Chapter 1595: The Shadowed Time

Urelon entered the shadow of Krimanax, and everything inside of the cities slowed down. Only the most essential things were kept running, while everything else came second in priority.

The many expeditions to the outside had been slowed down as well, with nothing much needing to be done anymore now that the outside world was fully freezing.

The Spark would be difficult to handle in the cold after all. It would've been a different matter if it was cold alone with no atmosphere, but the people living inside of the cities had created enough air and water that there was a thin atmosphere outside, and when it became cold, everything was frozen in clumps of dirty, which was very annoying to go through.

They also had dug away all of the Spark they could in the past few months and needed to let the moon gather more Spark before they took away anymore.

The next 7 months where when the moon would remain on the dark side of Krimanax would be that time.

Inside the cities, they were slowly healing more and more of the Sparkless as well as people that weren't Sparkless either.

Thanks to Ning, they learned about Spark crystals and had realized that the crystal was blocking the access of the organs inside their bodies to the Spark they ate.

While fully covered, the Spark crystals made one Sparkless. But even with partial covering, it still made their efficiency in usage of Spark quite low.

They had begun removing this from all people who had used Spark for a long time, and these people had found a newfound ability to use Spark at a higher level.

Of course, there was still the matter of talent. Not all organs were the same, and some people could use Spark better than others. But at the end of the day, all that mattered was that everyone could do better than they ever had, and that simply went toward saving up on a lot of Spark with a small investment.

For the next 7 months, Ning did nothing significant. He took on his role of a Lieutenant seriously, looking after the people that were under him, giving them tasks, and sometimes doing a few things himself.

His life was slow, and he was fine with that. He had enough bombardment in just the first few months alone.

A full year had passed since he had come to this world by now. A year after his System's AI had shut down.

And as per the System, there were still 5 more years to go. Ning wondered if he was going to have to spend the next 5 years just like this, or if there would be some more fun things to do. He had been sitting in his room, dealing with some tasks on the DODS when someone knocked on his door. He looked up and smiled. "Captain, what are you doing here?" he asked.

Redaime walked in and sat on a chair, saying nothing but just giving him a weird smirk.

Ning narrowed his eyes. "Is something wrong?" he asked.

"Greet me again," she said. "But do it right this time."

Ning was surprised to hear her speak like that. She had gotten used to the way he talked, so he didn't expect her to want so much formality.

"Okay," he said and stepped to the side. He did a formal salute, and shouted "Captain!"

Redaime's smirk didn't disappear. Instead, it only got stronger. "Try again," she said. "But this time, say the right word."

Ning frowned. What right word? He had only said one. Then, a thought came to his mind and a weird smile formed on his face as well.

He saluted strongly once again, and called out "General."

Redaime's smirk turned into a smile. "That's correct!" she said. "I am a General now."

Ning laughed. "That's amazing. Congratulations, General Redaime," he said.

"It is," she said with a long sigh. "It was too long that we were without a General. Finally, the Majors managed to make the decision on who to promote, and thanks to my efforts, well mostly your effort in taking down the Dust gang, they gave me my promotion."

Ning nodded. "I had no doubts at all. I knew you were going to be the new General right away."

"Yeah, yeah," she said. "Do you know what it means that I became a General now?" Ning shrugged. "You will have greater responsibility, but also greater power?" he asked. "No, I meant what it will mean for you," she asked.

"I'm not sure," Ning said. "Surely I'm not becoming a Captain, am I?"

She smiled. "Who knows?" she said. "The spot is open now though. Everyone is free to try."

Ning smiled. "That is great, but I do not want to be a Captain. I'm fine with being a Lieutenant for now."

"You need to have more dreams, more ambition," she said. "You have the opportunity to get bigger. You need to take it."

"I'll think about it," he said. "But I have no intention of doing so right now. Actually, now that she has been doing so much better, shouldn't Derria go back to being a Captain again? She has the knowledge after all."

"I'm not sure that she can. Well, it will depend on the other Generals, I suppose. She has improved a lot since Sparkless was healed. Being a Sparkless is no longer a threat for people, just a minor obstacle that can be easily removed."

Ning nodded. "People have also begun being more careless. I wish they didn't do that."

"People will do what they do," she said. "Anyway, I came to tell you that I became a General and ask if you were interested in becoming a Captain."

"I'm not," Ning said.

"I'm still going to put your name on it. We'll see what happens then," she said and stood up. "Keep up the good work."

"I will," Ning said. "And once again, congrats on becoming a General."

Redaime couldn't hide her smug face as she waved and walked away.