005 THE META AMPLIFIER
Damen couldn't afford to care.
The Meta training class was exactly what he needed — and there was nowhere else he could get it. He followed Mikey into the school's Meta Training Center.
The place resembled an auditorium: rows of tiered seats circling a stage cluttered with strange machines. Instead of desks, each seat was just a wide cushion where students were expected to sit and meditate.
It was Damen's first time here.
"Hey, look who decided to crawl in … trash-boy Damen," Onda Gronne shouted from across the room. One of Thames's loyal thugs.
"Yeah," another sneered. "What a waste of the school's precious resource. He's gonna bomb his finals anyway. Life is so unfair."
"Ignore them," Mikey muttered, tugging Damen toward a cushion.
Damen sat cross-legged, pulling out his phone immediately.
"What are you doing?" Mikey frowned. "Class is about to start."
"Just telling the mines I'm not working today," Damen lied.
In truth, his fingers were already sliding across the DemCoin app.
He locked onto Onda Gronne. The Acquire button lit up, hovering above the usual Mine. Damen didn't hesitate. He pressed Acquire, then tapped Strength.
"Arghhh!" Onda shrieked, clutching his head before collapsing.
The room erupted into chaos and panic.
"What the hell? Why'd Onda faint just like Thames?" someone whispered. "Are we cursed?"
Paramedics rushed in and carried Onda away.
"It's strange, huh?" Mikey whispered to Damen. "Your enemies keep dropping one by one."
Damen's heart jumped. "It's got nothing to do with me."
"Of course not," Mikey snorted. "You think you're some kind of voodoo witch? Please. You couldn't curse those bastards if you tried."
"Yeah… right," Damen mumbled, forcing a laugh.
The stage lights dimmed. Mr. Fischer stepped forward, his voice echoing. "Apologies for the delay. Some of our students seem to have fallen ill unexpectedly today. We'll begin."
The machines on stage hummed. Though invisible, the air shimmered with a strange pressure, like heat without heat. Every student felt it … a tide of unseen energy rolling over their skin.
"For those using the Meta Amplifier for the first time," Fischer explained, "what you feel now are Meta particles. They are the foundation of what makes us… more than human. This equipment produces them in abundance. Your task is to draw them in."
"How do we absorb them?" Damen asked suddenly. Heads turned his way. Damen usually never spoke up in class.
Even Fischer blinked in surprise. Then he answered, "There is no fixed method. Each student adapts differently. If your body resonates with the particles, you will grow. If not… then this training is not for you."
The hall quieted as the students sank into meditation. Even Fischer folded himself cross-legged at center stage bathing in the meta particles.
Damen glanced at his phone. Quietly, he whispered, "Sorry, Mr. Fischer. I'm farming you again." He tapped Begin Mining. This was the second time he farmed Mr. Fischer today.
The DemCoin counter spiked instantly, digits racing up faster than he'd ever seen.
"Woah…woah."
Damen's eyes widened. "So… the rate of mining skyrockets under Meta amplification."
The Meta Center's training dragged on until evening. By the end, the students were drained, shuffling out with heavy steps and blank faces.
"How are you going to explain this to your uncle?" Mikey asked as they left the building. "You skipped work today."
Damen didn't hesitate. "I've got that figured out," he said, tapping his phone like it held the answer.
Mikey frowned. "Need a lift home? It's pretty late."
Damen shook his head. "No. I've got somewhere to be first."
"Seriously? At this hour?" Mikey sighed, but he didn't press. He waved and headed for the school gates, where a car was already waiting.
Damen turned the other way. He had no ride, just a long walk through dark streets… with one secret stop before home.
-----
Damen weighed his options carefully.
Ralph was always violent, and when drunk, which was nearly every night, he was worse. If Damen went home tonight, he knew what waited for him.
The stolen strength from Thames and Onda was still settling in his body. It came in waves, slow and uneven, not the instant transformation he had hoped for.
He was stronger, yes … but not nearly strong enough to take Ralph head-on.
And middle school finals were coming. If Ralph broke him now, he'd lose everything. His scores, his chance, maybe even his future.
"I have to stop him somehow," Damen thought.
He turned down a side street and found himself in a narrow alley, loud with laughter and the clatter of glasses. At its end sat a dimly lit pub … Ralph's nightly haunt.
Damen squared his shoulders and walked forward, only to be blocked by two broad-shouldered bouncers.
"Hey, kid. You're not old enough," one growled.
Caught off guard, Damen forced a quick lie. "I'm not here to drink. I'm looking for my uncle, Ralph Dark. He's a regular. It's urgent …. family business. Erm… his grandmother is pregnant."
Damen was still not used to lying.
The bouncers exchanged a curious glance. "Grandmother!!!"
After a tense pause, one jerked his head laughing. "Ralph eh… Fine. Be quick. We don't need cops sniffing around with an underage inside…. Grandmother or not."
"Thanks. I'll be gone in a jiffy," Damen said, forcing calm.
He slipped inside.
The air was thick with smoke and sweat, the bar packed with miners from the nearby Aur pits — hulking men with dirt still caked in their fingernails. Damen kept his head low, weaving through the crowd.
Then a heavy hand clamped down on his shoulder.
"Damen Dark," a voice slurred behind him. "What the hell are you doing here? And why weren't you at the mine today?"
Damen froze. His blood ran cold.
There was only one man in the world who would demand that answer …. the one he had come here to confront.
Ralph.
Damnit. Damen's throat tightened as he slowly turned. I came here to find him, but he found me first.
The stink of alcohol hit him before the words did. Damen's hand twitched toward his phone, but he knew: one swing from Ralph and he'd be on the floor before the app could even load.
