“My boys and girls, it’s the Voice of the People here on K-RAD LA! Let’s get the day started off fucking right with the hot new hit ! Get that blood flowing and get your reps in, y’all!

  “And y’all – better not forget the dope show we got for you this Saturday at Eclipse!”

  - DJ Demophon Kerner on K-RAD LA, April 16th, System Year 453

  I rolled out of bed, cursing my stupid fucking alarm, bright and early the next morning. I realized I wasn’t sure where to go for physical training, but it turned out that the instructors were waiting for us in the small square formed by the dorms. When I saw that it was JJ and Leon, I groaned.

  It was not. We started off with a ‘nice short run’ – in full armor. We followed a path around the entire perimeter of the school, just inside the walls and along the edges of the cliffs that lined the valley. Apparently it was four miles long, and we were going to be getting familiar with it. We were all following Leon, who set a pace that felt punishing to me. JJ ran alongside us, yelling out explanations about all the amazing things he was going to teach us, in between berating those that threatened to slow down in the slightest.

  “Listen up, maggots!” he roared enthusiastically. “We’re going to build up those scrawny little bodies of yours nice and strong! Remember, Stats amplify your body, they don’t replace it! Better to train those flimsy little twigs you call arms now! It’s hard to find weights that can challenge a Tier 3 like me,” he paused to flex his admittedly impressive biceps, without slowing his run at all, “but for you, any old rock will do! Fortunately for you, we have a world-class gym here just waiting for you to sweat all over its floor! Now drop and give me twenty push-ups, maggots! Don’t forget, pain is just weakness leaving the body!”

  By the time we’d finished the first lap, and several more sets of push-ups, my legs and arms were burning and I was sweating freely. So was most everyone else, though the orcs only seemed invigorated. Considering they’d been shivering under their furs in the cold morning air, I guessed the exercise was just getting them up to a more comfortable temperature. The run ended in the gym, which was a building behind the training yard that was full of what I soon learned to be various forms of torture devices.

  We were divided into groups by Squad and introduced to an ancient form of punishment known as ‘weight-lifting’. I paired up with Zaire, Raylan with Jayce, and the orcs and the trainees with each other. There were several additional instructors there supervising us and showing us how to use the different weights for various exercises. Apparently, our Squads would rotate through focusing on different body parts on different days.

  Zaire proved to be a very reluctant companion. When, after ten minutes of him obviously sulking, I asked him why, he replied in a voice that was clearly meant to carry to our group’s instructor.

  “Gunner Az, my people – the manaborn – simply do not benefit from this kind of physical exertion. My body is fixed in this state and will only change slowly as I grow older. There is no point to this particular training for me!”

  “Tell it to someone who cares, kid,” Leon responded immediately. “Everyone gets the same training here, it's up to you to make the best of it.”

  By the time we’d finished what Leon called ‘leg day’, I could barely walk to breakfast. Thankfully, my body seemed to recover quite a bit during the hour-long break, and I only had a mild limp as we made our way to the shooting range, where we found a smirking Wolf waiting for us.

  “Looks like y’all had fun this morning,” he said, far too cheerfully.

  Our first day of Ranged Combat mostly consisted of learning the rules of the range and how to use the automated magical targets. I hadn’t noticed before, but at the end of the low, stone walls dividing the lanes was an engraved runic array where you could feed in mana. Once you did, the enchanted system would throw up illusory targets at different distances in a random order, each one disappearing after it was hit.

  The targets were mostly stationary, but the wider lanes on the end had moving targets. Of course, everyone wanted to use those, so we had to take turns. As we rotated among the lanes, people started to need breaks to recover their mana.

  The Mages ran out far faster than anyone else, each Spell they cast using several mana or more. I was carefully collecting my expended shells, and only using the BB rounds. Since I could replenish those for a mere one mana each, I was able to continue for much longer. I even outlasted Arlo, which surprised me, but he firing rounds more quickly than I was. I noticed again that he kept his pistols holstered on his hips when he wasn’t using them, rather than store them in his Inventory.

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  The nice thing was that it got less crowded as people dropped out, so I got more chances to use the moving targets. The instructors, which included Zenia – the Lightning Mage with the tentacle arm – were spending time with each of the students as they stepped away from the range. When it was finally my turn to stop, only the Archers and Arbalists were still going – despite the fact that none of them were recovering any arrows.

