I looked around me and checked my own body to see if my vision is working properly.
Seeing my arm and my hands which ran over my body, sense of sight is okay.
Feeling my hands as it ran over me, sense of touch is also okay.
Sense of hearing and sense of taste was also working properly which I verified by clicking my tongue and licking my lips.
As for the sense of smell, I guess it's also fine.
The Pathways, the Abilities, the Skills, the Energies, everything is in here. Even the clothes that I stripped myself off earlier were now covering me. The items and everything that was on me, the Orbs and the Necklaces were also here.
It really reflected all that I am outside this simulation.
Wait. Could it be drawn upon my memory? Was that why even the clothes I took off were back? It's a possibility.
However, when will the scenery be rendered? It's already a minute and I'm still in this never-ending white space. Although I could feel that I am standing on the ground, my senses would surely go haywire if I tried to move from this spot.
"Can you hear me, Daisuke?"
Suddenly, Lexie's clear voice rang out from somewhere.
Ah. I'm inside a simulation, looking for where the voice was coming from is pretty useless.
"I do. This is pretty amazing but there's nothing in here. Is it supposed to be like this?"
Hearing my question, I could hear her rushing from one place to another judging from the distance of the sound of her footsteps.
"Ah! That's my bad, sorry. I forgot to load the program, wait for a few minutes."
This girl… my first impression of her was slowly crumbling. Where's that fairly competent lady in white earlier? Was that a mask?
After a few minutes of waiting, the surrounding white space changed into a wide expanse of a plain. The sky is clear and there's nothing that could be seen on the horizon.
Alright. This is another endless space.
"I'm really sorry from earlier, Daisuke. Before we start your assessment, do you want me to accelerate the time or not?"
I see. So they also touched upon Brain Acceleration.
"Won't there be a downside to it?"
"As long as it's not more than 10 times. If we exceed that number, it will have an effect towards the final result of the assessment."
"I see. You're asking me this because this assessment will need a long time to finish, right?"
"Yes. The program will put you in tests and scenarios where you can shine and show your full capabilities. You can stop it anytime but I will not be able to talk to you like this if you decide to speed it up."
"Well, we need to finish this as soon as possible so… just get on with it, accelerate it by 10 times."
The memory from the Incarnation will soon arrive and wasting time in a simulation will not really help me in any way when threats can arrive at any time. Since there will be no drawbacks if we accelerated to 10 times, that's obviously the ideal choice.
"As you wish. Good luck, Daisuke."
"Thank you."
As soon as we ended our conversation a timer appeared in the sky which dimmed almost immediately and it would only shine again if I focused my vision on it. Apart from that timer, there's nothing else that changed. As if this program was meant to be more realistic to give a sense of pressure for the assessment.
Soon enough, I heard footsteps behind me. I turned around and saw a man, walking from a distance, with a gun which I don't recognize in his hand. Most probably a gun only existing in this world.
As soon as he arrived at a certain distance, he aimed and opened fire at me.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
As bullets went flying towards my head, I jumped to the side and shot an Air Bullet towards the muzzle of his gun, this one's only an armed regular human. The Air Bullet accurately slipped inside the muzzle and broke his gun to pieces, another Air Bullet and the man whose armor was just his clothes, died on the spot.
Well, it's a simulation but to provide realism, his corpse was left there bleeding from where the Air Bullet passed through his body.
A few seconds later, 5 more similar to the dead guy appeared and rained me down with bullets without any warning. Though it wouldn't hurt me even if it hits, everything is possible to happen during a battle. What if it was suddenly enhanced that it could penetrate any type of defenses, then that's carelessness. As much as possible, I will not let myself be hit.
Dodging and killing regular armed humans like this until the place became full of their corpses, I could clearly feel that this program wanted to exhaust me.
Too bad though but this much isn't enough. I didn't even need to use my sword or any other skill apart from Flash Steps and Air Bullet, a Level 1 Spell and Skill from the World of Systems.
Time passed where I kept on killing more and more of them. After the armed humans reached 500 in numbers, I sensed that it would be the last wave before the simulation leveled up.
Everyone at my level could pass this but it wouldn't be as easy as how I've done it.
Well, if they use their abilities it will be fairly easy but like in the real world, they will be depleted soon enough. The energy around was just as abundant as how it was. Whoever made this simulation is really a genius. However, it's still not as perfect as it seems.
