The next day of training came, and I was back to facing warlocks.

The night before, I had discussed some things with Umara, getting her insight on how warlocks operated. She provided me with some weaknesses as well as the thought process behind her decision making.

Warlocks were just as fragile as summoners. The only reason they weren’t seen as that weak though was because, unlike summoners, their magic could actually protect them. But that also meant they had a singular point of failure: their barriers.

As she had told me before, barriers were only loaded with so much mana at any given time, a quantity that changed when damaged or according to the warlock’s wishes. My bullets and grenades could outright bypass some of those defenses with penetrative power and rapidly shatter the integrity of the spell.

Barriers, as described by Umara, were one large active spell formation. So disrupting the spell meant disrupting the barrier. However, good warlocks could also shift the power distribution, allowing for variable strength in different areas of the barrier. Warlocks from the Magisterium were taught spherical barriers that provided omnidirectional protection. But they were also taught how to shift the power concentration, so I could count on definitely facing that.

This worked against me in two ways. Not only would my bullets be less effective, but I also couldn’t adapt to it. If I placed a grenade behind them while shooting from the front and they failed to perceive the threat of the grenade, it would just kill them.

I had plenty of ways to kill a warlock. Keeping them alive while crippling their ability to fight back was something else entirely and magnitudes more difficult.

Right now, I was the icon of the industrial war machine, and it was spitting out some of the deadliest tools of wrath that Earth’s history had ever seen.

And I was being forced to rein it in and direct all of that explosive power into measured, non-lethal attacks. That was like trying to train a bunch of hungry rapid wolves to capture a rabbit instead of just tearing it in half, chewing it up, and shitting it out.

But it could be done, in part by not using the rabid wolves, but bloodhounds instead. I needed to use the precise tools instead of explosive ones, and I needed to understand how my enemy thought in order to corner them.

But that meant battles would take time, and such time was putting my cardio to the test.

Once I was back on the training grounds, the Puppet Master threw some Authority 7 warlocks at me. These warlocks weren’t operating like true Authority 7’s. He just wanted to make the barriers tougher to break and the spells more varied, giving me more of a challenge.

But after just a few hours of fighting, I was stumped. A warlock at that level could tank all my shots while also using spells to simply run away when I closed the distance. Not only that, but their spells were fast and powerful. I couldn’t even do anything to them.

Of course, the Puppet Master understood that. Sometimes I thought he was having me do a cardio workout instead of actual combat training. Either way, I realized where my limits lay and what to do when a warlock was really good at one particular thing.

The staffs they used helped them buffer spells, which meant that the good warlocks were able to cast multiple spells at once and in quick succession. If you let them, they would throw a constant barrage at you with no rest, all while being mobile.

Of course, the downside to this was the fact that the barrier was neglected, making them a weaker target. Against that, I could only stress myself to find a shot while constantly dodging and moving. During a battle against one opponent, I had only half a second to take a shot and that was while taking a pressurized ball of water to the leg. That left a nice bruise, even through my coat.

So I continued to wrack my brain for solutions. I didn’t want to be helpless and resigned to constantly dodging, but that seemed to be all I could do.

Or at least, until I thought of something. After that, it all seemed so obvious.

Barriers were spell formations, and my bullets could affect that spell formation. The fact that I could pierce through barriers was evidence of that. If my Psyka were unable to affect Mana, then my empowerments would do nothing to help me break barriers in the first place.

So why the hell wouldn't it do that to every other spell formation?

Although launched spells were just clusters of an element, they still relied on formations to keep them together and guide them with a specific purpose, so Psyka could still affect it.

With that logic in mind, I put it to the test.

Standing across from the warlock, I panted in exhaustion. I had already run a lot in the past few hours and I was getting sick of it.

But now, my veins pulsed in excitement as the warlock created its barrier.

I stood there and brought out another new gun. Called the Remington A-5, it was the first semi-automatic shotgun ever created and a weapon that John Moses Browning considered to be one of his greatest achievements, and for good reason.

This model was chambered in 12-gauge, like most shotguns, and it handled like most shotguns with a tube fed system.

But that semi-automatic system was way too attractive to continue to use the Trench Gun – despite the satisfaction of slamfire – so when I discovered it, I communed with the responsible spirit immediately.

I watched as four fireballs hurled toward me, raising the shotgun and firing as soon as they crossed the 50 meter mark.

The stock slammed back into my shoulder. A brass casing spun off to the side. All the buckshot that flew out the front was empowered and aimed right for the fireball.

And I watched as the fireball was blown up, all of its power being disrupted and detonated mid-flight. The rest scattered as the spell formation holding it together was destroyed.

I smiled even as I shot the other three, all of them being snuffed out like the first.

The warlock across from me stood there, frozen for a few seconds until the Puppet Master appeared.

I smiled at him without a word, causing him to scoff.

