Saydaa let out a yelp as she hit the floor. She quickly shot up, glancing around.

This wasn’t her bed.

She groaned and rubbed her head.

And then the lights turned on.

She was lying on the floor of the sparring room somehow, the other members of the team lying around her. Except for Elise who was already standing up in combat mode. Saydaa grit her teeth and pulled up her power from within her…

And then Elise lowered her arms and her helmet receded.

“Wakey, wakey, ya little brats.”

Saydaa turned towards the voice. Xiong Huang was standing over them, arms crossed.

“Welcome to training. Aka the excuse for me to beat children to my heart’s content, at any point of the day I feel like it. And guess what? Since I’m doing this for free, I’m going to put my whole heart into it.”

Xiong Huang grinned at the groaning teens as she took a stance, gripping her hands into fists.

“Now stand up and get your beatings.”

Saydaa quickly closed her eyes and lay on the ground, trying to roll behind one of the others. S-She was asleep. She would just let Elise go first…that’s all…

She found herself floating in the air, Xiong Huang lifting her by the back of her shirt.

“I see we have our first volunteer.”

Xiong Huang sneered as Saydaa’s eyes widened and trembled.

Back in his room Bob groaned as he was stirred from his slumber. Screams rang all throughout the facility. He sat up for a second, processed what he was hearing, then lay back in bed while grabbing some earplugs.

“Evil cultivators are so annoying.”

Saydaa stood in a small training room. Xiong Huang sat on a chair in front of her, stifling a yawn.

“Now, magic girl, bring up your power.”

Saydaa nodded and held her hands in front of her. Her eyes began to glow…

SLAP!

The glow immediately faded as her head swung to the side.

“What the heck was that for?!”

SLAP! SLAP! SLAP! SLAP!

“First, for talking back to the Mistress. Second, for failing to thank the Mistress for trading pointers with you. Third because I felt like it.”

“You jerk!”

SLAP! SLAP! SLAP!

“Stop that!”

SLAP! SLAP! SLAP!

“I mean it!”

SLAP! SLAP! SLAP!

Saydaa glared at her with a swollen face. Xiong Huang simply smiled and held up her palm.

“I can do this all day, can you?”

Saydaa grit her teeth, barely holding in a scream. But she forced the words through her mouth.

“...Thank…you…Mistress…”

“What for?”

“For…trading….pointers…”

“With this unworthy peon.”

“...”

Xiong Huang raised her hand.

“With…this…unworthy…peon.”

“Better. Still would be kicked out of my sect but that’s what you get with a street rat like you. No manners whatsoever. Now, this Mistress shall be generous and explain her lesson, since you are too stupid to understand it yourself.”

Xiong Huang grinned as Saydaa’s face scrunched up.

“Control, and focus. You have neither. And since I don’t have decades to train you the right way, we’re taking shortcuts. Which means instead of hours of meditation to move tiny bits of your energy, I’m graciously allowing you to haphazardly move all of it. And then training your focus by distracting you. However I happen to feel like. It means you’ll always be shoddy and dumb but that’s already true. Now, show me your power.”

Saydaa winced, closing her eyes. She slowly began to draw out her power.

SLAP!

Xiong Huang and Arvid stood outside. She pointed to the ground.

“Sword.”

Arvid raised an eyebrow.

“This is the legacy of my forefathers, I cannot simply…”

SLAP!

“I won’t repeat myself.”

Arvid rubbed his cheek but lay his greatsword on the ground to the side. Xiong Huang tossed him a stick.

“You need to learn how to fight.”

“I know how to fight, a thousand years of my line dwells within me.”

“No. Your ancestors know how to fight. You on the other hand, don’t know crap. You’re a machine working off a program. Worse, actually, because we have one of those and she’s actually adapting her programs. Now come at me. And do not call upon your ancestors, or I will beat you for fun. Or more accurately, I’ll stop pretending not to.”

Arvid frowned, and gripped the stick as he would his sword. He let out a yell and rushed forward.

And promptly found himself in the dirt. He coughed out some dirt as he stood back up.

“And that’s why we do this outside. Just something satisfying about knocking people into the literal dust. Now come on. We’re doing this until you know how to fight or I’m satisfied, and we know you’re not learning how to fight anytime soon.”

CLANG!

The palm struck Elise’s face. She simply turned her head back, no expression on her face. Xiong Huang frowned.

“It’s not as fun if you don’t react.”

“Query: Is this a combat simulation, Mistress Xiong Huang? Should this unworthy unit attempt a counterattack?”

Xiong Huang sighed.

“Let’s just get this over with. You can drop the excessive groveling, it’s just annoying when you do it.”

“Acknowledgement: Understood, Mistress Xiong Huang. Updating communication preferences.”

“Now, how much of your AI can you disable?”

“Answer: The techno-organic interface is necessary for cybernetic components to function, all other protocols are theoretically optional, though minimum operational effectiveness will not be possible in that case.”

“Good, disable all of them.”

Elise stood still for a moment. Her human eye blinked a few times, looking down at her hands, then up at Xiong Huang. She opened her mouth for a few seconds, and then spoke.

“Status…Report: All...extraneous protocols are disabled.”

“Good, now prepare to be beaten.”

Elise blinked a few times.

