Chapter 16
YOU ARE NOT READY
"Uh... uh... yeah... a... b-blickey..."
IAM stared ahead blankly, eyes drilling into Raj's, wondering if he was just screwing with him. Maybe this WAS a prank and they would all start laughing and grab his shoulder and point in a direction and tell him to wave at the camera.
Raj caught his look and chuckled. "Surprised?" he grinned. "Yeah, guns aren't really used much in battles. People prefer cold weapons—swords, spears—stuff like that. It's way easier to channel mana and path techniques through something simple. Guns? Way more complicated. You've gotta guide mana through all these circuits just to get the desired effect."
His grey eyes sparked with excitement as he continued, clearly enjoying the topic.
"But the trade-off?" Raj shrugged. "When done right, the firepower's insane. The problem is, in a real fight—when your life's on the line—you don't get a do-over. One delay, one mistake in channeling your technique, and boom. You get backlash."
"Backlash?" IAM asked, furrowing his brow.
Raj nodded. "Yeah. The technique snaps back at you. So basically, to activate a technique—or a method, as some like to call it—you need mana. The mana flows through your avien, channels into the brain, and then gets pushed through your veins and arteries in a controlled way, to avoid damaging them and to either manifest it through your body or your mech."
He leaned forward, his tone getting a little more serious.
"Now let's say, under pressure from your opponent, you accidentally route that mana through the wrong vein—one not meant for that specific technique. You could rupture something inside. Internal bleeding. Organ damage. It happens more often than you think. Even with heightened senses and a reinforced body as your level goes up, it's still hard to track everything perfectly in the middle of a fight. That's when backlash hits."
He raised a finger. "And the damage? That depends entirely on how powerful the technique is. If it's one of your big ones and it backfires... you've basically signed your death certificate—unless your opponent's dumb enough not to take advantage of the moment you're doubled over in pain."
He leaned on the counter. "That's why most people stick to cold weapons. Safer. Consistent. Unless you're someone whose path demands a weapon like a gun... or you're just really stubborn."
Still catching up to Raj's machine-gun delivery, IAM slowly nodded. "Well… since I'm a complete novice, the backlash from my weak techniques should be minimal, right? That makes it manageable. Besides, my path doesn't have much offensive power early on, so this can cover that gap. And when my level increases I might not need it anymore. "
Regina, leaning silently nearby, gave the smallest nod—barely a twitch of approval. Ryan's ever-present smile twitched at the edge, just slightly.
Raj blinked, then raised both thumbs. "Hey! Never thought of it like that. Pretty clever, man."
Raj's eyes lit up as he turned, hands moving with a surprising grace across the sleek counter, pushing aside stray parts, tangled cords, and an open panel exposing the guts of a half-disassembled mech. The ambient hum of machinery deeper within the facility seemed to swell in that moment, like the building itself was responding to his energy.
He snapped his fingers and turned around. "Good news, I've got some low-quality guns in stock. I'll have someone send over bullets, a maintenance kit, all that good stuff by tomorrow."
IAM blinked. A blick. It still sounded absurd to hear that word here, in this clean, strange, alien place that smelled faintly of ozone and machine oil. His eyes drifted to the sterile white lighting that buzzed faintly overhead, casting sharp shadows under every angle of metal. It was far too clean—clinical, almost like a lab pretending to be a war camp.
He was about to say something—maybe thank Raj, maybe ask how the trigger mechanism worked—when Raj suddenly paused.
A sharp inhale.
The energy in the room shifted, dropped.
The lively tone in Raj's voice stuttered out, replaced by the quiet furrow of his brow as he looked at IAM like he was piecing together something that didn't quite fit.
He tilted his head, and his glasses caught the light in such a way that his eyes disappeared behind the glare. "Wait…"
A silence, pregnant with implication, thickened the air.
Raj's expression had changed—no longer playful. There was a tightness in the line of his jaw now, a hesitation in his posture that hadn't been there before. His fingers drummed once on the counter, a beat of suspicion masked as idle movement.
