"98...99...100!"
"Ah…Finally!"
Shaan immediately lay on the ground as his push-ups reached 100. His whole body felt so tired that he could feel the pain spread throughout his body. Just imagine, he had walked around the field for 5km, squatted 50 times, sat up 50 times, and pushed up 100 times. Honestly, in Shaan's entire life, he had never done such an extreme physical exercise before.
"Good, at least you've accomplished the warm-up stage of this exercise." Maximus folded his arms, looking at Shaan lying weakly on the ground. "However, it's not over yet. I will give you about 20 minutes to rest before we move on to the next exercise."
'The warm-up stage? Seriously. This training is insane.'
"All right, Mr. Maximus," Shaan said with a gasp.
With all his might, Shaan gathered all his energy and walked back to the cafeteria to get a drink or a high-protein snack provided in the cafeteria. "Ah, at least this is much better." Shaan quickly gulped down his drink bottle. "I'm just curious—how are the other trainees doing? Did they go through the same kind of training...?"
Shaan's eyes widened in shock as he saw several other participants appear, staggering weakly. They were so exhausted that they had to support each other just to stay on their feet. Not only that, their faces were covered in bruises and swelling, as if they had taken a serious beating, making them look far more battered than Shaan.
"This is insane, I... I just can't take this anymore," said the green-haired man as he laid his head on the table. "This agility training is driving me crazy. Imagine having to dodge swinging wooden beams coming at you from all directions for almost two hours straight. My whole body's covered in bruises from getting hit over and over again."
"Aa, I... I agree," the blue-haired man to his left also complained. "I'm also continually being asked to train my mana enhancement skills by sitting in the center of a spell circle using a special machine. When the engine is turned on, it feels like your body is receiving hundreds of blows in a short period, until it makes you very exhausted. "
'Oh man, so I'm not the only one suffering. This training... It's way more brutal than anything we've been through before.'
As Shaan took one more sip from his water bottle, there was the sound of clamoring steps walking into the main kitchen. At first, he thought it might be a crowd of amateur daemonists who had the same fate as him, or perhaps... worse.
"Oh my... That's... That's the... group Upper-intermediate daemonists (tamer of darkness)," said the orange-haired man beside the two men. "They are back."
All the eyes of the amateur daemonist in the main kitchen immediately saw several groups of people wearing gray uniforms complete with robes walking into the Cafeteria. A look of admiration was on everyone's face, including Shaan, when he saw the group of tamer of darkness, considering that they already had their title in the general public and were considered heroes.
Shaan had indeed read in one of the articles that discussed Daemonists, which were divided into several levels. Early Daemonist (Amateur Daemonist); Middle early Daemonist (Seeker of light); Upper middle Daemonist (Tamer of darkness); Upper Daemonist (The ruler of Midnight realm) and Master of Daemonist (Destroyer of creatures of darkness).
Each rank has its specific duties when it comes to handling the appearance of Midnight Realms. The power of a Tamer of Darkness far surpasses that of a Daemonist Amateur or a Seeker of Light. Naturally, they also boast impressive accomplishments, as they are assigned to some of the most difficult Midnight Realm cases. Most of these portals contain powerful and terrifying dark creatures, often requiring one to three months—or even longer—to fully resolve.
"They're all so cool," said the orange-haired man, gazing at them admiringly.
"Yeah, and I just wish I could be one of them," said the green-haired man.
After the group of tamer of darkness left the main kitchen, Shaan then directed his gaze at the wall clock, which turned out to show the time 11.55. He still had about 5 minutes to relax in the main kitchen. However, Shaan decided to go to the training room early because he did not want Mr. Maximus to wait for him for too long.
"Oh, hello, Shaan." Mr. Maximus looked at his watch. "Just in time. Good time management. I like people who have good time management."
"So, what's the next exercise?"
Mr. Maximus snapped his fingers, and instantly, a training dummy walked over to him. At first glance, the dummy looked exactly like the dummy that Miss Briana had used when showing how to use the dual sword, but this robot looked much larger than the usual training dummy.
"Alright, Shaan. Now I want you to take down this doll."
'That's it? This is a piece of cake. I can even destroy it in a matter of minutes,' Shaan said confidently.'Well, it turns out that this exercise is much easier than I thought.'
"Now, go ahead and prove that you can take down this dummy doll."
Shaan smiled, then took out his dual short swords confidently. "Alright, my pleasure."
Shaan dashed forward at full speed, slashing his blade straight at the training dummy. The strike landed cleanly, but strangely, the dummy didn't react at all—it didn't even attempt to fight back. Weird. Was it broken?
'Screw with that, the important thing is I'm going to finish this training dan and get some rest,' Shaan stated instantly, delivering his ultimate attack. "It's time to take down this dummy doll."
With a spinning slash, Shaan finally brought the dummy down. Nice—looked like the thing was finally defeated, and that meant his training was done. He then strode confidently towards Mr. Maximus, who watched him from a distance with a faint smile.
"Mr Maximus, look! I've finally—"
But just moments later, a strange sound echoed from behind him. Suddenly, the training dummy rose to its feet, glowing red in both eyes. Crap. What the heck? Why is it still moving?