Divine Milking System Chapter 65 | Balance Point

A Ruby boy raised his hand. "What about ability augntation?"

"Weapons training in my class is sixty percent physical foundation, forty percent mana channeling through the weapon itself. You will learn both. You will not skip the physical foundation because your ability is impressive." Her eyes moved across the room with the patience of soone who had made this speech before. "Every hunter I’ve watched die in a gate had one thing in common. They trusted their ability more than their body. Your mana runs out. A well kept sword does not run out."

Nobody argued with this.

"The other thing." She walked to the nearest rack and ran her fingers along a row of practice blades. "Weapons aren’t costic. The reason IHC mandates this course is that mana flowing through your body elevates your physical baseline whether you want it to or not. You are all stronger than you were before you awakened. Faster. Your bones are denser. Your reaction ti is shorter. A weapon in the hands of an awakened hunter is not the sa as a weapon in the hands of a civilian." She turned back. "Which ans if you’re in a gate and your ability fails you are not helpless. Not if you know how to use what’s in your hand. Clear?"

The room answered affirmatively.

"Good." She gestured. "Spend the next twenty minutes at the racks. Handle what appeals to you. I’ll co around. Don’t grab anything that requires a two-handed grip if you’ve never held a weapon before, you’ll hurt yourself and annoy ."

The room shifted toward the racks.

I followed the general movent and stopped in front of the first row. The selection was comprehensive. Straight swords in multiple lengths, short blades, staff weapons, a row of what looked like weighted training batons, pole arms, and at the far end so kind of compact crossbow that a Ruby girl imdiately picked up and started examining with the excitent of soone who had been waiting for this their whole life.

Naomi stopped next to a staff. She ran her hand along its length, testing the weight, and lifted it with both hands. Her form was imdiately more natural than I’d expected. Captain Cross hadn’t just given her a sponsorship letter, apparently.

Jordan materialized at my shoulder. "I’m getting the short blade."

"Why."

"Requires the least amount of moving to use effectively. I extend the shadow bind range. The blade is for if soone gets inside it." He picked up a short sword that sat about fifty centiters, tested the balance with one hand, and nodded. "Done. That took four seconds."

I looked back at the racks.

The problem was I didn’t actually know what worked best with Wave Motion at Copper rank. The ability used stamina to propel either projectile shots or movent bursts. A weapon that extended range would stack well with the projectile function. A weapon that worked in close range would work with the movent bursts when I closed the gap.

But I also had E-rank Strength working its way toward D, which ant anything requiring significant upper body leverage was going to be embarrassing in live drills.

I picked up a short spear from the middle rack. Light enough that my current stats could manage it, long enough to create distance without requiring to be within arm’s reach of sothing trying to remove my face. The shaft was smooth, the tip weighted for balance.

I shifted my grip, tested how it moved.

Tsukishima appeared at my left.

I hadn’t heard her coming.

"Interesting choice," she said. She was looking at the spear, not at . The lollipop had reappeared. "Most lottery students default to the sword because it looks like what they’ve seen in dia."

"The sword requires upper body strength I’m currently building. The spear works with reach and body chanics."

She looked at for the first ti. Golden-brown eyes, calm and asuring, the specific attention of soone who actually listened to answers.

"You’ve thought about this."

"I have about six days to not die in my first gate evaluation. I’m motivated."

The corner of her mouth moved. Not quite a smile.

She moved my grip two inches forward on the shaft. "There. That’s your balance point for your height. You’ll find the leverage is better."

She was right. The weight redistributed imdiately.

She moved on to the next student before I could say anything else.

Naomi was watching from three ters away with the staff resting against her shoulder, a small smile on her face.

"What," I said.

"Nothing." She turned back to test her grip width. "She likes you."

"She adjusted my grip."

"She corrected Jordan’s stance without touching him and told a Ruby kid to put the crossbow back and work on sothing he’d actually finish a training cycle with." Naomi glanced at sideways. "She moved your hands personally."

I considered saying that Tsukishima was an instructor doing her job.

I considered saying that Naomi was reading into a two-second interaction.

Instead I looked at the spear in my hands at the exact grip adjustnt Tsukishima had made, which was genuinely perfect, and accepted that Naomi’s perception stat was not a joke.

Belle appeared at the rack with her arms folded, surveying the options with the expression of soone shopping at a market where all the prices were in a currency she found personally offensive.

"I don’t want any of these," she said.

"Pick sothing light," I said.

"I want sothing that doesn’t require to get within three ters of sothing dangerous."

"Crossbow. Far end."

Belle’s head turned. Her eyes found the compact crossbow the Ruby girl had put back after Tsukishima’s correction. Belle walked to the end of the rack, picked it up, held it, and her posture changed imdiately. The calculation dropped out of her expression for about three seconds and sothing that looked like actual interest replaced it.

She looked down the sight line.

Then she looked at .

"This is mine," she said.

"Class weapon. Stays in the room."

"Then it’s mine for the duration of every class." She carried it back toward our section of the floor with the conviction of soone who had just resolved a long-standing personal question.

Jordan was already sitting cross-legged against the padded wall with his short sword across his knees, eyes half-closed again. Naomi was running slow practice forms with the staff, getting the weight mory into her arms. Belle stood with the crossbow, already figuring out the cocking chanism with the thodical patience she applied to everything that might eventually pay dividends.

I held the spear and watched Tsukishima move through the room, correcting grips, redirecting choices, occasionally saying sothing that made a student laugh.

Six days on the clock.

Weapons class. Combat assessnt Friday. Midnight Foxes leaderboard. Belle’s attraction percentage climbing sowhere above twenty-four.

The spear felt right in my hands at the grip point Tsukishima had found for , and the morning sun ca through the annex windows in long horizontal strips across the padded floor, and sowhere behind Naomi was doing staff forms with Captain Cross’s training in her shoulders and the buff from last night still running warm through her system.

I took a breath.

Rolled my neck.

Ti to work.