“Well, I was a bit busy, you know, fighting off an invasion and all that stuff.”
Mei walked up to him and gave him a quick hug. “So what do you think about our students?”
“They are good for beginners. How are your advanced classes going?” Adrian asked.
“They can use most of the Sha abilities that we can; they still don’t have the reserves to match us, but it will come in time,” Meifeng said.
“That’s good. We are going to start triggering the change in children soon. And the Hand will be going through the treatment soon.”
“Finally,” Clara said.
“That means you will have little children capable of using the Sha soon. You sure you are happy about that?” Adrian asked.
“Ugh… Didn’t think about that,” Clara said with a grimace. “What is the plan, how young will they start training?”
“According to sphere, the Sha manifests sometime between six and eight years of age. We will be admitting children to schools as soon as they gain the ability. You need to start deciding which of your more advanced students will be capable of teaching.”
“How many do you think we will need?” Mei asked.
“As many as you think can do it. Don’t sacrifice on the quality of teachers for numbers, though, we will make it work. Just choose good teachers. I’m also going to have some Sowir come in and teach advanced telepathy, first to your students, and later perhaps even to children. I’m going to send you everything that you need to know; you’ll be in charge, so decide what you will need and send it to Tomas’s office. He’ll make sure you get everything you need,” Adrian said.
“New facilities?” Clara asked coyly.
Mei hit Clara’s shoulder with the back of her hand, evoking a yelp from the much taller woman. “What was that for?” Clara asked, but Mei just glared at her.
“You need new facilities?” Adrian asked, looking around at the room they were in. It seemed sufficient; it had everything that his own training rooms had.
“Well, we had some ideas…” Clara said slowly, looking at Mei askance.
“As I said, you are in charge. Just prepare a presentation for Tomas, explain what you need and why, and if he agrees, you’ll get it,” Adrian said.
“Great, we will do that,” Clara said, satisfied.
“Anyway. We heard that Seo-yun has some new treatments. Any chance that we get them soon?” Mei asked.
“Actually that is one of the reasons why I came,” Adrian said. “I’ll be getting those upgrades soon. I wanted to let you know so that you can plan ahead. Once I finish and test them out, you’ll be able to do them too, but only if you have replacement teachers.”
“We’ll find people. What are the upgrades?” Mei asked.
“They learned how to trigger the latent genetic triggers that they couldn’t do in adults up until now. I’ll be getting some things that my abrupt change couldn’t handle, mostly growth of tissue and organ enhancements. A small gas chamber attached to the lungs that will store gas for use by a few Sha abilities—the plasma shot, for one, meaning I won’t need to use my own blood anymore. Then there are some of our scientists’ upgrades for my muscles, giving them even more density and strength.”
“Hm… That will be useful. But for strength… why don’t you grow your body? They can do that, give you a bigger body, I mean. You’ll be stronger. Not that you are short now or anything,” she added quickly.
Adrian smiled. He was right about average for a human at 186 cm. But he understood what she meant. “Well, for one, doing that would probably cripple me a lot. I have complete control over my body, my mind is familiar with it perfectly. Growing it out would mess with my brain’s control over the body. I grew with this body; getting a new one now that my mind is developed fully would be very hard to adapt to. I might never gain the same ability I have with this body. And second, with these upgrades, now I won’t need it. I’ll be much stronger, but remain the same familiar size.”
“Makes sense, but you know that some of the others are planning to do that too?” Clara asked.
“They don’t have my mind. They might be able to train and adapt eventually, but I can’t risk it with mine. We don’t yet know what exactly happened to me; without knowing and understanding it, the benefits of staying like this far outweigh the disadvantages,” Adrian answered.
“So how long will the treatment take this time?” Mei asked.
“Three months, plus a few more for recovery.” Adrian sighed. “I decided that now is the best time to do it. I doubt that the Shara Daim will be back soon; Sol is protected, and there is nothing really for me to do other than wait. Best I get it out of the way now.”
“Well, I don’t envy you. It sucks not being able to move,” Clara said compassionately.
“Yeah it does,” Adrian said as he remembered the last time he’d undergone these kinds of treatments.
Adrian dropped down to the floor as an orange ball of plasma shot towards his head. Anessa was running towards him, ready to attack. Or rather, his mind’s version of Anessa. Adrian’s body was undergoing upgrades, but he had retreated himself into his mind-space for the duration. Inside, time ran differently, and he could think and train. The fact that he had complete control of his body meant that he didn’t need muscle memory; any move he devised in his mind-space, he would be able to replicate perfectly in real-space.
Now he was fighting his imagination’s version of Anessa. His mind had analyzed her movements and attacks, and could recreate a passable image. Adrian needed to train against opponents stronger than himself—and Anessa was the strongest he had ever encountered.
Thankfully, he would have a long time in mind-space to develop techniques and tactics to fight opponents with the Sha that were much stronger than he was.
Chapter Twenty-Four
One month later — March; Year 56 of the Empire — Erasi battleship Highborn
Hanaru Weaver of the Erasi stood in the sanctum on board his ship in orbit of Tarabat. Around him floated holograms displaying various data that he was studying. The war against the Shara Daim was proceeding according to plans, at least for now. The invasion force had caught their leadership off guard and their Legions out of position, and yet their response was nowhere near what the Weavers had expected.
The projections had predicted an immediate and powerful response, which was the reason why they had chosen to attack while the Legions were out of position. Waiting for an all-out war with the Empire would’ve been preferable, but they couldn’t risk them somehow coming to an agreement. Therefore, the Erasi forces had struck earlier, blowing through the Shara Daim system guards. The expectation had been that the Elders of the Shara Daim would recall their Legions to defend their territory, leaving a smaller force to deal with the Empire. Instead, the opposite had happened; they’d recalled only a small force to deal with the invading force.
Hanaru wasn’t sure if the Shara Daim believed the Empire a greater threat than the Erasi, but it was a stroke of luck for them. Then the Shara Daim attack on the Empire had happened, and the Erasi ambassador had witnessed it. The Empire had been hiding a lot of their power; they had completely dominated against the Shara Daim, destroying one entire Legion and allowing the two surviving to leave. That bothered Hanaru and his superiors; the Empire clearly had the means to defend itself, yet they constantly pushed for peace.
However, the battle in their Sol system wasn’t what had Hanaru worried. It was what had happened just a few weeks ago, and of what he’d learned just now. The Empire knew about the Erasi stealth ships in their territory, and they had chosen to make sure that he and his people knew it too. Three weeks ago, at the exact same time across multiple systems, every single stealth ship had been pinged with a powerful tachyon-based scan. The scans weren’t omnidirectional; they had been targeted directly at the ships. They had known exactly where they were. Hanaru had suspected treachery, an information leak; it was unlikely that they could’ve found every single ship, but he was convinced once he read the next report. Each time a stealth ship entered an Empire system, it was immediately pinged.