After cleaning the last of the 500, all the bodies piled up disappeared. I looked up at the timer and it took me 10 minutes to pass this level. 1 minute has passed outside.
After a minute of rest, the next level started. This time, it's not Rank 1 Mortal or a Bronze-rank which I was expecting. Looks like the program already adjusted it to skip unnecessary lower leveled which depended on the result of that first level.
10 minutes of clearing time resulted in this…
From a distance, I could feel the intensity coming off from the woman who suddenly appeared. A Rank 4 Mortal at least or in this world a Diamond-rank.
When she reached a certain distance, a Powergen appeared and covered her body and as soon as it finished covering her, she dashed from where she was towards me.
Seeing that, I took out my sword and sent an Energy Slash, Severing Blades and Wind Blades towards her.
A triple-slash ranged attack.
The woman in her Powergen didn't dodge it but she chose to face it head-on by pulling out a shotgun-like weapon which was augmented by her ability. She then pulled the trigger three times in front of her, aiming at the attacks i sent. It carried a certain power which almost broke the Energy Slash that I sent first.
Clang! Slash! Clang!
However, all of the attacks I sent were stronger than the Air Bullets I was using earlier. The bullets from her gun failed to break it and all three attacks hit her at the same spot which led to her Powergen having broken open by the Energy Slash. After that, the Severing Blades slashed open her body before her Powergen was repaired and lastly the Wind Blades broke it open again which hurtled her off backwards.
"I see. The program was also analyzing what can be my weakness. Her gun could probably break the Air Bullets but not those three."
A few seconds later two more Diamond-rank in a Powergen appeared before me. The woman who was sent away probably died from the damage she received from those attacks.
This time the program adjusted itself again as the two new enemies dodged and deflected my attacks. However, in the end, they were still bested by me.
In this kind of continuous battle, the enemies that showed up after defeating one were increasingly getting stronger and stronger.
At one point I almost got ganged up and would've been stabbed at 5 different spots if I didn't use the Phantasmic Doppelganger. My clones surprised them and I targeted them one by one.
At the 2-hour mark, a Powergen was generated for me since the next opponents were all Legend-ranks that were around 80-90 in Power Level. They also have their own variety of abilities that were being enhanced by the Powergen they were wearing that I need to be wary of.
However, after the Legend-rank. The enemies stopped getting powered up. Instead, their numbers increased again and they started to have more and more intelligence.
If before they were just lunging at me blindly as if they had a directive to immediately kill me, the newer enemies started to employ tactics.
Also, other enemies appeared as well. In this simulation, I saw the alien species from that Alien Civilization which, according to Nysia's story, appeared 20 years ago.
They're humanoid at best but they had a slippery appearance and a dark-green skin.
If I can compare them to something I've seen before, they look like Nam*kians with the feeler on top of their hairless head.
Those feelers were supposedly their weakness. Once you cut it, their senses will be utterly distorted.
However it's not easy to cut it, it can be sunk in their head if an attack was about to hit it. It acted as their sensors after all. That's why it could sense an attack aimed at it.
It could only be hit by strays that it didn't expect. Also, they could generate thick carapaces that were on par with Powergens. I used at least 10 minutes to study the first alien that appeared before trying to kill it at the fastest possible method.
Phantasmic Doppelganger, Orb of Ailment, Orb of Enhancement, Energy Field as well as every buff I could cast on me before swiftly attacking it with every skill in my arsenal.
However, it was proven overkill as it died on the three-slashes combo and quick stabs filled with Energy Explosions.
I guess this simulation was also educating their recruits on how to fight the real enemies.
Err… but with Metagens, maybe these aliens will also have something that could fight it. This was probably why Nysia was so wary not to leave the planet to clean those bugs at the planet's moon.
For her, these aliens are the bigger threat between the two.
I already informed her about the upcoming descent of stronger enemies, though she believed me, she still couldn't erase her uneasiness about these aliens who seemingly became silent for more than 6 months now.
Maybe it could be linked to the Principal's warning before we entered the portal. We'll see. For now, I'll finish this assessment and start making preparations as well as further increase my strength.
With Transcendents like Nysia, they still couldn't defeat that Alien Civilization completely, that's why I need to reach Transcendence here and let the three heroes grow and reach Transcendence as well.