“Prodigy?” Garen frowned. “You might have been mistaken, Teacher, my talents might not be that great…”
“As long as you’re not utterly hopeless, you can be built up with resources. For our Black Flood Party, the hardest part is that resonance skill killing moves are too difficult. Many of those so-called talented prodigies can’t manage a single one, anybody who can finish learning Black Wind within a year would already be considered highly worth cultivating. I know what your talent is like, it’s not that great, but we can still build you up with resources,” said Van Doe nonchalantly, waving his large hand.
As expected of a rich school, they had the funds for anything.
Garen’s heart calmed down slightly.
“I have a question, Teacher.”
“Speak.”
Garen sorted out his thoughts.
“It’s about matching training method Willpower with Mechs. One type of Willpower can only be matched with one Mech, so does that mean the other sub-types of Willpower would be useless? They can’t reach Inherited Level?”
“Exactly, you can only achieve resonance with one Mech. A Mech can also only match one type of Willpower, that’s something that cannot be helped. If you want to change your Willpower training method, you must then also change the makeup of your Mech, so that you can adjust your resonance degrees,” said Van Doe, nodding. “Our Black Flood Party’s strongest Black Flood’s Wind Training Method is just like that, it can only fit our school’s Black Flood Style Mech.”
Only then did Kaneer recover, staring at Garen with a complicated gaze.
“Back then, Teacher invented the Crouched Eagle Talon just so he could find a training method that suited the Black Flood’s Wind Killing Move better.”
“Teacher was the one who invented the Crouched Eagle Talon?!” This time, Garen was truly shocked. Just how old was this geezer… They say the Crouched Eagle Talon showed up more than two hundred years ago, and back then, the prodigy in the Crouched Eagle Talon’s quantum computer, those simulated fighting techniques…
Perhaps he was the same age as Garen…
Garen glanced at the old man secretly, and did find some things strange, just like he thought. The old man’s skin was slightly stiff. Somehow, he could not see a heartbeat in the old man’s chest, and even his breathing seemed overly rhythmic.
“Alright, kiddo, first I’ll tell you the general situation right now. Since you’ve joined our Black Flood Party, you can more or less ignore most of the powerhouses in the Blackboard and Polar Regions. Publicly, at least, you overpower them, but there are still some people who you can’t cross for now.”
Van Doe’s smile grew deeper.
With a whoosh and a tap of his finger, a large map appeared on the table between the three of them. The map was made out of countless blue lines, forming a large picture of the four regions, the Blackboard Region, Polar Region, Maria Region, and Royal Region.
The mountains and rivers on the map were very clearly pictured, they looked very realistic and detailed. If it were not for the fact that they were all blue, it would be no different from actually looking down at a three-dimensional sandbox from the sky.
Van Doe pointed at the center of the map.
“This is the Blackboard Region, where we are.”
With a buzz, one part of the map lit up in red. The word ‘Blackboard’ appeared on it.
“This one, slightly further away, is the Polar Region.”
He pointed again.
A part that was just slightly connected to the Blackboard Region stretched out, and lit up another oval-shaped area. All of it was red.
“The Blackboard Region had their Three Marshalls and One Star. That means the three Great Professors, those immortal geezers controlling the whole of Blackboard, and the Black Star. You can’t cross these people. Pay attention now. Especially that punk, Black Star Diofie, he’s pretty strong, and really cruel too. He jokes with you on the surface, but secretly he’ll stab you faster than anyone else.”
Garen nodded, showing that he understood.
“In the Blackboard Region, these are the people you shouldn’t cross, the others would give me face to some extent,” Van Doe said.
“And then, the Polar Region.” His finger slid across the map, moving to the Polar Region.
“This is where our Black Flood Party is based, you need to pay attention to two things. First, the Twelve Divine Wind Generals. Divine Wind General is the title given to the strongest fighters in the Black Flood Party, some of them are even stronger than the Party Leader. Don’t cross them, there are factions inside the Black Flood Party as well. You gotta understand, as long as there are people, there will be cliques. That’s especially true once there are more people, there will also be larger divisions among humans, perhaps in principles, perhaps in personalities, or maybe even in interests or hobbies. The social distances as a result of that will naturally differ.”
“And then, when there’s the occasional conflict, they would naturally split into different factions,” Garen continued from where Van Doe left off, showing that he understood.
“As long as you understand.” Van Doe nodded in satisfaction. “Of course, there are factions among the Twelve Divine Wind Generals who favor us as well, one of them being my teacher Osiris.”
“Understood.”
Garen nodded. The Blackboard Region’s Three Marshals and One Star, the Polar Region’s Twelve Divine Wind Generals, they all seemed to be forbidden existences. Their own power was enough to suppress most problems and conflicts. That was what Teacher Van Doe was trying to tell him.