  I asked Wolf about it when he walked up to me, and he told me that no one was allowed to recover projectiles on the range. There was too big of a chance of being hit by a stray arrow or Spell. I was lucky that I could pick up my brass from right by my feet without crossing the firing line. He then went over some tips with me, mostly about how I needed to make sure I kept both eyes open while shooting instead of closing my left eye as I aimed with my right.

  “It’s a common problem with Arbalists, and I’ve seen it in firearm users before. The thing is, you lose half of your peripheral vision when you close that left eye. Just because you’re focusing on where you’re aiming doesn’t mean that’s the only threat! Keeping that left eye open might save your life someday, giving you an instant of warning to dodge or take cover before something takes your head off!”

  Students made their way back into to the rotation as their mana recovered. Once I was back up to twenty, I got a lane and practiced shooting with both eyes open. It was weird, and I still wasn’t used to it by the time the class was over. Wolf pointed us in the direction of the classroom building and sent us off in a group.

  The building held several different size classrooms. Following the pattern of the training rings, there was one large room, two medium sized ones, and four smaller ones. The large room must have had about a hundred seats in it, with the rear seats elevated up higher so everyone could see. As the group arrived from melee combat, we filled up a good chunk of the space.

  Squad Hard Limit sat together on the right side of the room. Zenia, who wanted us to call her ‘Professor Osco’ whenever we were in the classroom, gave us a rundown of the options for Elective I and Elective II, which would be that afternoon.

  “Most of you have the option of choosing between our elective classes – except for the few Healers among you. Healers, including the hybrid Healer-type Classes, are required to take First Aid during the morning elective period and Intro to Magical Healing in the afternoon elective period.

  “For the rest of you, there are several elective options. I’ll go through each one starting with First Aid, which teaches basic non-magical techniques for treating common wounds, including the proper use of healing items like potions and injectors.”

  She quickly listed out the remaining options, with a short description of each one. The choices were Leadership, Stealth & Scouting, Monster Anatomy, Advanced Magical Theory, and Intro to Magical Healing.

  It seemed pretty obvious that First Aid would be a good choice. And I figured Leadership was a good idea, though it still seemed strange to me at times that anyone trusted to make decisions for them. As Professor Osco started to wrap up, I returned my attention to her.

  “You have ten minutes to discuss with your team and decide which electives you’re taking. We’ll have different electives available every three months, so you’ll take a total of four this semester. To find your first elective, look in the hallway, the chalkboard outside each room will show you what’s being taught in there. Go!”

  I wanted everyone to take First Aid, but Jayce was determined to take both Advanced Magical Theory and Leadership. I decided to let it go and count it as a win that seven of us would take the class, four in the morning and three in the afternoon. I picked Leadership as my second elective, and Tara planned to join me and Jayce in it.

  Raylan and Arlo were interested in Stealth & Scouting – I hadn’t expected that from Arlo, but he explained that mods to silence guns were available and that made pistols well-suited for stealth roles. H’ruk was the only one of us with any interest in Monster Anatomy, so I encouraged him to take it. G’hala, as a hybrid Healer, was locked into First Aid and Intro to Magical Healing.

  Once we all split up, G’hala, H’ruk, Tara and I found that First Aid was taught in one of the medium-sized classrooms. It must have been the most popular elective, because there were close to thirty people there – nearly half the class. The first session wasn’t very interesting though, covering mostly stuff that I’d already picked up just from my adventures getting to the Academy.

  Sadly, I discovered that just like in the Head Instructor’s office, the Squad Comms didn’t seem to work inside the classroom.

  I was happy to get out of the classroom, even if it meant that I had Melee Combat next. The group consisted of everyone who’d been in Ranged Combat that morning. My enthusiasm for swordfighting wasn’t killed when I realized JJ was running our class. It just needed a Jet Cola and I was sure it would perk back up.

  “LISTEN UP, MAGGOTS!” he roared at us. “You might be a group of Spell-toting, arrow-spewing WIMPS, but for the next hour, your ASSES ARE MINE! We are going to make sure that when you run out of mana, you know which end of the sword to stick in the monsters! We’re going to start with evaluations, and I don’t expect to be impressed – prove me wrong if you can!”

  Professor Osco, Lightning Mage