novelraw Chapter 102 : Chapter 102
Chapter 102 : Chapter 102
Chapter 102 : Fall
"Argento! You can handle that much distance easily!"
Lars shouted from the other side of the crater.
Divinity and her team were standing there in a relaxed manner.
When Anthony succeeded in jumping in a single bound, Barry grinned widely, and now Sal was left alone on the opposite side.
For him, this class was truly a nightmare.
Sal earnestly wished for this time to end quickly.
Sal carefully gauged the distance he had to cross, feeling every muscle in his body stiffen and resist.
‘I’m not ready yet...’
He gritted his teeth, took a few steps back, and tried to steel himself.
The mocking remarks from other team members behind him offered no comfort at all.
Sal couldn't even bring himself to turn his head, unable to face their pitying gazes.
"Hah..."
Breathing heavily, Sal ran forward with all his might.
The moment his right foot stepped on a small patch of flat ground, he threw his entire body to jump over the crater.
It wasn't an outstanding jump, but in return, Sal had to feel a terrible pain as if every joint in his body were tearing apart.
The only moment he could catch his breath was the brief instant he hung in the air just before landing.
His body felt precariously close to buckling under its own weight.
At the moment of landing, his pants activated, perhaps mistaking the impact for an injury or the start of combat, digging deeper into the surrounding ground.
"Puhaha! Hey, Sal!"
At that dramatic landing, some twitched their eyebrows, and Barry's laughter deepened Sal's embarrassment.
Lars instructed the other students to step back from the edge of the crater and stared at Sal with a deeply thoughtful look in his eyes.
"Care to explain what's going on, Argento? Considering the battles I've seen you fight so far, you should be able to display much greater skill than what you're showing now."
He paced around Sal, showing signs of annoyance before his expression changed to one full of curiosity.
"Even after asking about your physical condition, you have no intention of backing down."
Lars murmured almost like a monologue and sent a faint smile toward Sal.
"Admitting that this is too much for you to handle won't get you points deducted. A Supporter needs to be more thorough in self-care than anyone else, but the important thing is showing improvement, even if it's little by little. You can't fix a lifetime habit of sitting around all at once. Please take good care of yourself. Understand?"
Sal nodded and walked toward the group.
They barely made it through the course for the rest of the morning, and many students struggled to learn the basics.
Witnessing Sal's pain, his teammates began to voice worry and encouragement instead of mockery.
"Hey, Sal. You okay? You're doing great."
"Sal, your body is in that state! You're too stubborn..."
Barry's encouragement and Blanid's constant nagging continued.
Divinity still hadn't lost her smile, and Sal felt assured he could get through the day safely.
Perhaps she was secretly enjoying the fact that Sal's short-sighted attitude had pushed him into deep water.
The one annoying Sal the most was none other than himself.
The only small comfort was the Essence growing stronger within his chest.
Whenever break time came around, Sal checked the state of his Core and could feel the threads strengthening with every moment.
He also felt his appetite had become much more voracious than before.
‘Is this hunger also Vanessa's work?’
By the afternoon, Sal looked around the simulated battlefield and felt a faint sense of accomplishment.
He had crawled through piles of debris, jumped over countless craters, and identified weaknesses in the surrounding structures.
He had even succeeded in climbing to the top of one of the ruined buildings.
The final gateway was a makeshift zipline leading to the safe zone at the end of the course.
Sal looked at the zipline with cautious eyes.
‘This... I can't do this.’
Even if his arm strength was enough to support his weight, extreme tension would be unavoidable.
In his current physical condition, it felt more like a challenge that would hasten his death.
When Sal looked at Divinity, she lightly shook her head.
It was a clear signal.
It meant that it was an reckless challenge, implying that now was the time to take a step back.
"I'm sorry, Professor. This seems to be my limit."
Sal turned to Lars with a frown.
However, Lars shook his head with a smile, disagreeing.
"Argento, that won't do. You've held on brilliantly up to this point. Giving up right in front of the finish line is unacceptable. First, try to recover your strength as much as possible. Once all the other teams finish, I'll give you another chance to try, so get ready."
Sal stared blankly at Lars in shock, unable to say anything more.
Lars clapped his hands to draw attention and began explaining how to use the zipline.
"No one can use their abilities here. You might hit your limit in the field, so our precious support teams have set up this exact rescue point. There might be injured people or someone on the verge of death. This is truly like a lifeline to escape danger. recognizing your own weaknesses is very important. This small training exercise sometimes brings about a great awakening effect."
He gave a thumbs-up over his shoulder, pointing to the space between the buildings.
"There's padding down below to cushion the fall, so don't worry. Many people will be jumping from here, so consider it a leap of faith and use it as an opportunity to show that you firmly trust your own stamina."
Although safety measures were in place to encourage a brave attempt, Sal knew clearly that immense pain would assail him the moment he hit the mat.
Once the explanation was over, Divinity and her team began to cross the zipline.
However, only Divinity arrived safely on the other side.
Her team members, composed of Supporters, all fell onto the mat as soon as they stepped off.
Sal felt relieved seeing Jack and Blanid fall onto the mat with faces full of laughter.
Anthony threw himself onto the mat next with a groan.
Barry, as if to tease Sal, frequently threw smiles at him while crossing on the zipline.
While the following teams took on the challenge one after another, Sal stood side by side with Lars, taking in the scene.
As more and more students threw themselves onto the mat without hesitation, sighs of relief from the ground echoed up to the top of the building.
"You seem to be in a tough state lately, worked on anything recently?"
