Alex was then transported from the Commander’s office into the basement of the base, where he found a training facility that would put the United States special forces’ training facilities to shame. Alex was told by the Commander that he should find someone called Gwenden, who would start off his training. Alex, sure enough, managed to find Gwenden, and after telling him the Commander had sent him to be trained by him, Gwenden sharpened his eyes and carefully looked over Alex.
“The Commander sent a weakling like you to be trained by me?”
“Yes.”
“Well, as much as I find this to be a pointless expenditure, he must have seen great potential in you.”
Alex who desperately wanted to get as far away from the Commander as possible, wanted to speed up this process as much as possible.
“So, will you accept me?”
Gwenden eyed Alex and then asked Alex a question,
“Did you manage to stand up to the Commander’s Aura of Fear and not run away?”
“Yes, but I was overcome with fear and had to use pure willpower to keep my legs from running.”
“Good enough for me. Now we will start your training, I am sure you have seen your new skills?”
“Yes, but what about them?”
“They are what we will be training last. As much as you want to test them out, you need to improve your base stats first.”
Alex dreaded what was about to come next, but asked how they would be improved.
“How?”
“For your Strength, Stamina, Agility, and Vitality stats, we will make you run up and down the stairs from floor 1 to 100, 100 times each day, for 2 weeks. Failure to do so will simply mean your training time will increase.”
Alex knew it would be something horrible, and yet this answer made his spirits fall even more. But Gwenden ignored Alex’s expression and continued,
“The training will begin from now until midnight. Better get running, weakling.”
Alex resigned himself to his fate and started to jog up and down the stairs. He only stopped to recover his stamina and to eat.
For the first week of Alex’s training, Alex would wake up tired, and then go to sleep tired. He missed the quota for all 7 of those days. Alex’s spirit was broken, and every day, he would be like a mindless machine, day after day repeating the same steps, while his mind recovered in a place deep inside his head.
It was Alex’s summer vacation from school, and as Phantom Guns operated at a rate of 1 day in reality was 10 days in-game, Alex wasn’t bothered about logging out, since his capsule could handle food and his parents would be out.
By the time the 2nd week had finished, Alex hit the quota every day, with a couple of hours to spare. His Stamina, Agility, Vitality, and Strength had all increased by more than 100. Alex was probably already the strongest hand-to-hand combat player at that time, but he hadn’t learned any shooting skills in the game.
Gwenden saw how his stats had improved and was surprised at his growth, and he started to smile wickedly just like the Commander.
Alex suddenly had a bad feeling when he saw Gwenden smile after looking at his stats.
Gwened then told Alex,
“You have managed to complete your training, so now we will move on to the next stage of physical training. First, you ran up and down stairs. Now, you will have to keep a 5 ton weight above your head for 5 hours. There is no punishment for failure, because if you do, you will probably die.”
Alex was then lead to a room where there was a man, who wasn’t dressed like the rest of the people on the base, stood on a large stand .
“Trainee, stand underneath me. This will be your final phase of the base stat training.”
Alex complied and stood under him. He moved his arms up as the sign at the bottom of the stand showed. Then, a sudden crushing weight was placed onto his arms. Alex’s face contorted in pain. Alex’s stamina was being consumed at 100 points a second. He did a quick calculation and found he could only hold on for 5 minutes. After it finished through consumed his stamina, Alex’s health then slowly started to decrease. Alex was receiving a strength stat every 10 seconds and a stamina one every 20. His vitality was increasing as well, but his health would be gone in a few seconds, and he still had 4 hours left to go on the clock. His vision started to blur, and eventually started to give up on passing the test.
Gwenden was watching Alex’s performance, and was awaiting the moment where Alex would be crushed, because that would be when his true nature as a Shadow Being would surface. Gwenden knew that no matter what Alex did, he would end up crushed.
Alex, after finally being crushed, wasn’t immediately logged out. He awoke floating in darkness and heard a voice calling him. A female appeared before him and started to talk to him,
“I am your shadow, and only if you accept me, will you gain the true power of your race. Will you accept me?”
