While he fully intended to achieve this, it was a huge hurdle for Lucian to cross. Not only was he not an Official Knight yet, but he hadn't even met the requirements to become an Apprentice Knight.
To become an Apprentice Knight, one had to have at least 1.0 across the board in all his Physical stats. Right now, Lucian was the only student in the entire preparatory academy who had yet to cross this threshold. In fact, most of the other students met this threshold before even enrolling in the place.
'It's no wonder my predecessor received so much bullying.'
The constant teasing and harshness towards him made sense to Lucian now. This world operated on the principal of Survival of the Fittest, the strong rule and the weak cower. With this ironclad law in play, the other, stronger, students could do and say what they liked to Lucian without repercussion as long as they didn't kill him or permanently injure him.
'This world is much harsher than Earth.'
However, despite all this a devilish smile started to creep its way onto Lucian's face.
'But that just makes things so much more interesting.'
***
After finishing up his breakfast in the canteen — ignoring all the scornful and ridiculing stares — Lucian spent the rest of his morning coming up with a plan of action. Today was Sunday, the only day off the people of this world had of the week, so it was perfect for him to devote all his time to researching and devising strategies.
From what he knew, his predecessor really didn't like the idea of becoming a knight. So much so that he completely neglected his training entirely, which resulted in him becoming so weak in comparison to the other students in the academy. Instead, he chose to focus on fictional stories and books which had no meaning to him whatsoever other than to entertain and distract him from the real world.
Naturally, Lucian found such pitiful and weak behaviour a complete waste of time, and couldn't help but join the other students in ridicule of the kid. Lucian wouldn't have had such a big problem with the kid reading books all the time, if they were actually constructive and educational instead of just fantasy and fiction.
In fact, Lucian's first destination after breakfast was the library. He intended to find out all that he could about Knights and their training methods through the various books available, and considering this place was an academy specifically designed to create Knights en masse, there were quite a few of them.
Books on training methods, books on knights famous in the Barren Islands' personal experiences in battle, even some books on the history of knights.
Whatever the book, if it had the word knight in the title, Lucian picked it up and skimmed through them page by page, not actually reading more than a couple of words himself from each one.
'AI, scan the contents of each one of these books and store them all in a file called 'Official Knight training plan'.' He issued a command, one that left him feeling quite happy that he had the AI to assist him.
Others would have to spend hours reading a book, making sure their entire focus and concentration were on it the whole time if they wished to actually add the knowledge inside of it to their brains. But not Lucian — he could have the AI do all of the heavy lifting for him, and when he needed some specific information, he could just ask the AI and it would provide it straight to his mind. It was all very efficient.
In the end, by the time lunchtime came around, he had scanned probably over 50 different books, garnering a few confused and curious glances from the librarian and the other students in the library during this time. But what seemed nonsensical and a waste of time to all of them, was the complete opposite to Lucian.
'That should do it. There are no more books related to knights in this place — none that are useful at least.' He noted.
Lucian put down the final book, returning it back to the same spot on the shelf he took it from, and promptly returned back to the canteen, picking up his lunch and scoffing it down in a heartbeat before immediately running back to his dorm.
Time was of the essence, and even spending a minute longer in places that he didn't need to could be the difference between spending another three years here or not.
'If this were my past life, I could probably put myself through some intense and excruciating genetic engineering to bring my stats up, but with no alternative here, I'll just have to go at it the old fashioned way.' He seemed determined to go through with this.
Lucian's plan was simple — if he couldn't rely on methods from his old world to help him essentially boost himself all the way to the level of an Official Knight, then he would follow what this world had to offer.
It clearly worked, as everyone wouldn't be so absurdly strong otherwise.
'AI, I have a task for you. Scan the 'Official Knight training plan' file for all mentions of training methods, and find as many methods possible to increase my strength in a short amount of time.'
This was the very reason Lucian didn't bother reading each of the books himself, as that would have taken up the entire three weeks if he wanted to finish all fifty or so of them. On Earth, the idea of 'forgetfulness' and diseases such as Alzheimers had long been eradicated, thanks to the invention of the AI implants.
These AI implants essentially housed super powerful, instant access computers that the host could store near limitless amounts of data on across their lifetime, essentially acting as a second brain to store memories in. It didn't need to be said how groundbreaking and useful this technology was, as
Lucian's use of it in the library was already example enough.
[Scan complete.]
[Results - 68 training methods found.]
'That's quite a lot.'
Lucian paused for a second before speaking to the AI again.
'Now filter these for those with the most effectiveness and highest rate of success. Oh, and I also must be able to begin the training immediately.'
[Scan complete.]
[Results - 1 training method found matching the filters.]