"Gary!" Number 32 shouted, either forgetting or not caring about the rule of only calling each other by their numbers. In this situation though, such a rule hardly mattered.
Gary, or number 31, spat out blood, unable to talk.
"Can't finish these damn laps in peace." The bald instructor cursed and rushed back. He then forced Gary's mouth open, stuck two fingers into it, and pulled out a rather large bug.
The bug looked like a wasp with green and black stripes. It fluttered its wings angrily, trying to bite the fingers that captured it, but there was no effect. The instructor snapped it in half and pocketed it.
"A Tier 1 green wasp. Quite fast, but it's not very strong." The instructor explained. "Although it caused some damage in your throat, you should survive.
The bald instructor proceeded to create a stream of water in the air from the pores in his body, then he directed it into Gary's mouth. It was quite the weird sight.
"That should do. Just don't speak, and your throat should heal in a few hours. The rest of your body is still fine, so you still have to run." The instructor devilishly smiled.
Gary could only look at him in despair. He swallowed some of the lingering blood, mentally preparing himself for the hell ahead. Even number 32 looked at him with pity.
"Hey, 31, it's fine, life has ups and downs, you know? Maybe next time the green wasp will fly into your stomach and you can directly digest it." Number 32's expression turned from pity to teasing.
Gary glared back and gave him the middle finger.
"Should I make you shut up as well while I'm at it, number 32?" The instructor reprimanded.
"Listen up, everyone! All of you are superhumans now. This world is filled with danger! Humans, Inhumans, monsters, they're all threats! You have to risk your life every fucking day, knowing you might die! This is what it means to be a superhuman! This is the path you walk! So man the fuck up and keep going!"
Hearing a motivating speech instead of degrading insults, many cadets were moved to tears. Ben, who had caught up, also learned some more information.
"Now that everyone's here, get a move on and run! I don't want to see any of you maggots stop or talk, or I'll kill you personally!"
…
Night fell, and everyone finally finished their ten laps. They had started on the South side of the island, which was a beach, so they rested on the sand. Even the instructors felt tired, although that was mostly because they were monitoring for danger and had some other sort of training device on them. Who said instructors couldn't train at the same time as cadets?
In the distance, two figures appeared. As they got closer, the moonlight shone on them, revealing their appearances. One looked like Yairel, and the other had wide shoulders, long straight hair, and was slightly short. He had a rectangular, metal tag with the number "25" on his blue uniform.
"Well, well, well, look who's back." The bald instructor had a big grin. "Instructor Zevrov did ya in, did he? Haha!"
Number 25 kept walking forwards, as if he couldn't hear anything. One could see that his eyes were unfocused, and he walked as if he was about to collapse. Sure enough, when he reached the camp of cadets, he fell forward onto the sand.
'Huh, he's not even limping. Was it a fake injury, or maybe this Instructor Zevrov has healing powers?' Ben observed.
"Well, now that everyone's here, let's begin today's exercise," the bald instructor announced. The teenagers just stared at him. "What, that running was a punishment, remember? Y'all deaf or something? Get the fuck up now!"
Everyone wanted to keep resting, but they forced themselves up anyway. Ben was again surprised at the willpower of his peers. After all, even though he had an 80kg vest now, running was a lot easier when he was Rank 2. Yet, even with the fatigue from the past 3 days, everybody just kept on going.
"We'll be heading to West Shore to build boats! The second half of hell week trains your essence after all. Follow me!"
Everyone was instantly more energized, slightly baffling Ben. Was building boats and 'essence training' that fun?
Funnily enough, the instructor started running, dampening everyone's energy. They weren't allowed to take off their weight vests either. The ones who took off their vests earlier had recovered enough energy to put on their vests again.
Ben was quite happy though, as he enjoyed the feeling of seemingly infinite stamina. Blood pumped through his veins, and his running form was terribly efficient. He felt like he was gliding on the ground! And this was with an 80kg vest!
Half an hour later, they arrived at a site with stacks of wooden planks, rope, and an instructor. What was noteworthy was that the instructor was female! After seeing only men for the past few days, Ben was quite surprised.
She was blonde hair, wore a white uniform, had paler skin compared to everyone else, and was around the height of the cadets.
"Welcome cadets! I'm instructor Nina, and I'll be your guide in this boat-building exercise! First, I will split y'all into 6 groups of 6." Instructor Nine had a bubbly voice, and she was a sight for sore eyes, and these teenagers were sore!
After randomly being split up into 6 groups, Ben found he was paired with 31, 25, 19, 18, and 2.
"Most of you don't have any skills that can be used as sealant, which is why I'm here! Come to me when you need help." Nina explained. Suddenly, her smile disappeared, replaced by a grave expression. "Now chop chop motherfuckers! Move it!"
'Is being mentally ill a requirement for becoming an instructor?' Ben wondered. Everyone started moving with great familiarity, leaving Ben extremely confused. He didn't even know what type of boat they were going to build!