“And then there’s the Maria Region, they have the Zero Pistol Sue-Anna. If you meet them, just run. They have a seven-man Anthem Brigade, every single one of them is crazy, they’re famous for being completely unreasonable. Don’t provoke them unless you’re Inherited Level. In the Royal Region, be aware of the party called Spiral Tower, no one else matters. The people in this party are all religious fanatics, they’ll self-detonate anytime if they can’t beat you. Compared to those White Light people, I think the Spiral Tower are more like terrorists. The others are all just normal school or party members, nothing much to be worried about, you should be fine seeing how experienced you are.”
Garen memorized them one by one, Blackboard Regions Three Marshals and One Star, Polar Region’s Twelve Divine Wind Generals, Maria Region’s Zero-Pistol Sue-Anna, and the Royal Region’s Spiral Tower.
These were all things he had to be wary of.
Van Doe was in a very good mood, so he took out his pipe, lit it, and started to smoke.
“Of course, you don’t have to be too careful either. It’s rare for these people and factions to make a move once in a few years, because once you reach a certain level, like Black Star Diofie, you’ll need to search everywhere for materials and techniques that suit you. You would be constantly consuming them to evolve your own Mech. After all, Level Six Inherited Level is when you start your foundations. At that level, their schedules are vastly longer than regular people’s. Although it seems like there’s a lot of them, it’s very common for them to only communicate without showing up for a dozen years or so, unless something extremely serious happens.”
Garen nodded in understanding.
Beside him, Kaneer added,
“Anyway, even after so many years of being Teacher’s student, I’ve still only encountered one of Maria’s Anthem Brigade members in the past decade or so, and even then, we just exchanged a glance from a long distance away before separating. The more active ones in the regions are the Outer Courtyard’s elite students and a few people from the Inner Courtyard. The ones who are active in the radiation belt tend to be the true Inner Courtyard elites from the different regions, they’re something like the Black-Clothed Generals. People like us, higher-ups from the Inner Courtyard, only tend to stand guard at the places that are more strategic in battle.”
“In other words, people at your level, Senior Brother, tend to be generals standing guard at important fortresses?” That was what Garen understood of it.
“Yeah, this level is mostly at Level Five New-Moon, that’s the lowest.” Kaneer nodded. Suddenly, he received a message on his watch, and lowered his head to glance at it, frowning. “There’s an assassination order for you on the Exterminet? Nono, did you offend someone important?”
“Exterminet?”
“Yep, it’s an assassination website, I do some part-time work for spare change there too.” Kanner nodded. “We don’t know who set it up, but the bounty is ten million Universal Units, that’s quite a sum.”
Beside them, Van Doe looked displeased.
“Exterminet?” he began to say something, but then he instantly thought of something, and calmed down. “Right now, we’re the ones who should not reveal Nono’s background, before he has his own Mech, it’s far too dangerous.”
“Teacher, are you saying that some people might try to make a move?” Kaneer frowned deeply as well, his expression solemn. Evidently, some people are not so easy to deal with, or at least they would be a lot more troublesome than the ten-million-unit bounty on the Exterminet.
“It’s very likely, maybe they don’t want our party to get stronger. Even if they turn hostile, as long as no one knows, they still have nothing to fear.” Van Doe stood up and started walking around the room, pacing back and forth.
After a few minutes, he suddenly stopped.
“We cannot reveal Nono’s talent, just give him the status of a normal disciple. However…” He flipped his palm, and a translucent cube that looked like plastic appeared in his palm.
“Take this.”
He stuffed the translucent cube at Garen.
“This is…”
Garen accepted the cube. It looked just like a little palm-sized brick, and was slightly heavy, but it was not hard either. Instead, it was extremely soft, if he pinched it slightly, his finger would sink inside.
“Twinkling Cube,” said Van Doe solemnly. “I left an Inherited Level Willpower blade in there, it’s equivalent to Level Six without resonance, and you can use it three times. Against an opponent who isn’t Inherited Level, you can use this thing to turn the tables on them, it’s slightly weaker than a Level Five Two-Moons Level using all their power to activate a resonance skill. It’s enough to keep you safe.”
Garen nodded heavily. This thing was evidently very precious, or else Van Doe would not have considered for some time before taking it out. He could tell just by looking at his Senior Brother Kaneer’s expression of envy.
“Thank you, Teacher.”
“If it weren’t for the fact that this thing can only keep Willpower that strong… Sigh…” Van Doe let out a long breath. “Alright, now let’s test your condition.”
“How are you going to test?”
Before Garen even finished speaking, there was a blur in front of his eyes, and he was patted lightly on both his shoulders and his back, three times in all. With his reflex speed, he still could not keep up, and by the time he reacted, he had been hit three times.
He saw Van Doe reappear in front of him.
It was a very strange feeling. He could clearly feel that Teacher Van Doe had patted him three times, but no matter what he just could not pinpoint exactly when those three hits landed. It felt as though they were all completed at the same time, but when he thought about it carefully, it felt as though Van Doe just walked over, not too quickly or slowly, and just patted him three times casually.