“Whatever. It’s not like there’s ever been a cold summoner capable of doing what you just did, so I didn’t know it was possible. I guess it should've been obvious though. It’s a good thing you found out about it.”

“Fuck yeah.”

“Hm, well, I’m suddenly far less worried about how you’ll handle warlocks. Still, I’ll make sure you can handle different varieties.”

“Fuck yeah.”

I responded with an even wider smile. He was right. This just made things a lot easier.

After that, I got to do a little skeet shooting as spells were constantly flung at me. They came in batches and each one was a different type from a different element.

From fire, to water, to air, all kinds of spells were hurled at me in just as many varied forms. The only thing limiting me was my reload time. There were no such things as speed loaders for shotguns at the time so I had to make do with handloading shells. However, that was exactly what my Crown helped with.

I resorted to practicing loading two shells at a time. Without needing to grab them from a belt, I could simply have them appear in my hand perfectly oriented for insertion. Then all I needed to do was shove them in repeatedly.

It might’ve seemed unnecessarily complicated, but I still couldn’t simply will the shells into the tube. That seemed to be a feature I was incapable of, at least until I figured out why and how to bypass it.

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Regardless, the A-5 could hold four shells in the tube and one in the chamber. So long as I left one in the chamber, I could just load four with two swipes of the hand and continue shooting. That meant I had four shots before needing to reload.

Of course, more than four magical projectiles could be thrown at me, so the strategy became shooting the ones I couldn't easily dodge and going from there. Threat assessment was key.

Like that, the rest of the day was spent practicing my quickdraw, reloading, and quick aim. I used both shotguns and rifles to shoot spells, but naturally shotguns were far more reliable. It was like shooting birds, and birdshot was in fact better suited for the spells.

One issue was now resolved. Now, it was time to move on to the rest.

When the third day of training came around, I had the Puppet Master give me knightly opponents. Unlike warlocks, knights were straightforward to fight, but also more difficult.

I didn’t have to worry about accidentally killing them. They were built to take hits, and the only way I could beat one was to dish out more hits than one could handle.

That took sheer power and brute force, not so much precision. And even if I went overboard and gave a knight grievous wounds, they were tough enough to stay alive and the doctors had more than enough leeway to heal them.

Ever since that tooth and nail struggle with the Royal, I knew that knights could fight even when half dead.

For them, I needed to bring forth the full might of the industrial war machine. And the Puppet Master was good at drawing that out.

It was exhausting, to say the least. I could now easily go toe to toe with Authority 6 knights but doing so took a lot out of me. Not to mention that they were usually fast and strong, just like Ponteck Gulliard.

It seemed like everything always came back to Gulliard.

I asked the Puppet Master to give me opponents as fast as Feiden and as strong as Vetsmon, which seemed to be where Ponteck lay. Though he couldn’t quite match the extreme attributes of both, he wasn’t far from it. The man really was a powerhouse deserving of his spot on the board.

My main issue with fighting him would be maintaining distance, given his speed. Of course, with some suppressing fire and my Aura, I could deter him from getting too close too fast. But I couldn’t stop him, even if I was hitting my shots.

It would be his victory if he got close. After that, it would take everything I had in order to keep myself alive, from the power of my coat to the fullest use of Aura.

Dodging was nearly impossible with that guy. He was too fast and it wasn’t like I was trained in martial arts. Five seconds trying to keep my life felt like an eternity and, oftentimes, I couldn’t make it any longer than that. I would reach my limits and no amount of precognition or time dilation could save me from my comparatively lethargic body.

So my goal was to keep as much distance between us for as long as I could while trying to put him down before he could reach me.

It was difficult, but not impossible. My recent advancement meant that my bullets were more than capable of wounding him. Armor was a factor that could mitigate that significantly, but I also had a way to circumvent that.

Four hours of constant battle with the dummy left me at the edge of exhaustion, but I called the training session to an end a bit early in order to work on something else.

I finally met up with my squad, the five of us on a field for our own special training.

“Hey guys.”

“John. How’s training going?”

“Eh, it’s going. This is turning out to be harder than expected.”

I shrugged while clasping hands with Vetsmon and Feiden.

“Ponteck is fast and strong, so if he gets close, I’m screwed.”

“Mm. How difficult is it to bring him down before then?”

“Difficult enough. Which is why I want to do this training. I need my Aura to be sharper and I want to test out something new. Something that might help me keep my life against someone like him. Come here.”

I grabbed Feiden and pulled him over to the open field.

Then, I stood about 15 meters away, the two of us squaring off.

“I want you to catch me. All you have to do is lay a hand on my body and you win. Utilize whatever means you can, whether that’s Aura or your full speed. I don’t want any handicaps.”

“Hm, alright.”

“Umara, start us off.”

Feiden took up a stance as Umara raised her hand from the side.

“Ready… Go!”