"I heard you got amnesia, number 28. Don't tell me you even forgot how to build a canoe?" Instructor Nina asked incredulously.
"I forgot." With days of listening to conversations combined with a sharper mind, Ben could imitate basic sentences pretty easily.
"Well ain't that convenient. How about I join your group and guide you," Instructor Nina sighed.
Ben's teammates looked at him with eyes of admiration. Ben thought he could even see a little envy in some of them.
'Don't get the wrong idea…' Ben thought as he followed Instructor Nina.
"First, you have to shape these planks so they're actually suitable for building. They're too rough and irregular, so you're going to have to smooth them out and strengthen any weak parts. Since your platoon used Tier 1 swordfish, you should have a cutting ability. Use your finger to be precise!"
Ben saw the others moving their fingers along the edges to smoothen the planks out. He copied their motions, only to find out nothing happened. He then tried to imagine it, but still nothing happened.
"Sigh, did you forget how to use your essence as well? Imagine a ball of energy in your core, then channel it to your fingers." Nina kindly instructed. It was her job, after all.
Ben followed her instructions, but no matter what he tried, nothing happened.
'Maybe my transmigration messed with this body's original powers? Or this channeling process is a skill that needs to learned and not something you can automatically use?' Ben wondered.
"Still no? I guess if you've forgotten how to speak, then this makes sense as well." Nina sighed again. Seeing how Nina was teaching Ben how to channel essence and not helping with preparing the planks, Ben's teammates became quite dissatisfied. They were also quite curious about his amnesia.
"Alright, every superhuman has an essence core. It's always located in your core, and it's basically an extra small organ right in front of your intestines. Like the brain, it's originally white, but is dyed red by your blood. It's perfectly spherical, but it's also connected to everything in your body. Your vessels and nerves transport essence from the essence core to the rest of your body, and it feeds on your blood to regenerate its essence."
'Finally, my sensei is here! And it's a hot blonde woman instead of a woman! I'll take it!" Ben nodded along her explanation. A silly grin appeared on his face.
"Stop looking at me like that." Nina reprimanded, instantly wiping his smile away. "Continuing on, your essence is transparent and travels through your vessels and nerves pretty fast. Since it's constantly circulating, all you have to do is gather it in your essence core and send it to your fingers. Now, try it again."
After Nina's explanation, Ben could visualize the process a lot better. He tried to calm down and sense his essence core, kind of like how you would sense your heartbeat. After a few seconds, he really did find some warm and powerful energy radiating from his core. He then imagined gathering power in that core. The core got warmer. Ben then tried to channel the energy into his hand.
The warm energy flowed almost instantly to his right hand. Success! Ben felt like he had learned how to use a limb that he always had but was unaware of. He then channeled the energy to his middle finger, and sure enough, when he tried to cut the wood, it fell off pretty easily.
Nina looked quite offended, so Ben quickly switched to cutting with his index and middle fingers.
'Looks like the middle finger is quite the universal body language,' Ben thought. Indeed, it was an intentional test to probe the nonverbal language of this world.
With amateurish technique, Ben traced the edges with his fingers. Wait, that sounds kind of wrong. Ben's planks didn't look as clean as the others, and his mind also felt quite tired from channeling the essence. Luckily, Ben felt like he still had quite a lot of essence in him. Maybe the large essence pool came from the fact that he was Rank 2?
By now, his group had started using ropes to build the infrastructure for the keel. Other groups had started as well, causing Nina to run around everywhere to shoot out some sort of sticky liquid as sealant from her palms. It was translucent with a blue tint.
'Budget Spiderman type shit,' Ben thought. Nina rushed over to his group, and for some reason she glared at him.
'Spidey senses type shit.'
Ben gave the planks to his teammates and sort of just stood there dumbly while observing. He had no idea how this worked, after all. Number 18 ran his hands along a plank, curving it to his will and greatly shocking Ben.
"Quite a convenient ability you have," Number 2 commented. "Where'd you get that from?"
"Some mutant bird." Number 18 briefly responded. Number 2 shrugged, cut his planks into smaller pieces, and pieced them together with Nina's supply of…sealant, or whatever the hell it is.
'So it isn't a swordfish ability,' Ben thought. 'It also seems like you can absorb abilities from multiple types of Godflesh even as a Tier 1. Interesting…'
The group then started building the hull, attaching the planks to the framework with ropes. They adjusted the planks as they went, fitting it into the framework. Nina's sealant was quite strong and convenient here.
Ben would help by passing the planks and the rope, maybe holding up the framework when it needed support, but overall his contribution was quite low. His teammates didn't seem to care too much though, diligently working on the canoe. Number 2 smoothed out the planks just by wiping his palm on the surface, creating a comfortable spot to sit in.
Although Ben didn't help much, they were still the second group to finish. Number 18's skill saved a lot of time after all.
"Looks like everyone's finished! Ha, took you like 20 minutes to build some simple canoes, eh? Quite an impossible speed for normal humans, but we're superhumans! Way too slow! Break it apart and do it again!"
"..."