“Now then, show me you aren’t going to burst inside out as soon as you do something”, Walden said and basically told Kaden to perform some practice movements.

Kaden did as ordered and did not find any problems. He hadn’t expected to either, but doing so would perhaps placate Walden, if he fulfilled his wishes. What he did notice was that he felt he had gained a lot!

His movements were fluid and smooth! Each move was effortless and Kaden felt he could exert strength far beyond his previous limits, if he so desired. He figured he should be able to fight a true Formation stage mana cultivator, if he wanted to, but he had no idea how well he compared to expert of that level. People who reached Formation stage usually already had quite a bit of experience.

Even if his body was new, it felt familiar, as if it had always been the way it was. Evolution truly was wondrous thing! Humans did become better upon advancements, but probably missed the extent evolution gave. Still, humans were more intelligent than beasts to begin with and could use their different kind of power in clever ways.

“Any discomfort?” Walden questioned.

“Obviously not!” Kaden replied. “I feel wonderful! I’m stronger and faster! I think this goes beyond limits of simply advancing from mid to advanced Channel Opening.”

“We’ll see later then, if you start bleeding from all of your orifices”, Walden said. In his opinion even, if Kaden was not on brink of death and was technically fine, Kaden had still suffered horrific mutations! “This also happens to bring some ideas that I’d like to try. I may have an idea about your difficulties in using the movement techniques we tried. I’ll go report this matter to Nelsen, but once I come back we will be trying some things. Everyone, until then continue combat drills! See if you can notice any oddities about Kaden.”

Kaden stayed up on the platform and everyone else nodded. Walden walked back in where he had come from and took out his phone.

“Hehe, I’ll be first to try out the freak”, Olren said and jumped onto the fighting platform. He eyed at Kaden for a moment and then looked back to Hem and Sari. “Perhaps we should give him a collar and say he is a tamed beast.”

Hem and Sari didn’t reply to his joke. Olren shrugged and concentrated back at Kaden.

“So what do you think, freak?” Olren continued taunting Kaden.

Kaden himself knew, if he truly threw all caution to the winds and released his full power, he could turn Olren into pile of disfigured meat. Yet, he would not do that. At least not yet. With how he was suppressing his power within acceptable levels, it was still much higher than anyone should have ordinarily. He had good excuse for it too. There was simply no way that Olren was any true opponent. Before it had only been barely the case because Olren could use proper techniques.

“Why don’t you come say that here”, Kaden said casually. “Better do so with your full strength straight away.”

In fact, Kaden did want to fight with Olren. They had been so close that he was a good measuring tool to compare. Hem and Sari were slightly weaker. Olren had received quite a bit more of resources before joining the team due to his nobility background. Kaden wanted to beat Olren and show his superiority too. He wanted to be the strongest on the team.

Walden was another matter. If at Channel Opening the team members could truly give a relatively equal fight before, then what could someone experienced at Formation stage do now? Kaden would not underestimate anyone, if he could avoid it!

As for the fight with Olren. Kaden felt strange sensation as soon as it started. He had wondered, if he should match his core suppression just high enough to beat Olren, but he found out he had no need to do so at all! He even noticed he could suppress his core even more and still keep fighting, if he wanted to!

Olren used his movement technique that created illusory images and struck Kaden with his sword technique that was relatively similar. That was his style, fighting with illusory distractions and take advantage of enemy confusion.

That odd feeling Kaden had. He still had the similar problem as previous fights with Olren. He could not tell which illusions were real or follow Olren and could only rely on quick reactions and trust his close combat experience. Even, if that was the case, he somehow took the right steps, moved just aside in time, jumped backwards and even strike at space that didn’t seem to have anything in it, yet Olren had been forced to take defensive moves.

He was not able to follow Olren, yet he was somehow reacting to his moves perfectly!

Kaden was not quite sure what was the cause. He just felt what was the situation just before next move happened and then he was able to react to it. Some kind of predictive sense? His core suppression only seemed to effect how fast he could move and react, but had nothing to do with the sense.

For outside observer, Kaden had just really good movements. This made Olren really mad. He had got used to being strongest and now this freak was seemingly toying with him. He was angry that he was not the strongest anymore. Once some promotions were considered, he would be seen to be the second best! This was not good for him since he was looking for a good military career. He only hoped since Kaden was a freak, they would ignore him.

Olren truly started fight with all his ability! Yet, Kaden only had to keep his power level same and keep reacting. Even with the speed his power limit allowed, he could win the fight as soon as he wanted to, but he wanted to keep testing this new ability! No matter how Olren’s false images flashed around him and strange illusory impossible sword slashes passed right by, he did not get hit.

Eventually he decided to see other fighting styles by fighting Hem or Sari, then in a flash he delivered a kick forward. Just a normal kick. The taloned foot collided with Olren leaving behind bleeding gashes as Olren flew outside of the platform. He had not suffered more than minor external wounds that were not problem for someone of his level. Had Kaden added any extra mana on that kick, it could have caused true damage!