Is this really my luck? he thought bitterly. Dead before I even get a chance to fight back.
-----
006 EXCUSE NOT TO MINE
Damen flinched, bracing for Ralph's fist. He half expected the blow to break bone, maybe cripple him. But the hand that reached for him wasn't Ralph's at all.
"Uh… Mr. Yaris," Damen said quickly, forcing his voice steady. "My finals are coming up. I might not be able to keep working part-time this month."
The man in front of him wasn't his drunken uncle but Supervisor Yaris, the foreman of Aur Mine No. 15…the one who signed off Ralph's hours and handed him his wages.
Yaris chuckled. "Don't worry about it. A kid like you have no business in a mine anyway. I've told Ralph that more times than I can count, but he never listens."
"Where's my uncle? I need to talk to him… about stopping work."
"Ral!" Yaris called out, lifting his voice across the pub.
Damen raised a hand quickly. "Please…don't call him. Not yet. I need to figure out how to tell him…in a nice way."
Yaris studied him for a moment, then nodded. "He's over there. Drunk, as usual."
In the corner, Ralph sprawled across a battered couch, one hand clutching a glass, the other draped lazily over the shoulder of a bored-looking hostess.
Damen didn't move toward him. Instead, he pulled out his phone, raised it in Ralph's direction, and tapped the screen.
"Begin mining," he whispered.
Turning on his heel, he made for the stairs.
"You're not going to talk to him?" Yaris called after him.
"No. Not tonight. Maybe in the morning, when he sobers up. He won't take it well if I tell him now."
"Right."
Outside, the night air was cool.
Damen's eyes stayed fixed on his phone, watching as the DemCoin app confirmed the mining process was still locked onto Ralph.
"Heading out already?" the bouncer at the door asked.
"Yeah. Told you it'd be quick," Damen replied.
"Come back in a few years when you can forget about the grandmas and taste the pussy cats inside", the bouncer added with an obscene smile.
"Right, probably not… ever", Damen replied his thumb tapping the next command.
Acquire. Strength.
A smile flickered across his face as he walked into the street. Ralph wouldn't trouble him tonight or for many nights to come.
------
Damen wandered the streets with no real destination, dragging his steps. He thought about where he could spend the night when the sudden wail of sirens cut through the air.
"Huh… that was fast," he muttered, a faint smile tugging at his lips.
He guessed the ambulance was for Ralph. The shock of having his strength stripped must have dropped him cold.
"Should I go home?" Damen wondered aloud.
He needed rest after a long day and then after another punishing round under the Meta Amplifier.
But then he shook his head. "No. If I go back, I'll get no peace. The hospital will call, and Aunt Melody will force me to check on Ralph."
That left him with only one option. The school.
-----
The campus gates were already shut by the time he arrived. The night guard eyed him warily though he recognized him as one of the students of the school. "You're not supposed to be here this late."
"I came for the extended Meta Amplifier training," Damen said smoothly.
The school had rented the Meta Amplifier at a staggering price, so they kept it running day and night. Evening sessions were open for anyone willing to pay a ticket especially students hungry for an edge, professionals desperate to polish their abilities. Damen had never joined. He couldn't afford the fee.
"Are you sure you have a ticket?" the guard asked.
"Yeah… yeah", Damen replied as he walked to school waving his hands without showing proof of his ticket.
But the guard did not insist. He merely waved him off glad that he could return to his snooze.
Soon, Damen reached the Meta Training Center when a voice shouted at him.
"Damen Dark, why aren't you home?"
The voice came with a firm pat on the back. Damen stiffened. It was Mr. Fischer, his Meta class teacher.
"I—uh, I dropped something in the training center earlier," Damen stammered. "Just came to pick it up."
Fischer frowned. "Sorry. You can't go in now. This session is ticket-only. Come back tomorrow and check Lost and Found." He started to walk away.
"Wait, Mr. Fischer." Damen's tone sharpened. "Will you be in the overnight session?"
The teacher blinked at the question, surprised, then sighed. "No. I need rest too."
"Then who's presiding?"
Irritation flickered across Fischer's face. He was clearly exhausted from a long day's work, but he answered anyway and pointed a finger towards someone at the door of the training center receiving the guests.
"Professor Gawdry. From the Meta Human Association." With that, he turned on his heel before Damen could squeeze out more questions.
Damen smiled at his retreating figure. That was all he needed to know.
He lifted his phone, sighted Professor Gawdry across the courtyard, and locked him in the frame. The app recognized the target even from this distance. The range of his app had expanded after the last upgrade.
"Begin mining."
The command pulsed across the screen, and Damen slipped into the shadows near the Training Center. From there, he watched the DemCoin app tick upward.
Gawdry's output was staggering. It was several times richer than Fischer's.
"Damn. I'm going to be rich," Damen whispered, his grin widening as the numbers climbed.
Then the rate spiked again. Gawdry had entered the Amplifier chamber, and under Meta amplification the mining yield skyrocketed.
"This is worth sleeping outside for," Damen murmured, settling into a cross-legged posture in the corner.
The DemCoin app drained energy on its own, but this time something different stirred inside him.
He closed his eyes, letting the steady pulse of harvested power hum quietly in the background. He tried to train in meta power using the techniques he learned in class but never tried at home- breathing rhythms, mind focus and proper form and posture.
To his surprise, the meta energy within his body shivered awake, like embers catching flame.
"So, this… is what Meta training feels like?" Damen whispered to himself, wonder mixing with disbelief.
This was the first time he started Meta training all by himself without teachers and Meta Amplifiers.
For the first time in his life, he could focus. There was no shouting, no fists, no distractions. Just pure practice, pure growth as meta particles slowly gathered around his body.
----