Chapter 378 - 378. Full Exhaustion

Louis was in a slight panic. He had felt the hard grasp of the training dummy on his arm. He had instinctively flexed his muscles making lighting spark out. The light from this caused the shadows over the blank face of the dummy causing it to appear to have one. It undoubtedly caused Louis to react even more dramatically. He lashed out with a straight punch over and over trying to free himself. He didn't even notice that he had signaled the others in the gym by accident. 

His attacks seemed to do the trick because when he was able to move his other arm again there was nothing holding him. But as he stepped forward he hit the body of the dummy with his foot. He knew exactly what it was and how it had gotten there. His blind attacks had caused it to fall to pieces as it was supposed to. But the haunting image of the dummy's shadow face was burned in to his brain. 

The charging motion that came from Louis's minor panic caused him to head first sprint in to Art who had already found Jackson. He could have released lightning again but he could somehow tell that Jackson and Art were real people compared to the dummy he had just been attacked by. 

In the split second as he considered this before linking arms with the two was that he could tell the difference in the electricity inside their bodies. The training dummies was tiff and constant where as the human body was more similar to a thunder storm. It was changing constantly and never exactly the same in a single second.

As the floor began to shake a little, other groups had the feeling that they were big  approached by the large dummy. Unknown to every single one, but the large dummy was the only one that was able to capture them without any fancy movements. It was trying to wrap its' arms around Jackson, Art, and Louis at the moment without their awareness. 

Luckily, Asher and Sammy had bummed right in to its back and knocked it off balance. Art felt the pressure his his side and he caused everyone to duck at the same time. When he was about to kick out he felt a breeze pass him. 

Laura was speeding around slowly taking out dummies. Before she had trained her super power and her mind, she had been always in the dark. For Laura to perceive the situation while moving at a high speed, she had to train he mental processing power. Before she had trained it at all she just saw darkness or flashed of color. It was the main reason she struggled so much with her super power training until she had met the group and joined their goals. 

This being the case, Laura had no problem rushing around at higher running speeds while she was blinded. At worse, she would charge in to and tackle someone. Nothing that couldn't be dealt with later. Her fearless attitude brought her to the large golem without her knowing it. The arms of the dummy were nearly knocked off completely before it hit the ground and fell to pieces. 

Since both groups had felt the moments they reached out and grabbed Laura. The realization came to them and the entire chain they made was only missing Jane and Cara. The two girls had found each other and were also moving towards where they believed the lightning had come from. They had been able to avoid the dummies for the most art. Jane had narrowly missed them three times and not even known it. She sprinted right past one when she saw Cara in the brief moment of light. 

Everyones' sense of time had been totally lost. The loud music and the darkness were taking their toll. For them, they had just been at this for a few moments. But in reality, they had all been facing the level two dummies for much longer. The sudden silence was more than enough to send them all for a loop. As the lights began to slowly but surely reach their previous brightness, the group noticed that Cara and Jane were standing right in front of them. They had all managed to come back together in some form or fashion. 

They could all see the pieces of dummies around from their dark battles. Garnet appeared saying something which was more or less unheard by the group. She instead handed them all tabs of a medicine which they popped and swallowed. The warm feeling that came with it grew until it reached their head and ears. 

Like a clap of thunder, the group could hear clearly again. "As I just said. This is a one time use medicine made by a friend of mine. They had a pretty useful super power when it comes to medicine making but if you use it more than once in a day it does the opposite. That means if you get hurt you will need to heal the old fashion way." Garnet didn't appear to be unhappy to part with this medicine at all. She almost looked proud that she had been able to provide it to the group. 

"Believe it or not, you lasted the hour. But you also gave yourself away and made us turn up the difficulty." Everyone looked at Louis. But they didn't blame him. They might have done the same thing if they were surprised too.

"All of you should be trying to scare him constantly. He should be desensitized of the jerk reaction he had. We could see all of you through the security cameras. They are night vision after all. All of you have jerk reactions. The only two that managed to stay calm were Cara and Jane. You two remained calm when coming in to contact with each other." Coach Winters joined the conversation with her input. 

Garnet and coach Winters stood silently for a moment. They were deciding what to say because they had seen a lot of bad habits. "We will send a report of performance to the elite home gym app later to let you study it." Garnet made a swift decision. Coach Winters didn't look as happy but couldn't express it. She knew it was the best way to send the information this way so that they would be able to do their at home training better. 

"Lastly, today we have the partner weight lifting section. We will group up and lift. That means you are always supporting someone." Coach Winters started to walk then through a few skeptical looks. Hearing that the end was simple weight lifting made their minds race. If this was a hidden trick then they wouldn't be able to so survive it if they were not mentally prepared. 

"Let's go! We have a four hour session to do!" The lifting weights passed fast enough. But the exhaustion they were all feeling was getting to them. Their bodies were at the absolute brink. They had completed the harder training and even had some mental exhaustion as well.

"We will have evaluations for you all soon. Just get home and eat a big meal. You have a few more days left to train alone to work on team skills. You are all still lacking in the team work area even though it looks like you are making progress." This was mostly because the group had managed to come together in the end of the second challenge. 

The group stumbled out of the gym to find the sun starting to set. None of them wanted to walk or jog home. But they had no choice. They needed to get to their home and that was that. "Here, before everyone tries to get home to sleep, take another vitamin packet. We all need to recover and be ready to push ourselves." Laura surprised everyone with this. She had been inspired by the tactics she had missed out on. there were many new things for her to train and potentially use in her next sparring matches. 

If anyone were to look out their window and see the group leave from the school on the jog home, they would have wondered if they should call for the police or an ambulance. The group looked as if they were ready to pass out asleep on the side walk. Not to mention their clothing was clear in showing just how hard they had been working out. 

By the time Art, Asher, and Cara made it back to their house, they didn't even have the energy to fight for the shower. Asher's mother and father had watched the three move like zombies through the shower, eat, and head to bed routine much earlier than usual. It was a strange occurrence that made them both worry but glad that the kids were working hard. They made a mental note to get up extra early and make a big waffle breakfast for them in the morning.. It was the only thing they could do to keep pushing them to improve without getting too involved. They weren't going to be helicopter parents!