Becoming a pseudo elite boils down to some pretty simple things.
Strength, willpower and unfortunately the most important one: luck.
The proces is a treatment after all.
It could he seen as a steroid cycle. Take certain drugs and use certain tools to upgrade your body quickly.
But although it is in fact quick when considering the fundamental change that one will undergo, the proces still requires multiple years.
It starts with injecting virus.
A virus is basically a small pocket of DNA that injects itself into cells, changing their DNA to become factories producing more of the virus that spread upon the death of the cell.
However, with a bit of manipulation, the DNA that the virus injects into the cell can be made to change the cell in predetermined ways that don't involve becoming a zombie cell factory and exploding. Instead they could change the cell for the better.
The sergeant did not go into how exactly they change the cells, but it had some almost supernatural effects. After injection, your body feels weak. It will still be as strong as before but you feel way to weak for about 3 days. According to the sergeant this is because the change in DNA elevates your human potential somehow. And apparently the change is so big, especially because before the injection your body will be near peak potential which your brain is used to, that your brain thinks you lost all your power instead of the potential itself changing. There are two very important things associated with this period. First of all, if your body is not near peak potential, there is a high chance that your brain thinks you are dying because you are so weak compared to your potential. This could funnily enough result in death due to the brain trying to compromise for the weakness by for example speeding up your heartbeat to the point of getting a heart attack. Therefore, it is extremely important that your body is near peak potential.
The second important thing about this proces is the weakness. The feeling and duration of the weakness can give you a general view of your true full potential. After all, the more potential you have, the weaker you would feel. Up until two days of weakness indicates that your potential is likely to be around pseudo Elite at a maximum. 3 to 5 days means you can become a low Elite with some hard work. 5 to 10 days is thought to be indicate random potential between middle Elite and the highest of the high Elites. It is still mostly up to you to capitalize on this potential.
And the sergeant also told everyone to remember exactly what kind of weakness they felt. If it comes in the form of sleepiness or feeling cold or just feeling like you ate something really wrong and need to go to the bathroom. This is apparently pretty important but he did not want to tell us why exactly.
After the first injection there are a lot of herbs and extra injections and even operations that one can use to speed up the potential fulfilling proces. They did not have a lot of those in the NSC. Only one potion that gives one a bit of a boost in perception for some reason.
Also important is that there are some obstacles in your advancement at certain points in your journey. Breaking through these obstacles gives larger boosts in power and indicates the difference between ranks. The ranks, he would not explain because it did not matter much and there should be lists in some classrooms.
But now the most important piece of info.
The injections where all stored in a bunker somewhere in the forrest. Only accessible by using a pass.
And because of the sergeant, they now all had a pass.