Chapter 10: Welcome to The Cold Nirvana

Chapter 10 - Welcome to The Cold Nirvana "I have to say, you managed to surprise me. Your performance was more disappointing than I anticipated, with the exception of Jake here who arrived 10 minutes before stoppage time!"

He said while gesturing towards the spiky haired guy who he identified as Jake, while looking at the recruits sprawled on the ground

Kieran eyes constricted at the revelation, this reaction was unnoticed as his head was till bowed.

'To think the difference was that large'

He thought a bitter feeling welling up in him. He had thought with that surge of power he felt, he could win, but reality proved different.

The instructor pulled out a device and a holographic screen popped up showing each candidate and the time it took each of them to complete the race.

Jake's name was ranked first with Kieran just below but this didn't bring him any joy, the other recruits were looking around trying to figure out who Kieran was.

The blue haired lady stared at him for a moment in contemplation but eventually eliminated the possibility, they hadn't noticed him when they arrived and assumed he came later with the other recruits.

'She's going to be a problem'

The instructor continued,

"I'll let this slide since this is your first time"

and the recruits sighed in relief, one of them saying,

"Thank goodness, no punishment!"

The instructor who heard this smiled sinisterly as he dropped a bucket of cold water on the recovering recruits

"Who said there was no punishment?" he said and everyone glared at the recruits who had spoken

"By letting it slide, I'm only postponing the punishment"

"wh-a-what is the punishment, sir?" a random recruit asked with a shaky voice.

"You'll get to know the next time we meet. Now SCRAM!!! You've got other places to be." He screamed at them

"You don't want be late, hehe", he added, with that creepy simile of his.

This time a fair number of recruits saw it and were marred with cold sweat.

'How are we to know what's next when our watches are-huh?'

'It's working again'

Looking down on his watch which was back online, he saw the next thing for the day, the location and the path to get there, most importantly he saw the time left and immediately ran out surprising the other recruits as they also looked at their watches before breaking into a mad sprint like him, the exhausted ones suffering the most.

'Damn, I've only got two minutes, I can't fail again'

Kieran thought as he ran madly through the corridors of the base fuelled by his desire not to repeat his earlier failure and he managed to reach the venue a few seconds before the time was up.

The venue was a classroom, it seemed they weren't going to be doing anything physical there. In one of the chairs sat a female instructor. She looked up upon Kieran's arrival noticing his erratic breathing she commented

"You ran all the way here?"

"Yes, I wanted to make.... it... on... time" he replied, trying to catch his breath.

"Hmm, where are the others? Let's wait for them before starting" she said before resuming her previous position.

Noticing the lack of response from the recruit in front of her, she looked up to see his already composed face, but she could still make out the trace of disbelief and anger in his eyes.

"Sigh! Judging from your reaction, I'll take it you've already met with that creep, Marcus."

"Sigh! Take a sit on one of the chairs" she said with a sympathetic expression feeling sorry for the recruits and their experience at the hand of the soldier.

Kieran slowly approached a chair and silently took a seat, losing himself in his world of thoughts while waiting. He didn't even notice when Jake, followed by the other recruits arrived and each took a seat until the instructor stood up and cleared her throat

"Ahem!"

Snapping out of his thoughts, he looked dazedly towards the instructor who had mounted the podium awaiting whatever she had to say.

Assessing the miserable condition of each recruit, Selena felt some pity for what they had yet to face. With a weary sigh, she carried on with the class, introducing herself.

"Good day, I'm instructor Selena and I'm here to clarify somethings to you."

"Firstly, this is just an introductory class and you'll still be seeing me around for some time."

She started, the sympathetic expression on her face having vanished into thin air, a cold, neutral and composed one, befitting of a soldier taking over.

"Judging by the way you all rushed into the class, as well as your haggard state. I'll take it you've all met with both instructor Keith and Marcus, and I see you've learnt your first lesson." She paused to study their ugly expressions.

"Before we go further, let's discuss the other aspects of your first exercise. Some of you might have an idea of what aspects the exercise covered, but I'll be clarifying that for those that are still clueless."

Most of the recruits wore expressions which showed that they were already anticipated something like this, Kieran was not exempt from this group while the other recruits looked around in confusion yet to catch on.

"The whole assessment started the moment the alarm was heard and your subsequent performance was recorded. That was the first part and it tested your reaction speed and how well you'd react to sudden occurrences given a limited amount of time." She started.

