Kaden had become pretty good at telling lies. At least that was his opinion. After all, his fanciful stories had been relatively succesful recently. It did not take long for Kaden to construct a story to explain his unusual appearance.

By the time he was done with it, it was still some time until morning so he calmly sat down and pondered about his inspiration regarding the mana system he was constructing. His sudden transformation was something he simply accepted as normal and it did not weigh his mind and cause distractions. He was far more interested in his personal research.

He had seen the stucture of his future innate formation. A focal point! He had previously been attempting to just spread the mana he had gathered, but it would be far more efficient to just get it to his core directly. A mana system was for his human type cultivation so making mana system for his core, the beast side, would seem counter productive. Yet, seeing how his innate formation had network ready for future channels, it wouldn’t probably matter! He would arrange the separation of useful mana right at the core at several intersecting points of the innate formation. Right now his mana system could only have a single point along its structure, but his new one, that was not limited by usual requirements, could do it better!

He had also seen his core evolution drag along his mana channels too. There was no telling, if it would happen again, but it seemed likely. It had been dangerous and only by chance it had worked right. If it was going to happen once again, it would be good to tie his mana channels and core together into one system. That way they would grow together and support each other and probably be greater effect than the sum of each. There was no need to try keeping the paths separate.

There were still too many sudden dangers. Safety precautions had to be implemented without compromising anything. These advancements seemed to always be risky. Yet, they were steps he had to take so he only could prepare for them with the best of his ability.

Kaden’s skill at creating formations was barely enough for his current work, so he still had to take some steps on intuition. If it didn’t work, once he was better, he could alter his mana system. Even now, he had well enough room for improvements!

Sun was about to rise around that time. It was time to start daily training.

There was a momentary pause as Kaden realized he could not put shoes on anymore. Following that thought he realized that sharp talons and clothes probably don’t mix. He shrugged and decided to be concerned of that stuff later. They were secondary matters, some of which he had already planned to correct, such as the matter of boots. With these thoughts he walked out of his room.

It seemed everyone else were already starting out in the training yard. Kaden nonchalantly walked in. Time to put up the show.

*Shriek!*

Sari had noticed Kaden first and had shrieked after seeing someone like Kaden, something clearly inhuman, appear. That was all she did, though as she realized who he was seeing and only covered her mouth with her hands.

“What the f...”, Hem shouted too and also took a few surprised steps backwards.

Olren took a fighting stance.

“What are you all hollering about?” Kaden told them with somewhat annoyed voice.

“Is that you Kaden?!?” Hem asked with a wavering voice.

“Who else?” Kaden said and walked further in like everything was entirely normal. He had planned on downplaying the entire things and saying lies that weren’t too far from the truth either. “I was under assumption we were training team tactics and moves today?”

Around at this time Walden came in too after hearing the sounds. “Holy shit!”

All was going well in Kaden’s opinion! No one had attacked him yet! Most were just in shock and looking at him incredulously.

“It’s just a little mishap with my cultivation!” Kaden said, as if his transformation was only some minor thing. He waved his hand in a dismissive manner.

“Kaden… listen, this seems like a pretty big problem”, Walden said and took steps closer.

“I merely reached advanced Channel Opening last night and then this happened”, Kaden started explaining twisting in some lies and misinformation. “Some already happened back when I reached Channel Opening stage. I expected something like this to happen when I reached Formation stage, but it seems it happened a bit earlier. Thats why I didn’t say anything before!”

While all this, Kaden was suppressing his core. He had to show outwards strength that was quite a bit stronger, but not outside of his supposed cultivation stage. He figured it was something he would have to keep doing for the foreseeable future. At least until he step onto Formation stage and can explain his power. Only when it was absolutely necessary, he would bring out his true might!

Walden stared at Kaden quietly for a moment and then sighed. “Damn it, why did Nelsen send me an experiment.” Moment of silence. “I did notice those mana mutations before, but this is pretty damn extreme. I have seen some things before, but nothing like this. I have no idea, if something can be done to reverse it. Perhaps we should try cutting those talons off?”

“I don’t want to reverse it”, Kaden said and shook his head. “Nor will I agree to any mutilation! I have grown stronger! I detect no problems within my body. I look forward to my future growth! This is perfectly fine!”

“This is not fine!” Walden disagreed immediately. “You look like a monster! You are a freak!”

“Is that a problem? Does my appearance somehow make me weaker?” Kaden replied with a question. “I only need to grow stronger. My appearance has very little to do with it. Once I’m strong enough, if I so desire, I can separate heads from shoulders of those people who have a problem with it and actually tries something! With my great strength, no one will dare do anything to me. Strength is everything!”

