How To Survive A Calamity

"First year cadet 1499, Victor Bright, it is unfortunate to say this to someone as young as you are, but, I'm afraid this is where your career as an Awakened ends. It would be a risk to your life if you continued to carry on."

"You've reached the limit of your potential."

The doctor's final words hung in the air, stunning the entire room. His last words reverberating deeply against our ears like the deep strum of a string vibrating. I felty mind grow still and draw blank amidst silence of that brief moment.

I froze, a small frown furrowed ony brows lightly. Right from the beginning, i had an inkling i probably wasn't going to like what i was going to hear. The truth was, i knew how bad my condition was better than anyone else. As long as o had Meta, there was no one closest who could knowy body better than i, down to the smallest details.

In the end, some of the things the doctor had mentioned were some points i had already spent some of the time i was awake regarding and concluding myself, although the doctor had better put it all in perspective. And they were in line with Meta's diagnosis as well.

But the truth in the end was simply just like a hammer straight to the head. For a moment myind went blank and everything seemed to fade, but i quickly regained composure and calm. Underneath all that feigned and placid exterior, however, my gaze on the doctor grew deeper and and i reflexively silently called out to Meta in my head.

'Meta...'

It was almost an instinctive reaction of mine; if i struggled to understand something clearly in an instant, I'd turn to the system. And aside from all that was happening now, there were still a bunch of other things i didn't know or understand as well.

From the corner of my eyes i could see Alexander was equally stunned, perhaps even more than i who was supposed to be the subject. No, the difference was that I was more swift and quick to take control of my reaction and expression, while Alex's was like an open book.

Then slowly, i watched his expression begin to contort as he seemed to suddenly want to lash out back in my stead, but i promptly prevented this by calmly interjecting.

While i waited for Meta to respond, i brought my attention back to the doctor who looked overworked, his exhaustion mixing with the dreariness of the news he had just delivered. Despite having no direct ties with me, he seemed sympathetic.

I should have probably felt touched by that , but instead, i felt a boiling exasperation and rage boil inside me.

Was that pity? Was what i thought it as.

Regardless. I controled myself, raising my brow in a question.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

The doctor seemed stunned. My voice was steady and my bearing appeared calm and controled, nonchalant even, despite the news he just delivered. He probably expected me to be flustered or too confused and stunned to speak, or probably react as extremely or even more than Alex was just about to.

Well, it wasn't that i couldn't, or didn't. It was simple just that i had dozens of different thoughts suddenly racing through my brain at the same time, i seemingly couldn't spare any expense on an exaggerated and exhausting, time wasting reaction.

Plus, a portion of me just felt numb and cold, detached from it all. That gave me and added calm to my actions and thoughts.

The doctor blinked, regaining his bearing against mine. "Yes?"

"You said I've reached the limit of my potential, can you elaborate a little on that for me?" I asked.

The sparse headed medical practitioner reverted to his usual drab and dreary expression as he slowly placed his glasses back on, gazing at me solemnly.

"Due to the strained conditions and circumstances surrounding your forceful breakthrough, specifically the extreme state of your physical condition, and the added prior state of your body under a long term bottleneck period, you've exhausted a vast portion of energy and your life force. Your advancement from Mortal Rank to Eta Rank took a whole lot more amounts of energy, and as a result your current state no longer has enough more to spare for another future possible Rank Up or evolution."

"Your Aether Core, or Aura Core and physical body and vessel have been strained from overwork during your bottleneck, and the forceful condition of your subsequent Rank Up was the breaking point, snapping that already thin hanging thread in two. If anything at all, once again you are quite lucky and blessed it seems. Usually all of this factors together meant you would have died, or be permanently crippled as a human and an Awakened for life."

"It's a common case for Awakened who have misjudged their strengths and abilities only to have it all come back and bite them. In mundane terms, it'll be like pushing your body past its threshold overwhelmingly in the name of working out excessively and tearing a muscle, or ligament. That's what usually happens when Awakened believe they're suffering from a bottleneck and think only by pushing even harder would they overcome it, instead of taking a different approach and know when to give your vessel rest to recover adequately."

The doctor exhaustively explained, even going further to break down the terms and comparing it to more mundane counterparts.

My brows creased again..All these mentions about Vessels, hadn't i heard them already before from Meta? It was all just like the doctor said as well.

But back then, as much as Meta seemed to emphasize how much of a big deal and how severe it was for me to overwork my body amd core, or vessel, the damned system was also pretty casual about how seemingly easy it was to overcome it all by simply just Advancing.

I nodded slowly, holding the doctor's gaze.

"I see. I think i understand it a bit better now, I really am lucky to be alive and in one piece, huh? But doesn't that also mean there's a chance then? Sure right now i might still be suffering from the backlash of my forceful Advancement that any more strain on my vessel during this moment would make me crumble, but what about later? Wouldn't i just heal from this state in the future? Torn muscles heal eventually at some point, right? And they come hack stronger and better, too."