Chapter 39: Chapter 38: Family

Knowledge: Expert Biology (Claim?)

 

‘Claim…’

Being swallowed by darkness a last time, Aven woke up a few hours later with a very mild headache, but apart from that, he was long over needing medical assistance after claiming an expert knowledge.

Getting up from his bed, he dressed in a fresh set of Eland military uniform then made his way to the fridge to drink a few refreshing sips of cold water, then purely and simply exited his quarters.

“Hu… I think this project will be a bit more fun than expected,” his emotionless morning face lit up considerably the more all the new knowledge he had integrated collided with each other.

Once he reached his design room, he first turned on the music with a few shortcuts and was welcomed by electronic music his past self had found to his liking, “Not a bad way to wake up.”

Approaching the central table, he swiftly opened the cardboard folder containing all the insights on his new projects he had gathered the day prior, then started amending most of them.

“Now the question is… Should I make a version dedicated exclusively for martial supers? Going for a universal version sounds like doing nothing if I’m to be honest,” making an assumption from what his new knowledge was telling him, more specifically his energy applications, special operations, and close quarters combat knowledge, Aven seriously considered his options.

Martial supers were unique in that their fighting style was exclusively restricted to the short-range due to… Obvious limitations inherent to their energy system wide but ultimately narrow applications. And where the supers of other systems also had options to fight in short-range, the majority still preferred medium to long-range.

“Should I design exclusively for supers this time too? All the solutions I need to use to make the most cutting-edge full body armor reside in more investment in the end…” Musing on this fundamental project-defining choice, he started weighing the pros and cons.

And the way he chose to weigh the pros and cons was by directly moving on to designing all the solutions he wanted to incorporate into every version.

For the full body armor version designed for martial supers, he put the most expensive and critical life-saving new generation nanomaterials, chemical layers that would need to be reapplied after only a few days, and complex ergonomic and free joints, letting the user move as if the armor wasn’t there.

For the version catering to regular soldiers, he limited himself to making sure acid rain wouldn’t infiltrate or erode too much, and that even if they were punched by a grade 2 martial abominations, they would be sent flying their bones straight even if broken.

Finally, for the version he would want to wear himself if he was to go there, he incorporated special anti-penetration ceramic alloy layers, overlaid on each side with special alloys and nanomaterials better for other types of damages he also intended to use for the martial version.

“And this only took me… Huh? 5 hours? What?” Mystically, by the time Aven had finished establishing the most basic framework for each version that no one else but him could read, 5 hours had already passed.

And his stomach quickly confirmed this amount of time had really passed when he felt hungry as hell, “Well… Looks like it’s time for a meal break.”

When he felt satiated, he considered returning to the design room to work more on his imminent next project, but he decided to first do his 5 hours of volunteering to counter his expense in cultivation resources that amounted to 217 600 FCP every 24 hours, or 54 400 FCP every 6 hours.

 

Faction Contribution Quest: Nation of Eland Military

Innovating: Give your faction new ways to achieve its goals. The more impacting and practical the innovations, the greater the contribution.

Reward: 4 500 FCP

Faction Contribution Quest: Nation of Eland Military

Volunteering: Contribute to the stability of your faction without asking for anything in return. The more time spent and the harder the tasks, the greater the contribution.

Reward: Claim?

 

However, seeing the derisory reward from 5 hours of average innovating quest made him think about much more than just this small ridiculous number, and eventually, those thoughts got to him, “Or should I update my schedule?”

Stopping himself in the middle of a random corridor on the way to the production area, he made a sudden turn in the direction of the design room on a whim, not minding the fact that his silent escort had seen everything.

Once there, he turned back on the background music and opened a spreadsheet he had created weeks ago to help keep up with his growing expenses, time awake, tech-enhancement, energy cultivation, and all sorts of other factors that just naturally went up with time.