Alex looked at the female and saw that she was beautiful, her body was slim and curved, and her hair was long as straight. But true to a shadow, formless, her body kept shifting and changing. It was never the same, and looking at her was making Alex sleepy.
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After hearing what she said, Alex immediately accepted, because he wanted more power than everyone else in the game.
“Yes, I will accept you.”
Her sweet voice lulled Alex into her grasp,
“Before I give you power, you must complete a series of challenges.”
“What are those challenges?”
“You will know in due time. However, before I leave, I will give you a parting gift.”
The girl reached out to him and Alex, unresisting, was kissed on the cheek.
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Gwenden watched as Alex was crushed underneath the rock, and saw his shadow still there. He breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that Alex had managed to succeed in entering his shadow’s world. He left and then covered the room in darkness, so Alex could revive in peace.
______________________________________________________________________________
Alex was stunned at what the girl who claimed to be his shadow had done. Before Alex could make a comeback, she had already disappeared into the darkness. Alex felt his body move again, and he saw himself emerging from his own shadow into dark room. The first thought that came to Alex’s head was to find Gwenden and beat him into telling him why he wasn't told what was gonna happen, and so he set off to find Gwenden. Little did he notice that his shadow was now in a different form. Once the shape of him, now it was the shape of the girl he met in his shadow world.
As soon as Alex found Gwenden, he started to question him,
“GWENDEN YOU BASTARD!!! WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME ABOUT--URGH.”
But was soon stopped, as Gwenden shoved a fist into his stomach, making him double over in pain. He towered over Alex and then calmly told him,
“Now it is time for you to increase your intelligence and wisdom.”
Gwenden dragged a helpless Alex into a different room, and placed a mountain of books in front of him.
“Read these by the end of the week.”
After saying those last words, Gwenden walked out of the room, leaving Alex, who curled up in pain, with the mountain of books. As he closed the door, he locked it so Alex couldn't get out until Gwenden allowed him too.
______________________________________________________________________________
Alex, who was curled up into a ball, was staring at Gwenden with murderous eyes as he left the room. After he recovered, he immediately started to read the nearest book “Cutting with the Shadows”. After he finished it, he received a couple of stat messages.
Intelligence has permanently increased by 1!
Wisdom has permanently increased by 1
Shadow Understanding proficiency has increased!
He saw that reading the books would be helpful to him, so he started to read the books at a faster rate. His eyes would only take seconds to read each page, and he was finishing a book every half hour. Yet, as fast as he was reading it, it was not enough to read all of the books by the end of the week.
On the 3rd day of continuous reading, he gained a new skill.
You have gained the skill Quick Reading! [Active] [Passive]
When the skill is active, you will read twice as fast. When the skill is not active, you will read 10% faster.
Cost 5 mp/s.
Alex took to his new skill, and with his now large mana pool, activated the skill and started to read. At the increased pace, he was able to finish almost all of the books but 1. It was the day before the deadline, and the last book in front of him was a book that was thicker than his head. He picked it up and started to read it, only to find out it was encrypted. Alex put his hands to his head, and started to lament about how he would be unable to finish his task. Then, Alex looked closer. Whenever the shadows on his hand moved over the letters, they started to form into readable words. He used the skill Shadow Control, so the shadows would be thicker, and he slowly started to read the book.
Once he finished reading all of the books, his Intelligence and Wisdom stats had by then, increased a lot, while many of his skill proficiencies were all at Beginner level 1-2. His Shadow Understanding Skill, however, was at Beginner Level 5.
Alex heard the door unlock and saw Gwenden standing in the door frame. Alex, whose murderous intent never vanished, immediately started to glare at Gwenden with dark and murderous eyes. But Gwenden was unfazed by his glare and went over, picked him up, tossed him over his shoulder, and started to walk out of the door before Alex could attack him.
Alex knew resistance was futile, so he just laid there until Gwenden brought him to a new training center.