"The second aspect targeted your ability to memorize and to remember what you memorized, it started from the moment Marcus showed you the map and route of the race. The third aspect tested your ability to adapt. The fourth..."

As she went on with the long list, the faces of the recruits started to change even the faces of the most composed hardened at how thorough the aspects it covered was.

To them, the test was just rather hard, not something they felt they had to worry about, but coming face to face with the things that could be derived from their performance, even their breathing patterns was noted. Kieran was just as surprised, he didn't expect them to be this thorough.

"Now that's over with, let's move on to the main theme of this introductory class." She started, fully capturing the attention of all the recruits.

"The main aim of this class is to make you familiar to how thing are done here in the camp and to set a guide for your next two years, in other words you can take this as your actual orientation."

"Your stay in this camp can divided into four stages. This is an unorthodox division that was made up long ago and was later accepted and passed down by soldiers of this camp."

The ears of the recruits perked up at the mention of the unorthodox nature of the division.

"The first stage is called the 'Cold feet stage', it covers the first four months of your military training. This is the period where you all will participate in general training ranging from self-defence, basic weapon handling to some basic war strategies. It's a stage where you'll be stuffed to the brim with knowledge from various fields."

"You can take it as a period where you're being trained to become an all rounded soldier. This is the period where you shed your cold feet and start to develop an attitude worthy of a soldier, hence, the name."

"The second stage is called the 'Cold hell'. Here, after surviving your first four months, you'd be entitled to picking a specialization of your choice and if it is noticed that you're struggling with in the field of your choice, then you will be taken to a suitable field based on your stats and performance report since the moment you stepped into this camp."

"Your personality also plays a role here as some fields require its members to have a particular level of secrecy for example. As for the reason behind the name, you'll find out when you get there, if you last that long, that is."

"The third and fourth stage are popularly known among the soldiers as 'The calm before the storm' and 'The arrival' respectively."

Kieran along with the recruits with better senses frowned as they noticed the slight and controlled tremor in her voice when making mention of the last two stages especially the last one.

For a seasoned soldier like her to have such a reaction, she must have experienced something drastic.

"You all are too fresh to be worried about that, but when the time comes, I want you to keep in mind that they are the most important stages of your stay. The next thing on the list is your contribution points and credits, the only form of currency in this camp."

"Anything you want to get ranging from equipment to your breakfast will cost a certain amount of contribution point. Over the years, the camp came to adopt the structure of an academy to facilitate the most competition among you recruits, now pay attention as this is where the value of contribution points really shines."

"To maintain the standard of soldiers, the camp set up an elimination and ranking system, by setting a monthly quota any student which fails to reach this quota is sent packing but a student with enough contribution points can cancel that fate by paying a certain percentage of his/her contribution point."

"Although this method can only be used a maximum of three times with the price increasing exponentially each time, it's still a worthwhile option. As for how to get contribution points? That's for you to find out. The usefulness of contribution points is far more than that, the entire military is based on this contribution system albeit slightly different from that employed by this camp, the specific will be discussed later in one of your subsequent classes."

"Next, I'll be sharing the schedule you will all follow effective from next week along the contribution system and some other features of the camp."

She said looking blankly at the furrowed brows of the recruits as they tried to digest such a large amount of information.

'This is more complicated than I anticipated'

Kieran thought as he imagined the countless ways in which this contribution point system could be used.

"Ok, that marks the end of the class!" she clapped her hands awakening the recruits from their trance.

"You have a week to find out how to gain CP because you won't have that time when you resume activities fully. Spend this week wisely, eat up all you can cause you won't be able to come next week, heh!" she concluded with a chuckle.

Hardening his heart and making up his mind, Kieran stood up and left the room. The eyes of the other recruits flickered and they also left the room one after the other having come to a decision, they were no push overs, they were geniuses in their own right!

Selena looked at the recruits with amusement in her green eyes

'Ahh, if only they know what they are about to face maybe they won't be so determined to head straight in. Anyways, they made up their minds rather fast, how far they go is a different story though!'

Her face darkening at the last thought which summoned some unwanted memories. Shaking those thoughts away, she went back to taking a nap on one of the chairs without a care for the world.

Back in the mountain, Kieran took a satisfying hot bath and marched to the canteen. Walking up to the counter, he asked the young lady whose hair had been tied into a bun covered with a cap highlighting her pale, long neck. He asked,

"It's an all we can eat till next week, right?"