“Today… I should reach 251% tech-enhancement, remain at peak condition for 38 hours and a half, gain 403 300 FCP through my 5 hours of volunteering, expend 394 400 FCP to maintain my optimal trinity status, make 26 800 FCP through the remaining hours spent innovating, and I should reach 400 in my cultivation…” Reading the right line that corresponded to the current day, Aven had to rectify his mindset with a mocking laugh, “Hehehe~ I’m so borderline in deficit, no way I’m lowering my hours of volunteering.”

To confirm he hadn’t seen wrong even if he knew the chance of that was abysmal, he opened his status.

 

Aven Amias

Faction: Nation of Eland Military

Energy Grade: 2

Energy Cultivation: 396/1 000

Energy Affinity: Tech

Physical Talents: Basic Energy Furnace Cells

Energy Talents: Basic Tech Energy Affinity, Basic Energy Sense, Basic Natural Energy Growth, Basic Self Revolving Energy

Spiritual Talents: Inquisitive Spirit, Advanced Knowledge Integration, Basic Tireless Spirit, Basic Armored Spirit

Universal Talents: Unawakened Fairy Ancestry, Creative Instinct

Basic Armored Spirit: Your spirit innately knows how to mobilize its capabilities to defend itself, allowing it to instinctively defend itself against foreign intrusion or spiritual harm.

 

“Yup, 400 by the end of the day, everything checks out… Sigh~” Resigning himself, he paused the music again and exited the comfortable design room to go and do his 5 hours of volunteering to make sure he wouldn’t be in the red by the end of the day.

…

After accomplishing his 5 hours of volunteering, Aven cheerfully returned to working on his next project until he was interrupted around 10 hours later by someone entering his sacred temple.

“The tests are finished,” Alain reported to him the summary of why he was here, which translated in Aven’s mind to “All the tests are finished and all the data was stored on the network.”

“Oh,” blinking a few times, Aven then narrowed his eyes as his socially extrovert self took over, making all sorts of small talk questions and serious matters to talk about pop in his mind, “My dear Alain, why don’t you take a look at what you’ll work with if you decide to continue working with me? I really like how you always reply wittily and don’t hesitate to make your opinion known.”

The sarcasm had no chance of having gone unnoticed, but as usual, the serious-looking man with brown hair, black eyes, and tanned brown skin ignored it all and did what he wanted, and this time what he wanted was to take a look at what the much younger man seemed excited about.

Using the chance to shift from the table to his data computer, Aven easily found the newly uploaded data and started sending them to different computers for them to be treated in the way he wanted them to be.

Making a lap, he infused his energy in each modeling computer to speed them up before returning to the main data computer to start deciphering the freshly formatted data.

Half an hour later, after properly organizing all the data, he couldn’t find anything he wanted to patch up, so he started packaging all sorts of good-looking and objective data he would send in accompaniment with his project closure report.

A dozen minutes later, he was done with wrapping and cleaning up the report and the data block, so he started encrypting everything and uploaded everything on the military-restricted network.

“There~ Done!” Closing everything related to the “Alternative Innovative Tech Super Restricted Anti-Abomination Stationary Heavy Artillery Sniper” project, he created a new online file he named “Alternative Innovative Full Body Armor (Temporary Name)”.

Taking a deep breath, he asked his stomach a few questions that were answered very positively, leading him to exit the design room, intending to supply his body with dearly needed nutrients.

When he came back half an hour later, he saw that Alain was still there, hence he directly asked, “Conclusion? Do you join the next project too? Do I send another request for a new grade 4 production tech super?”

“I’m very much interested in this new project, so allow me to remain,” turning his head to look at him, he seriously both requested and agreed to his proposition to remain.

“Perfect! Then for now you can do whatever, I don’t need you,” dismissing him the moment he officially joined his new project, Aven waved at him to move out of his way in an absurd way.

Thinking a bit more, he added, “Maybe go study more about ceramic alloys? Or go learn more about nanomaterials? I intend to use those 2 very abundantly in this project. Also, nanomaterials are clearly the future, so if you want to work long-term with me then you better be at the top in this field.”

