As Rain and Siobhan walked further along the road inside the headquarters, Rain observed the people around them. Many were from their department, the Ghost Department, which had no official uniform—everyone worked in civilian clothes. He recognized a few faces, nodding at them in silent acknowledgment. They were all busy, having spent the last week trying to contain the chaos caused by an out-of-control weird item and maintaining order in the city. Despite their efforts, they had ultimately failed.
Siobhan, walking beside him, broke the silence. "Teacher Sky knows who the culprit is—the one who let Francis's clone into the city."
Rain nodded. "Yeah."
"But why didn't she tell us?" Siobhan pressed.
"It must be top secret. The team captain probably instructed her not to share it," Rain replied, glancing at her.
Siobhan frowned, her voice lowering but still filled with suspicion. "If they're not making any arrests, it must be the council members who are involved."
"Shh, keep quiet," Rain hissed, looking around nervously. "You're going to get us in trouble."
Rain knew all too well that Spark Technology was no democratic government. Whatever the board members decided was law, and no one dared criticize them. The same was true in the city—no one was allowed to speak ill of the Council members unless they were strong enough to challenge them.
Siobhan huffed but kept quiet for the rest of the walk, until they arrived at a large square building with automatic glass doors. They entered and found themselves in a hall with doors lining three sides. Rain glanced around, unsure of what to do. "Now what?"
"Follow me," Siobhan instructed, heading toward one of the doors. She placed her hand on it, and a green light blinked as the door slid open. "We choose doors with green lights; it means the room is available," she explained, pointing to a black suit hanging on a hook. "Put this on, but you need to wear it without any other clothes." Without another word, she closed the door behind her.
Rain wondered why she seemed upset with him but shook his head and selected a door with a green light on. After entering, he removed all his clothes and put on the black suit, which covered every part of his body except his face. Suddenly, a door opened at the back of the room, leading to another room with white walls and a helmet in the center.
A voice echoed, "Please wear the helmet, and the program will begin."
Following the instructions, Rain put on the helmet, its visor covering his face. Through the glass, he could still see the white walls of the room. A voice echoed, "Program start."
In front of his eyes, the room transformed into an arena. The white walls morphed into wooden barriers, and behind them, the distant roar of a crowd filled the air. The ground beneath his feet turned to dirt. Then the voice came again, "Name your opponent."
Rain paused for a moment, thinking it through. He decided to start simple. "Human," he said.
The voice responded, "The program will simulate a D-rank human. After defeating it, the next opponent will be 10 percent stronger, and so on. Each level will increase by 10 percent."
Rain nodded as the simulation began. A man materialized in front of him. Rain chose not to attack immediately. Instead, he decided to limit himself to using his poison claw technique to practice and familiarize himself with the simulation's mechanics.
The man threw a punch, and Rain, curious to test how realistic the Virtual Reality system was, caught the blow. He could feel the solid impact of the man's fist. When the man lifted his other hand for a follow-up strike, Rain shoved him back, releasing his grip. Before the man could recover, Rain focused energy into his right hand, forming a sharp energy claw, and swiftly slashed at his opponent's neck, delivering a clean cut.
The man vanished, signaling the end of the round, and the next opponent began to materialize. Rain defeated the next ten levels easily with his energy claw, as none of his opponents could defend against the attack. Up to level 10, his power was enough to overwhelm them. After that, however, the enemies grew faster. By level 30, although his attack power had reached mid-D rank, his opponents had become twice as fast, dodging most of his strikes. At this stage, they also had enough genetic energy control to transform their energy into weapons, making the battles more challenging.
After reaching level 40, Rain paused the program. He realized that his lack of speed was limiting him in close combat. Faster enemies were able to dodge his attacks, forcing him to take hits before he could counterattack. Reflecting on his use of the poison claw technique, Rain thought, *It's not just about the claws themselves. The real key is learning to mobilize the entire strength of my body with every strike,* Rain thought.
He formed a stick in his hand and began practicing the movements of the poison claw technique with it. However, when he used the stick while gripping the middle, he found it hard to channel his full power into the strikes. Shifting his grip to the end of the stick, he could feel the strength of each strike, but this created gaps in his defense. Controlling the stick from only one end made it difficult to defend effectively.
Rain muttered to himself, "What other weapon can I form? A sword? No, with my current control over genetic energy, forming a sword is impossible. A knife would be just as difficult."
He thought about how most genetic warriors wielded either sticks or whips. Since he had already tried the stick, he decided to test the whip, performing the poison claw technique with it. Rain quickly realized that using the poison claw movements with the whip felt natural. The whip was even better than the stick, as he could control it with one hand while keeping the other free for the Life Vine Shield, once he mastered it.
He instructed the chip to simulate the Life Vine Shield and started the program again. When his level 41 opponent appeared, Rain struck with the whip before the opponent could move. The opponent raised his arms to defend, but the whip shattered both arms on impact, and the second strike finished him. This continued up to level 50 with ease.
At level 51, when Rain attacked with the whip, his opponent formed an energy shield to block the strike. Surprised but unfazed, Rain attacked again, destroying the shield with a second blow that took down his opponent. From then on, each opponent's shield could withstand one more strike from his whip, but Rain still felt no significant pressure as he advanced through the levels.
By level 70, the opponent's energy weapon was just as strong as Rain's, forcing him to rely on his skills and technique to win. After several minutes of intense combat, Rain narrowly emerged victorious, fully mastering the poison claw technique with the whip.
After defeating the level 70 opponent, Rain paused the program and lay on the ground, wincing in imaginary pain. Though not the worst pain he had ever experienced, the opponent's energy stick landed heavy blows that felt like they struck directly to his bones. Feeling the fatigue and hunger creeping in, he checked the time—it was already past 2 PM.
He got up and commanded the program to stop. The helmet powered down, and the arena returned to the familiar white room. Rain removed the helmet, hung up the black suit, and dressed in his clothes. As he exited the room, he sent a message to Siobhan, asking if she wanted to have lunch. Just as he opened the door, he received her reply: "Yes, wait for me in the hall." After a few minutes, Siobhan emerged from her room, ready to join him.
Rain asked, "How was your training?"
"It was okay, and yours?" she replied.
Rain smiled, "It was good. I reached level 70 facing human opponents."
Siobhan, who was walking ahead of him up the stairs to the building where the canteen was located, stopped in her tracks. Her mouth hung open as she turned around. "What? How?"
Rain formed an energy claw in his right hand and showed it to her. "With this."
Siobhan's eyes widened. "Your genetic control has reached this level?" She touched the energy claw with her hand, her face filled with surprise. "Then you've completed the first part of genetic energy control."
Rain nodded. "Yes, but now I need to solve the issue of genetic waste and the limit of beginning D-rank genetic energy then i can breakthrough miiddle d-rank realm."
"How?" Siobhan asked as they reached the top of the stairs.
Rain looked around and found many people sitting and eating. He spotted an empty table, walked over to it, and sat down with Siobhan across from him. He hesitated for a moment, knowing he couldn't exactly explain the "golden finger" that helped him. So, he shrugged and simply said, "It just happened."