Deep inside the mental technique training facility in an isolated room, Rui sat with crossed legs and closed eyes
He was stoic, unmoving.
The walls of the isolated room were padded tiled with an esoteric substance found in the caves of the Basara Mountain range far west of the town of Hajin, that insulated sound to an extremely high degree. Not a single decibel managed to escape its grasp.
It was so silent that Rui could nothing but his own heartbeat and his own breathing.
Yet, they did not distract him.
They guided him in the void.
The guided him as he traversed through his own vast mind palace.
His body was in the Academy.
His consciousness was also in the Academy.
Yet, they were not in the same place.
One was in a real physical location, and the other was in a figment of his imagination thoroughly reconstructed inside his own mind.
He walked across his mind palace leisurely. Nonchalantly. Every location of his mind palace had documents and files neatly stacked on top of each other. Normally, it would be irresponsible to stack them that way, instead of in a drawer or file cabinet.
What if they fell over? They would certainly get dusty as time passed.
This was within his mind, his imagination. He was effectively an omnipotent god inside his mind palace, gravity existed to help feel comfortable as he navigated his mind palace.
And dust simply did not exist.
He would occasionally pick up a document. He would carefully open it up, scroll through its content with interest before closing it and putting it back exactly where it was before.
Eventually he made his way to the Apprentice dormitory, accessing his room.
Yet it was quite different from its real-life counterpart.
The furniture was all gone.
In the center was a book.
[Project Water and the VOID algorithm
It was the publication he had published after the final iteration of the VOID algorithm was created. He picked up the book carefully, affectionately.
He skimmed to the final chapter, reading through a specific excerpt.
[...And so, although the VOID algorithm is complete and functioning, Project Water is not yet complete. The next phase of our research is aimed at verifying whether or not the VOID algorithm is viable. If it is, then the Project will end on the spot, but if not, we will continue working for as long as it takes to realize this project and succeed. We here at Combat Spots Research Co. Will aim to fulfill our dream to create the ultimate combat style!...]
A tinge of melancholy flashed through his eyes. He recalled the confidence and enthuse he had written that bit with. And yet, many years later, he had ultimately failed and later died.
Then he had woken up in a strange new world, with strange new phenomena. He was shown a new path, and he chose to walk it. And after much blood, sweat and tears, he had finally come to take a step further in the direction he never could in his previous life.
He was going to take that step now.
He shut the book with force, and instantly, his mind palace disappeared.
A total of seven months had passed since he originally began his training. The techniques themselves had been mastered nearly a month ago. The problem was getting used to them and learning how to apply them in combat, building comfort and some amount of muscle memory so that he would fight fluidly.
For the Mind Palace technique, however, required more than just basic mastery. Rui had found that even if he was able to use the technique, it was too slow. He needed to become so adept with it that he could enter it and exit swiftly with the slightest bit of effort.
And so, he had locked himself in a room, dedicating himself to the technique thoroughly.
There were times where he felt he was losing his sanity, unsure of what was real and what wasn't. It got especially bad because the mental rejuvenation potions and the lack of a sleep cycle made him lose track of time. He'd felt like an eternity had passed in that isolated room and in his mind palace, and time didn't pass the same inside his mind palace as it did in reality.
But he gritted his teeth and continued until his proficiency grew tremendously. To a certain degree, he did with the technique what Hever had done with the Meteoric Swing technique, going far beyond basic mastery.
He had reduced the lag time until it reached a level where it no longer hindered him.
He consumed a rejuvenation potion as he opened the door to his isolated room, he simply walked out as he headed to the exit of the facility.
He needed to test his current power level and more.
He hadn't used the Mind Palace technique because his proficiency with it was too low, and too slow. But now that he had mastered it to the degree where he could actually use it in combat, he no longer knew what he was capable of.
He needed a strong, powerful opponent, preferably an all-rounder, preferably someone he didn't have much information on prior. The reason for these were simple. All-rounders were the best to test the Mind Palace solution for the viability problem, because they had no inherent weakness and so several of the lower systems of the VOID algorithm weren't effective, thus any success he had would mostly come from the pattern recognition systems he was going to employ.
It also had to be an opponent he didn't have much information on so that his analysis of the Mind Palace technique would not be skewed and biased. He had fought against Nel too many times and had gained a good intuitive understanding for his rather simplistic fighting style, so fighting against Nel would not give him a clear idea for how effective the Mind Palace technique was.
If he could not rely on Nel, then who could he rely on?
"Squire Kyrie." Rui called out as he reached the sparring facility.
She turned, meeting his unfathomably deep eyes.
"It's time." He told her.