For Kairo, everything turned into a blur as he locked in for the next few days, fully surrendering himself to the obsession of training.
After finally building his foundation, getting his only ability, he held nothing back, putting his all into practicing that ability to the best of his ability.
Unlike others who had to focus on different abilities, researching and experimenting on how to improve their power, Kairo didn’t have to do all of that complicated rubbish.
All he did was train and workout.
With regular hints from the system guiding him, he was able to maximize his time as if he was not doing squats, he was raising dumbbells, working on every muscle that was spread across his body.
And as he did, his ability truly blossomed.
Kairo didn’t rank up. Afterall, it was not that easy to rank up. His stats didn’t increase either, not that fast, but what did grow was his muscles.
In the next few days, he bulked up.
And what helped him was food. If he was not doing squats or training, Kairo was sneaking into the city, hustling for food.
Of course, there were police in the city, but as an Awakened now, it was harder to catch him, especially if you were a smuggler as experienced as him. With his agility, he managed to steal food on a daily basis without being caught.
Besides, compared to the outer rings, people here in the city were far richer, giving him far more avenue to steal and fill his endless pit of a stomach.
And of course, he didn’t just work out and steal food.
Knowing that he would have to fight against strong opponents during the tournament, he also used the dummies in the training ground to train his punches, trying to perfect his form.
At some point, he also realized that the instructors that were assigned to them were not here just to watch them.
And so, one day, approaching one of them, he directly asked.
"Umm... can you teach me?"
For a moment, the instructor was stupefied.
But then, he nodded, though he clarified. "Bound by Academy laws, I can’t teach you any technique or skill belonging to the Academy, but I can teach you how to perfect your fighting stance and also basic defensive techniques".
"Great!" Kairo nodded, glad at his courage to ask.
That happened on the 2nd day of his stay at the training ground, and from there on, he had an instructor who gave him pointers.
2 days later, on the 4th day of him keeping up this schedule, the system lit up with a new notification.
[Congratulations! Your Stamina Stat has increased!]
Kairo grinned. His hard work, both on his muscles and on his stomach was not in vain. He checked his full stats.
>Class: [Warrior lvl. 1]
>Hypermuscle Creation.
[System Remark: A half-baked frog who has no idea the size of Mount Tai.]
Kairo smirked. The system had a penchant for snarky remarks.
2 more days later, on the 6th day, the system lit up again, informing him that his Mana Capacity had increased to F.
It was almost time, just one more day remaining.
That night, Kairo couldn’t sleep early. Laying on the ground in one of the public tents, he couldn’t stop thinking of his sister and his parents.
’Mom, Dad, I miss you...’
At some point, he finally slept.
Arcanum Nexus awoke to the toll of the six bells of the Academy. It was an indication of a new day and a new morning, but most importantly, it was an indication for something even more important.
It was today, the day of the Entrance Tournament.
By now, the public training ground was bustling with applicants. There were 10,000 applicants outside the gates of Nexus Academy.
The instructors did their job, lining the applicants in orderly fashion, before leading them to the Blackstone gates of the Academy.
As they marched, Kairo looked around, at the myriad faces around him. Most, he didn’t recognize but he recognized a few.
Very soon, they would be pitted against each other in a brutal tournament to weed 10 applicants out of 10,000. The odds were tough and tight.
He clenched his fists tightly.
During the past few days, while training, he had also observed the competition. Not all of them were strong, but a lot of them were strong.
He’d seen them brag about their dual-abilities, even some with triple and even quadruple abilities. Mages bragged about their elemental affinities, warriors bragged about their weapon-related abilities.
Him? All he had was his fists and muscle.
Like the instructor who he interacted with for the past few days said. "Your ability is a weird one. It’s not just any amplifying ability, it doesn’t amplify weapons or abilities, all that it focuses on is your body and muscles".
"So, to bring the best out of it, you have to build your combat style around your fists, your legs, your whole body".
"That’s the best way to make use of your ability".
"I don’t know if you can get far with it, but good luck".
Kairo clenched his fists even tighter. ’Don’t you worry about me,’ a slight smirk tugged at his lips.
’No matter what is required, I will go far!’
’I will do everything required!’
’I won’t stop until I get the scholarship. And even then, I won’t stop. I won’t stop until I get strong enough, until I find Leora!’
The gigantic blackstone gates of the Academy groaned open, steam and chains hissing as the participants were led inside one by one, tension thick.
They were led to an open field in the Academy ground, and there, on a podium stood a stern-faced middle-aged man with an eye patch covering his left eye.
The applicants started murmuring as soon as they saw him. "It’s the one-eyed Raven!"
"It’s really him, I can’t believe it!"
"SILENCE!" His voice boomed like thunder.
A hush instantly settled over the crowd of 10,000 applicants.