"Oh man. I thought I had a dream where I was drowning." At Victor's question, most of the group displayed confused expressions, excluding Darius, who showed slight fear at his question.
Victor raised an eyebrow in response. "Is that something you dream of? How often must that happen before you are unable to distinguish between dreams and reality?
Darius shrugged in response. "It just never occurred to me that something like that might happen. I was fine when I woke up, so I chalked it up to a dream."
"Wow, your dreams must be super realistic." Elaine joked.
Darius rolled his eyes and ignored her, speaking to Victor. "Did you see the silver liquid too?"
Victor just nodded in response before Rosa spoke. "So why did that happen to both of you and not the rest of us?"
Darius pondered for a moment before speaking. "Now that I think about it, I think it started right when it turned 6:00."
A flash of understanding crossed Victor's face. "Oh, so you guys must have already fallen asleep when the silver liquid appeared. Anyone who was awake or arrived late to their sim pods probably saw it too."
Everyone then nodded in understanding. Given the tendencies of the members of the group, they now understood why only he and Darius had seen it. Rosa usually likes to be prepared, so she would definitely enter sleep around 5 minutes before the curfew. Jax isn't much of a rule breaker either, so he would also enter sleep early enough. One of Elaine's hobbies is to play around in the simulated world, so she definitely would have entered the simulation early and stayed inside right until the time ran out and she was kicked out. And finally, Darius, he's normally not one for schedules or timing, so he must have also been a bit late to enter the sim-pod.
"Strange, it's unlike you to have missed the deadline like that, especially with the warning we got." Rosa noted.
"Yeah, I got caught up saying goodbye to my caretaker." Victor explained.
Seeing the confused frowns on the rest of his friends' faces, Victor realized he had received special treatment from his caretaker.
"Wait, Angie visited you?" Darius asked with an additional layer of shock on his face. Angie had been both Darius's and Victor's caretaker after all.
Victor looked around awkwardly before answering truthfully. "She said she had to give me something before she left."
There was an awkward pause, and Victor quickly glanced at Darius, who held an unreadable expression.
"Because of that, I ended up entering my sim-pod late. When I saw the silver liquid, I thought I was about to drown." Victor continued.
"What do you think that liquid was for?" Jax asked.
"Well, if the silver liquid appeared at the same time as the curfew, it probably has something to do with our awakening. Beyond that, there isn't that much we can infer." Rosa responded evenly.
The group spent some time talking about the system functions they explored. The group went around in a circle, and their findings more or less matched up with what Victor had found.
"I tried using my mentor function, but no one responded." Darius spoke.
Everyone nodded in agreement besides Victor, who showed a grimace.
"I spoke with someone briefly, but he doesn't really give off the impression of a good mentor." He concluded before moving on. "Looks like all that's left is to test our new abilities."
Darius grinned and stood up, eager to demonstrate his newly acquired abilities. Darius held his palms out in front of him so everyone could see. They watched as a metallic sheen crawled up his hand before stopping just beyond his wrists. A trace of astonishment briefly passed through their eyes.
"Ohhhh, so your new power is making your hands shiny." Elaine teased.
Darius sighed in exasperation. "I'm not done yet. Watch." He then walked to the nearest wall and reached out to touch it. The others watched on as the same metal texture crawled up his arm before slowly spreading up his arms below his clothes and across his face. Even his hair was granted a metallic shine.
When Darius turned to face his friends this time, they genuinely looked impressed.
"How do you feel?" Rosa asked as his friends gathered around to feel his transformed skin.
"I feel heavier, but surprisingly, it's still quite comfortable to move." Darius while stretching his arms.
As Victor held Darius's wrist, he reached out to touch the wall. "The texture is quite similar."
"Wow, so you're a metal man now." Elaine casually strode over to the weapon rack and picked up a random blade before revealing a mischievous smile. "How about we test your durability?"
"Shit! Don't wave that around at me!" Darius raised his hands up in panic, and everyone was able to notice that his hands and the rest of his body held different textures.
"That's enough," Jax spoke up. "Even if he is metal now, it's still dangerous to test his ability like that."
"Come on, a little poke wouldn't hurt." Elaine fake-pouted as she put down the weapon.
Jax just gave her a serious look. In terms of hand-to-hand combat, Jax was the best within their group. In fact, Jax's skills ranked among the top ten at their school.
"As much as it would be interesting to try it out, we should start with safer tests first." Rosa spoke evenly.
Luthor turned back to Darius, asking curiously. "How did you do that?"
"I tried out the [Ability] function while I was in my room. At first I couldn't figure out what the second component of my ability did, no matter how much I activated it. But I ended up accidentally touching a button on my clothes and discovered how it worked. After somewhat more practice, I figured out it's possible to activate my ability without the system function, but I'm guessing it takes more practice to do it as effectively." Darius answered.
As Darius finished his explanation, Rosa replied with her insights. "It's strange how our abilities aren't explained by the system, yet it can interact with them flawlessly. Is this the system's limitation, or was it intentional? Regardless, it appears we can use the system function as a guide to activate our abilities."
Rosa then turned and pointed to one of the control panels on the wall before she continued. "I checked the control panel, and it looks like the training rooms have been updated to allow our abilities to be tested safely. I'm curious to see what I got."
Rosa then fiddled with the settings before walking into the training area. The rest of the group stayed behind the see-through partition that appeared between Rosa and them.
Luthor touched the energy shield in front of him before focusing his attention on Rosa. There was a moment of silence as Rosa stood in the middle of the room, unmoving. Then, her hair and her clothes began to move like a breeze blew by her.
Suddenly, Rosa cursed and dove to the ground as lights flashed across her body at various points. Victor recognized the texture on Rosa's body as similar to the energy shield in front of him. 'She's under attack?'
"Rosa, are you all right?" Jax shouted anxiously. Rosa remained still for a moment before sitting up, drenched in sweat.
"Yeah, I'm good." She stood up shakily before walking out of the training area.
Everyone gave her a moment to collect herself and calm down before questioning what happened.
"When I activated the first component of my ability, I felt it progressively get windier around me. Eventually the winds reached their peak while spinning around me almost like I was the center of a tornado, so I decided to activate the second component." Rosa breathed in deeply before continuing. "It was then I noticed cuts appearing in the ground before I heard something slicing towards me. I really thought the wind was going to chop off my head next."
Everyone shared serious expressions as they looked around. None of them had thought it was possible to be hurt by their abilities. Somehow, they had assumed they would be granted an immunity from their own power.
A serious expression crossed their faces as they contemplated the possibility of getting killed by their very own ability. Yet after a moment of grim silence, Elaine turned and fearlessly walked into the training area next.
"What are you doing? Didn't you see what just happened to Rosa?" Darius questioned.
"She's fine, isn't she? If we want to test out our new powers, this is the perfect place to do it. It was made to withstand our powers. If my power turns out to be dangerous, it's better to find out sooner rather than later."
With that explanation, Elaine made her way to the middle of the training area as she used the system to activate her ability. A strange silence filled the room as Elaine frowned before she rolled up her sleeves.
Everyone watched as a rectangular layer of her skin peeled off her arm before falling to the ground.