Walden was speechless.

“Though, I’m well aware that I look somewhat unusual”, Kaden added as if it was some after note.

“Somewhat? SOMEWHAT?” Walden finally screamed. “This is not somewhat! This is not a slight blemish like a scar on your face! Your hands and feet are fucking talons! Your eyes don’t look like human eyes! And that thing on your head! Are you a bird or a man?”

“I also have armor upon my skin”, Kaden said and ignored Walden. Then he opened his shirt a bit and showed the feather pattern on him that was, until then, hidden by clothes. It was best to show all this immediately so that once all this blows over, there is nothing new to cause ruckus anymore. “And don’t call my plume a ‘thing’!”

Walden was yet again speechless.

While Walden was trying to figure out what to say, it was Sari that spoke.

“I think your plume is pretty”, she said, probably trying to calm down the situation a bit. “My family used to tame weaker beasts, including birds. I thought they were beautiful.”

Kaden turned to look at Sari with wide smile. Finally someone noticed his wondrous plume. He still lacked matching coat of feathers, but the most important part was already well visible. In his mind, Kaden already gave big plus to Sari and decided, if possible, she would live through whatever plans he might produce in future.

“I know right!” Kaden started. “See how it accentuates my wondrous appearance.” He then flicked it up and down a bit with seemingly new muscles he had for it.

Walden’s face was turning red. He wasn’t sure how he should react. Part of him was enraged how Kaden was treating his sudden and major mutation! He could have died! Turned into mass of flesh in worst case! Major mana mutations were not a minor matter. Yet, there he was, showing off his inhuman parts like it was some kind of a game or something to be proud of!

“Did your mother mate with a dire chicken?” Olren suddenly asked Kaden with a mocking voice. “I’d figure there were lots of them to choose from at whatever bumpkin village you come from. Perhaps one of them was more endearing than the rest.”

Kaden immediately stopped showing off and turned to look coldly at Olren. It was clear Olren wanted to taunt him into attacking. With his new changes and sudden agression, there would be repercussions. They would think he was unstable!

At least this was what Kaden thought. Whatever the truth was, the taunt was ineffective. Yet, the words were enough. Mocking his mother earned Olren a death sentence. Once it was possible, Olren would die. There would be chances in the future.

Kaden merely snorted and turned his attention back to Walden. “Lieutenant, we should continue training, yes? Upon advancing, I had some inspirations and I would like to finish my personal mana system. We should ingore my little mishap so we can get days work done?”

Walden frowned. “Fine! We will put you to test and observe your body during that and we will see, if there are truly no problems. What if your heart grew extra blood vessels that insteads flow blood backwards once mana flows through them or maybe your organs will simply explode upon exertion. This is a team and whatever happened to you must, at least for the time being, be taken into account. Team practice must wait.”

It worked! Even such extreme unusualness could be downplayed with some good arguments!

“With that said, we will have to do something about your appearance!” Walden added with a stern voice.

“Do not worry!” Kaden replied. “I’m aware how I look. So before I get that strength I spoke of, it is beneficial to me to hide all this. I already made some plans regarding that. Problem is that I still do not have contribution points. I do have some personal money, though. Is there some place where I can request metals and other materials? I’m not yet familiar how it works.”

“What are you planning?” Walden asked.

Kaden explained Walden his ideas about hiding his most conspicuous parts. Walden quickly agreed with this. Though, there were some disagreements when Kaden said he wanted to keep his plume visible. Eventually he was able to convince Walden by agreeing to create something for his head too. It ended up being a circlet mostly due to it covering least.

They were common armor type since they were far lighter than an entire helmet and yet a shield formation carved upon it would still provide protection for the entire head. It was also not unusual to have all kinds of decorations on them. A huge plume would only appear to be rather gaudy adornment.

“I’m still reporting this to Nelsen immediately after we confirm you have no life threatening abnormalities. At least ones that we can find”, Walden pointed out. “Nelsen will have a last say in all this.”

“I’m sure the captain will be overjoyed to have one of his underlings grow stronger”, Kaden said with confidence. “Surely he was aware, when he recruited me, that I was special.”

“Special indeed, but perhaps not the extent of it”, Walden said.

“I’m certain it is not a problem!” Kaden said with few nods.

Walden sighed and motioned towards the combat area. “Lets hope so. Get on in there. If nothing else, you have to get used to this.”

Kaden was rather eager to test his evolved body so he quickly jumped on the fighting platform.