“Hu…” Taking in great stride the experience of being “ordered” by someone much younger than him, Alain simply nodded, grunted, and silently left the design room, his intentions unknown.

As for Aven, he didn’t even send a glance his way and plunged right back into his designing work.

His mind was fusing with ways to create the best full body armor ever created, one he clearly intended to save lives that would otherwise be lost against mindless abominations.

…

Faced with yet another impassionating project where Aven knew he could really change things, he didn’t hesitate to once again set perfection as his objective.

He had pretty much lost contact with what was taking place outside of Blackdale IMC, and he didn’t even try to find a way to remedy that problem. He was fine in his own bubble that let him progressively grow as much as he wanted.

In this manner, weeks passed, and nothing came to bother him during all of it, or maybe a few things had happened but he hadn’t been made aware of them.

For him, the most revolutionary event of this period of time took place at the end of the 17th day, where his 5 hours of volunteering, earning him 430 500 FCP, theoretically wouldn’t have been enough to counterbalance the expense of his awake cycle that had grown to be 42 and a half hours, which amounted to 430 667 FCP.

Hence, from that day onward, his volunteering period had been allocated 1 more hour per cycle.

The prototype phase of his full body armor project arrived a full 4 days after that event, or 3 weeks after starting this project in earnest, which as he had expected, gave amazing results.

The complexity of the involved integrated production lines wasn’t as high as in his previous project, so the only difficulty that had really stumped him was the number of component units needed.

Humans didn’t have a universal size or form, after all, so he had to adapt a whole lot of parameters to be optimized for those forms and sizes. And he had 3 different full body armor versions, with one far eclipsing the other 2 in terms of convolution and entanglement.

Ultimately, it took him 2 more weeks after the prototype testing phase to close the project, sending his final closure report about the performance of the 3 full body armor versions he had innovated, and move on to something else with peace of mind.

However, it was a fact that he had given his all to make sure Eland had the best gears it could possibly have, so with that matter out of the way and feeling no need to help more than he already had, and before starting the next part of his life, he decided to focus on a somewhat neglected aspect of his life.

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His family.

Thus, he departed the next day with only his escort in an armored car camouflaged as a normal civilian one, the trunk filled with things that no civilian should ever come to possess.

…

A few years ago, in a nightclub rented out by MIC Serenis University for the integration day of their new first-year students.

‘Maybe… I’m the problem?’

A younger Aven, an unawakened Aven, was sitting at a table alone in a corner of the colorful and lively nightclub, thinking of how horrendously different he was from others.

“Yo, Aven~ Maria is asking for you at the other table, I think she’s ripe for the taking if you know what I mean~” A heavy and disgusting alcohol stench arrived at the same time one of his new friends, a senior, came to inform him of something he had no interest in.

“Nothing I can do about my handsomeness and charisma, right? You stink of alcohol by the way, it’s disgusting. You should try some fruit juice or iced tea,” not beating around the bush, as everyone in the nightclub had learned he loved to do, he rebuffed the man with whom he had somewhat bounded that night.

“Ouch! My poor heart!” He exaggerated his reaction before conveniently remembering something else, naturally changing the subject, “Oh, right. I think your high school friends are also calling for you to save the day, they look more like normal newcomers struggling with their integration, unlike you~”

“Hah~ Let’s go then!” Aven stood up explosively and stepped back into the epileptic neon lights of the nightclub’s disco ball, “I need to flex a bit of my uselessly strong social interaction needs, so it’s perfect~”

Just like that, and for the following 5 hours, he joined back the mass of hot-blooded university students with the sole objective of enjoying himself by doing one of the 2 things he loved to do more than anything else: Interacting with new people. The other being exploring new places.

The integration day, or it was more appropriate to call it integration party, eventually went on to last until no one able to hold a basic conversation was left standing, and Aven once again accidentally established a reputation as an endless witty chatter who could continue talking till death ensued.

