Luon woke up refreshed the next day, vaguely recalling the mysterious man's swordsmanship. It was a style that he had never seen before, however, at the same time, it felt familiar to him for some reason.
He attempted to recall the movements that the man-made. Luon could barely manage to make out the trajectory of the blades, if there was something memorable about the move set displayed in the dream, it was that constant bell-like ringing sound that the swords had made.
As he was unable to decipher the attack any further, Luon then thought to himself, ‘Who was that man? Why does it seem so familiar? Could it be?’
Luon then turned to his BMPU and launched an application. It was the first time he used it even though it was already preinstalled in the device. The memory recovery application, otherwise known as Avucer, reinitiates the memory amalgamation process.
Although the memory was stored digitally, the application on the device merely attempts to unlock the sealed memories within the brain by syncing the information.
It was like the brain was the file server while the BMPU acted as the source device that sends information to the brain.
The beam of light appeared once again in Luon’s mind, however, unlike the first time his memories were only refreshed with no changes at all.
The act of refreshing his memories was based on the same theory of reviewing the letters and words of another language. The more often one would review over them, the more it would stick.
However, Luon knew something wasn't right. With his logical reasoning, he found that a portion of his memories had holes or contradicting points as the rest were sealed as if coated by a barrier, which didn't allow him inside despite it being his own brain.
Was that swordsman someone he had met in his simulated world? Who was it? Luon didn't know despite trying his best to recall him.
The only hint that Luon could manage to perceive was that all the excessive dark feelings he had accumulated during his simulation were less than what he had anticipated. Besides some basic combat skills that he had learned during the second simulation, the latter years of that life were missing and vague.
Similar to how the writer of a novel summed up a war or battle scene by saying “He done and did it, in one punch,” the core parts of his missing memories were probably more gruesome than what he initially perceived. If a writer had to put more details to the story, it would like, “The blow caused a devastating amount of damage, shattering homes, causing guts and inner organs of the deformed piece of meat to...”
Luon let out a sigh as he remembered a particular face at this moment. The look that the Black Luon gave him during the memory fusion process was full of understanding, it made Luon believe that he had survived the process and absorbed all the evil, negative thoughts and sealed himself away in the back of his mind.
Seeing how it was pointless to ponder on the mysterious inner workings of the memory management system. Luon raised his body from the ground surface he was laying upon. He figured that he had spent the entire night was spent dreaming inside the Vortex Container after his magic practice.
It may not be as comfortable as a real bed, but after Luon realized it was all a simulation he no longer cared whether or not he had dust on him, neither did he care too much about taking baths in the simulation world. It was all fake to him so why should he mind the spiritual practice of doing so? Luon could log off and relog himself in to instantly reset his state.
Looking at the time remaining Luon found that he had another 2 hours in real life, which was equivalent to 20 in the virtual world, before the match with Zythos and his goons. Not wasting a single second he began reviewing over the new magic spells he had learned the night before and managed to reduce the casting time by half. It was easier to practice one spell than to learn a hundred others.
Why pretend to be a master of a hundred different spells when you can use one that will work in nearly a hundred different problems? There once was a mage who trained the explosion spell to the point where it became an instant cast ability that was a hundred times more destructive than their peers, it also consumed all of their mana causing them to be a one trick pony… but it was still an amazing feat.
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Still, despite training for the majority of the time, there was still a limit on how focused one could be. During the first simulation, most of Luon's fellow students were called ‘millennials’ and had a shorter attention span the longer they used a search engine found on the internet. Original works were also hard to come by as copyrights would be tossed everywhere they can be used, and the cyber division of many countries tried cracked down on hackers and malicious frauds online.
The internet was a shock breaking, ruthless era. Fortunately, centuries had passed since then, and those kinds of problems settled down with the passing of time.
Bored Luon began to practice his sword skills since he had several more hours to kill.
He made the simulation conjure up an image of Janet and the orc Shaman and sparred with both of them.
As Luon continued to spar with them he began to adapt to their habits, he got confident enough where Luon would try to battle the both of them. However, that idea wasn't so good as he had lost badly against the two.
He had one sword had to deal with one of his enemies, and while he was preoccupied the other would attack him, Luon wondered if he had another sword, would he be able to deal with both of them? He pulled out another sword from his stack of forged blades, although it wasn't as powerful as his primary hand, it was merely a test.
Luon fought the two again and found that he was able to last against the two, however, as the battle continued he was only able to stay fight defensively.
If only he could counter their attacks as he repelled them. Luon hadn't studied any dual wielding techniques before which caused him to be unable to retaliate.
He suddenly recalled the way the mysterious man used his two swords and backed away from the battle. The two simulated enemies halted as they were programmed as so. With a swift motion, his hands repeated the same movement he had seen before.
A ringing sound resonated from his blades, like a pendulum the sound stayed constant. Luon barely managed to repeat the motion, he was unsure whether or not his body will instinctively react based on muscle memory despite having the core part sealed.
His steady feat advanced forward, reinstating the fight once more. The result was something not yet usable. Before he could perfect it and further, the alarm rang signifying the match was about to start.
…
In the waiting room, Luon had designated Thomas as the commander. There was no need to strategize as they knew their opponents were going to rush them. It was better to conserve their points and summoned defenders in the last minute when it was necessary.
Luon looked at his comrades who had a severe expression on their face. This wasn't just a semifinal match for them. This was an opportunity for them to get payback for all the injustice they’ve experienced during the survival camp. Although the officials on the scene were punished, Zythos and his gang got off scot-free as there wasn't enough evidence to condemn them.
Instead of having robots in their gear slots, they were armed with the final equipment that they had created over the summer.
The field they chose was a normal plain field with a full view to see their opponents.
The battle started without any problems. Since it wasn’t the first day, it was no surprise that the progress was easy to do.
Thomas sat at the table with a small stand of scraps to keep himself preoccupied while the rest of the team set out.
At the border of both fields, the two teams met face to face, Gizmo, Tyron, Bendan, and Luon stood gallantly on the open field while their opponents had just emerged from the forest, heavily armored.
Waiting for their opponent's next move, both teams stood still. The longer they took, the more critical the commander role was in this battle. Which is why Team Warbeast made their first move, two of their soldiers started charging towards the range attackers of Luon’s team.
Gizmo and Tyron backed off allowing Luon and Bendan to intercept the two. However, they were blocked by Zythos and the tiger beastmen.
“Zythos,” Luon muttered as he pulled out his sword.
“Today I will have your head,” said Zythos as he also pulled out a sword. Because of the armor, Zythos was unable to use his claws and was forced to use a sword which he wasn’t used to.
The two began to exchange blows, with Luon superior skill he managed to overwhelm Zythos, however, did almost nil damage to the armor.
On the other hand, Bendan and the tiger beastmen squared off against one another and were in a temporary stalemate.
Gizmo and Tyron were doing simple range attacks, dragging away the other two from the battle.
To execute the plan perfectly Tyron and Gizmo needed to pull away from the two successfully. Otherwise, the tactic may be intercepted by Zythos who might have figured it out. To ensure the success of the plan, Luon and Bendan had practiced the art of cursing their enemies to distract them.
This action caused Zythos and the tiger beastmen to follow suit, as they continued to battle while cursing each other, their vocabulary slowly became more profound to the point where they would have to stop and think of something to say.
The curses continued, and the battle stopped.
The simple crowd thought, ‘What kind of battle is this?’