Following his gut instinct after what Drayce had told him about the global situation, or more particularly the situation of the Forbidden Continent, Aven decided to turn on the AR7.62 and SR12.7 production lines for no other reason but to try his hand at different things.

Unexpectedly, as if the fact that he had claimed an advanced knowledge was nothing amazing, Commander and Rival didn’t come to visit him for the next 4 days, allowing him free reign to try anything he wanted.

Over these 4 days, he decided early on, during the first day, to reschedule his alternative 4 and 3-sessions day into a universal 3-sessions day, but with each session being prolonged to be 6 hours long instead of 5 hours, making him volunteer his energy for 18 hours a day.

Even with this intensive-looking schedule, however, he only needed to take half an hour of break between every session to regenerate enough energy to start another cycle.

And with each passing day, he had continued gaining a bit more efficiency here and there, quickly bringing his 35% average ammunition enhancement to 38% at the end of the 4th day.

The only explanation he found to explain this quick increase was that his intermediate knowledge integration talent was somehow helping him apply his knowledge without his true skill at it increasing.

All that didn’t really matter to him though as this talent was a part of him, it was his base state now, not a temporary one.

And it reflected pretty positively on his daily FCP gains too.

On the day he woke up with a massively expanded knowledge base, his gain rose as high as 37 800 FCP, a very motivation-boosting gain considering he had wasted a bit of his time by diversifying his energy investment into totally new machines he was not used to working with.

Most notable of all was the SR12.7 production line. It was far different from the H9 one and the demands for it were different. His only saving grace was that even if it was an SR12.7 ammunition production line, it wasn’t an advanced one that incorporated double-base propellant or advanced bullet heads.

At the end of the 2nd day, he had gained an additional 38 880 FCP, and on the 3rd, he had gained 39 960 FCP.

Finally, as he wrapped up his 4th day after testing all sorts of ammunition from the 3 production lines, he accepted his reward.

‘Claim.’

Faction Contribution Quest: Nation of Eland Military

Volunteering: Contribute to the stability of your faction without asking for anything in return. The more time spent and the harder the tasks, the greater the contribution.

Reward: 41 040 FCP

“That brings me to…” Keeping his last word in suspension, he brought up his shop.

Faction Contribution Shop: Nation of Eland Military

Faction Authority: Second Lieutenant

Faction Contribution Points: 163 730

…

Knowledge: Advanced Developmental Engineering (450 300 FCP)

…

Perfected Evolution Elixir (670 000 FCP): An elixir refined with the topmost human and super biology knowledge available. Gives the drinker a deep and forceful DNA wash, allowing previously hidden physical talents to emerge. Only works one time and is not guaranteed to make a talent manifest itself.

Energy Growth Wonder Flower (780 000 FCP): A flower only found in nature in extremely luxuriant environments with growth conditions not yet understood. Awaken any life that eats it while also giving it the natural energy growth energy talent.

Tireless Apple (810 000 FCP): An apple that grows every decade from a tireless tree in good condition. Gives the eater the tireless spirit spiritual talent, a talent that can grow the more it is used.

…

Self Revolving Energy Mutation Elixir (1 460 000 FCP): An elixir created through an ancient rainbow fairy formula with most of its ingredients being extremely difficult to gather. Gives the self revolving energy energy talent to anyone consuming it.

Inexhaustible Body Mutation Serum (1 630 000 FCP): A serum made from both rare beasts and humans who had this physical talent before dying. Gives the consumer the inexhaustible body physical talent.

Basic Energy Furnace Constitution Mutation Elixir (1 850 000 FCP): An elixir made through an extremely difficult process that cannot be fully controlled due to the need to add mixed-origin blood and organs from life already having such a constitution. Gives the consumer the energy furnace cells physical talent.

“163 000, still a bit away from what Rival has planned for me to get~” Commenting on his situation, he found his next knowledge amidst the endless list.

Knowledge: Advanced Chemical Engineering (238 200 FCP)

This knowledge was previously priced at 243 000 FCP, but the advanced ammunition one had included a lot of parts that touched upon chemicals, telling a lot about how linked the two fields were.

“Anyway, it’s only 2 days before I get to it, what could possibly happen in between?” Jinxing himself as hard as he could with great hope for the future, he happily turned off the lights of the building as he finally left.

…

‘Someone is here?’

Arriving back at his assigned production building following a normal “night” of sleep, the first thing Aven saw was the presence of someone chilling at the main entrance.

Stopping his bike not far, he got down and quickly saw that the guy before him was a major, 3 military ranks above him, and it didn’t look like an honorary insignia at all, it was the real deal.

“Good afternoon, sir! Were you expecting me?” Saluting, Aven started inquiring about the occasion.

“Official Engineer Aven Amias, orders for you have come from above,” returning a neither soft nor firm salute, the chill major took on a document from one of his pockets.

“Yes, sir! I’m all ears!” Adding another layer, the easily excitable young man kept his saluting position.

“At rest, I’m only a messenger in this situation, not an officer, and every super must receive their orders directly, it’s protocol,” giving him a sloppy-sounding reason, the man unfolded the documents, which turned out to be 2 identical ones, and gave one of them to him.