Having not had a single drop of alcohol, Serenis being a lit-up city during the night, and with no desire to sleep in an unknown place, Aven left the nightclub filled with wasted students and rode back home on his bike.

Unknown to everyone, however, was an infernal internal turmoil that forced him to stop in a well-lit park, where he used a vending machine to get a can of peach iced tea.

“At least with this I’ll never be disappointed~” Displaying a sorrowful smile on his slightly tired face, Aven found a bench located just under a lone lamppost in the middle of a totally empty park and settled on using it as his respite place.

“Hah~” Taking a big gulp of his newly acquired can, liquid happiness went down his throat and rejuvenated him, erasing a bit of the alienation he felt towards the world.

“Really… How is talking for hours on end something extraordinary?” He asked no one, and certainly not himself.

“Is the entire world a hidden camera? Are they all repressing their own social interaction needs? Romance? Sex? What’s so good about those? Between them and a good pastry or a good original discussion, forget about them!”

Venting his true feelings, he acted like he was drunk while pertinently knowing he wasn’t, and that alcohol-based drinks were most often too aggressive for his delicate palate that preferred sweet things.

“The freak is a natural leader? Why are studies even a talking subject? Why are they all so superficial? Why can’t they just read the mood and adapt? Why are my expectations of life so different?”

The more he vented, the more he devolved into the mindset of feeling like something was seriously wrong with himself.

“Why can’t they understand how talking and visiting places is the only thing they need in life to be happy? Why can’t they just keep joking at all times? Is there a need to be so serious when so many fun interactions can be made by not being like that?”

“Why…” Slowing to a stop, he took another gulp of pure happiness in hope of soothing his vendetta against both the world and himself, “Why are they all so… Different?”

That night, Aven returned home in the same way he had since he realized, on a memorable night back in middle school, that his innate social gifts and instincts weren’t exactly positive when few to none were there to allow him to express them to their limits: Resigned.

In his mind, it just wasn’t possible for the world to change to accommodate the individual, so he simply had no other choice but to resign himself to living in a world filled with an extreme minority of people that would understand him.

It wasn’t like such a foundational statement of how society worked could ever change, right?

…

“What do you think? The best pastry of Eland I say!” Handing his bag of pain au chocolats to Ron, Aven didn’t enter the armored car and indicated to him to take one.

“Thank you, sir,” respectfully taking one of the freshly baked pastries out of the bag, the escort kept the bag in his arm and started eating with gusto.

“That’s not how you address someone in a casual setting,” he harshly criticized instantly, nearly making his respectful escort choke on his marvelous pastry, before relaxing the mood, “Hehehe~ Anyway, if you feel comfortable talking like that, then just do it.”

As the two were wearing perfectly casual civilian clothes, Aven couldn’t help but criticize him every time he made a blunder out of habits.

“Finished?” He noted the end of the pastry break, “Let’s go then, my parents should already be home and waiting for me.”

Getting in the car which appeared to be a normal car but was in fact an armored one that was actively infused with Aven’s energy, the duo departed in the direction of a completely normal residential block of Serenis city.

Seeing the familiar scenery flash by didn’t make much of an effect on the young man, it just reminded him that maybe he could have returned earlier.

‘I’ve not even been gone for more than a year. What’s there to be sentimental about? I can still picture my life when I was a student at MIC, isn’t that telling of how it’s all still relevant to me?’

A few minutes passed where Aven enjoyed the scenery like a normal man, not trying to find deep sense in all these buildings he had already seen before but just had never concerned himself with trying to know what they were.

When the car was parked not in the private underground park but above the ground amidst other cars, the duo got off together and walked a bit until they arrived at their destination.

From there, it was Aven who took the lead by entering the code to open the entrance door, knowing perfectly that his escort couldn’t simply be dismissed because he ordered it, so he lived with it and let him come along.

