Chapter 39: Vacation, Psychiatrist, and Lone Trip

Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations

Basic firearms: 100 credits

Basic military combat: 100 credits

Basic driving: 100 credits

Basic special combat: 200 credits

Basic special vehicles piloting: 200 credits

Basic tactical command: 300 credits

Luke pondered as he looked at the three abilities he couldn’t learn.

The three abilities unavailable to him required more credits. Perhaps these were high-level abilities?

But he already had more than 2,500 credits now. So, the restriction wasn’t due to the lack of credits, but perhaps because he didn’t meet certain conditions?

This super learning mode was only activated after he won a bet with Robert.

And if he wanted to learn new abilities, he had to defeat an opponent. So, did he have to defeat Robert again to unlock these abilities?

With that in mind, Luke spent the next few days betting with Robert.

He lost two rounds and won three of them.

He found that the restriction really was due to him not meeting certain conditions.

After an overall total of two victories in his bets with Robert, all the abilities became available to him.

Moreover, after spending 300 credits on basic firearms and basic special combat, all the abilities were still available for him to learn.

So the condition he had to meet was indeed to defeat Robert.

Also, it was likely that the condition was assigned a numerical value, and the ability was unlocked when that value was met.

This small test also helped Luke figure out how this so-called condition functioned.

When he made the bets with Robert, he found that if his total victories dropped to zero, all the abilities on the list would be blacked out.

Even the two abilities he had already purchased would be blacked out, and his body seemed to forget how to use them as well.

In other words, the moment he stopped meeting the “condition,” the abilities he got would stop working.

This entire thing felt like a video game.

It was similar to many video games in his previous life. For example, the equipment he already had would stop working if he suddenly stopped meeting the requirements for using them.

But Luke also discovered something that was different from video games.

After learning Robert’s basic firearms and basic special combat abilities, he still continued with his daily shooting practice.

When he practiced shooting after losing Robert’s ability, the results told him that he hadn’t exactly lost everything.

He only had Robert’s abilities for two days, and only used them in a brief two hours of shooting practice. In two sessions, his aim transformed from that of a complete newbie to a veteran.

From this, Luke concluded that if he practiced and used his opponents’ abilities while he had them, his own skills would still improve.

This was akin to a low-level character unlocking a temporary high-level skill. Even after the duration of use for the high-level skill passed, the experience and loot earned from using the skill to hunt monsters remained.

Even after losing Robert’s ability, Luke might still be able to retain that level of skill after a few months or years.

No wonder the super learning mode wasn’t called the super duplication mode. The core function of this mode was still to learn instead of copy. It helped Luke to learn and improve quickly.

After understanding everything, Luke became very excited.

He was a conservative person by nature, and he loved things that were truly his.

That included skills and abilities.

In a flash, it was the end of his third month in the force.

It was now that Luke applied to Robert for annual leave.

Technically, someone who had only started working for three months shouldn’t be taking annual leave. But Robert still agreed.

That was because Luke told him he needed to go on a trip to take his mind off the stress.

When Robert heard that, he stared at Luke for a long time before asking, “Do you want me to introduce you to a psychiatrist? I guarantee that it’s an excellent psychiatrist.”

Luke smiled. He understood what Robert meant. He was trying to assure Luke that the visit to the psychiatrist wouldn’t be logged in the system. After all, if there was a record of it, Luke would have to head over to Knox City to get a mental evaluation done.

Actually, he had already gone once after the battle. In fact, all the police officers involved in the shootout had gone as well.

But the mental evaluation showed that Luke’s mental condition was still perfectly normal.

Ultimately, with just a large rucksack over his shoulder, Luke got Selina to drop him off at the bus station. Traveling alone, he got on a Greyhound Bus and left town.

Luke headed south on the cheap Greyhound Bus, and when he arrived at his destination, he rented an old pickup truck. After buying some stuff, he headed for the border.

The border of Mexico and the United States was a stretch of land so wide that there wasn’t enough manpower to guard the entire length. Thus, the number of Latin Americans in Texas increased every year.

Currently, Caucasians only made up about 50 percent of Texas’s population. Latin Americans made up 30 percent of the population, African Americans 7 percent, and various others made up 10 percent.

And most of the Latin Americans were from Mexico.

Every year, a large number of Mexicans would enter the United States illegally in search of the so-called better life.

Mexico was too far from heaven and too close to the United States.

It was the largest source of drugs that circulated in the United States; in a few years, the war on drugs would begin as well.

At that time, the Mexican military and police would engage in a large-scale conflict with the drug cartels.

Similarly, the drug cartels would become increasingly vicious and even better at what they were doing.

The Carlos Family couldn’t be allowed to survive that long. The coming chaos would either destroy them or enable them to grow even stronger.

Luke drove the truck around, and after a while, he finally found a suitable location.

The truck sped through the desolate wilderness and arrived at a tall wire fence on the border.

Looking at the spikes on the fence, Luke scanned his surroundings for surveillance cameras.

It was impossible for the United States to install surveillance cameras all along the border. That would be a waste of resources.

Generally, surveillance cameras were only installed near roads or highways.

Luke was currently at the border in the middle of nowhere. Even illegal immigrants wouldn’t pass through here as they usually traveled in large numbers and required cars. Thus, they would usually travel where there were roads.

Of course, the odd illegal trespasser or so did still opt to travel through these desolate areas; it wasn’t as if the government could catch all of them anyway.

Luke removed the planks from the back of the truck and set up a platform which sloped from the back of the truck up to its roof.

He then opened his rucksack and took out a pair of odd items that looked like artificial limbs.

These were actually similar to stilts with springs on them, which he had put together himself.

He put them on, and after affixing them firmly to his feet, he stood up.

He warmed up as he tried running around the area in them, and also to test if they were working as intended.

When Luke was done with all his preparations, he stopped and adjusted his breathing.