Lars's voice was so low that others couldn't hear, and even Sal found it hard to gauge if he was talking to him.
After a moment of silence, Lars raised one eyebrow slightly and stared at Sal.
Sal shook his head lightly and tapped his chest.
"I was too engrossed in meditation and even went through with a ridiculous workout routine."
At those words, Lars couldn't hide his interest.
He held out his hand, swollen with anticipation, and continued.
"Saved it on your tablet? Show me."
Sal didn't know what to do, but thanks to Lars's gaze being occupied, he earned a moment to catch his breath before the zipline challenge.
He took out his tablet from his pocket, pulled up the workout list Vanessa had put together on the screen, and handed it to Lars.
"You did all of this last night?"
Lars frowned, alternating his gaze between the screen and Sal.
Sal didn't know what to say, so he just nodded firmly.
Before he could offer excuses or blame his own recklessness, a faint smile appeared on Lars's face.
"Is this your routine? Must be something someone sells at the Credit Store."
Lars handed the tablet back to Sal without a hint of displeasure.
"It might be like being thrown into deep water from the start, but it's undoubtedly an excellent introductory guide. If you keep at it, this rough course will soon become a piece of cake."
Sal put the tablet in his pocket, inwardly relieved that Lars wasn't displeased despite Sal himself disparaging it as a ridiculous workout routine.
"Thank you, Professor."
They silently watched the students carefully fiddle with the zipline bar before throwing themselves onto the mat.
Lars urged them not to give up and do it properly, but most were just going through the motions.
Since dozens of students were still waiting for their turn, Sal had enough time to compose himself.
Reading Sal's expression, Lars smiled.
"Your will to improve yourself is impressive. But what I just said is sincere. If you try to change drastically in a short period, you might ruin your body instead."
Sal responded with a polite smile and examined his inner state again.
However, Lars did not stop talking.
"There are cases where talented people like you stay cooped up in the workshop until graduation, so seeing you work so hard is really gratifying."
Lars continued, pointing at the zipline.
"Supporters are indispensable to our success. Equipping heroes with gear to rescue them from danger is important, but the fact that there are Supporters who properly understand our core tasks is what's most special. Orders for weapons and defensive gear will flood in, but the part where you can contribute the most in the field is creating equipment that can minimize damage."
Finishing his words, Lars took a step back from Sal and began guiding the students heading toward the zipline one by one.
Thanks to his strict gaze, none of the students slacked off.
Sal chewed on Lars's words as he watched the remaining teams wait for their turn.
Some of those receiving instructions to stand in front of the zipline cast envious glances at Sal.
When Sal glanced at the building on the other side, not even 10 percent of the total students had crossed the zipline safely.
The Team Leaders mostly succeeded, but there were also a few people Sal didn't know.
As the decisive moment approached, Lars looked at Sal and smiled brightly.
"Don't worry too much about having to jump onto the mat. I wanted to let you know that not finishing doesn't mean you failed. Everyone has a starting point, right? This is your start."
Lars stepped aside and gestured for Sal to take his position.
The zipline cable was firmly anchored to the brick wall on Sal's left, stretching diagonally toward the lower floor of the adjacent building.
The bar slid toward the apex of the cable as if possessed by magnetism, not too far from the point where he had failed last time.
Looking down, he saw a few people rolling onto the inflated mat.
Laughter and cheers erupted from the ground, and shouts of encouragement from the opposite building rang in his ears.
"You can do it!"
That single phrase from Nova, shouting louder than anyone else, eased Sal's tension a little.
Sal gripped the bar with all his might.
Sal glanced at Lars one last time and tightened his arms to steady his posture.
At that very moment, Barry's voice from the crowd pierced clearly into Sal's ears.
"Keep your elbows straight and focus all your strength on the handle!"
A doubt crossed his mind that Barry might be intentionally giving bad advice to make him crash into the ground, but Sal took his words deep to heart as he stepped off the building.
He extended his arms straight and focused all his remaining strength on the handle.
Perhaps because he rarely did exercises using his hands, Sal didn't feel much pain in his hands while hanging in the air.
Instead, tension weighed down on his shoulders, and Sal squeezed his eyes shut, sensing that his arms wouldn't be able to hold out.
Despite the pain screaming from every muscle in his body, Sal desperately tried to hold on for just one or two seconds longer.
Wind brushed past his cheeks, and a weightlessness he had never felt before wrapped around him.
When the severe pain in his right shoulder finally reached its limit, Sal unwittingly let go of his hand.
His center of gravity shifted to one side, and the right side of the zipline bar shot up into the sky.
Sal hung precariously in mid-air, barely holding on with his left hand.
His body spun a half-turn from the shock and shook violently until he eventually lost his grip.
Since Divinity had already predicted failure, even Sal himself couldn't understand why he had tried so desperately to hold on.
Sal's eyes snapped open.
He watched the sight of his sunglasses slipping off his face as if in slow motion.
The sunglasses tumbled onto the mat, and Sal was dangling perilously in the air.
Intense pain, as if his neck were breaking, assailed him, but as Sal looked around, he noticed a hand firmly gripping his leg.
"Hi?"
Nova was beaming brightly, leaning her upper body out of the hole.
Her grip strength was as solid as iron.
"Pull him up, Lucia!"
"Just pull!"
From the floor above, Divinity and Barry shouted at Nova to pull Sal up.
The two firmly supported Nova, and she had attempted a dangerous acrobatic feat to catch Sal before he fell.
The moment Sal was clumsily pulled up to the floor where they were, Lars's laughter rang out from the roof of the building across from them.
"Bwahahaha-!"