Feiden flew forward as soon as she spoke. It was clear that he didn’t bother holding back to see what would happen, which is exactly what I wanted.

Because right when he did, I let my Aura bloom, expanding out through the area like a thick fog.

Like during my operation, I was able to see everything around me with great clarity, almost as clear as my eyes were, though with far more insight. I could see Feiden, the heat running through his muscles with every neural impulse, and his plans on attempting to catch me. Of course, his own Aura attempted to blur his intentions, but my own had advanced so much that it didn’t really matter.

Like that, I infused my Psyka into the fog of my Aura, the power of the mind entering Feiden’s body and affecting his psyche.

Then, I started visualizing things that didn’t exist. I stood completely still, yet imagined that I was moving to dodge.

I almost convinced myself that I was actually moving even when I was sure I was standing dead still.

And sure enough, I watched as Feiden veered to the side and dove at nothing.

Halfway through though, when he realized something was wrong, he recovered and slid to a halt, turning back to me, seeing me in the same place as I was when we started.

I looked at him and then started running.

……

Two Johns split off from the same location. It was difficult for Umara to tell which was the real one.

Though she wasn’t quite worried about that. She was still shocked that this was happening at all. It seemed John had learned how to utilize illusions, a power she had only heard about before.

Illusions couldn’t easily be mimicked by magic. That was because it required one to not just project realistic images, but trick the mind. With Psyka and Aura, it was much easier, yet few summoners ever learned to do so simply because they didn’t need to. They couldn’t fight, and so they didn’t develop many combat-related techniques.

This was the first time she was ever seeing something like this. A fog permeated throughout the area for a great distance, even enveloping them who stood on the sidelines. That fog was only from John’s Aura, and so it didn’t actually disrupt their vision. They could still see both of them clearly.

But the effect that his Aura had on their minds created illusions of things that weren’t real. They obscured John’s body while creating other images of him that weren’t real. Even they were tricked, because they had thought Feiden caught John the first time he dove forward.

And after that, Feiden gave chase to multiple Johns, none of the ones he caught being the real ones.

When he would catch one, it would disappear, as if his mind finally registered that it wasn’t actually there. It would do so for the others too. But then, the real John would release another illusion that Feiden had to try and differentiate against once more.

None of them could seem to do it. They had faint feelings, but it was too confusing and there was only one Feiden. He could only choose to chase one.

And even if he made the right choice, John would just kill the other illusion and create another, forcing Feiden to make another decision that was likely wrong. So, in practice, he could never be right.

The only way to fight against it was Aura, but none of them had an Aura as developed as John’s. Not only that, but their minds weren’t very resistant to Psyka, which made his illusions all the more effective.

Suddenly, the power of the mind seemed so incredibly powerful. All of them knew that summoners were weak. John was merely an exception. But when they saw this, they felt like summoners had unfathomable potential.

Everyone was vulnerable against the type of magic they didn’t wield. Knights were vulnerable to mana, warlocks were vulnerable to vigor. But now, their friend had shown them just how vulnerable to Psyka they were.

Because of that, Feiden was unable to catch John for an entire 10 minutes. No matter what he did, he was always outmaneuvered. John didn’t even have to stress himself physically, not nearly as much as he usually would in this situation.

Finally, once he seemed to have enough of teasing Feiden, the fog receded and they all laid eyes on the real John. The moment the influence was gone, the illusions felt painfully obvious, and they doubted they could’ve ever mistaken them for the real John

“Well, that was certainly fun. Too bad I can’t use this against the puppets.”

He chuckled a bit and sat down. He was obviously tired since this wasn’t his first workout.

Feiden scratched his head in confusion.

“I’m not sure what the hell just happened.”

“Illusions my friend. If you want to avoid them, then you need to train your Aura more. All of you do. Tomorrow I want to train like this more. Next time, I’ll also use my guns and see how that affects things. Still, just imagine not knowing where you got shot from.”

“That’s kind of scary.”

Tana shivered a bit, making John chuckle.

“Anyway, I’m tired. Maybe I can just sleep here…”

“No no, let’s get back to the hotel. Come on big guy.”

Umara walked over and hoisted John up, wrapping his arm around her shoulder.

After saying goodbyes, the two walked off, leaving the knights to ponder to themselves.

Feiden sighed.

“If Ponteck doesn’t have a good Aura, he’s screwed.”

“No kidding. John is already hard to catch. That just makes it impossible. Still, it’s amazing how powerful he is.”

Vetsmon rubbed his chin in thought. The level of Aura he displayed was unreal. It made him question himself, thinking that Aura couldn’t possibly be so difficult to train if John was already doing so well.

He hadn’t even been training it for a year! All of them had been training since the young age of 16, like everyone else. They had years under their belt while John had less than one, yet he was already an Authority 5 and had a far better Aura.

The growth was freakish. Completely alien, almost.