Apocalypse Redux

Chapter 98: Training Mishaps

“Alright, ready?” the ‘ringmaster’ asked, getting nods from both Isaac and Yoo-jin, and then practically ran out of the room.

The whole mess with the asshole had been dealt with, he’d been banned from all Guild services, including the Dungeons themselves, for an unlimited amount of time, had to pay for the damages to the building and was currently explaining to the police just what had gone through his head when he’d pulled that stunt.

Initially, Sehan had claimed someone else had fed him a line about Isaac’s character but as it turned out, that person not only had absolutely no reason to do anything like that, they had also been Dungeon diving at the time in question.

At that point, it had become rather apparent that the whole thing had been arranged to happen the way they’d actually ended up unfolding, but the manipulation didn’t really absolve the idiot of anything. Now he was getting charged with terminal stupidity instead of assault … well, actually, terminal stupidity wasn’t a crime, so the official charge was still assault with a side helping of property damage and endangering the lives of others, but everyone knew the real problem with him was the fact that he was reckless and irresponsible.

So now, there was one less idiot with superpowers around, or at least one idiot who wouldn’t be growing any stronger for the foreseeable future. He couldn’t access Dungeons and given that summoning was very much illegal here, his growth would stagnate, leaving him falling further and further behind and into irrelevance.

At the end of the day, it hadn’t gone too badly, though. Handling that magnanimously and only holding the actual perpetrator accountable had earned them all a decent amount of goodwill and also impressed the need to watch out for high Level idiots, which could only be a good thing.

But neither Isaac or Yoo-jin was dealing with that directly anymore, they were in one of the building’s training rooms to spar with their [Auras], with a [Ringmaster] right outside to reinforce it to make sure this didn’t end with the ceiling falling on their head.

This was a [Class] that could seriously support the training efforts of the people affected, but didn’t come with many [Skills] that increased personal power, so the man had undoubtedly decided that ‘near them’ when their [Auras] went to work was a distinctly unhealthy place to be.

One moment, there were two people standing in front of each other, motionless. The next, clashing fields of energy ravaged the space between them, bitterly cold, artic winds clashing with the blood-drenched air of a battlefield, both wrapping around each other, clashing, withdrawing in places only to slam back together with renewed force elsewhere, over and over.

Yoo-jin’s [Aura] control had returned with a vengeance after maybe half an hour of practice and now, it burned with a terrible cold that, against any other opponent, would have practically guaranteed his victory, slowly yet inevitably wearing down his opponent until they were frozen in place, helpless.

Unfortunately for him, his opponent was Isaac, who was pushing forward with the same inevitability, not because it was a function of his [Aura], but by his own indomitable willpower. Attacks that bore down with all the weight and inevitability of a glacier were deflected and pushed to the side, while his own strikes carried with them the full power of an army.

The cold was affecting him somewhat, but even without the regenerative effect of his [Aura], Isaac would have been fine long enough to win this.

In the end, though, the match ended in a solid draw as the ground began to crumble under Isaac’s feet and he flung himself backwards, retreating all the way to the far wall, the mere brushing of his [Aura] against the ground reducing large parts of it to dust.

… oops.

In hindsight, it was obvious what had happened. Yoo-jin’s freshly enhanced [Aura] had dropped the temperate of the floor down into the double digits on the Kelvin scale of measurement and when Isaac had stepped onto a patch that hadn’t been shielded by his own [Aura], the tough, reinforced to the point of absurdity, floor of the training room had crumbled like a child’s sandcastle that a particularly assholish adult had decided to flatten. When he’d then jumped backwards, he’d flown over other spots that likewise hadn’t been shielded by his [Aura], likewise making it incredibly fragile and brittle.

The [Ringmaster] had tried to stop the fight at the first sign of trouble, but [Skills] that should have shut this whole affair down in a matter of milliseconds affected the pair of combatants about as much as a bee sting would affect a dragon. Thankfully though, the pair of them knew on their own that now was the time to stop.

“I don’t suppose you’ve got someone who’s able to fix this?” Isaac asked “One of my colleagues is a [Geomancer] and can repair any damage we do in seconds. I swear, he’s the only reason our pictures aren’t being used as dartboards by the maintenance staff.”

Yoo-jin just laughed “I do know someone like that, except he is the maintenance staff. And it isn’t pictures he throws darts at.”

“… ah, I see.” Isaac said. He did know people like that. They had the knowledge and skillset to be incredibly useful, but they were also very aware of where the line was and what not to do to cross it. They were demanding, criticized stupid actions and the like, never so much as putting a single toe across said line. But they were also oh so worth it, experts that could do the work of a hundred lesser people and still have enough time left over to tell cool stories or mentor the younger staff. In other words, a curmudgeon who’d earned the right to be a curmudgeon.

Besides, none of the people who’d had darts chucked at them would be in any real danger, given that they were able to damage a place this tough to such a degree as to actually piss off the maintenance guy.

“Well, the issue is that people with that [Skill]set are incredibly hard to Level.” Yoo-jin sighed.

The issue was rather clear, though. [Geomancers] and similar [Classes] excelled at fixing this kind of damage, but they were a stone cold pain in the ass to level when all you had available were Dungeons. After all, they were meant to manipulate existing earth and stone, but the Dungeons’ walls, floors and ceilings were flooded with their mana, making them incredibly difficult to manipulate. This made [Geomancers] practically useless in Dungeons and therefore, they were very difficult to properly level using them. And given that regular summoning was very much a no-go here, due to how easy it was to concentrate all the monsters, and therefore, the danger, into a handful of places using Dungeons.

“I wrote an essay on the uses of [Geomancers] and related [Classes] in military matters a while ago.” Isaac said “Maybe that could be used to convince the local officials to grant you an exception.”

“Maybe.” Yoo-jin sighed “They certainly don’t listen to me. They probably believe I’m exaggerating things to get more people with those [Skills] and making things up.”

“Bureaucracy is the same everywhere, isn’t it?” Isaac asked.

“Yep.” Yoo-jin said “But while we clearly can’t practice in here anymore, why don’t we go to a Dungeon and work in there?”

As he said that, he turned to the observation area “How about you guys, should we go together? We’ve got a new Dungeon with Tier 6 monsters I’d like to show you, Professor Kim.”