Daneel sat back down after Elanev proceeded to check on the others. He had only smiled in response, unable to say anything due to the many emotions he had been feeling at that moment.
With his back straight and legs folded, Daneel laid his arms on his knees palms facing down before closing his eyes and following Elanev’s instructions.
He breathed in deep, absorbing the extraordinary air and visualizing it entering his lungs from his nostrils. After that, he imagined a white substance staying back in his lungs while the rest of the air was exhaled. The energy was then moved to each part of his body from his stomach and intestines to his legs, arms, and head before being exhausted and leaving again along with the air being exhaled in roughly the 5th breath after the air was first inhaled.
For a long time, Daneel felt nothing different as he diligently fueled the imagination.
After 10 minutes, he started hearing gasps from some kids who were subsequently extracted by Elanev soon after.
After around 20 minutes and many, many breaths, Daneel finally understood why they had gasped.
In one particular breath, Daneel felt his chest heating up as something different started happening. He hurriedly tried to spread the warmth throughout his body by imagining the white substance being carried to different parts of his body, but it was no use as consequent breaths kept increasing the warmth until it turned from an uncomfortable feeling to pain.
Daneel could only stop himself from breathing in a hope to stop this. After trying this for as long as he could, he finally gasped like the others, having no choice but to take another breath in.
Elanev was already by his side and laid a hand on his back. Instantly, Daneel felt the warmth leaving his body in the direction of his breath.
Getting back to normal, he realized that there were only 2 other kids beside him still in the room.
A slightly sad look was on Elanev’s face as he escorted Daneel out.
As Daneel walked out, he saw that some of the kids were smiling and beaming with pride whereas a few others were lying on the ground crying.
It seemed that they knew something he did not as Elanev simply left him there before hurrying back in as another kid had gasped inside.
Whatever it was, Daneel realized that he had changed due to possessing the system. He had never been the most confident of people back on Earth and had even felt small in front of some who had achieved a lot and never stopped bragging about how good their life was. Although he knew deep down that there was nothing very wrong with his life which would warrant such a feeling, he could muster up the confidence from anywhere.
In this world though, he had a system which had shown miracles after miracles. He had parents who loved him wholeheartedly and who must be missing him right now. He had a whole life ahead in which he would, potentially according to the system, dominate the world!
Thus, Daneel did not feel down even though he had seen the sad look on Elanev’s face. Even when 2 kids walked up to him with gloating expressions on their faces, he just smiled before waiting for them to speak.
"Talentless kid! Let us tell you in case you didn’t know, the earlier one comes out of the Energised Training Chamber, the more potential their body has. My father told me this as he went through this training himself. You are almost dead last. You better do my chores in the training if you don’t want trouble to come your way from someone who’s more talented than you", said one of the kids who had been dressed nicely.
He was pudgy, with a small nose and forehead which almost made him look like a pig. His belly which was already huge for a 12-year old protruded out as he shook his finger at Daneel, warning him.
The image looked so funny to Daneel that he could not help but laugh.
"Did your father pass or fail the training?"
All the kids so far who had come last had only obeyed him in fair. Seeing this one laugh, the pudgy kid was bewildered before anger came on his face. But, this was replaced by a little embarrassment as he heard the subsequent question.
"He-he failed. But what does that matter? I’ll pass in his stead!", said the boy, regaining his confidence.
"I thought so. Well, good luck. You don’t want to faint during the training though, as it is rumored that Master Felix loves eating fat young kids who faint in training for his breakfast."
Daneel nonchalantly walked away after saying so, as if ignoring the sweat that had formed on the kid’s forehead.
After moving a bit farther away, he couldn’t help but laugh again. That would teach the kid not to bully someone again.
A few minutes, all of the kids were out of the chamber. Assembling everyone, Elanev said:
"I will be reading the names of those with high-grade bodies first before proceeding to mid and low-grade ones. Split into 3 groups based on your grade."
Saying so, Elanev read out the names of the rest of the kids. The pudgy kid’s name was Epok, and it turned out that he was in the group with the high-grade potential.
Unsurprisingly, especially from what Epok had said, Daneel was in the low-grade potential group. He had even remembered that in the beginning when telling him about his status, his potential had been either F or F-. Although he had no idea how the system could calculate it without having information regarding it, this was another hint that his potential was low-grade.
There were 6 kids in his group. Except for Daneel and another kid who stood straight, the rest were sobbing on the ground. Daneel was fine because he trusted the system to improve his potential, but why was the other kid fine.
Having his interest piqued, Daneel walked up to the kid and held out his hand.
"I’m Daneel. You are?", he asked politely, smiling.
The kid who was thin just like him was also wearing clothes with many holes in them. He had a look of determination on his face on affirming that he indeed had low-grade potential. Seeing Daneel come over and introduce himself, his expression melted as he gave a small smile and said, "I’m Faxul. Nice to meet you."
The two shook hands but couldn’t talk further as Elanev was speaking again.
"Now that you are graded according to your potential, training will begin shortly. From today until 3 months later, there will be no break or holiday. Every day, you will have to finish the daily tasks assigned to you. You cannot go to sleep unless the tasks are finished. Every week, there will be a fighting assessment where you will have to spar with your fellow batch mates. The winners will have their workload lessened for the subsequent week whereas the losers will see an increase in their tasks. Take my advice, and try not to lose.
Your completely paid for 3 month walk through hell officially starts now. First, run around the training grounds 10 times. It’s roughly 5 kilometers, so you will want to hurry if you want to have lunch."