As his migraine-like headache slowly settled, Aven who had recovered his enthusiasm and quick wits picked up on clues he hadn’t seen before, like a large bruise on his left hand, a compress on his neck, a bandage around his right wrist

“What the hell did you do to my innocent body while I was sleeping?!” Exclaiming at all those shocking clues, he used the towel to apply pressure onto his nose to stop the bleeding.

“Experiments obviously,” shamelessly admitting to his guilt, Rival closed his laptop as he seemed prepared to leave at any moment, “I’ll send you the data later, not that there’s anything extraordinary about them. You're essentially a comatose person when you’re claiming knowledge.”

“Okay,” taking this intel in stride, he stored it somewhere in his burning brain as more and more knowledge became accessible to him, “I have so much more understanding and knowledge on missiles, bombs, grenades, landmines, warheads, shells, and everything related to the ammunition engineering field now… It’s crazy.”

Bringing him back to Green was Rival, as always, “Even if you can now produce perfect missiles and bombs, they’re not part of an industry that needs you to help them. Plenty of other production tech supers are already on them.”

“Yeah,” Aven quickly admitted, followed by some tempering, “But I really had no idea an advanced-level knowledge would contain so much… I think… I think I’m totally capable of giving my energy enough efficiency to keep a whole production line working with even a surplus.”

“That’s something you’ll tell us later then, now I need to be somewhere else,” packing up in an instant and cleaning behind him, Rival left without turning back.

His abrupt departure didn’t shock anyone, neither his lifelong friend and rival Commander, nor his new young production tech super investment Aven.

“I also have things to do,” standing up, the white-haired old man voiced out his imminent next action, “Rival already warned you, but now that your potential will start to show, you’ll receive the visit of someone very soon, so don’t be startled, he would never hurt a fly.”

Leaving behind these words, Commander followed in his rival’s steps and left the meeting room, though he relatively didn’t clean as much before departing.

Left with no one but himself, Aven decided to first check something he seemed to be completely sure about but for no reason at all.

Aven Amias

Faction: Nation of Eland Military

Energy Grade: 2

Energy Cultivation: 101/1 000

Energy Affinity: Tech

Physical Talents: None

Energy Talents: Basic Tech Energy Affinity, Basic Energy Sense

Spiritual Talents: Inquisitive Spirit, Intermediate Knowledge Integration

Universal Talents: Unawakened Fairy Ancestry

“So it reached intermediate just with a single advanced knowledge…” Confirming his somewhat innate understanding about something that had happened during his sleep, he wished for a description of this upgraded spiritual talent to be displayed.

And his wish was answered instantly.

Intermediate Knowledge Integration: Following a continuous and intense exposure to massive amounts of knowledge, your spirit has naturally adapted your brain configuration to optimize your access to it. Slightly increases your knowledge access speed.

“Slightly… Slightly…? Isn’t it…?” Musing for a moment, Aven remembered that he had another talent that included the term “Slightly” in it, so he brought it up to confirm.

Inquisitive Spirit: Your curiosity cannot be satisfied by merely simple observations, and your spirit naturally seeks understanding of what it doesn’t understand. Slightly increases the speed at which you understand anything you’re curious about or interested in.

“Huhu~” Keeping to himself his deduction concerning what his knowledge access speed now being "slightly" increased meant when he already knew the terms "minimally" and "moderately", he simply nodded wisely to himself before moving on.

And moving on meant standing up, drinking some water, putting on his headphones, infusing them, and entering the production area to start heating up all the machines making up the H9 production line.

‘If before I could only apply enough knowledge to bring the final tech-production enhancement to slightly less than 25%, then now… Even if my skill at correctly applying my knowledge hasn’t increased, the amount I have and the speed at which I access it should be enough to increase the lower limit by… A lot. Yes. A lot. Relatively.’

Focusing on the later machines, the ones actually responsible for making what the knowledge he had acquired was all about, ammunition, he carefully infused his energy and newly acquired much grander knowledge of them.

As for the earlier production machines, only the ore refiners were really left in an awkward spot as ammunition engineering had still included a consequent amount of associated alloy and chemical knowledge with it.

Once he was done with infusing everything, he noted an obvious difference between the energy he had expended now compared to before he had acquired his new advanced knowledge.

Such a notable difference could only have 1 explanation, and it certainly wasn’t that he had decided to only infuse a small bit of energy into each machine.

Even if it spoiled a bit the answer as to whether his new massively expanded knowledge base about the ammunition industry had increased his energy efficiency or not despite his knowledge application still being lackluster for a production tech super, he was satisfied enough to not even notice it.

With nothing else to worry about, he made sure he had accepted the volunteering quest again and started the H9 production line.

Going outside as the whole production area started becoming alive with the repetitive movements of conveyor belts, Aven was welcomed by a White-less sky as the night had already fallen.

“My circadian cycle is broken again, what a misery, sigh…” Melodramatically sighing, he couldn’t help a smirk from appearing on his face. The reason his circadian cycle had been completely shifted was a damn good reason after all.

