Reincarnated as an Energy with a System

Chapter 2084: The Facility

Tobin explained some of it as they walked, apparently having heard about the place from older cadets. The facility was shared between all three of the military academies in the city, each of them sending small groups of cadets whenever a slot became available. But the academies were not its primary users.

Most of the time, the True Simulation pods were reserved for active pilots undergoing requalification, soldiers returning from leave or injury who needed to prove they were still fit to fly before being sent back into the war.

"That’s why it’s booked so far in advance," he said. "Cadets are an afterthought here. We only get the slots the pilots don’t need."

They were led into a large waiting hall on one of the lower floors, where several groups of cadets were already gathered.

It did not take Ning long to work out who they were.

The cadets from the other two academies stood in two separate clusters on opposite sides of the hall, each wearing uniforms of a slightly different cut and color from the ones Ning’s academy issued.

They were noticeably better equipped. Their helmets were newer models with sleeker designs, their uniforms looked freshly issued, and several of them wore small badges and insignia that Ning’s academy did not give out at all.

They also carried themselves with considerably more confidence. They stood with the easy, relaxed posture of people who were used to being in places like this, and when Ning’s group entered the hall, several of them turned to look with obvious interest.

That interest did not last long. Once they had looked over the four new arrivals, most of them turned back to their own conversations with expressions that made it clear what they thought of Ning’s academy.

One of them did not turn away.

He was a tall, lean young man with neatly styled light brown hair and a sharp, handsome face that seemed permanently fixed in an expression of mild amusement. He stood near the front of the larger cluster, and from the way the cadets around him kept glancing in his direction, he was clearly someone the others paid attention to.

He looked over Ning’s group with interest, and then his gaze settled on Ning and Naysha, and on the markings of their batch.

His expression of mild amusement widened into a grin.

"Well," he said, loudly enough for the whole hall to hear. "I heard your academy was struggling, but I didn’t realize it was this bad."

Several of the cadets around him laughed.

"What’s that supposed to mean?" Tobin asked, his voice tight.

The young man spread his hands innocently. "Only that your academy has produced so few pilots worth anything lately that it’s been forced to send first-years to the True Simulation."

He looked pointedly at Ning and Naysha. "These two can’t have been here more than a year. Was there really nobody else? Or did your instructors simply give up on finding someone better?"

More laughter followed, this time from both clusters.

Tobin’s jaw tightened, and he took half a step forward before Elena caught his arm. Her own expression had gone cold, and her gray eyes were fixed on the young man with obvious dislike.

"Watch your mouth, Hale," she said.

"Or what?" Hale asked pleasantly. "You’ll outscore me? I’d like to see that, Sorvik. I really would."

Tobin’s hands curled into fists at his sides, and for a moment it looked as though he might shake off Elena’s grip and do something he would regret. Elena held on, though she looked as though she would have quite liked to do something herself.

Naysha stayed silent.

She stood beside Ning without moving, her face calm and expressionless, her eyes fixed on a point somewhere across the hall. If Hale’s words had affected her at all, she gave no sign of it.

Ning, on the other hand, found it amusing.

He looked at Hale, at the cadets laughing around him, and at the upperclassmen bristling beside him, and he could not quite keep the faint smile off his face. It had been a long time since anyone had looked at him with quite so much confident disdain, and he found that he was rather looking forward to seeing how long it would last.

Hale noticed the smile.

His own grin faltered very slightly as he looked at Ning, as though he could not work out what a first-year had to smile about, and then it returned, a little less certain than before.

"Something funny?" he asked.

"Not yet," Ning said.

Hale let out a scoff and quickly dismissed Ning.

A short while after the four arrived, a door at the far end of the waiting hall opened, and a woman in a crisp gray facility uniform stepped through.

She was middle-aged, with a stern, angular face and a thin scar running across her chin. The cadets from all three academies fell silent almost immediately when she appeared, which told Ning that at least some of them had been here before and knew who she was.

"Follow me," she said.

She led them through a set of heavy security doors and into a vast chamber that seemed to take up most of the facility’s lower level.

Ning stopped just inside the doorway and looked around with genuine interest.

The True Simulation pods stood in a row along the length of the chamber, and they were nothing like the simple pod at the academy.

Each one was enormous, easily three or four times the size of the academy’s simulator, a massive sealed sphere suspended inside a cradle of heavy mechanical arms and hydraulic struts.

Thick bundles of cables ran from each sphere into the floor and walls, and Ning could hear the low, steady hum of powerful machinery somewhere beneath them.

Above the row of pods, a large observation gallery overlooked the chamber, with a wide display screen mounted on its far wall.

"My name is Instructor Varga," the woman said, turning to face the gathered cadets. "I oversee the True Simulation sessions at this facility. Some of you have heard about what these machines can do. Most of what you’ve heard is understated."

The instructor gestured toward the nearest pod.