Chapter 57: Information Overload
Translator: Oneshotwonder Editor: Tehrn
A rush of adrenaline swept through Wang Tong's body as soon as he turned on the training terminal. While being busy with the monthly test, Wang Tong had almost forgotten just how much he had enjoyed the thrills of performing challenging techniques—an acquired taste that he had developed on Norton. As the crisis of the monthly test had been averted, Wang Tong's life started to become mundane, and the desire for more challenges resurfaced.
He gave himself a hard time during the last simulation and injured his fingers, but he thought that was simply the way it was: no pain, no gain. His injuries were minor anyways.
"You can watch me do it first. It was a Kaedeian's technique. Speaking of the Kaedeians, we could really learn a thing or two from them regarding space battles. I have been experimenting one of their methods, which I believe could be used by Earthlings after some modifications," Wang Tong's said with a serious tone; he was always serious when talking about battle techniques.
"I have gone through the theories, and I just need to see how it is done so that I can try to follow."
"Ok, watch me. Keep in mind that the system pre-set these targets so it would be more difficult in real-life since the enemies can pop up anywhere around us," Wang Tong said as he flexed his fingers. Although the technique looked simple, it was tough to pull it off correctly.
Wang Tong looked at the screen and marked sixty targets in his mind and then rested his wrist on the dashboard. He had only one second to respond to all sixty targets; it required not only superhuman reflexes but also endurance for the enormous strain placed on his body from the lightning speed movements.
Then the simulation started; a bright light flashed across the room and then came a deafening blare; all sixty targets were locked on at once. Success!
Wang Tong flexed his fingers again and heaved a sigh of relief. His balance had improved a great deal since last practice. "You can try it with sixty targets, let's keep it simple for now."
An awkward silence fell.
Zhou Sisi stared at Wang Tong in disbelieve, "You expect me to do the same thing?"
"Yea. That's the clone technique." Wang Tong was perplexed by Zhou Sisi's hesitation. He had executed the technique by the textbook, and it indeed worked.
"Are you a freak or a mutant? I have seen what you did there, and it definitely wasn't the clone technique, not even a Kaedeians could have repeated what you just did." Zhou Sisi threw a suspicious look at Wang Tong.
"Really? I thought that was how everyone did it." Wang Tong scratched his head and wondered why Zhou Sisi made a big deal out of such an ordinary technique.
Zhou Sisi pushed away her pride, mustered her courage and then asked, "Can you show me again? It was too fast." It went without saying that Wang Tong's method was different than Kaedeians since the later would never willingly gave away the crux of their military secret in any training guide they had published. Zhou Sisi had a gut feeling that Wang Tong's method was somehow even better than the Kaedeians.
"Yea, of course. Here, look!" Wang Tong repeated everything in slow motion.
The awkward silence fell again.
Zhou Sisi had always been very proud of her quick mind and swift movements, but then she felt devastatingly ashamed for her pride after seeing Wang Tong's speed.
After a while, Zhou Sisi asked hesitantly, "Can you please slow down your speed even more?"
"No problem." Wang Tong cracked a smile. He broke down his movements into different sections and demonstrated each section to Zhou Sisi. "Is it clear now? What I have shown you were set movements, it was meant for training the synchronization of your left and right hands. Everyone's synchronization is slightly different. Give it some time; you will get the gist of it."
Zhou Sisi didn't reply; she was too busy memorizing Wang Tong's movements. She then quickly realized that to complete the full set of actions under a mere second, she would need soul energy of at least a hundred sols which was almost impossible for a first-year student. Should her calculation be correct, Wang Tong should have been highly sought after by even the S-Class Academies, let along Ayrlarng.
"What made you come to Ayrlarng?" Zhou Sisi asked abruptly.
"It's close to home," Wang Tong answered casually and went on with his training. He had already grown accustomed to the question since many before her had asked the same thing. His answer wasn't far from the truth since he had planned to stay somewhere close to home to wait for Old Fart's return.
Zhou Sisi was speechless at his answer; she watched as he quickly engrossed himself in his training. She knew that he had lied to her again, and his too-cool-to-care kind of demeanor gave Zhou Sisi an urge to punch him in the face.
Personal feelings aside, she wouldn't help but marvel at how quickly Wang Tong had immersed himself in his training as if he had forgotten about her existence. She didn't bother herself to talk to him again; she had her own work to do. She went on with rehearsing what she had remembered while watching Wang Tong's demonstration. She always had a knack of memorizing things among many other things that she was naturally good at. Although her exposure to tactics came at a much later age than most S-Class students, which explained her gap with them, she firmly believed that through hard work, she would eventually catch up with, if not surpass, those who used to be better than her.
Unlike Wang Tong, who always rushed into actions and made decisions on the spot, Zhou Sisi was much more calculating and cautious before attempting a move. She didn't jump right into training; instead, she pulled out a notebook and detailed every single movement that she had recorded in her brain. When she was done, not even a slightest detail of Wang Tong's demonstration was missed in the notes. Yet again, she had held off the training and rehearsed the entire set of movement in her mind, paying attentions to how movements were connected with one another and measuring the nuances of the simplest maneuvers.
Meanwhile, Wang Tong was engrossed in the sea of information stored within Ayrlarng's information bank, the equivalent of a library. It contained space battle technique of all races but only provided high-level summaries of many advanced techniques without getting into details. Nevertheless, the amount of information was impressive, a result of decade-long development and expansions. The information bank stood out as the only achievement of former principals before Samantha.
Despite the wealth of information, it was not properly categorized and was ill-maintained, most likely due to the lack of interests among students since many of the techniques were too hard to be understood by Ayrlarng's students.
Although the year spent on Norton had hardened Wang Tong's body and sharpened his mind, he had never learned any battle techniques directly from Mr. Wannabe. Instead, he only scraped bits and pieces of advice by himself after he slowly picked up experiences while fighting with the Zergs. Upon returning to Earth, he was immediately mesmerized by the plethora of techniques deployed by TPA fighters and craved that one day he would be able to learn them all. Therefore, as soon as he had discovered the information bank, he was quickly drawn to it, satisfied and filled with joy after he had mastered a new technique recorded within. The pleasure was comparable to that of slaughtering a new-found species of the Zergs, which Wang Tong would quickly disembowel upon ending its life, throw the carcass into the cauldron and then enjoy its flesh when it was cooked. Sometimes he worried if the new species of Zerg he had just eaten was poisonous, but so far, he hadn't gotten sick even once.