Once the man saw him start reading, he gave the summarized version he had already prepared, “From henceforth, you’re asked to engage in active contribution to the anti-abomination ammunition industry with all your capabilities. In exchange for your service, Eland will provide grade 2 cultivation trinities.”

“Huhu…” A bit absent-minded, Aven took a bit of time before connecting the dots with a certain event that happened 4 days ago, then he pushed it to the border of his mind and refocused on the present, “Where do I need to go to say I’m going to be volunteering?”

The chill major smirked at that and took out another document, handing it to him lightly, “Well, you don’t need to go anywhere, but the reverse is true. If you want compensation, you need to go to the central administration and ask for it.”

“Okay~ Is that it?” Satisfied with this custom-made order, he fetched his phone and asked if there was anything else.

“Nothing, no. Thanks for having a wrecked sleep cycle, by the way. It gave me a break I really wanted and needed,” leaving these words behind, he got in his small jeep and turned it on, departing almost instantly.

Waving politely, Aven had already written a message to Commander, Rival, and Drayce, asking what was happening.

His curiosity was burning, and his inquisitive spirit was asking for answers.

Reading the document containing his new order, he confirmed the man that had just left hadn’t been lying and returned to where he had gotten off his bike.

Jumping on it, he pushed the pedals and arrived at the area he had scouted merely 4 days ago after Drayce had told him about one of his “guesses”, except this time he observed that the area was even more swarming with trucks and personnel alike than before.

“Oh, freak…” By far one of the most shocking sights he had seen, above even the impromptu military raid he had seen in the industrial area of Blackdale, he picked up his phone again and saw that he had 3 unread messages sent while he was riding.

[Commander: Just go with the flow. I’m being transferred to the Forbidden Continent so we’ll not meet again for a few months or years if the surge is long-lasting enough.]

[Rival: Adapt. Ask me if you have huge doubts concerning continuing to follow your development plan.]

[Drayce: I think my guess back then was a bit too much on point. It’s been proven just yesterday that an abomination surge in the Forbidden Continent is imminent, and not just on the Vow’s side, but everywhere, so pretty much every power is preparing. But you know there’s a problem, right? *Wink*.]

‘When the senescence stage is over with, does a super go back to being young-minded?’

Asking himself this question, he absorbed all the hints contained in those 3 messages and headed towards the most appropriate building according to what he had scouted 4 days prior.

And same as all the area he was in and beyond it, people and transport trucks were swarming around it and inside it.

Calculating an itinerary in an instant, he reached one of the main entrances of this building and interrupted a passing logistician, “Where’s the tech super’s manager of this production building?”

“Last I heard she was resting in the 7th meeting room.”

“Okay, thanks,” not dilly-dallying, he thanked him and moved on towards the side of the building that wasn’t a gigantic open hall.

Locating the 7th meeting room was easier than expected as it was the room with the most people waiting before it, seemingly blocked before it.

Approaching, he asked the first guy that looked at him, “Is the tech super’s manager of this building here?”

“You need to wait for your turn,” without asking for more details, the guy denied him.

“Does being a production tech super give me priority access?” Showing his order document, Aven inquired curiously without appearing impatient.

“He!” The guy appeared shocked, then hurriedly apologized before moving out of the way, “You can go on, sir!”

“Thanks~” Breaking through the wall of people wanting to meet the person he himself wanted to meet, he eventually was stopped by scary-looking bodyguards at the door.

“I need to be informed of which production lines need to be infused in priority to not conflict with others,” handing over his order document, Aven appeared inoffensive with his polite social smile and casual attitude totally contrasting with the general mood.

One of the bodyguards took it and nodded half a minute later as he gave it back, opening the door with only a single comment, “You’re clear.”

Looking back for no reason, Aven saw that the waiting people gave him pretty heavy stink eyes, so he hurriedly turned back with a snap and looked forward as he entered the 7th meeting room.

Inside, it looked, and surely was, a totally normal meeting room, but there were 2 people already discussing that didn’t look like they had expected someone to enter, so they were looking at him with raised eyebrows.

“I’m a production tech super,” he quickly announced as he looked straight into the woman’s tired eyes, “I need to know which machines I can infuse without conflicting with others.”

Standing up under the defeated eyes of the man that was previously talking to her, the woman went to collect a pile of documents from one of the only desks that looked relatively too organized amidst the chaotic others which consisted only of piles of papers without any distinction between them.

Approaching him, she expressionlessly gave him the pile before giving a bit of context, “Follow the order introduced by the page numbers, and I can assure you there’s no risk of you ending in conflict with others. Good luck.”

“Yes, ma’am!” Saluting, he backed away and left through the door less than a minute after entering, under the confused eyes of the still waiting people.

Ignoring everyone and everything, he entered an adjacent meeting room that was paradoxically empty, put down his backpack in a corner, put on his headphones, infused them with his grade 2 energy, and started blasting music to completely cut himself from the world as he began reading through the pile of documents he had been given.