The lady who also happened to be in uniform underneath the apron, exposing her identity as a recruit, but of a higher year, stared at him in silence for a few seconds before giving a short reply

"Yes."

"I'll be having six large bread buns and....", he started spitting out a long list attracting the attention of the people around, bringing the hall to silence.

The lady stared at him again, this time longer before asking in the same bland tone as before

"Ok, Anything else?"

"No!"

He answered thinking the list through, making sure he hadn't missed anything.

Getting his confirmation, the lady started moving, preparing his order with an amazing efficiency and after standing for a few minutes captivated by her efficiency, a tall stack of food trays appeared in front of him

"Your order!"

She reported, not bothered about how he planned to carry it across the room to an empty table.

Unfazed, Kieran carried the tall yet strangely stable pile of food and moved towards an empty table, the gazes of all other people in the room following him.

"He doesn't think he can finish that right? There's no way!" one of them said, voicing the thoughts of the others.

Placing the huge pile of food down and taking a seat, Kieran started devouring starting with the buns he ordered first paying no attention to the constantly growing expression of shock on the faces of the people present as they watched the mountain of the food get dumped in his stomach which miraculously hadn't changed shape.

"W-Wha-Does he have a black hole as a stomach?" The one who had spoken earlier spoke once again, the others silently agreeing with him.

"Burp!"

Few minutes later, Kieran ate the last piece of food in front of him letting out a satisfied burp patting his stomach.

"Ahh! This is the best meal I've ever had, it's not as good as that at the orientation though, but I've never felt this full in my life!" Kieran said out loud, remembering the heavenly taste of the food served back at the orientation.

According to what overheard from two noble recruits speaking, that type of food was only served for free at the orientation ceremony and other very special occasions and wanting to eat them on a regular day cost a baffling amount of CP, but it was worth it.

Eating foods like that over a prolonged amount of time could manifest effects that even those two nobles weren't entitled to knowing.

Truly heavenly food!!!

Getting up from the table, he headed towards his room, the bystanders and crowd who came to watch the show parting way for him.

On his way out, he paused at the counter with the intent of thanking the soldier who had served him only to find a different person. Walking up, he asked,

"Hello, do you know the lady that was here previously?"

The young man's expression changed subtly on hearing Kieran's description of the lady

"Yes, her shift ended a few minutes ago!" he gave a short reply

"Huh! Explains things. Please, tell her I said thank you", he said, still feeling giddy from the monstrous meal. No! it could only be described as a feast.

The moment he left, the previously silent room exploded into a heated discussion. With this performance, Kieran had set a new record that'll be passed down to other recruits' years from now. Some of them ran out of the room, going to tell others of the impossible feat they had just witnessed, stirring waves in the camp even attracting the attention of some of the upper officers.

Meanwhile in Kieran's room...

The subject of the commotion fell face flat on the bed the moment he entered the room, he had been struggling not to fall on his way back. The food here had something special

'it probably has something to do with the soil and vegetation on the planet.'

He thought remembering that some ingredients had been replaced with others he had never seen. There were even dishes he had never seen or heard of, he usually attributed them as food only nobles had access to but now he had a better idea

"Ahh!" he groaned, his drowsiness putting an end to his string of thoughts as he fell asleep, a peaceful expression occupying his handsome face.

......

Somewhere on one of the flat mountain tops, was a landing pad which was welcoming a Series A-24 hover jet. Kieran might be oblivious to things like that, but of any of the nobles among the recruits or a machine enthusiast were present, their jaws would become slack from shock.

This was the latest brand from the GLACTIOUS company most advanced series, money alone couldn't get you that, showing that the background of the owner wasn't ordinary. Whoever was in there must be a bigshot!

The door opened and a boy same age as Kieran with scarlet red hair and an expression that showed his unwillingness to be there walked out, a tall middle-aged man trailing behind him.

One of the surrounding soldiers came forward to greet them,

"Young master scarlet, welcome to Origin military camp." He said in a way that was neither disrespectful nor subservient.

The butler behind the young master took over, "It's been a while colonel Axel!"

The colonel didn't reply and the butler sighed before turning to the boy behind him.

"I've completed my assignment young lord, good luck on your stay here!" he said before boarding the hover get that took off a moment later

Looking at the young kid in front of him, he asked

"So, what's your name?"

"Richard!", he replied, the arrogance he tried suppress in his voice still showing through.

"Ok Richard, welcome to The Origin camp also known as The Cold Nirvana!" He said, letting out a hearty chuckle.