Taking the stairs for no other reason than feeling like it, the two climbed to the 7th floor effortlessly and their breath wasn’t even affected, proving they were both supers who were passively boosted by their supernatural energy.

Arriving at his apartment’s door, his escort settled himself at the entrance, clearly not willing to enter with him. As for him, he swiftly entered the code, unlocked the door, and rushed inside after getting his shoes off, “I’m back! I’m back, I’m back, I’m back!”

Making a scene out of his return, he ran into the living room and saw his mother lounging on the sofa alone watching yet more TV series while his father was cooking something in the kitchen, something oily from the frying sound.

“Ah, finally. Our little genius is back,” turning, his father immediately started jeering at him while keeping an eye on what he was cooking.

“Excuse me? Do I hear sarcasm?” Taking to the skit instantly, Aven put back on his genius persona, “Is it because I graduated in 1 month from a top-rated university that you say that? Or is it because I revolutionized the artillery field? Maybe the full body armor field? I have a hard time counting my achievements, you know…”

“As if I could know if you really did all that,” shrugging at his answer, his father focused back on the kitchen, “You never sent news back apart from some nonsense messages after all.”

“Maybe? I don’t really remember that part,” he confided, “I never felt in need of familial moral support so I pretty much threw my phone to the side, I’ll explain eventually, but first! I see you’re cooking! I also brought things to eat!”

Opening his shop, Aven didn’t hesitate to claim what he needed to claim.

 

Faction Contribution Shop: Nation of Eland Military

Faction Authority: Six-Star General

Faction Contribution Points: 6 680 733

…

Energy Growth Wonder Flower (780 000 FCP): A flower only found in nature in extremely luxuriant environments with growth conditions not yet understood. Awaken any life that eats it while also giving it the natural energy growth energy talent.

…

Self Revolving Energy Mutation Elixir (1 460 000 FCP): An elixir created through an ancient rainbow fairy formula with most of its ingredients being extremely difficult to gather. Gives the self revolving energy energy talent to anyone consuming it.

 

“Behold!” He dramatized his action, even going to the sofa to bring his mother back to reality by shaking her everywhere, “Mom, that’s an important scene! Pay attention”

His mother who had been unresponsively staring at the TV during their whole exchange finally reacted and smiled at him lovingly, “Yes?”

“Hu… Yeah,” he ignored his loving mother and continued on his path.

 

Energy Growth Wonder Flower (Claim?)

Energy Growth Wonder Flower (Claim?)

Self Revolving Energy Mutation Elixir (Claim?)

Self Revolving Energy Mutation Elixir (Claim?)

 

“Behold! Claim! Key to eternity! Power of my genetics!” Making more of a scene than ever, 4 swirling rainbow clouds manifested themselves before him the next instant, “Hahaha! See this? Say goodbye to your previous miserable life of being normal people!”

Entranced by the supernatural phenomena taking place before them, both his father and his mother became silent spectators through the whole light and color show.

Only when the 4 items finally fully manifested and Aven carefully put them all on the table did they come back to themselves.

“That’s a weird way of giving gifts, are they awakening serums? Why 4 of them? And why do 2 of them look like flowers? Some sorts of reagents to maximize the effects? Do you have something like a pocket space?” Making an assumption based on what his son had said, Sen misunderstood the situation.

“I recognize myself in you, young father, but don’t be hasty in your judgment, more haste but less speed as you would always tell your son,” taking on the wise man persona, he carefully picked one of the two jade-like flowers and handed it to him, “That’s much better than an awakening serum.”

Taking the other flower to his mother, he then backed up and shrugged once before saying, “That’s it, just eat it. Becoming a super isn’t that hard when you have access to natural wonders. Even if you have defective genetics it can still bypass that and awaken you. Say goodbye to your previous life as normal humans, maybe? I don’t know?”

“Okay…” Unsuspecting, Sen, his father, took the lead and slowly started to munch on the beautiful flower, shortly followed by Hana, his mother.

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