Chapter 176: Heavy Weapons
It took the better part of two hours to walk the wall, install the new turrets, and check on all the repair teams that were fixing the broken concrete after the Ogres attacked.
But for the most part, everyone had the same concern.
What the next wave of monsters would be.
However, there was one more aspect that Kalli had managed to overlook. The afternoon was turning cloudy, with a chance of rain overnight. And that meant no moonlight.
"Can we get spotlights with stands? Wide angle lights, so that we can illuminate the area around the fort without using magic. Just a couple dozen spotlights should do the trick, letting us see what’s coming without special skills or relying on the moons to let us fight in the dark.
I’m thinking that we can keep them off until the first groups identify what’s coming for us, then light up the field when they’re in range to attack.
That will give us the advantage, as the lights will blind them as they try to charge at us, making it harder for them to spot the defenders, except when they’re using energy weapons," Temple explained.
"That’s an excellent point. Alright, here are the first batch of lights. They’re mana powered, like so much of the gear the System grants us. But they’re only one mana per hour, and they’ll run all night on a charge.
Get them prepared in advance, and I think that we should be fine."
They were also only one System Point each. Two dozen of them spread around the walls to give the defenders a bit more light to work with would cost her no more than one Pulse Rifle for the lines.
She should likely send them more lights.
So, two dozen more lights were made, and distributed to the runners to place around the outer wall. When night fell, they would be fully prepared to face anything that might sneak up on them in the dark, and they’d have ten new heavy weapons platforms that could be moved to defend against enemy forces.
But even better, the whole outer wall, except for one section near the gate, was a smooth slope of volcanic ash and gravel. As long as there were no heroes in the way, the trucks could make good time getting from one hot spot to another.
It wasn’t an intentional feature, but it should work out well for their defenders.
There was one last thing that Kalli wanted to do before she finished the day’s improvements, as the city planners hadn’t finished their work yet. She decided to go to the gymnasium of the Academy, and install the training room that she had received from the first round of quests.
The room was large enough for hundreds of heroes to train, she assumed. But once she tapped the training room’s mystery box, the whole gym changed.
The old room became a lobby of sorts, with seating and viewscreens, while an elevator led to what she assumed were underground training areas, as the exterior of the building was unlikely to change. Each section was labelled with a training type.
Combat drones, Gravity Training, Agility Course, Sparring Arena. The occupancy was listed as 0/100 right now, so there were a hundred different rooms available, far more than Kalli had expected when she activated the item.
She had just thought that she would get an improved space to work out.
So, she decided that she would be the first, right after she sent a message in the Academy App that the new training area was ready.
The Gravity Room was exactly what it promised to be, a standard Gym Bro equipped gym facility, with adjustable gravity, based on a setting on the wall. There were vital sign monitors, so that it would turn off if you messed up and set the gravity too high, but Kalli wasn’t going to do anything too extreme.
{Rooms in use: Gravity Room 1} Setting 3x standard gravity. 1 Occupant. Open room, all may enter.
Kalli started her usual workout routine, but this time she didn’t have to carry excessive weight. Even the ten kilo dumbbells were thirty kilos in this room, and her body weighed three times as much as usual.
Which wasn’t much, but enough that she didn’t need a backpack for her run, and she could use the same treadmill settings she was used to.
It wasn’t long before a few Warriors chose to join her, and nearly staggered as they exited the elevator and stepped into the first training room on the gravity floor.
"Damn, girl. You don’t mess around. This place is awesome, we’re actually going to be able to build our bodies properly in here. With triple gravity, you can press a small car on the smith machine." Burt laughed as he entered.
"You can turn it up more if it’s just the guys doing weights. But I thought that this would be a good start for general purposes, since it lets me use smaller equipment for my run. The maximum setting is ten times standard gravity, so the higher level warriors will be able to go all out for quite a while before this gym won’t be able to help anymore.
And that will keep the quest going until we’re all practically monsters ourselves."
She had no idea how right she was. Muscle developed differently in high gravity settings. More dense, with higher strength to volume, so that excess bulk didn’t get in the way of movement. It would also encourage shorter heights if you started training while young, but almost everyone who would come here was already an adult.
{Maximum Time Reached} 1 Strength, 1 agility, 1 Endurance awarded.
That was incredible, Kalli decided. Even at this point, she had gained three total points to her stats.
She was about to head to the showers when a group of the ammo runners, the level 0 teen boys, came into the training room, and collapsed to their knees.
"Boys, you can go to another room that’s set a bit lower. Three times might be too much for you to handle," she offered gently.
The boys all pushed back to their feet, using the wall for leverage.
"No, we will train in here with the heroes. Even if it’s just the empty bar, we will do it."
Kalli shrugged. "Alright, but don’t say I didn’t warn you, and remember that you need the full ninety minutes for maximum gains."
Just moving their bodies was a workout for the boys, but reaching the stat requirements was the only way that they were going to reach level 1 hero status.