"You haven't formed an avien yet, have you?"
IAM's heart sank slightly, but he forced a chuckle, desperate to preserve the atmosphere, to not let the shift crack the fragile comfort that had settled in the last few moments. "Yeah," he said, trying to match Raj's previous tone, but it came out thin, transparent. "Me and Ryan are still working on it. Still trying to—"
"Just you," Ryan cut in, voice clean and clipped.
Time froze.
The words hit like a slap, sharp and loud in the suddenly too-quiet room. IAM's head turned slowly toward Ryan, eyes wide with disbelief.
"I actually formed mine yesterday," Ryan added, scratching the back of his head like it was nothing more than a casual update, like he'd just remembered to mention he'd done laundry.
But there was something in the way he said it—some gleam in his eye, subtle and cruel, that twisted deep into IAM's gut. It wasn't just a statement. It was a knife dressed in politeness.
IAM stared.
There was no warning. No signs. Ryan had been right there with him, side by side, their progress neck and neck. They'd pushed through the pain together. Or so he thought.
IAM's lips parted, voice barely a breath. "Wait, but… just before we got here, you said your limit was eight minutes and forty-four seconds—and the pain, it's supposed to get worse the longer you go on—"
Ryan shrugged. "I guess I got lucky," he said with a soft chuckle, looking off to the side.
That laugh…
That fucking laugh.
It echoed in IAM's skull like a mocking whisper, bouncing around the hollow of his chest. It wasn't luck. Not entirely. That wasn't the kind of laugh you had when you stumbled into success.
No.
That was the laugh of someone who knew they were ahead.
And who wanted you to know it too.
"Or maybe I just got used to the pain quicker than I thought."
That laugh—it echoed too loud in IAM's ears, too smug, too careless. It stung.
IAM's stomach twisted violently. He could feel it—his insides curling into themselves like something was rotting.
Already?
Ryan had already crossed that line.
He had done it.
And IAM…
IAM hadn't.
The word floated like a dark cloud.
Useless.
That's what he was, wasn't he?
Slow.
Weak.
Pathetic.
His thoughts slammed into him like hailstones. Each one heavier than the last. How? How was Ryan already there? They had started together—literally side by side. They had walked the same path, taken the same steps, endured the same training...
Hadn't they?
Six minutes and twenty-four seconds. That's where IAM had stalled out. That was his line. That was the wall he couldn't climb.
And now?
Now he was being told—right in front of everyone—that it wasn't enough.
Raj gave a slow, almost apologetic shake of the head. "Sorry, but I can't give you any equipment. No mech, no weapon, nothing—not until you've formed an avien. You're not ready yet."
He said the words softly, cautiously, like trying to avoid setting off a landmine. But it didn't matter how gently the truth came—it still hit like a hammer.
IAM didn't respond.
He couldn't.
Silence spread like fog in the room. Thick. Suffocating.
No one said a word.
Even Regina's usual hard, cool demeanor seemed to hesitate. Her expression unreadable. Ryan looked away, lips pressed in a line.
The silence weighed down on IAM's shoulders, a crushing pressure that made it hard to breathe, hard to even stand. His knees trembled slightly, and for a second—just a second—he thought they might give out entirely.
Every eye in the room.
On him.
Watching. Judging. Piercing him like blades.
No words were spoken. None were needed.
Because in that silence... a verdict had already been cast.
He wasn't ready.
Not good enough.
Not strong enough.
Not fast enough.
Not anything enough.
A nobody.
That's what they saw.
A background character fumbling around in a world that didn't have space for the weak.
IAM stared down at his hands, limp at his sides, heavy and empty.
The air around him seemed colder now. Thinner.
Like the world had tilted just a little—like it was moving on without him.
Even the walls of the steel cube, so clean and cold and gleaming moments ago, now felt like they were closing in. Trapping him in a quiet cage of inadequacy.
A nobody had caught wind in their sails.
And already, it was dying down.