Saksham didn't have to wait for a long time before his name was called out by the examiner of stage II. Saksham nodded and went inside the dome-shaped machine. As the examiner had said, the first thing he saw inside was a treadmill sort of thing. The only place it was different from a normal treadmill was the fact that there were no handles on the side of the machine. The conveyor belt was built into the machine. Its belt was about 3 meters long and 2 meter in width. Saksham had an illusion as if this thing was meant to test the speed of the cars. He shook his head and looked towards the person standing beside the treadmill.
Noticing someone had entered, the middle-aged man recording some data on the computer looked up and saw Saksham just standing there…menacingly. There was something about Saksham's figure that gave him chills. He coughed lightly to hide his embarrassment. He looked at the clipboard in his hand and asked, "Mr. Asura?"
Saksham also nodded and waited for his instructions. Saksham had no interest in this stage of the test because he knew that right now his speed did not correspond to his strength. After all, he still had to strengthen his legs. You can say that right now if Saksham was not wearing the Assassin's Suit, his speed would be even worse than an average person. He sighed lightly and focused again on the middle-aged man in front of him.
"Just stand on that belt and tell me when you are ready. After that, the belt underneath your feet will start moving. It will slowly speed up and get faster and faster as you run on it. When you feel that you can't go any faster, just tell me to stop and I will start slowing it down for you. This will be done 3 times. Each time, the conveyer belt under you will change its hardness to imitate 3 different types of grounds. The 1st one will be swampy ground, 2nd will be rocky ground and the 3rd one will be water. The average speed will be noted and recorded into the database."
Hearing this, Saksham also nodded and stood on top of the belt. Feeling the soft feeling underneath his feet, Saksham tried jumping a little as if he found a new toy. The examiner also smiled wryly and coughed lightly. Saksham also stopped and gave the examiner a thumbs-up. Examiner also nodded and pressed the button beside him, starting the conveyor belt under Saksham's feet. As Saksham started walking slowly, he felt as if his feet were being sucked into the belt. As he looked down, he found nothing, but the feeling remained.
'So, this is how it feels to walk on swampy ground,' thought Saksham.
As the conveyor belt sped up, Saksham's original walking also changed to a light jog. Soon, Saksham was running with all his strength. When he found that he couldn't go any faster, Saksham opened his mouth and said, "Stop."
The examiner nodded and pressed the button lightly. The belt under Saksham's feet started slowing down. Soon, Saksham also stopped and looked at the examiner, indicating him to start the second round. The examiner nodded and walked towards the wall of the dome and turned a knob slightly. Suddenly, Saksham felt as if there was a rock hard surface underneath his feet. He looked down and found that the earlier soft feeling had disappeared without a trace. Saksham tried jumping again and found that the belt under him had really turned into a surface almost like the rocky ground.
Saksham once again gave the examiner a thumbs-up, who once again started the machine.
______
5 minutes later
Saksham stopped and looked towards the examiner with a grudging look which scared the wits out of the examiner. Saksham couldn't help but curse at the person who created the 3rd round of the speed test. Earlier, when the examiner explained that the 3rd round was about running on the water surface, he didn't expect that he was serious. The conveyor belt under Saksham's feet had become so soft that Saksham was not able to stand on it. As for running on it with his top speed? That was impossible for the current Saksham. Forget about running, he found it even hard to walk on it.
The examiner clenched his butt in fear and ran towards the computer and pretended to seriously enter some important data. Saksham saw this and also sighed. He can't really blame the examiner for this. After all, this was all a part of the test. He came off the belt and still felt weirdly wobbly after stepping on solid ground after that 3rd round.
After the wobbly feeling disappeared, Saksham asked, "What now?"
As he heard this, the examiner raised his head lightly and pointed towards the door on the right side and said, "Go there and take the last test for your Comprehensive combat power. After you are done there, you can exit from the door there. And yeah, your average speed is 50 km/hr."
After he said this, he looked at Saksham doubtfully. The information he got from outside was that the person standing in front of him had an arm strength of about 2000 kg. But why was his running speed so low? In fact, Saksham didn't even expect that his current speed was so fast. He expected much less than that but this result surprised him. His current speed was faster than the fasted man alive. And this was just the bonus of the Assassin's Suit. If he strengthens his legs, Saksham's didn't dare imagine what his speed would be at that point.
