Only Wisdom Awakened - Chapter 67

Hunter Academy
“Excuse my lateness, I had to finish my workout and lost track of time”

The room being slightly darker than the outside, the man’s face couldn’t be seen until he took two steps forward.

But his amazingly shaped huge body could be recognised by anyone who had already met him at least once in their lives.

He was tall, really tall, standing at 250cm (8’2).

And his body was refined to the extreme, anyone could tell just by the size of his shoulders.

His heavy steps resounded through the room, and his face could finally be seen.

His skin was dark, and he had a horseshoe moustache, connected with his beard, that also reached his chin and went up to his ears.

He wore glasses and a watch, that made him look like an intellectual figure, even though his muscles immediately cancelled that view.

He also wore a tight suit, with a waistcoat and an unbuttoned black jacket.

His palms were covered by two black gloves, that stopped at the fingers, giving them an appearance similar to the wrapped bandages used to fight in sports.

He went ahead and sat, not waiting for anyone’s opinion.

Everyone was annoyed by his behaviour, especially the New York branch leader, but the meeting continued as planned.

During the four long endless hours of discussion, that Hans found incredibly boring and suicide inspiring, they talked about many different matters.

But the main ones were two: first of all, the gates had increased exponentially during the last few months.

And secondly, America was now lacking a public figure, one that could take the place of Elijah after his retirement.

After killing the boss of the S-rank gate: vicious swamp, Elijah had publicly declared his retirement, to mask his current dangerous condition.

And it had worked, people didn’t think of anything else, and he soon became a hated figure, that puts his own interest for rest above the lives of the citizens.

No one even though that something was wrong with his body, being that he had just slain an S-rank boss monster in one hit.

In the famous site known as, “the list” Elijah had always been ranked first, even after his retirement.

Hans heard many insults and words of disdain towards Elijah, who he once considered a hero.

The gathering concluded almost five hours later, and all the guests started leaving.

Ninety percent of the things they discussed were useless, some were even only speculation.

“Haaa”

that night, laying on top of his comfy bed, Hans let out a sigh of relief, “finally!

it was almost as boring as school lessons”

Even if he dropped school at quite the early age, the incredible boredom of those classes still remained imprinted in his mind.

But even with that horrendous thought, he still found the time to sleep, and recover completely before facing another day.

The morning was spent goofing around the city with Kenta, and searching some gifts for Aiden.

Afterwards, they had to return to the association’s building once again.

It was the third time he entered, but that building was already a pillar of Hans’ bad memories.

They walked through the whole structure before finally reaching the place for today’s assembly.

It was a vast room with a high ceiling.

The form of the room was really unique, it looked like one of those arena from ancient times, with the only difference being that the middle wasn’t covered in sand and warrior’s blood, but in a marble stand, placed there to help the speaker who would’ve got up there.

When all the seats on the steps were finally taken, the meeting started.

This time, the assistants also finally got a place to seat on, otherwise Kenta might’ve really lost ability in his legs after standing still for so long.

Callahan Quinn, the NY association branch leader, stood in the middle of the hall, and slowly watched every corner of the room, before noticing that no one was absent, and beginning his explanation.

“As most of you may know, today will be fully dedicated to the solving of our nation’s problems, that we highlighted yesterday.

The discussion and debates will be very tense, so brace yourself.

From this moment on, for the next ten hours, ‘You’, do not exist, we must all think for the future of our country, don’t waste a single minute, and don’t fight for useless things.

Well then, let the meeting start”

The leader returned to his own seat, and patiently waited for someone to take the place in the middle.

Not long passed before the first proposal came forward.

With her matchless boldness, the LA branch leader walked down the stairs, attracting the attention of all the other members.

Every step she took with her black long heels, resounded through the room.

When she finally arrived in the middle, she started speaking, watching in the direction of Callahan Quinn.

The fan in her hands that she had been gently waving from the start of the meeting was closed, and lowered together with her right hand.

Her beautiful but authoritative voice enhanced the words that came out of her mouth.

“Good evening, it is my pleasure to be the first person to speak during this meeting.

Hearing of the recurring problem regarding the exponential increase in new gates to raid, and the increasing amount of new awakened, I have come here with a proposal that could benefit greatly both the country and the association.

The world has always been balanced, for example, when the gates appeared, we were given these powers, and when stronger monsters started being released into our lands, we were bestowed powerful hunters to face them.

That also applies to the present situation.

More gates are being discovered, just as the number of awakened is increasing.

Then, some may think that we should leave it at that, and the situation would just gradually resolve itself.

But, you’re wrong.

When the gates first appeared, it took humanity various months before finally repelling those monsters, and during that period, many innocent lives were lost.

The problem here isn’t the number, but the experience.

While monsters are born with it, these newly awakened hunters know nothing about fighting, and need to develop fast enough for them to pull their own weight without hindering the work of the more experienced hunters, that already have their own slice of cake to think about.

More specifically, we need to train younger ones.

As most of you have probably seen with your own eyes, they’re the ones with the fastest learning capabilities, so much that the youngest branch leader currently sitting in this room is suspected to have awakened only about three years ago and having already reached A-rank.”

The gazes of the curious people shifted towards Hans, clearly recognising him for his wrinkles free face and smooth skin.

“This is why, I suggest we proceed with a project we’ve had to leave behind four years ago, with the attack of the abyssal snake.

Do you perhaps remember why we wanted to start the construction of an ocean city like the ones they had already designed and developed abroad?”

The faces of the people, especially the members who had been in the committee for over four years, were shocked.

People started whispering, and making comment about the proposal, while the new members, who had joined in the last four years, making up about 30% of the members, were cut off, trying to understand the situation.

Even the New York branch leader was quite surprised by this, and just to make sure he had heard it right he asked:

“Are you perhaps talking about….

“Yes, that’s right, just as how the Europeans made it, the Chinese made it, even the Japanese and Koreans made it.

It is finally time for America to build its own hunter academy.”

The hunter academy, a building and a society, created specifically to train hunters.

They do not only instruct them about how to fight, but also about how to survive.

The terrain, the environment, the conditions of the weather, a well trained hunter is able to utilize all of them to his advantage, and in terms of reliability to clear a gate, they are even higher than high ranking awakened, who have excellent fighting prowess, wasted because of their lacking knowledge.

The first country to realize the importance of such academies was Germany, in Europe, which is one of the central branches of the association.

Following them in the course of the next few years were the Korean and the Chinese.

The Europe branch built the academy two years after the gates opened, and after five years of arduous training, the student’s skills were honed to the extreme.

When released into awakened society, all the students, with few exceptions, became incredibly successful and known.

They were simply a step ahead of everyone else, both in terms of experience and power, since they were trained by the best in each category.

Seeing the results shown by these students, other countries like Japan and the Arab Emirates followed their example and constructed a facility themselves.

And now, it was finally the American’s turn.