"Ah, fuck. 108 hours is sure exhausting to the body and mind."
A tired murmuring came from the pod, and a wet being crawled out.
"Titan? Are you okay?" Deryl's worried voice could be heard by Titan, when he crawled out.
He lifted up his head and opened his eyes. He looked at Deryl in front of him. Behind Deryl were two guards. They stood with astonished expressions on their faces, while looking at Titan as if he was a monster.
Behind them was Night Thunder, without any expression on his face, but his internals were in a state of chaos.
What happened before, was quite rare even in the higher species of the universe, but in humanity it was unprecedented. The moment Titan came out, while being awake, he lost all his thinking ability. He'd been trying to hold his heart and prayed for the wellfare of the kid, but when it happened.
When the kid came out out of the pod, he felt a burst of feelings. Them being mixture of fear and happiness, was not even puzzling. As humanity could have lost everything... if something happened to the kid. He had been trying to rationalise the vitals of the kid, with all his power. Even using the guards, to keep watch over the rest.
It wasn't just the one, but this was the second anamolly happening today.
The other kid who had jumped out after 53 hours, was also very big deal. He had also made a record for humanity, the 3rd greatest record. But against this one, he paled in comparison. Paled too much.
The previous kid was offered a path to Auditorium, but he insisted on staying. He stood beside the pod of the other kid. He seemed to be waiting for him to hurry up and finish. He didn't seem worried at all, even after 90 hours had passed.
Night Thunder, had even heard him murmuring.
"You're great. Too much… Too much."
Before Titan could gain his senses, Night walked up to him, overtaking Deryl. He held his shoulders.
Asking, "Are you okay? Should I take you to a Medical Center?"
His hold made Titan come to senses.
"Yeah. No, I mean no. Just let me lay here for a while."
And after saying that, he just sprawled on the pure white floor, with his saliva dripping.
Night was dumbfounded and just sat in the same position for a few seconds. A while later, he stood up and said to the guards.
"Let the medical staff inside."
Before the guard could reply, Deryl interfered , "No need, listen to his words and do what he needs for himself. Don't touch him, just bring liquid nutrition of Supreme Grade."
The guard looked at him, then looked at Night.
Night nodded towards him.
"Do as he says."
About half an hour later, Titan woke up like nothing had happened. The other people were just standing there, waiting for him as if they had nothing to do better than looking at him snore.
"What the hell are you looking at?' He thought.
Upon awaking, he walked towards Deryl, grabbing the nutritional liquid from his hands.
Deryl smiled. "You did it, Tits."
Finishing half of the liquid in one breath, Titan put the bottle down. He smiled towards Deryl.
"You bet I did. What about you?"
He sipped again.
"Half as much."
"Well that's great. But I am the greatest."
"Yeah, bitch. Whatever. Let's go. The Auditorium is waiting for just us two."
"Yeah sure."
They walked together towards a portal. While walking, Titan looked towards Night and said, "Thanks for this. I owe you one for today."
Then, he walked into the portal with Deryl.
In a huge auditorium.
One thousand seats had been filled, now that the two boys had come. Just as they took their seats at the front.
A hologram of a young lady appeared on the stage.
"I beg your pardon for the delay."
"From today, you're no people. You are initiators. The future of mankind."
"Today you will be informed about the basic…"
Deryl was looking at the lady, while Titan looked at him. Noticing the gaze on him, he looked back at Titan.
"What? You're interested in guys now?"
"No, I am just thinking. How the hell will you surpass me now?"
"That's none of your business." Deryl said, with an annoyed tone.
"Yeah, whatever."
"Would you just listen to her?"
"She can say nothing, that you and I don't know."
"Well she won't but somebody may. There is a big news going on among the higher ups."
"What news? How come I don't know?"
"It appeared when you were initiating and I had gotten out. It isn't completely certain but… Oh here comes. Listen to this guy, I guess he's here for the same thing."
Beside the lady, a young man appeared. He seemed to be in his twenties and had quite a handsome appearance.
When he appeared she had wasn't finished with her speech. But she stopped and disappeared from view upon saying, "Thank you for your attention."
The man took her place.
Putting both his arms, forward in a welcome position, he gave respectful look the initiators in the audience.
"Congratulations on being the top one thousand initiators of humanity. I believe the lady didn't need to speak the basics to you. Anyways those are just formalities."
"Today, I am here for a purpose. Not useful for me but you."
"There's going to be a competition, 3 months later. Every human initiator below the age 20, will participate."
"It's compulsory for everyone to participate. No further details will be given except the requirements. There's just one - Level 100."
Once he said about the requirements, every initiator seemed to have been confused. Murmurs could be heard throughout the auditorium.
"Is it that?"
"Isn't that supposed to be hundreds of years later?"
"Damn! Level 100 in 3 months?"
"I finally have a chance to prove myself."
Meanwhile, Deryl and Titan looked at each other.
"Is it really…" Titan questioned.
"Yes, it comes all the way from Milky Way United." Deryl answered.
"And can level 100 be done with the plan in 3 months?"
"We'll just have to push harder. We have an opportunity now. I believe it will be moderately difficult."
"Well whatever, you the boss, not me."
The young man, let the audience cool down. When the murmurs faded, he spoke again.
"For better performance 3 months later, all 1000 of you will be settled into permanent pods. Starting now, you are supposed to power level yourself in the Network."
"You will transported to your respective pods, in a few minutes. Please stand up and line up in rows of 10."
Everyone stood up from their seats, and lined up laterally in front of their seats. As each row of seat had 20 people, half faced to the left while the other half faced right.
Within seconds, portal opened in front of all of the rows, and they walked inside.
When everyone had left the auditorium, the man gave a look to the portal, which Deryl and Titan had entered.
Upon looking, he thought of something and sighed. A few seconds later, he disappeared from the stage.
The initiators were transported to the Network District of the Milky way. It was a cluster of stars used to power the Universal Station.
Universal Station was a space abode like structure, literally indestructible and had almost infinite capacity. Each of the galactic civilizations were given one, by the Universal Skynet upon recognition.
The initiation pods, were nothing but temporary pods, provided by the Universal Station. Researchers had continued to examine the initiation pods, but nothing useful could be obtained.
The technology level of the pods was too high for the humans to understand. It's functions could be replicated, but the real thing was too high grade, compared to the imitations.
Although, the Universe Station had infinite capacity it wasn't sustainable to use for a large number of people. Till date, only about hundred thousand people had been granted access.
The huge power requirements of permanent pods, made it so, that common people only had access to temporary pods. But today things had changed.
A total of 1000 newbie initiators and 170,895 pro initiators under the age 20 had been transported to the Universal Station. While the one's who were over 20, were removed.
A total of 231,986 users were given the permanent usage rights, currently. The energy required was so vast, that the stars of the whole district dimmed outright.
The external temporary pods are also running at high capacity, with about 13 billion usage rights, currently effective. The temporary ones, are powered by different sources of energy around the galaxy.
This situation of humanity was not feasible for a longer duration, not at all.
It would take the stars of Network Dristrict atleast twenty years to recover from this extraction, but the MWU, didn't seem to mind this at all.
Deryl, Titan and others have been transported into their parmanent pods. Humanity is buckling up for the event three months later.
It seems as if, the future lays in the hands of these 231,986 initiators, with the support of about 13 billion young initiators behind them.