Admiring the night scenery of Blackdale IMC, with nearly every building still being lit up in both the super-restricted he was in and the normal area, for a good 5 minutes, he finally had breathed in enough “fresh” air and got back inside his abode.

There, the first H9 ammunition had already started exiting the final infused machine and passed through the quality control machine before being stored in safe boxes that automatically filled a grand hall without any need for human intervention.

Touching the cartridge assembly machine, the machine with the greatest energy upkeep by far, and also the one literally setting the pace for how regularly he needed to come back to fill it back and the rest “on the way”, he evaluated that from the previous 30 minutes, he would maybe now have to come back only every 45 minutes or so.

Picking a few H9 ammo that freshly got out of the quality control machine, he headed toward the shooting range, unable to contain his excitement anymore.

And so he prematurely started a shooting test.

As for the result?

35%, purely and simply.

…

“So, hu… Both Rival and Commander told me about you potentially coming to meet me while obscuring the reason behind it, but… Aren’t you a bit too fast?” Asking the young-looking green-haired stranger who had intruded into his abode’s meeting room in the middle of the night, Aven decreased the volume of the background music.

Smiling amiably at him, the green-haired man confirmed his suspicion a moment later, “I could have come much earlier, but in the end I didn’t until now because I felt like it.”

“Well… What can I help you with?” Not shy with strangers in general, not even higher grade supers, Aven went straight to the point, ignoring the weird answer in passing.

Taking a seat for himself, the young-looking man started introducing himself, “I’m Drayce, and I’m just here to get to know you.”

“Is it to make your innate ability work?” Letting his curiosity free, Aven didn’t put a barrier to his thoughts and directly asked what first came to his mind before politely introducing himself too, “I’m Aven, a soon-to-be 2-months old super, and a future… Very important person, I don’t think society has a name for my future position yet, I’ll have to create it when I reach it.”

“Happy to meet you, Aven,” keeping the same smile, Drayce took a bit more time before continuing to talk, “Yes, discussing casually about lots of different things helps my innate ability.”

“And what does it do? Or maybe you want an exchange? I tell you mine and you tell me yours?” Proactively taking charge of the conversation as it didn’t seem like his conversation partner wanted to take this position, he started leading the flow.

Same as before however, Drayce didn’t answer for an awkward few seconds, “My innate ability gives me guesses.”

“Guesses? Why would they be so obscure about you if that’s all you have? Are your guesses maybe overpowered? Is it related to why you’re taking your time to answer? Like, you’re waiting for your guesses to optimize your answers?” Coming up with tons of questions in an instant, Aven wasn’t surprised when this time Drayce narrowed his eyes slightly.

“It’s your turn,” he answered without waiting this time.

“Oh, that’s right,” Aven looked a bit embarrassed at having forgotten what he had himself suggested, “But can’t someone of your authority directly access my file if you’re interested? Anyway, the first facet of my innate ability is to be able to appraise people, getting their name and faction.”

“Eland’s highest sphere of power is the royal family, and they’re the one leading the super community, so I can’t access your file directly without their agreement,” he clarified, “And getting them to give me your file is not worth it, it takes too long, and it’s a bother as well.”

“Ah~ Yeah, that explains why my mentors didn’t know about me,” realization dawned on his face and he linked a few facts, “Does it mean that maybe Major General Lainesy didn’t have access to my whole file when I first met him? Only a report?”

“Most certainly,” he helpfully confirmed before going back to the main exchange, “My guesses allow me to make irrational deductions that are as often true as they are wrong. And lately, I had a very bad streak of bad guesses related to the global situation.”

“Seems dope,” Aven gave his raw first impression, “So, you’re here because you got a guess related to me? Or you already had one but only a few hours ago did it explode or something like that?”

Contemplating for a few seconds, most probably to feel his innate ability at work from what Aven understood, Drayce finally answered, “No.”

“A shame,” acting like he had taken a great blow to his ego, Aven tried to beg for some flattering, “I would certainly feel flattered if it was something like ‘ultra genius you need to meet before he starts his ascension’, can’t you make up a lie for me?”

But even that was denied, “You would need to show your capabilities much more for me to guess something like that, it has never happened by the way if you’re curious.”

“Curious? How do you know I’m curious? Did you guess that?” Taking it a bit too far, he tried to find if the man before him was okay with something like that.

“I certainly could,” and he responded positively, not like an unfeeling robot only answering to his innate ability.

“My turn then. If I contribute to my faction, I can redeem rewards from it, including knowledge,” skipping the beating around the bush stage, Aven went directly to the main core of his innate ability, “And as summarized and short as it appears to be, I won’t explain deeper than that because beyond that is set aside for only friends.”

Then he added with a bright smile, “If you want to enter this category by the way, then I’m open.”

“That’s acceptable,” ambiguously accepting what Aven had said, Drayce didn’t specify whether he was accepting the friend part or the end of his innate ability description part before lapsing into silence again, followed by a surprising clarification half a minute later, “Both are acceptable, if you want to become friends then I would really like to do so.”