If someone was to have seen him, they would have been shocked by his apparent professionalism and dignified appearance now that he was seriously going through the whole pile.

What others saw of him at first was only his young age, after all, his facial hair hadn’t finished spreading, and he didn’t look in great physical military form no matter the point of view.

All in all, he was the perfect picture of a young engineer who should have just graduated from school.

Inside, however, even if it was involuntary on his part, the knowledge he had gathered made up for his lack of maturity and experience from being new to his position.

By claiming knowledge he, unfortunately, didn’t gain the life experience that others would have acquired with it, but once he combined it with his outgoing personality and nascent ambition, his knowledge transformed into confidence in being able to assume a much higher position than he was put on.

Aven didn’t think he was overconfident or arrogant, but he didn’t go out of his way to try and stop these feelings that felt like those assumedly bad personality traits.

Eventually going through the whole pile of a few dozen pages in 20 minutes, he carried his backpack with him as he went on to search for rooms that were super-restricted according to what he had just read.

Finding them quickly, he chose one randomly.

And it was empty.

“Well~ I feel a little lonely there,” he admitted unimpressed.

Storing his backpack on the central table of this room, he took his notepad and document pile out of it and brought them with him as he got out, this time to really do his job.

Entering the production area, the first thing he did was climb up to the overview floor, a simple metal balcony surrounding the whole thing and allowing for easy access to all the vents and industrial grapples used to transport important quantities of melted metal or alloy.

Localizing where each production line and machines he needed to infuse were in a few minutes, he put them to memory and got down before heading towards the first machine he needed to infuse: The final machine of an advanced AAC30CH production line, a cartridge assembly and sealing machine.

“Autocannon 30mm with special acid chemical infused core and triple-base propellant with compartmentalized injection head…” Reciting what he was infusing as if it was a holy gospel, internally he was shocked that the ammunition he would end up tech-producing would be consumed at a rate from 100 to 10 000 rounds per minute depending on the need for firepower.

As soon as he started his infusion, a blue and white led brightly turned on and staff, upon confirming it wasn’t a false alarm, went to the true final packing machine to prepare for the correct labeling change from normal-produced to tech-produced.

A few minutes later, Aven had infused this machine with as much energy as it could take, and his own reserve of energy had only been slightly impacted, so he started going up, in the opposite direction of where the various conveyor belts led.

The reason he had acclimated so quickly was that the pile of documents he had under his eyes told him everything he needed to know about those production machines, so he only needed to worry about the AAC30CH ammunition themselves.

Once he reached the end of the AAC30CH production line, which was in fact multiple ends as the different alloys and chemicals were produced by machines that weren’t under his jurisdiction, he moved on to the next one… Another AAC30CH production line.

This one wasn’t complete as it was relying on some machines of the line he had just fully infused to work, so in the end, he only had to infuse the few machines that needed to be doubled such as the final cartridge assembly and sealing machine, due to their inherently slow speed.

Relying on his fresh application, he infused all that he needed to in 20 minutes before shifting to, this time, a true new production line, and this one…

“TGA120FH production line! Tank gun and artillery 120mm tempered heavy alloy core with an explosive flat acid head! That one is so freaking crazy, awesome, and crazy again!” Salivating at the huge ammunition exiting the final quality control step where people personally inspected each round, Aven knew that these ammunition would never be used to deal with anything less powerful than grade 3 or superior abominations.

Imagining what the flat head of tempered alloy propelled at more than 5 times the speed of sound would do to anything made him really realize why the surge was having such an effect on the whole Nation of Eland Military.

With more seriousness than ever before, he started to infuse his energy into the final machine of this production line.

When the blue and white led turned on, he wasn’t even close to being finished, and the reason for that was that the machine he was working on was huge, bigger than any other production machine he had the opportunity to work with before.

‘And both Commander and Rival are working with machines so much bigger than even that…’

Being reminded in the middle of his 2 mentors' similar but different energy specialization, he reapplied his full focus almost immediately and finished pushing enough energy inside the relatively big machine for it to not accept any anymore.

By the time he was done infusing that big one and the rest of the TGA120FH production line, he felt his energy pool dipping below half his reserve, so he went back to the first AAC30CH cartridge assembly and sealing machine he had infused and noted the amount that had been consumed.

‘I infused it like… More than 30 minutes ago? Freak, I didn’t note it down. It looks like it’ll still continue being infused for 20 or so minutes though…’

Retiring to the super-restricted room he had stored his backpack in, he laid down on the couch and closed his eyes for a moment after setting an alarm for 15 minutes later.

From this comfortable position, he began cycling his energy not to cultivate of course, but to regenerate it.

“I think my ascension will start sooner than I had expected…” Softly saying something he absolutely didn't want anyone else to hear, Aven held the urge to immediately accept his volunteering quest reward.

Because not only had the supply exploded, which was already something that alone would have made his volunteering quest reward increase greatly, the basic salary he was refusing by volunteering had also massively increased out of nowhere, so maybe it had also given him a few points here and there.

And all these facts combined with his increasingly efficient energy contribution…

It was a bit like a dream was coming true step by step. Quick step by quick step.