[NR] Bruise Those Bones - Chapter 738

A few days later finds Jason smacking a wooden pole around. In particular, he is making use of his forearms and shins. Each strike is hard enough to bruise, yet he keeps going at it like a machine.

Admittedly, it helps that as long as Jason isn’t taking damage, bruising fades within moments. Still, that’s not quick enough to be fixed up before the next strike.

Off to the side, Courtney coaches him. “Harder now! We want bone-deep bruising. Put enough force so that your bones feel like they’re breaking!”

Jason adjusts his stance and begins to really lay into the pole. Forearm, forearm, shin, shin. Each strike is a bit faster, a bit harder than the last.

Courtney watches him like a hawk as his strikes grow wilder. “Hold at that intensity!”

Under Jason’s barrage of strikes, the wooden pole begins to chip.

Courtney crosses her arms, “I’m not sure if your tough skin is a boon or bane for this. It lets you strike harder without worrying about bleeding out, but you’re also going to go through wooden poles quite quickly.

“Eh, I guess wooden poles are cheap and then we reuse the broken ones as firewood.”

All the while, Jason doesn’t stop, and time passes.

At some point that neither notice, Rosha arrives back at the clearing. Her short expedition into the surrounding area not turning up anything too interesting. She wanders into her and Courtney’s house to lay down for a bit.

Not for a nap though. Jason’s non-stop training is a little too noisy for the nonexistent soundproofing of the house. So after relaxing a little she gets up and joins Courtney.

At this point, Jason has transitioned from fast strikes to more deliberate ones. Not that there is any less force in them. There’s just more pushing himself into the pole over allowing speed to carry him.

Rosha, “So this is supposed to give him a talent that improves the bones overall? I don’t really see how it is working the marrow.”

Courtney sighs, “Yeah, that is a worry. The theory behind this is that the bruising forces the bones to work on more blood. There were even suggestions to bleed or for those that heal quickly, use leeches. With Jason? We’re not even sure if bruising or bleeding would work in the first place.”

Rosha shrugs, “Eh, I bet the intent you put behind the actions have a significant effect on things. After all, it isn’t like he’s tempering every bone in his body. I bet it would be hard to work on those tiny bones in the ear, for instance.”

Courtney nods, “You aren’t wrong, but it still needs more than that. Otherwise, someone could claim that walking around is training the bones in their feet and that it should totally count.”

Rosha shrugs, “Add a pain requirement.”

Courtney, “Then they’d want to add up every bit of pain they felt while walking and claim it equals out.”

The two fall silent as they watch Jason slowly, but surely reduce the wooden pole to splinters. Which is actually what ends the current training session. A strike from his forearm manages to finish the job, the top half of the pole falling over.

Jason steps back and shakes his arms and legs out. “Well, that’s a thing.”

Rosha claps, “Hurray, least effective lumberjack ever!”

Jason laughs, “What I did to that pole is a little too blunt to be seen as chopping down a tree.”

Courtney, “Though it should be effective enough for our purposes. Otherwise, we’d have to procure a metal pole. Even a stone one wouldn’t last long enough.”

Jason rubs his left forearm, “I feel a stone pole would be particularly unpleasant to smack around. At least the metal pole would in theory have some flex to it.”

Rosha, “Well, that just sounds like it would be even better training!”

Courtney shakes her head, “While it might look like it, we aren’t aiming for actual damage. To temper Jason’s bones and gain the right talent, we’re looking to be right below that point. The guide I found online was very specific about it.”

Rosha frowns, “Aren’t the guides for training animals?”

Courtney sighs, “Yeah. I don’t think we’d get along with the pet battler types. It seems to really attract the type of person who sees stuff in NeoRealm as only data. Like, even though most people don’t think of NeoRealm as a real place, they treat the locals humanely simply because it feels wrong not to.”

Jason shrugs, “I would say that being in NeoRealm just makes them feel more free to do that kind of thing.”

Courtney, “Well, fair enough. Though there is certainly something about it being a game which makes things seem acceptable.”

Jason waves that off, “I’m not saying people shouldn’t play first-person shooters because that’s mean and you shouldn’t shoot people. I’m not even saying anything about people who play the various ‘evil’ storylines that some games include or when optimization in a management sim accidentally turns into farming mermaids for their high-value bones.

“Most games have a few layers of disconnect between you and what’s happening. NeoRealm doesn’t have that. You feel physically present. When you talk to a local, they’re just a person. There aren’t canned lines, beyond what you used to get irl from cashiers telling you to ‘Have a nice day and take care’. Though in the end, I also admit that as long as people think of this as a regular game, there are some who will do horrible things because they can.”

Courtney shrugs, “The only way to fix that would be to advance things to where people can’t help but admit there’s more to NeoRealm than a game. Though to be fair, you aren’t completely free to do what you want. There are psych evals if you go a little too crazy in here.”

Jason nods, “Good thing those apply equally to everyone and you can’t be rich enough to just get labeled as eccentric.”

Courtney shrugs, “Well, rich people does seem to be a running theme for why the world sucks. I don’t see any reason that should be different in NeoRealm.”