“Hoho~ Well, if you need me for anything then, don’t hesitate to ask me. The opposite is also true, but I don’t really need anything right now. Or maybe…? Can you guess what I want?” Going on a tangent as soon as an opportunity showed itself, the curious young man tested.

“I can try,” once again going silent for a few tens of seconds, Drayce ultimately gave his answer, “You want more information about the current global situation.”

“Woah~” Aven wowed instantly before standing up, “Well, and what can you tell me about it? Let me serve you the most amazing drink I have in this humble abode of mine.”

Fetching a few sodas, fruit juices, iced teas, and a few glasses, he put everything on the table and served Drayce a few glasses of everything, “One drink is too common, right? Just enjoy.”

“If you really want to enjoy yourself drinking, then you should seek tech-produced or martial-produced beverages,” supplying him with a bit of info he had never considered before, the green-haired grade 3 super took one glass and sipped on it a bit before putting it down, expressionless.

“Does that mean… I can…?” Inspired, even enlightened, Aven took a glass of orange soda and tried to infuse his energy inside.

And weirdly enough, his infused energy wasn’t totally accepted, but also wasn’t totally rejected, and the rejected part felt weird, as if it had worked, but didn’t at the same time.

Taking a sip, his eyes opened wide.

“Hehe~” A creepy laugh escaped Drayce’s seemingly fixed smiling face, “Young supers like you can really brighten the days of old guys like me. As for news about the global situation, what else can I say but that even the succession war happening in Emma is gradually being overshadowed by a most certain abomination surge in the Forbidden Continent?”

“Really? Well, that’s good news for me, my innate ability will work better the moment the military starts asking more of the ammunition industry,” unveiling a small secret intricacy of his, Aven felt beholden to this man who had told him about a new energy application he hadn’t thought of before.

Going silent again, guesses and all that, he ended up saying something else, “You shouldn’t wait for your mentors to tell you to switch to another building. Anti-abomination ammunition production lines are in another area.”

“Thanks for the tip,” not dwelling on it too much, he just set up an alarm on his phone for later to remind him to visit, at the same time, he saw that soon he would have to go infuse his energy again, “I’ve got like 5 minutes left before I need to go clear the energy upkeep of the machines, just saying.”

“Then I think it’s time for me to depart,” not drinking anything more, Drayce just stood up, “Should we exchange our numbers? If I get any guesses concerning the global situation, then I’ll send them to you if they're relevant.”

“How could I refuse such a deal?” Happily sharing his number and receiving a new one in exchange, the two then bid goodbye and went on their own way.

As Aven started taking samples of everything after he was left alone, he only had one thought concerning this encounter.

‘What a weirdo, maybe even above me!’

…

After 5 hours had passed since he had turned on the whole H9 production line, his remaining energy was still far from hitting its critical threshold, so he decided that before reworking his established 5-hours session cycle, he would take the chance to visit what had a great chance of becoming his workplace.

Riding on his bike, he cut through the temperate early-summer night air. Without him knowing, summer had arrived, but for the first time in his life, he wasn’t living through it as a student.

Other than noticing this fact, however, this didn’t make him reflect more than that. It wasn’t like him having become a super and reaching his current position as an official engineer in less than 2 months was anything abnormal… Or maybe it was? A bit?

Far from becoming overconfident though, Aven realized that the world didn’t seem set on letting him grow in peace, so he quickly arrived at the dozens of buildings that were indicated on the map as being anti-abomination production places.

As he had already visited them before during his whole Blackdale IMC tour, he didn’t deviate and found them without needing to correct his itinerary.

As he had expected but wished he had been wrong, the whole place was intensely lit up and was swarming with life.

‘And it’s the super-restricted area, meaning the equivalent of this place in the normal area must be…’

Assuming the worst, he entered the biggest building while starting to access his advanced ammunition engineering knowledge that told him everything he needed to know about how anti-abomination bullets were made.

Using stairs, he climbed up to the observation level allowing him to see through the entire massive production area sheltered by this building.

‘The acid production is there, the alloy making is there, that one is… A bombardment shell line, yes. That one is an anti motherfreaking big abomination ammo line…’

Recognizing everything effortlessly, Aven took out his notepad and started evaluating what he was seeing without needing to read the guidebook anymore. His knowledge was enough now, it was even above what was strictly necessary.

When he was done with this first building, he changed to the next one.

“Ho! Hypersonic missile line! Still as freakingly amazing sounding!” Remembering his first visit here, his lively eyes went over every single piece of machinery, enjoying this peak anti-abomination weapon production line while not hesitating to act his part as an excited young man.

And when he was done with this next building, he moved to a third one.

Over the course of a few hours, enough for his energy to naturally recover to its peak without actively trying to regenerate it, he appraised every building that produced anti-abomination ammunition, forming his own thoughts and opinion on where he would be the most effective if the military was to launch a call for a massive focus on them.

With that out of the way, he returned to his assigned production building and began reconsidering the AR7.62 and SR12.7 production lines.

‘I think… I should turn them on while I still can.’