Chương 95: The Second Combat Test

This reset, things were a little off. First off, her physical combat test wasn't being run by Ren, the veteran, this loop. Instead, some new face from security was waiting—a guy she'd never seen before. Why? Kelly had no idea. Maybe her existence had shifted something, a butterfly effect from all her tinkering. Or maybe the universe was just being petty. Either way, she wondered which of her actions had caused it. Her best guess was her own improvement.

This time, she'd pulled her punches killing that creature in the Mistmarket. The fight ran four seconds longer than her previous average. Maybe four seconds was enough for Ren to lose interest. A four-second efficiency gain, and suddenly the ghost had better things to do. The guard was a mountain of polished chrome and grafted muscle, a walking advertisement for excessive augmentation, and he was level 25. That put his EQ enhancement a solid 16.

4 levels above her baseline, with a specialization in speed that should have turned her into a stain on the floor. So, of course, he and everyone watching from the upper galleries were more than a little surprised when she knocked him flat, and handed him his own disassembled firearm in a neat, three-minute package. Soon, three more guards joined the party, looking personally offended by the upstart recruit. Kelly sighed, dodging a powered fist. This was going to take all day. She didn't have all day.

"Ren Sato!" she yelled toward the observation level, her voice cutting through the grunts and impacts.

"I didn't sign up for this… we had a deal!" They broke contact as she yelled, and eyed her curiously. One of the three guards leveled a nasty-looking coil rifle at her chest.

"Your file says you're a scientist," he said, voice flat.

"This assessment was a courtesy. Clearly, someone in research made a mistake." The second guard, arms crossed over a heavily augmented frame, snorted.

"She moves like she trained at some polished military academy—too rough, though. Not a graduate. Maybe a dropout. Pathetic." The third guard shifted his stance, the hostility between them thickening. This wasn't just about the test. It was departmental rivalry—a chance to haze a new upstart and cover the fact that she'd beaten one of their own. The first guard nodded, his grip tightening on the weapon.

"You get assigned somewhere prestigious, haven't even seen your first century, and suddenly you think you can show off against real fighters? You got lucky." He flicked his eyes to the others, their elite-grade weapons all trained on her.

"We won't kill you. But you'll leave on a stretcher. You can spend your first day of employment in the emergency wing." Kelly's gaze moved from the coil rifle to the three guards, her expression unimpressed, already counting the lost seconds on her precious day.

"How thoughtful," she said dryly. They fought. It was a violent calculus of gunfire, strafing drones, and cover-seeking droids. Close-quarters combat dissolved into superhuman movements—augmented strength against augmented mobility, weapon mods tracking and failing to track through a storm of return fire and kinetic deflection. The three exploded into a blur. A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Against Kelly's stacked augments, her jury-rigged tech, her reverse-engineered magic, and her new footwork—a stuttering, feinting burst of unpredictable speed—they didn't fare any better than the first guy. She beat them senseless. With nothing but a handgun and her transforming, rune-engraved weapon shaped like a mundane shovel. It was slightly embarrassing. For them. For Kelly, it was partially excessive, partially payback for wasting time she could have spent running more tests on her time attunement.

But there was a method to the madness. She needed to do something uniquely disruptive to catch the old monster's eye. She stepped over a groaning guard and raised her voice toward the observation galleries again.

"Ren Sato! Next person who comes down here to assess me that isn't you gets the same treatment, but I start using the sharp end. Your call." More staff filtered into the upper galleries to watch the spectacle. A few were promptly called away, likely pulled back to urgent duties by buzzing comms. Kelly thought she spotted someone on a live video call, projecting the feed of her and her victories to other parts of the building. Good. She hoped the old veteran would see it and decide to show up.

Unfortunately, the main result was drawing more guards who could afford a break from their posts. They stepped onto the training floor with a certain military bravado—home-turf pride, a collective need to break the newbie. Someone from the balcony called down, skepticism thick in their voice.

"She's beating her examiners black and blue and thinks that'll get her a meeting with the division head? Please." Kelly paused. Her stubborn eagerness might have made her come on too strong against people who were, technically, just doing their jobs. It was a heavy-handed way to send a message. The efficiency was questionable—she'd used energy, created a mess, and now waited for a bigger problem. She looked at the groaning guards, at the fresh faces moving to replace them. These weren't Ren.

They were just people doing a job. She'd been excessively efficient at dismantling them. The thought wasn't quite guilt. It was a tactical recalibration. There was a difference between breaking a system and breaking the cogs who happened to be turning it. This way was fast, but it was also loud. She considered the best way to get her grumpy, annoyingly overpowered tutor's attention. One of the downed examiners—an early expert-stage fighter—struggled to her feet.

She gave Kelly a baleful look as she keyed something into her palm, a gesture Kelly couldn't see clearly.

"Miss Voss," the woman said, her voice strained.

"Our division vice captain is on his way. He's asked you to wait for him. To prevent… further loss of resources." She swiped up, projecting the formal request to Kelly's own display. They limped away, carrying the other guards, likely heading to the infirmary. Kelly let them leave. She stood waiting. The man who arrived was the Combat and Defense Division Vice Captain, followed by an attendant of some kind. The man himself filled the doorway.

A massive man with a soldier's crew cut and a proud scar over one eye and through his lip. He wore a mechanized suit—a powered exoskeleton fused with his own biomech augments. Nanotech webbing gleamed under composite plating. Weapon mounts protruded from the frame. The suit boosted his physical presence, making him look like a giant. His EQ level registered him far beyond the threshold. The tank range started at an Enhancement level of 30 and ended just below the elites, at 59. The vice captain scored a solid 45.

0. A mid-level tank. Far higher than the battle-crazed Tüin ambassador, Ithili. The exosuit added formidable numbers to his already staggering level. He stood almost double what Kelly could reach even with Death's Foe active. His latent speed surpassed what Giant's Bane could grant her. Facing him was like facing Ren again—a problem that couldn't be solved with straightforward force. He looked down at her, his expression unreadable behind the scar and the permanent dismissive scowl. Kelly sized him up.

Like when she faced the old monster, she would not get through this with stats.