Chapter 19 - Mental Fortitude The next morning Gustav finally finished the last page of the last book. It was around five a.m at this time. "This has been an eye-opener... The general public hardly know anything about the past, was this the government way of keeping information from a lot of people?" After reading the history books, Gustav had suspicions because of the things he found out. There was a lot of information withheld from the general public. There were still more that he wished to know. The fifth volume only covered years 2110 to 2120. This was the year 4094. Gustav longed to know what happened after and now he felt the world wasn’t as simple as he thought. They were terrorist groups of mixed-bloods that have been existing for centuries, creatures known as Mixedbreeds that were said to have their bloodline go haywire after defective awakening, e.t.c. So many things that Gustav didn’t know beforehand because the city he grew up in was a top-class one that hardly got infiltrated by criminals and the rest. "How is it that the MBO is not able to handle all this?" Gustav had always naively thought the MBO was powerful enough to handle everything related to mixed-bloods criminalism. He had no idea that the world was even darker than he knew it to be. Ding! A notification popped up in his line of sight [Host has completed the goal: read a thousand books] "What?" Gustav stared at the notification with a shocked look. "Goal?" He had never seen the system bring up anything goal-related even after opening the system interface more than a thousand times. This was the reason for his shocked reaction. [Goal reward: Host has unlocked a new attribute] [Mental Fortitude] "Hmm... is this what scholars mean when they say knowledge is power?" Gustav held his chin as he stared at the reward. "Mental fortitude... I wonder how many points I’ll get right off the bat for that," Gustav pondered as he opened the system interface and called for the attributes panel. ----------------------------- [Host Attributes] -Name: Gustav Oslov -Level: 4 -Class: ? -Exp: 250/9500 -Hp: 170/170 -Energy: 80/80 {Attributes} »Strength: 23 »Perception: 21 »Mental Fortitude: 2 »Agility: 20 »Speed: 22 »Bravery: 19 »Intelligence: 22 »Charm: null {Attributes point - 0} --------------------------- "Ek, just two," Gustav was kind of disappointed after noticing the small figure placed in front of mental fortitude. He was expecting the number to shoot straight up like bravery but it ended up being lesser. "It’s gonna take a while for me to raise it," Gustav held his chin as he calculated how many days and points it would take for mental fortitude to reach the rest. Gustav still wanted for each of his attributes to rise evenly so for now he had decided to put off adding attributes to other stats till mental fortitude will have the same points with them. Gustav quickly went to prepare for school again today. -Thirty minutes later Gustav was on his way to school already with his skin color being pale white and his hair color being green. He looked so much different from his usual self. Unrecognizable also. What Gustav didn’t know was, his height was increasing and his body size was becoming bulkier by the day. If anyone saw compared him to how he looked last month, they would see the changes. Gustav got to school and headed for the school kitchen immediately. When he got in he met boss Danzo moving from place to place while giving instructions. "You’re late kid," Boss Danzo said and threw an apron towards Gustav’s position. Gustav caught it and wore it with a smile. "Good morning to you too boss Danzo," Gustav greeted after he finished wearing the apron. "Huh? wipe that cheeky smile off your face, I’m not falling for it," Boss Danzo shouted out as he turned towards the left. This caused Gustav to smile even more. "Sure Boss Danzo," He replied as he walked towards the large cooking equipment placed in front. In the past fifteen days, Gustav and Boss Danzo had built a kind of relationship that Gustav had never shared with anyone. The fifteen days were supposed to be filled with torture, instead, he was enjoying it. Boss Danzo always treated him like he was a real staff. Boss Danzo was liked by everyone for many reasons. He never discriminated against anyone, always valued the input of every worker here including Gustav. Gustav never thought a day would come when someone would utter the word, "Good Job to him," With a warm smile. Boss Danzo always gave him tons of food to eat saying, Gustav was too skinny and short. Gustav had really grown to like Boss Danzo. Also, he couldn’t see the scheming and vileness in his eyes like the way he saw other people. Gustav stood in front of a rectangular cooking equipment with seventeen different spots that were oozing out a blue fire. Ten big pots were placed on nine of those spots. "I say to wipe off the cheeky smile, yet you decide to make it wider... what a brat," Boss Danzo said as he opened up one of the large cooking pots in front. Sshhhsss! Steamy sounds enveloped the place. "You’re