Chapter 82 Recruitment Test Begins

*WHOOSH*

Massive streams of air collided with Mako as he was ejected from his seat. It was hitting him so hard that it was making it hard for him to breathe and open his eyes.

Adrenaline was pumping all over his body making his heart race and his body tremble. He started to feel a rush of excitement as he experienced the sensation of freefall.

Mako didn't know what he was doing, he felt disoriented and confused about what he should be doing while falling. He was unsure about their body position and what to do with his arms and legs.

He still had his eyes closed as he could bring himself to see how high up he was. Suddenly, he felt a grab on his arm and for a brief moment, Mako felt at ease. He opened his eyes to see Bill holding on to him and both of them were falling down together.

"What are we doing? Shouldn't we use the glider?!" Mako shouted so that Bill could hear what he was saying.

"No! We are still too high up! At this height, if we were to open the gliders, the sudden change in speed would be too much for our bodies to bear, and even if we do, it takes too long for us to glide down to the ground and neither of us has that kind of grip strength!" Bill replied.

While in freefall, Bill instructed Mako on how to take on a streamlined position that would make it so that they started falling at a faster rate and could use their own body weight as a form of steering to make sure they land on the water.

With Bill's assistance, Mako was able quickly to adapt and learn the basic of skydiving and even got the hang of steering very quickly. Mako wasn't much afraid at all at this point but the air was still making it hard for him to open his eyes.

Bill had the wind ability, which helped him create a small barrier in front of his eyes such that he could see without any hindrance. He had created natural goggles. Mako didn't have such luxury and he had to open his eyes soon in order to stick the landing. It was still possible for him to just wait until the absolute last second before he deployed his glider and at that point opened his eyes, but he didn't want to risk it.

Mako put one of his hands in his backpack and started wiggling it around to show that he was looking for something. However, in reality, he was just making sure that Bill won't become suspicious as he accessed his inventory and took out the Oni mask.

He quickly placed the Oni mask on his face and was able to open his eyes. The rest was pretty smooth sailing as Mako followed Bill's instructions and was able to successfully deploy his glider.

All of this was happening at quite a fast pace, as it had only been 5 minutes since the boys ejected themselves from the plane. After about 90 seconds of gliding, the boys made it safely to the island.

The gliders automatically converted back into a disk and Bill collected them and placed them in his backpack. The instructional video explained to them that the gliders were a limited-use item and would probably be damaged during the skydive if the person is inexperienced. However, if they managed to not damage it, it could be reused one or two more times.

While Bill was gathering the two disks, Mako had not moved from the spot he had landed. Bill approached him from the back after he was done. He touched his shoulder as he asked," Bro? You alright?"

Mako started to tremble. Bill quickly removed his hand as he didn't know what Mako was up to. Was this a relapse of what happened on the plane? Mako kept shaking up and down and with even more vigor.

"Alright?... Alright! ALRIGHT! I AM GREAT! THAT WAS SO MUCH FUN!" Mako exclaimed as he finally started to move around. Well... moving around would be an understatement.

Mako started jumping all over the place in excitement, continuously repeating the same words that he had so much fun with and that he can't believe that he was so afraid of such a great thing.

Mako was behaving exactly like a little kid and it took a knuckle sandwich from Bill to finally bring him back to his senses.

"Seriously! What is wrong with you today?" Bill asked as he wiped his fist after delivering another punch to Mako.

"I don't know. All I know is that I am no longer afraid of heights!" Mako said with a light chuckle as he rubbed his face where he was punched.

*************

After some time, Mako composed himself and he boys started to analyze their situation and decide on their next set of moves. Due to the episode that Mako had pulled onto the plane, they had not landed at the location that they had decided upon, rather they had landed at the exact opposite area of where they had intended to go.

They had to find a safe location where they could start to build their temporary shelter. According to the information that Brigadier Jones provided, the beasts were a lot more active at night, so it would be foolish to roam around at night.

They quickly realized that they had landed on the southwest corner of the island and were as far away from the center as possible. The original plan was to land near the base of the mountain and use one of the caves as their permanent shelter.

They decided that they would have to slowly migrate toward their pre-decided location by spending each day traveling and looking for a safe place to stay that night and to make sure that a tablet is always nearby.

Once they had figured out their game plan and decided upon the approach, the boys split up to scavenge resources such as locating water and finding food. They decided that it was for the best that they don't move on the first and first find out information via the tablet about the events that are occurring on the island, before making a final decision.

Mako decided to head into the nearby jungle that was right next to the beach where as Bill decided to walk across the shoreline in search of a tablet or food.

*************

*DING!*

A notification popped into Mako's head as he was walking into the jungle. He decided to open it up and see what it was about because he was not expecting a notification at the moment.

[An Amazing Achievement!]

[The user has conquered their fear of heights]

[Rewards: +20 Mentality]

[Mentality has now reached 50]

[New Quest Received]

[Obtain 3 amazing achievements]

[Rewards: New Title]

[Penalty: - ]

[System had sensed an interference with User's mind]

[(ERROR!) User perception is too low to be detectable]

[The interference is now no longer affecting the user]

Mako was not expecting so many notifications all at once, but he was happy to see that he would be receiving a lot of quests during their test which would help him a lot in leveling up.

The first set of notifications had given him the biggest boost he had received thus far and the following quest promised him a brand new title if he was able to obtain 2 more Amazing Achievements. The quest had no penalty which was a relief and it meant that the quest will naturally complete itself as Mako faced tougher and tougher situations.

"What the...?" Mako said.

The last set of notifications was quite scary as it stated that the system noticed interference with his mind but since his perception was not strong enough, he wasn't able to sense its presence or effect. This was very dangerous as something had recently played around with his brain and he didn't even notice.

It could mean that perhaps someone was targeting him or trying to sabotage him. Mako wasn't even sure when this event took place as he was already preoccupied with his own fears. It could have been done recently or some time ago, but he couldn't say exactly when since he also didn't know what effect the interference had on him.

Although it was mighty scary to think about, Mako couldn't really do anything about it at all. He decided that he would invest some more points into perception when he got the chance and keep his guard up. It could be possible that the thing that might be targeting him is on the island itself.

Mako closed the system soon after but something still shone in front of his eyes. He knew that it wasn't the system, but what else could be producing light in his eyes? He moved a bit and saw that he was staring into a beam of reflected light.

Near a cluster of trees, Mako spotted something hidden between the vines, something metallic. He closed in toward it to see what it was since polished metallic material didn't appear naturally in nature.

***********

[Meanwhile along the shore]

Bill was walking along the shoreline barefoot enjoying the gentle cool waves splashing on his feet. He wasn't successful in locating a tablet yet, but the beach was full of different types of crabs. Using several palm tree leaves, Bill had been collecting crustaceans to bring back to the meeting spot and Mako could cook them.

He was quite happy with his catch and was about to turn back around when he noticed something shiny half-buried on the beach a little further ahead.

Filled with curiosity, Bill decided to check out the buried object before returning back to the meeting location.

Both boys simultaneously crouched in front of the shiny metallic object that was almost hidden away and moved forward to extract it and investigate.

"What's this?" They both said with curiosity as they tried to pull the object out of their respective hiding areas.