After calming his thoughts, Saksham nodded and walked towards the door. Pushing the door lightly, Saksham entered another room where he saw a floating chair and a helmet that had thick wires connected to its back. The wires all connected to the mainframe of the computer that was sitting at the corner of the room. An old man was typing on the keyboard without paying any attention to Saksham who entered the room.
Saksham also didn't disturb the old man and waited for a while. Fortunately, the old man turned around and found Saksham standing at the entrance. He stood up in a hurry and said, "Why didn't you say anything when you came in? I am getting older and my ears are getting worse. I couldn't hear you stepping inside."
Looking at the old man, Saksham smiled lightly under the hood. This can't be blamed on the old man. This was one of the features of the Assassin's Suit. Average people can't even sense when he comes beside them not to mention someone who was not even facing him. So, he just shook his head and said, "Can we start?"
The old man nodded and led Saksham to lie down completely on the floating chair. After asking if he had to lift his hood, the old man shook his head and said, "You don't have to take your hood off, young man. This helmet his jointly built by the 7 major powerhouses around the world. After spending countless hours and money, this was made. The function of this helmet his like a VR oculus except that it is used to test the combat strength of a person. You will fight off against AI bots of the same strength and speed you have shown in the previous tests. Basically, their strength will be the same as you. While you fight, you can use your powers as much as you want. As long as you think about it, you can use your powers."
"The effect of your powers will not be diminished even if you are not fighting in real. This is because all of that will be happening in your brain. The brain is really the most mysterious part of our body. Your brain is like the main source of power as it records all the effects and the amount of damage it will deal to people or monsters. So, when you use your powers inside this VR fight, the effects will not diminish even a bit. Even the weapons you use and their effects are known by the brain and using those weapons will also have the same effect as it has in reality. So, you don't have to keep your hands while you fight inside. This way, your powers will be graded too. The longer you stay inside, the harder it will become to fight against those AI bots. The longest someone had survived in that is about 1 Hour."
The old man sighed ruefully as he recalled the time this record was set. He still remembered the shock it sent to the whole world when the news spread everywhere. Saksham didn't pay attention to the last sentence. He was sighing in his heart. When he entered the room, he already had some guesses about the helmet. But hearing this, he couldn't help but feel as if he had lived 18 years of life in vain. He never thought that there was such an advanced machine in the world till now. Though, he still sighed in relief because he didn't know if he would be able to use his weapons and his Assassin's Suit's power. But now everything was fine. He had always wanted to know just how strong he was right now. He didn't really care about the record and grading of his powers. He just wanted to know how much stronger he has gotten after strengthening his arms, hands, torso, and head.
He gave the old man a thumbs-up and the old man went back to the computer and pressed [Start Simulation] on the computer. Soon, Saksham discovered his line of sight had turned completely dark. Before he knew what was going on around him, his surrounding became clear. He looked around and found that he was in a forest. Before he could think anything more, he heard a scream. And as he heard the scream, Saksham's heart stopped beating for a second. His breathing became haggard as his eyes turned scarlet. He looked towards the direction of the scream and found 3 men dragging a girl on the ground. The girl screamed and wailed but they didn't stop. Instead, as if feeling something, they sped up.
CRUNCH!!!
If someone was present beside Saksham, he/she would dare not stand anywhere near him. Right now, Saksham was gritting his teeth so hard that it sounded almost as if someone was rubbing 2 bricks against each other. The aura around Saksham changed abruptly. The original mysterious aura disappeared without a trace. Right now, Saksham's lonely figure seemed as if there was a heaven devouring demon under that hood. Even the air around Saksham became heavy. Just looking at him would give anyone goosebumps. In fact, looking at him right now would fill someone with horror.
At this time, a terrifying roar resounded in the whole forest, "I WILL KILL YOU ALL AND DEVOUR YOUR SOUL!!! HOW DARE YOU TOUCH ANITHA!! HOW DARE YOU!! HOW DARE YOU!!!!!!!!!!"