1.33 – Training montage would do fine instead of this

Despite his eagerness to meet this Aoi or other students of the academy that Yukiko mentioned, it was Saturday, and calling them to Vermillion Strike’s office simply wasn’t an option. Without much else to do, he just wrote them down in his phone and asked about which class he could find them in. Most of those that Strike mentioned were from classes 3-S to 3-C.

Apparently, there wasn’t a 3-F or E class. Those that got all the way to the third year either advanced up or were kicked out. Nathan hoped he wouldn’t have to face a similar outcome. His fight with Alicia’s brother made him a bit unsure where he would stand in the rankings himself.

Hopefully, the tournament that was two months away now would show him.

From the teachers, other than herself, Yukiko thought of two others, but she also warned Nathan. “I know you may think of superheroes as these amazing beings that help people out of the goodness of their heart, and for a lot of us, that is the truth. Or maybe not the goodness of heart itself, but some other motivation that is altruistic in nature.”

“I have no idea what altruistic means.”

“That’s fine, you can think of it as a synonym of just good. What I mean to say is these two teachers might be willing to help, but their motivations may not be as heroic as you would like.”

“Honestly, as long as they do their job and help people, I don’t see how this could have a bad outcome.”

She gave him a pitying smile. “You’ll see. Anyway, anything else?”

“No, thank you!”

Nathan stopped looking at the names in his phone. He had about twenty, all in all far more than he thought he would have. Though to cover the whole city, he still needed more. Perhaps he could ask the school board to pin up a poster or go into other superhero academies and do something similar. A lot to think about. He also wasn’t sure how the future would evolve with Red Lily on the attack somewhat.

“Well, what are you two up to for the rest of the day?” Vermillion Strike asked, pointing to him and Alicia.

“Nothing much. I planned on looking up the students you named,” Nathan shrugged.

“I wanted to sleep—ughh, I mean, I wanted to revise what I’ve learned this week.” Alicia quipped.

“Are all Academy students so boring these years? Why are you not at parties or drinking?”

Alicia looked at her, confused. Nathan bit his tongue, not mentioning how many parties he attended himself. Getting alcohol wasn’t as hard in a large city like New York. It probably wasn’t that hard to get it in Tokyo either, but he didn’t really feel the need to do so.

“You two should have seen me when I was your age. I was partying up constantly.”

“Why does that not surprise me?” He chuckled at that.”

“Well, anyway, I’m bored out of my mind here, and if I have to sign yet another paper, I think I’ll probably completely lose it, so how about some practice? The training hall is free to use.”

“Is that not gonna cause you any trouble?” Alicia asked, though he could hear it in her voice; she wasn’t opposed.

“No., And as long as nobody gets hurt, I’ll go easy on you, I promise.”

“Your idea of going easy on me last time was throwing me up several hundred feet into the air.” Nathan crossed his arms.

“Hey, you surely must have enjoyed it, right? Plus you punched me into the ground as payback for that.”

“I had to fix the grass after; you’re lucky my dad didn’t find out.” Alicia shook her head, but there was a grin on her face. “Anyway, I’m down, better than revising. What about you, Nathan?”

Honestly, he kind of wanted to try to find out who the students were, search them on social media, and attach faces to the names. But practice was a thing he shouldn’t be skipping out on, not now with everything happening.

Suddenly he remembered something. The message he received on Thursday, right after Vermillion Strike left. How could he have forgotten? “I’m down, but first—”

“Okay, let’s go then.” Vermillion Strike ignored him hard into the air and went out of the door, urging them to follow.

———————

“Ok, show me how much you’ve improved in the last few weeks. When was the last time I saw you fight…?”

“When you fought us first week, and after that when you saw us fight a week ago against…”

“Ah, right!” She snapped her fingers. “The Onis. Yeah, okay, it’s been only a few days, but there have been a lot of classes, and those were more focused on bringing your potential out than ever before. You’re sacrificing a lot of know-how and understanding for raw power. I personally wouldn’t have agreed, but who am I to say? Hey, if you’re stuck on something, just tell me right now; I might be able to help.”

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“Your ability is nothing like mine!” Alicia shook her head.

“All abilities are somewhat similar; we all have super strength and abnormal durability.”

“We know, but this all depends on how much we cultivate our Z cells, doesn’t it? And I’ve been struggling with that.”

“What the hell is the Z cell?” Nathan asked, looking around. He might have skipped a few too many classes. He remembered the name Z cell, though; he heard it somewhere. Was it one of the abilities?

“The Z cell is the cell in your body. Because there are several thousand, if not hundreds of thousands, of them, they give you the superpower. We don’t know their origin, and we don’t know why exactly they work like they work. They aren’t identifiable before a person turns 18 years old. Once they do, some stay latent in people or just never show up; we don’t know for sure, but sometimes they activate, and for those that have a lot of these cells, those people become super humans.” Yukiko explained, slipping into a teacher persona.

“You need to stop skipping classes.” Alicia muttered.

“Okay, yeah, I get it.” Nathan nodded, remembering this very sentence from the video game. It came from Mrs. Gurehi, if he remembered correctly. “How do we cultivate these cells? Or make them activate or whatever.”