BIOLOGICAL SUPERCOMPUTER SYSTEM

129 The Red Palace (3)

Before going out, Benedict advised him to put on the Red Palace uniform. The clothes were made of red pants with some golden stripes on the sides and a jacket embroidered with the golden Red Palace Dojo's logo on the back. Both the new members of the Dojo put on the uniform and later went out of the room.

They entered a corridor whose carpet was red like that of the entrance hall, and the walls were painted in golden hues. A few steps ahead lay another door leading into another room, and so on and so forth for the whole corridor.

"Ok," Benedict said, "In the email they sent us, it has been explained how the whole building is structured. There are 163 floors in this building, which is 828 meters tall. The floors are layered the same, but with each rank, you go up, and the better the resources and the equipment are. Floors 1-10 are for the peasants, 21-30 for squires, and so on. From the viscount rank, they need more floors since the rooms are assigned for each student," Benedict said while speeding through the corridor.

"If you come this way, take a left turn here, and then a right here, you will arrive at the floor's cafeteria. Here you can order whatever you want; coffee, meat, vegetables, drinks, and the like. The best part is that everything is free since this is a government-funded institution." Once Erik and Benedict arrived in front of the cafeteria door, they peeked inside the room.

Clearly, the establishment was vast, capable of accommodating thousands of people. There was a huge counter stretching from the beginning to the end of the frontal wall, and behind it were kitchens. The counter had multiple types of food on display and spread out numerous tables covered with a red tablecloth in front of it.

The place was massive, to say the least, and a lot of people were already having breakfast.

"Impressive, eh?" Benedict said.

"Indeed, it's much bigger than my high school cafeteria."

"Yeah, mine too, and the food is better! I already tried it." Benedict replied. "Now, follow me; there is the gym to see and then a little surprise."

The young man then quickly dashed through the corridors, and after a couple of minutes of walking, they arrived at the gym doors. When they entered, Erik was pleasantly surprised. The gym was entirely covered in black trauma flooring, and the number of weights and machinery was unbelievable.

Treadmills, stationary bikes, dumbbells, barbells, benches, medicine balls, kettlebells, and ropes... It seemed as though every training tool imaginable could be found in this enormous room. However, the giant fighting ring on the side of the room caught his attention. It was bigger than the one used at school for the tournament. Beside it was a screen showing images of martial arts techniques for all to see.

"This is amazing!" Erik exclaimed when he saw the ring. "I would have never imagined that a place like this existed in New Alexandria!" he said.

"And you have seen nothing! According to a senior of mine, the equipment is even better on the higher floors since they even have intrity weights! He also said that from viscount rank, they also have gravity chambers, but it is rumored that they have one for each student on the emperor floors! Can you imagine it?" Benedict said with an excited face.

"I was already hooked up when you talked about intrity weights, but Gravity Chambers, are you serious?!" Erik asked incredulously.

Intrity weights were a new piece of technology that many gyms coveted but were expensive. They were tools that could change their weight. Nothing too fancy, but the technology behind it involved gravity control.

The so-called gravity chambers, instead, were rooms in which gravity was incremented. They allowed people to train harder and were particularly effective if paired with intrity weights. However, to use such rooms, one needed to have enough neural links as there was a need for the body to be able to manage such increased levels of gravity.

If one entered without the proper strength inside such chambers, there was a high chance of incurring injuries. Even clothes could wound you at high levels of gravity, walking could be as worse as falling from meters high, and even the blood flow would have problems working.

"Now, there is one last thing I want you to see. I don't know if you are into this kind of stuff, but if you are like me, you will like it. Come." Benedict said.

Erik took his time to observe the young but friendly man as they walked. Benedict was around 1.7 meters tall with short chestnut hair and chocolate-brown eyes. He had a pretty rectangular face and a mole on his right cheek.

Despite being a fighter, he wasn't that muscular, but he had notably bulky arms and a significantly developed back. His body was a little bit disproportionate in terms of muscles, but it was clear that there was a reason for that.

The duo walked for ten minutes before arriving in front of a guarded door. In front of it was a masked man with a rifle in his hands. Benedict and Erik went to walk through the door, but the guard stopped them and asked the duo to identify themselves.

"I'm Erik Romano."

"And I'm Benedict Goldstein."

The two said.

"Show me your IDs," the guard said.

"The IDs?" Erik asked.

At that point, Benedict came near Erik's ear. "It is on the email!" he said.

"Ah, thanks..."

Erik took his phone and quickly found the email; there was a sort of QR code that he identified as his ID immediately.

"Here!" he said. The guard scanned the device, and the door opened after he got the two students' identities.

Once they entered, Erik remained flabbergasted by the view. Countless weapons were hung on the walls in all shapes and dimensions.

On the right side of the room, there were swords, pikes, spears, daggers, axes, hammers, maces, and even tridents. They were all melee weapons. On the left side, instead, there were ranged weapons, starting from bows and crossbows and ending with rifles and pistols. A lot of these items were made of steel. Below the hung weapon, small holographic screens showed the weapon's parameters.

"Wow..." Erik whispered.

Benedict nodded. "That's just the crust. Go look at the weapon's screens," the young man said with a grin. As Erik did, he immediately understood why Benedict was grinning. From these devices, it was possible to personalize every weapon. There was the possibility to choose between different kinds of materials, colors, shapes, and other characteristics of the weapons.

"Can we take a weapon?" Erik asked.

"God no... Not now, at least. We need a teacher's supervision for this." Benedict replied.

"How do you know all this stuff? Didn't you come here yesterday?" Erik asked.

"It is all on the email!" Benedict replied with a smile.

"All right, all right!" Erik then observed the screens a little more, and after a while, he asked Benedict.

"I get that we can choose the weapon's colors and material, but is it so simple? We come here, we press a button, and that's it? We can choose whatever we want?"

Benedict shook his head. "We only have access to entry-level material for the weapon, currently. To get better weapons, we need the approval of our teachers. However, we can choose the colors and other small details," he then said.

"So, we can't take anything now, right?"

"No, but we can at least see what we have available!"

The two young men scrolled down the material list, the available serigraphs, incisions, and the like. They could even customize their weapons.

"Can we take whatever we want?" Erik asked.

"We can, but better listen to the teachers. They will recommend us the weapon that better compliments our strengths." Benedict replied.

At that moment, a notification appeared on Erik's phone.

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ERIK ROMANO, YOU MUST REACH THE GROUND FLOOR TO BE TESTED. COME TO ROOM NUMBER 5.

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"It looks like I must go to room number five," Erik said after having read the message.

"They didn't test you yet?" Benedict asked.

"No, I came to the room as soon as Miss Smith dismissed us."