The pair of son and mother got to the gym. The building looked pretty old compared to the ones that were around it, but you could see that it was being taken care of as there were no issues with the construction and its looks. After they went into the building, the receptionist hall looked just like the outside, like a relic of time past.
Mary looked at her son, who didn't seem bothered by the looks and asked.
"Flint, is this fine? It looks pretty old."
"Yeah, it's fine. Although it looks like a relic in the reception hall, who knows how it looks in gym hall. Anyway, lets go to the receptionist desk."
The pair went to the receptionist desk, there a middle aged woman was working as a receptionist. She looked at them with a smile.
"How may I help you?"
"Yes, I would like to sign up my son for a membership to the gym. But before that would like to know what the membership includes, if I may."
"Yes of course. The membership includes a full access to the gym, as well as help from our trainers and teachers. This is primarily a martial arts gym, but we also help with bodybuilding and medical treatment."
As Flint heard of the gym providing martial arts training, his eyes lit up. And also started asking questions.
"Excuse me, but what kind of martial arts does the gym teach?"
The receptionist looked at the boy and her her smile grew wider. Who knows what was going through her head at that moment.
"Primarily people come to learn self-defense, but we can also provide combat oriented martial arts help as well. Such as weapon training, hand to hand combat and things like that, but those are rarely picked up as most find just the self-defense courses enough." Answered the woman.
As in his past life Flint was a martial arts fanatic, though he never learnt any with the exception of the one he had to learn in the military after the body modification, this sparked his curiosity. He looked at his mother with eyes full of expectation.
His mother looked at him. She knew that he found something he was interested in, again. Since the way he looked right now, is the same as he was when the idea of fusing magic with science came to his mind. 'Looks like another scary idea came to his mind...' She thought.
"Alright we will take a membership for half a year then."
The receptionist registered Flint in their system and took his handheld, where she uploaded all the required data for the membership usage. After what she returned it to him.
"I uploaded a program with the membership, to go into the gym you can just place your device onto the locking mechanism and it'll automatically open. Inside the program you'll also find all the information on our lessons and teachers, who you can contact by choosing them there. You can start right away, the membership also allows you to bring a person with you to the gym, the maximum limit of people you can bring is two, though they wont be able to get lessons from out trainers and teachers they'll be able to use all of the mechanisms there. Thank you for choosing us."
With the explanation done, she showed the door to the gym hall and went back to reading.
Flint and Mary went through the door that the receptionist showed and what welcomed them was a hall full of modern training devices. The hall looked like you would think an old Eastern Dojo would be like, it was strange seeing modern technology in an old style building. There were people training and people watching over them, as well as some that were sparring.
"This looks like a place, that someone who is really into martial arts. Don't you think so?" Asked Flint his mother.
"Looks more like someone who is either of Eastern heritage or is really into it." She answered, while looking around the place. "But there seems to be children your age here as well, most likely training in self-defense. Looks like I can leave you here alone, I need to get to work now. Have fun."
She left after saying that, leaving Flint alone. As for him, he went onto his handheld, started up the program that was newly uploaded by the receptionist and started reading the information on the gym. When he found the information on all the martial arts that you can study there and the trainers that can help with forging his body for them.
The martial art list, listed all of the martial arts and the people that would teach you, if you wished to learn them. There were martial arts for specific weapons, body types and explanations for each one. A couple of them caught his eye, mainly gun, knife usage and hand to hand combat. While looking through everything else, he also found a teacher who was both a magician and a martial arts master that combined both paths in his teachings and combat. That same teacher also helped people to forge their bodies for martial arts.
While he was reading through the information on the gym, a few people started looking at him from time to time. Then finally one of the gym workers came up to him.
"Hey there, the name's Haze. So have you chosen what want to do?" The man asked.
Flint jumped up from the couch, that he had sat on, and greeted the person.
"Hello. Yes I think I know what I want to do, though since I only have half a year for everything I would like to ask, what should I choose to spend my time on."
"I should be able to help you to some point in that. Okay tell me what you chose, we'll work out your schedule."
"Thank you, I'm thinking of picking up Gun mastery, Body forging, hand to hand combat and magic martial arts."
They both sat down on the couch while talking. After hearing what Flint wanted to learn, Haze thought for a while before taking out his own handheld assistant to check something.
"Everything you've chosen, can be somehow taught by the same person. He is out right now and will be back in an hour or so, if nothing comes up. You'll have to work out the schedule with him, since most likely you'll only be working with him on your training. For now, I'll tell you about each device here and also explain how things work around here."
Once that was done, Haze did an excursion on the place for Flint. During that hour Flint got to know each person there, as he will meet them all frequently starting now.