right, I’ll come with a bouquet made entirely of lollipops stacked together with ribbon tying them in place, and 5 really big boxes of lollipops so you’ll have enough for a long time"

"...That sounds good, I hope you come back to fulfill that promise, and don’t go die on this mission, if you die on a mission I’ll be really mad at you, if you’re going to die, it has to be in a situation where both of us are going to die doing something impossible!"

"Don’t worry about that, I don’t plan on dying, now I’ll have to hang up, this is the maximum amount of time they gave me unfortunately, I can’t delay the mission...even if I wanted to keep talking to you, there are still responsibilities, after all, one minute of delay could cost someone’s life"

"Have a great day, Zenith, I’ll message you as soon as I can, and I’ll call you as soon as I get back to Aurora Island, I’ll also see if I can come visit you" He gives me a smile before hanging up.

"..."

"[You seem very happy, Zenith]"

"Don’t get on my nerves, Nexus, I didn’t ask you anything"

"[I merely decided, of my own accord, to congratulate you on taking another step in your relationship, you’ve both always had this tension between you ever since you were both commanders, isn’t it nice to finally have something concrete?]"

"Tsk...you talk too much, Nexus, shut up..."

"[As you wish]" Nexus’s tone sounds as though there’s something more behind what I feel.

’Stupid robot...’