Kaden stood on the edge of the platform and looked smugly at Olren. Perhaps the fool would now understand the difference of their strength. What had appearance to do with anything, if he had strength?

“I’m sorry, I used more strength that I should have”, Kaden said with amicable voice as, if the entire thing had been an accident. “It seems I’m indeed stronger than I thought! My mistake. I will accept this as my loss due to it!”

That should do it. Even, if he said it was his loss, everyone could tell it was his win. That is what Kaden cared about.

Olren gritted his teeth, but could do nothing. As it is, he was not match to Kaden.

To show his cincerity, Kaden fought more gently with Hem and Sari, as if it had truly been just an accident. Right kind appearance had to be maintained! Even if he was taking it easy, there was still no question about winner.

This did not surprise Kaden a bit. His beast like abilities were far beyond any of them with them being still at Channel Opening and he was still holding back. If he was planning on using purely his mana channels, result might be different, but there was no reason to do so.

Around at this time Walden came back.

“All right, how was it?” He questioned everyone.

“Kaden has clearly become much stronger, but thats obvious if he advanced. Not sure how much the mutations changed things”, Hem replied. “Other than his appearance, I didn’t notice anything else than he is significantly faster and can now deal with our movement techniques that seemed to be problem before.”

“Did he use any himself? Even that Force Move?” Walden continued questioning.

“I don’t think so”, Hem said and looked at Kaden for confirmation.

“I didn’t need to”, Kaden said confidently. There was no need to tell about his predictive ability, whatever it was. Still, it looked like it was not going to remain secret.

Before Walden could reply anything, Olren started talking.

“It was like the freak could react to my attacks before I really even struck!” Olren said. “No matter where I moved and used illusions, he could always tell where I was.”

Walden nodded a bit. “Kaden’s mutations brought out a thought I had not truly considered before, but now it seems likely. The experiment Kaden was involved in was indeed about mixing beasts and humans. Certain beast traits should be expected.”

Kaden wondered, if it was good idea to have told all those stories. He had not expected the mutations and now it might bring too much attention to things he had said before. Something would have come up eventually so perhaps it was okay. No one could ever find out his relations to Anuu, a phoenix.

Just as he was thinking those exact thoughts, Walden asked him a question. “Do you know what beast and how it was mixed with you?”

“I wasn’t conscious. I didn’t even realize it until I inspected my channels the first time”, Kaden said. “I can see the results and it was obviously some bird type beast.”

It was best to appear oblivious.

“You have that spell from the same place and it looks like this particular necromancer was researching mana and life consuption magic”, Walden said as he continued nodding slightly. “I have seen you eat too. You burn the food. Perhaps some kind of fire type carrion bird. I don’t know any that do it, but thats not surprising, there are too many different species to know them all.”

Continuing his thoughts, Kaden wondered, if he should stop burning his food too or do it only when no one sees him do it. Most beasts probably did not do so. Yet, Kaden had looked into beast encyclopedias. Such things were not difficult to find, if one put in some effort. Additionally only some seemed to even point out phoenixes and none really could tell much. Perhaps his best bet was to not show his behavior right in front of higher ranked people who could know thing or two about rare beast like a phoenix which rarely even had any interactions with human race.

“I would go as far as say you are probably a half beast”, Walden continued. “That makes me think you have a innate mana type which beasts have naturally where humans, in a way, set up types during Formation stage. If this is the case, your type include at least fire. Not sure what would relate to that Devour spell. Carrion would likely realate to death, but thats too high ranked mana and same goes for its counter part, life.”

This was important. Kaden had been aware of innate mana types, but that it would so significantly affect him. Human sure could cast any spells, but people at Formation stage supported their own chosen types to make spells stronger, not restrict to just them.

Kaden knew he could separete probably all kinds of mana that he could understand the concept. Yet, he had not really cast any other actual spells than Devour! Perhaps his assumption was wrong! Perhaps he had come to conclusion too hastily!

“Damn it! Is my advantage useless after all! I was supposed to be able to easily gather any type of mana! And worst thing is that I can, but if my body isn’t able to allow me to use it right then its useless!” Kaden lamented.

“I want to test this hypothesis”, Walden said and took out a few information crystals. “One could say we will continue the necromancers work and confirm the results of this unethical experiment. These are the simplest spells that we might teach to common soldiers, all of them different type. People should be able to understand and cast such easy spells very quickly. Train all of these and then try casting them. We will then see, if there are indeed some you can cast and some you can’t.”

This was a good idea. Kaden had not been planning on wasting time to get new spells yet, but with this he could use these low tier spells to see, if there was indeed problem with his body simply not being able to accommodate and use wrong mana types.