3 Training

In the opposite wing to the mess hall, was the recreation lounge. There was a pool table, a piano, and a ping pong table. There were a couple of TVs as well, and tables to play cards on. Currently, there were two people in the lounge; one was playing pool by himself, and the other was playing the piano elegantly.

At the same time that Naofumi started eating, the two swiveled their heads, and their gaze seemingly penetrated through all the obstacles between then and Naofumi, providing them with a clear view.

"Nao seems to be eating quite a bit. Do you think something has happened to him?"

"Probably not? We don't have any enemies here. In any case, why are you being a scaredy cat? You knew that it would be putting him at risk if we became his friends, but you did it anyway."

"Hey, I was young back then! I was just looking for a release but becoming friends with a normal person, but unexpectedly the three of us formed an unbreakable bond. You're a part of it too, so you can't push all the blame on me, alright?"

"Tch. Whatever."

The pair spoke in Japanese, acting as another layer of protection on their already cryptic conversation. After the one playing pool clicked his tongue, the pair stopped speaking and continued in their activities, stopping occasionally to monitor Naofumi.

*****

On the other side of the building, Naofumi was getting ready to train. He had filled up with sufficient nutrients, so all that was left was to train his ass off. While leaving the mess hall to return to his room to put on his runners, his gaze stumbled onto the ones belonging to the two in the recreation lounge. Unknown to Plato, his special ability had included an increase in eyesight. Therefore, he was able to see their faces and expressions very closely.

Looking at them, it took Plato less than a second to recognize them as Miyamoto Basara and Hattori Iwatani. Basara was the one playing the piano, while Iwatani was playing pool. When the three gazes met, they all simultaneously turned away, before returning once again in a fleeting glance. Naofumi secretly decided at that moment that it wouldn't be necessary for him to greet them.

First of all, it was not expected, given the level of their brotherhood. Secondly, it would be impossible for the normal Naofumi to recognize them from such a distance. Plato could just feign ignorance and walk away without arousing any suspicion whatsoever. If questioned about why he glanced at them once more, he could just say he was curious as to why the two people were doing different things and not playing a two-player game.

Reaching such a conclusion within a second, even Plato was surprised at his own quick-thinking. It would have been normal if it was something that involved combat, but this was an everyday situation that he had no experience with. Almost instantaneously, he realized that it was because of the Intelligence boost he had received. He was not aware of what the boost detailed, but he was quite sure that this was an effect of it.

Turning away and ignoring the pair as planned, he went back up the stairwell. As he ascended, he ran into his pod senior. After a quick greeting and a few meaningless lines, the two parted ways. While Naofumi did not have a good impression of this senior called Nash, it wasn't exactly a bad impression either. If he was forced to elaborate, the best way to put it would be a neutral impression.

Alas, his impression of Nash did not have much importance to him as of that moment. Plato was actually in a bit of a rush. There were only three days left of the orientation week, followed by the weekend, but after that he had to go to classes. He wanted to squeeze every second of these five days to train his body.

A couple of minutes later, Plato was finally ready to start. He began by running down the stairs, then out through a side door at the very bottom of the stairwell. He proceeded to run towards the old Bruce Hall, which was under renovations. They were demolishing it to get rid of the cancerous asbestos, and then rebuilding it into a brand new building.

As he ran past, a couple of workers greeted him with a wave for some random reason, so he did the same. After running for close to an hour, he was soaked in sweat and panting heavily. In fact, he was almost bowed over from breathing too hard. Although the stamina displayed was not bad, it was far from Plato's standard. His previous body had been capable of running with full gear - tower shields, sword, armor, food, tents, tools, etc. - for eight hours nonstop.

Naofumi had stopped his run next to a green field, which led to the engineering faculty's rooms. He had been focused on running and keeping his breathing in rhythm, so he allowed his body to take him to the places it was familiar with. Now that he was here, Naofumi felt like it was a good place to start his strength training.

Dropping to the lush, green grass, he started with pushups. His light body had gotten his hopes up about the number of pushups it could do, but he was again very disappointed. He had barely completed 15 pushups when he felt his muscles straining as they reached their limit. Plato was very proficient in sensing the changes of his body, so knowing his limits was effortless.

On the 16th pushup, Plato felt his muscles failing him, but he continued to push on. By the time he reached the 20th pushup, his form was so out of shape it looked like he was doing yoga instead. However, this was a good thing. By reaching and then surpassing the body's limits, the muscles would grow stronger. Combined with the protein that he had absorbed this morning, he was sure that his strength and muscle mass would increase significantly if he continued this routine for the next five days.

Next on Plato's list was leg strength. He was constantly fighting monsters that were many times taller than him in his previous world, so he had developed his legs the most. If he claimed that he was second when it came to training legs, no-one would dare to claim to be first. On the other hand, he could be considered third at most for training his other body parts.

Plato's leg training started with squats, then one-legged squats that were so low that he could practically sit down on the ground. Before he could use his legs as a launchpad for his body, he had to train his balance first. If he lost balance while trying to leap forward, it would be so embarrassing. The strongest of the alliance army stumbling over a simple jump... definitely not a good look.

After the squats came side jumps, to work on his evasion. His eyesight had somehow been upgraded, and his reactions were still top-notch. The only thing missing was the speed of his body. Following that were vertical jumps with all his might. As with the pushups, he reached his limit and surpassed it by five reps for each exercise.

By the end, Plato was tired and sweaty, but he felt refreshed on the inside. The release of endorphins that came with exercise was something that Plato could never get enough of. But he was not done yet. He dragged his exhausted body to its feet, and proceeded to throw punches.

Despite having perfected such a motion previously, he wanted to ingrain it into the muscles of his current body. By going through this motion when the muscle fibres were torn and in the process of repairing itself, it was possible to influence the way in which it mends, making the punches faster and stronger.

The only downside was the extreme tiredness and pain that came along with the training. Most people would be unable to withstand it, but for Plato, who had fought with monsters for years, this much was nothing.

After taking a short break for lunch, Plato resumed his inhuman training until 6 in the evening. In total, he had spent approximately nine to ten hours training. He was so tired that even the five minute walk back to Bruce Hall was excruciating for him. However, this fatigue proved that he was growing, which made Plato feel joyous.