“...Acknowledgement: Re-enabling combat…”

“Leave everything disabled.”

“...Confused…Query? Mistress Xiong Huang…how will this unit engage without combat protocols?”

“That is the point. Right now you are entirely reliant on preexisting protocols. That means you are rigid, and slow to adapt to any situation you haven’t prepared for. Correct?”

Elise stared into the air for a few seconds before slowly nodding.

“Affirmation: Review...of combat data...suggests that is the case.”

“That’s fine for a machine. But you’re not just a machine, are you? Isn’t that the whole point?”

Elise nodded.

“Affirmation: Retaining...organic creativity and...adaptability is a primary goal of the NSLICE program.”

“Then we need to train that organic side to make decisions. So that you can select the right protocols more quickly and efficiently and handle situations you don’t have a protocol for. Now come at me.”

“Acknowledgment: Understood. Elise…engaging?”

Elise held up her hand. She stood there, blinking for a few seconds, before her hand slowly transformed into machine gun mode. It swayed around in the air for a bit until Elise reached over and held her arm with her other hand.

“En..gaging…”

She stood still for a moment, and then the machine gun began to fire.

Bullets flew everywhere around the room as the recoil sent Elise’s arm flailing. Xiong Huang let out a sigh.

Xiong Huang and Kiyosuke stood in a sparring room, facing each other.

SLAP!

Xiong Huang sent him to the ground, Kiyosuke gritting his teeth.

“I’ll be honest. I hate you. I hate the very idea of you. If it weren’t for my deal with your new boss, I would have killed you. In the slowest, and most painful manner possible. You want to know why? Because you remind me of the guy who killed everyone I knew and your very existence fills me with rage. I’m sure you can understand that feeling, can’t you?”

Xiong Huang placed hand on Kiyosuke’s head, pushing him back into the ground.

“But do you know the difference between you and I? I have control. I mastered my anger and hate, and formed it into a deadly weapon that serves me. I control it, and wield it at my will, and I never let it make my decisions for me. Which is why I allow you to existing when every fiber of my being wants to end you. You, on the other hand? You’re no more than an enraged beast, indulging in your anger, letting your hate run you off a cliff. A beast that exists solely to be hunted.”

“So lucky you, I’m going to control my hate today. And instead of killing you like you deserve, I’m going to teach you the secrets of mastering hatred. The exact same way my father taught me: by beating it into you until you collapse, and then some. And I will enjoy every minute of it, and make you suffer for as long as I possibly can. I will tell you it’s so you can experience the full extent of anger and hate and still retain control of yourself, but that’s a lie. I’m going to hurt you because I enjoy hurting you. You want it to stop? Then stop me, or control yourself until it’s no longer fun for me. And you’re a thousand years too young to have a chance of stopping me.”

Xiong Huang released him and took a few steps back.

“Now get up, and try not to learn too quickly. I want to enjoy this.”

Kiyosuke grit his teeth as he rose to his feet. For his revenge...he would endure anything.

Arvid charged at Xiong Huang from the front, while Kiyosuke and Nana appeared behind her. Elise and Saydaa stood in the back, hands glowing purple and red. Saydaa made a mischievous smile.

A gust of wind blew past Kiyosuke’s feet, tripping him and sending him spiraling into Xiong Huang.

Xiong Huang let out a shout and all the teens were knocked to the ground. She immediately stood over Saydaa, arms crossed.

“What was that?”

“Supporting fire. You know, sometimes it’s hard to aim, with the lack of control and all.”

SLAP!

“What was that?”

“...”

SLAP!

“What was that?”

Saydaa looked to the side, mumbling under her mouth.

“...just a little payback…”

Xiong Huang slammed the girl into the ground, lowering her head to look Saydaa in the eye.

“No. That was stupidity. Taking every opportunity to exact petty revenge? Fine. Stabbing your comrade in the back in the midst of a fight? Unimaginative, but effective. Sabotaging a group attack on a superior opponent who’s still alive? Sheer stupidity like I’ve never seen, because everyone dumb enough to try it doesn’t make it home. And since you have these stupid urges, I’m now going to teach your body what will happen if you try that crap in the real world, so that if your idiotic brain can't make a decent decision, at least your body will avoid it on reflex.”

“I-I’m sorry.”

“The dead don’t get to apologize.”

For the rest of the day, Saydaa’s screams could be heard throughout the facility.

Bob calmly sipped from his mug as he read from a newspaper. Across from him, Cikizwa raised an eyebrow.

“...that seems like a lot of screaming, even for boot-camp. Are you sure this is a good idea?”

Bob shrugged.

“You want to train hormone-filled WMDs? Even regular teenagers are annoying.”

“Fair enough. I just hope there will be something left of them by the end.”

“If they can’t handle this, they’re not useful to us.”

“Says the guy who keeps glancing at the live feed from the cyborg.”

“...”

Bob quietly put away his phone.

“...if you’re worried about them…maybe you’d to try it out yourself?”

“Oh would you look at the time! Sorry, Bob, but I have that…thing…you know. I’ll, uh, report in later.”

“...”

“I’m sorry, please forgive me.”

“...Fine.”

Cikizwa wiped the sweat from her brow as Bob went back to his ‘newspaper reading.’ She shook her head.

Sensitive bosses are so annoying.