-Ethereal- BOOK I

Companion

I feel myself start regaining consciousness. Before I even open my eyes, I feel my FAMICI forms had been active even while I was unconscious, I was able to tell where Gin was and vaguely what he was doing during my blackout. Gin had been walking on the roof of the training room for the past three hours. He had altered his personal gravity and seemed to be reading something. He had been walking in a zig-zag pattern in an area of about four miles of my locations. Gin was about one mile away and walking back towards my location. I slowly open my eyes as I regain control over my body. I feel a surge of energy activated by my FAMICI. I spring up and backflip from the ground a few times landing on a kneeling position, I look up at Gin smiling and walking towards me. I stand and shake myself awake.

"Nice nap?" Gin asks

"The best! Still starving but I think I am back to normal," I reply

Gin walks towards me while briefly disappearing and appearing ahead slightly almost as he was lagging in a video game. Gin finally reaches my location and begins to walk in circles around me from above.

"Good. Good. Now during this forging you learned how this room works. If not consciously then you learned it unconsciously," Gin explains

"Yes. Red is close quarter combat reach and most mêlée weapons. Yellow Longer range mêlée weapons, certain projectiles and combat styles. Blue only long-range weapons, few mêlée weapons, unique unarmed combat styles and an optimal range for spirit usage," I respond

"Correct. However, you were only engaged in combat with one opponent," The ground lights up momentarily and then dims out. The ground is now covered in red, yellow and blue lines from all directions and angles. Gin continues, "How would you fight against multiple opponents or in the middle of a battlefield?"

"I think I understand where you are coming from. But the idea would be the same just in a wider scale, Correct?" I respond

"One versus many? Yes. But it' very rarely that simple. What if you have allies at different skill levels then you? Mostly lower of course but how would you fight? Ignore them?" Gin asks with a cheerful tone

Gin snapped his fingers and what seemed like ten wooden mannequins equipped with different types of weapons some mêlée some long-range begin to raise from the ground. The mannequins then begin to walk towards me and file themselves behind me.

"These guys are your allies! And these," Gin snaps his fingers and what seems like a never-ending number of red color wooden mannequins all equipped with at least one ranged weapons and mêlée weapon. The ground begins to deform itself and everything changes. The rooms now resembles a cold night battlefield. The area no longer resembled its previous scenery. Gin Continues, "We will be your opponent! let's play a game!"

Gin jumps and flies backward towards a newly formed bunker with what seemed like a machine gun and other artillery scattered throughout the area. Gin and I play a war game for days. I lose the first battle after all my allies are slaughtered by the heavy machinery after a few days. Gin restarts everything and we repeatably battle and I repeatably lose.

I can't seem to keep my allies alive for very long. I can easily enough do it myself but when I try Gin teleports to one of my allies and destroys it. Gin wants me to command and work together not to do everything for them. But they are so stupid and week. They move sluggishly and can barely follow my commands and instructions. I have to somehow improve them during battle. But how can accomplish that? can these things even learn? Every time we lose the forget everything and start anew. The biggest issue is they tend to move on their own sometimes if I don't issue commands for very long! It makes things much more complicated and difficult! I have lost count on how many battles we been in but it feels I have been doing this for a little over a month and there is no improvement. I reflect on the past month