gonna be making a Tradashi dish today, combining the mutated fox chick, roasted duck, fried beans, and tomato sauce!" Boss Danzo stated while walking towards where the food items needed were placed. Gustav’s face turned serious as he saw the peeled skin of a dead chick that had a foxy-like head and tail, A freshly skinned duck, and some other foodstuffs needed. "Have a go at it... and don’t burn down my kitchen!" Boss Danzo tapped Gustav’s back and left went to stand by the side to observe his work. Gustav first washed his hands before he started. His right hand first went towards the body of the duck and his left hand grabbed a knife. Chop! Chop! Chop! In the blink of an eye, Gustav had already chopped the body of the duck to small pieces with the knife. After doing that he opened one of the pots and threw them in. Sshhhsss! The sounds of steaming could be heard again as Gustav’s hand moved to the next item. Boss Danzo watched him from the side with a wowed look. ’This kid is really great,’ He thought internally with a smile. Suddenly he frowned once again as he remembered something. -Thirty minutes ago Behind the kitchen building Boss Danzo was having a conversation with a middle-aged fat man sporting brown hair. "I asked you to make sure he suffers! Give him a heavy workload! Why does it look like you haven’t done any of that!" The man spoke with a look of anguish. "Mr. Lon, he was sent here as punishment to work in this kitchen and he is doing just that!" Boss Danzo replied the man. "Oh is that how you have decided to play it! You want to protect that trash!" Mr. Lon stated with a threatening tone. "I don’t know what you’re talking about, Mr. Lon... Gustav is serving his punishment just as you four wanted," Boss Danzo stated and turned around to head back towards the kitchen, "If you’ll excuse me, I have work to do," Boss Danzo didn’t even bother looking backwards as he walked into the building. "Oh, we shall see!" The man stated and turned around to walk towards a red floating vehicle in the middle of the road. If Gustav was here he would recognize the man who was one of the teachers in the disciplinary committee. - ’I wonder what those bastards have against this kid,’ Boss Danzo wondered as he stared at Gustav who was currently running from pot to pot and putting ingredients inside them. The aroma of his cooking entered into Boss Danzo’s nose and he smiled. ’What a good lad,’ --- The school activities ended uneventfully again today. The environment became rowdy again as students walked out of their classes towards the school park where their rides will be waiting to take them home. Gustav recollected today’s activities as walked towards one of the buildings he was meant to clean today. He couldn’t find anyone of the subjects they had today, substantial except for Miss Aimee’s. "I am close to channeling my bloodline past the fourth point... it only needs a little more push," Gustav said as he remembered that one of his classmates had successfully channeled his bloodline past the fourth point becoming the first Zulu ranked mixed-blood in their class. Drale Godson was his name and he was among the students who Gustav planned to deal with. Class three had several students that had channeled their bloodline past the fourth point but Drale was the first student to do that in class 3 c. Gustav was able to sense his bloodline within his body from the time his bloodline got upgraded to F. He had been channeling it day by day during the middle of the night to make it move further and increase in quantity. Also, his daily usage of morph helped in the increase. He was only a little step away from channeling it through the fourth point now. Gustav was walking on the path that led to the Mixedblood training hall. He was currently passing by the side of a pitch where some mixed-bloods could be seen playing a football match. This was one of the Mixedblood playing grounds. The mixed-bloods couldn’t mingle with normal people because normal people could get hurt due to their high level of strength. This was why Mixedbloods had their own sports grounds located separately, where they played among themselves. Bam! All of a sudden a loud striking sound reverberated across the place. Gustav turned to look towards the left and saw a blazing ball coated with fire heading towards his direction. "You kicked it in the wrong direction idiot!" A loud voice shouted out from inside the pitch. Zwwhhhii! The ball cut across the air in an arc with an astonishing speed as it flew towards Gustav. The speed was way too fast for a normal person to follow but Gustav saw could see the incoming blazing ball. Gustav reacted by quickly stretching out both his hands with speed. Pow! The sound of collision rang out as the ball got trapped in between Gustav’s palms like a keeper protecting the goal post. The force made him slide back a bit but he was still alright nevertheless. Shhhsshh! Smoke was erupting from the ball and his hands as the fire went out. He stared at the students approaching with a cold look.