NOVPUBKayden’s barrier spell was broken, and only the dilation spell was left. Furthermore, he only had one more modification spell, the most special one and the one he had worked on the most all these years, his greatest possible destruction spell. His usual aura slash was compressed to the size of a finger, and its thickness became smaller than that of paper.
The density of the mana was so toxic that it would kill an apprentice before he was cut. As soon as it passed through the spell, the cut received a protective film that prevented its mana from spilling out. This allowed Kayden’s attack to travel dozens of kilometers if necessary, and although it would have a loss in strength, it would be a small thing; only in the hundreds of kilometers would it be something more significant.
The aura attack cut the lightning for several meters before it entered a stalemate. The seconds began to pass slowly; Kayden no longer had the strength to attack; his last defense was the mana barrier on his body. Seconds passed slower than decades in Kayden’s mind; the seventh ray had already fallen for more than a minute.
Finally, after a few seconds, Kayden sighed. "May it be whatever fate wants again", he said to himself when he saw his attack being devoured by lightning. Without giving up, he readied his katana to try and mitigate as much damage as possible.
As soon as the lightning hit the katana filled with a thin layer of mana, he felt as if an entire mountain was falling on his arm. Without wavering, he held on for just two seconds; then protected the vital parts of his body.
He didn’t even feel when the entire right side of his body disappeared; then his stomach was completely decimated, and the lightning continued upward. Kayden felt half of his heart destroyed along with one side of his lung. The lightning stopped...
Kayden didn’t automatically give up hope; he sealed off all of his body’s energy expenditure and automatically forced himself into an insane state of rest where not even his brain functions worked.
BOOOM!
A beam of an indescribable color fell on Kayden, it was a mix of amber and gold, it seemed mystical and sent a signal to all living beings within almost 1 trillion kilometers.
What was this sign?
"A possible god? So early?" Merlin appeared floating in the air a few dozen kilometers from Kayden and observed the situation. He wasn’t too surprised by Kayden’s condition; seven-ray tests were ridiculously difficult.
Meanwhile, Kayden was destroyed by the mystical ray, there was nothing left, absolutely not even a tiny particle of his old body. It was practically invisible to all living things, but Merlin could see Kayden’s soul floating in a small enclosed space.
Meanwhile, his body was being completely remade, from the bones to the veins, every inch of him was being remade. Some organs were removed, as they were no longer necessary, while some new functions were added.
For example, his kidneys were now able to filter the excess mana in his body through blood circulation. He could stay accelerated 24 hours a day now and there would be no consequences whatsoever.
His lungs were modified to breathe mana and accumulate it constantly along with his heart. His heart followed the same example as the old one, with some improvements that Kayden wasn’t able to see at his low level. All of their hearts experienced this improvement, but something else was done that Kayden had been studying for years.
In the past, he had a human heart that pumped blood normally, but now that was no longer true. Only his artificial heart which was located in the middle of his chest was present, and the concentration of mana in his blood increased even more. His entire body had been improved to a completely ridiculous extent, be it strength or speed, practically everything had received a huge boost, be it his speed or the toughness of his muscles. Every inch has been improved to a completely absurd level.
The body molding process was practically instantaneous. Before Merlin, a true god, could blink, Kayden’s soul was already being introduced into the new body. This was absurdly fast considering the old man could travel millions of kilometers in the blink of an eye.
Once Kayden’s soul was placed into the body, it fully integrated. Merlin could never understand how it was done; Souls were not things that could be changed easily. It required a lot of individual study of a single soul to make any changes.
A few seconds later, Kayden was integrated into his body, and his eyes opened. His first action was to draw in a large gulp of air; his last memories forced him to do so. To his surprise, his body did not absorb even a single bit of oxygen; only mana entered. Instantly, Kayden felt his ridiculous strength bursting through every inch of his body.
This breakthrough was far superior to all the others he had ever made combined. All of his attributes were above the third realm officially. His spiritual sense was nearly 100 kilometers away. Kayden had to shut it down quickly because of the flood of information coming at him. It was simply a frightening amount, and he still had no experience ignoring such a large amount of data.
Kayden stood still for a few seconds as it dawned on him how strong he was. His path could pull all that mana towards him in a matter of seconds. Probably, his spiritual sense was similar to someone in the fourth realm with four rays, but his control was much greater.
Furthermore, he could launch attacks at any point in that area. This was completely terrifying. His domain had not yet been practiced, but Kayden estimated at least 3 kilometers with it, a similar tenfold increase. This meant that he wouldn’t even need to get close to Felix to suppress him.
It would be an impossible fight for the cat. Even in the fourth realm, his spiritual sense was only a few kilometers higher than Kayden’s, while Milena’s was almost 30 kilometers lower.
His spells would have to be reworked, as Kayden now had a lot more mana for them. The power would be too much if he used the same step model as before. His longevity also increased by two centuries according to his estimates. This was about 100 years longer than he expected. His appearance returned to when he was young.
"Felix, did you see what that world was like that opened?" Kayden asked the cat that approached his shoulder. The feline didn’t even have time to respond when a voice appeared, taking them both by surprise.
. "Only the challengers can see the heavens." They both turned to the left and saw Merlin. Kayden didn’t react as surprised as the old man expected. His control over his body was even stronger. He didn’t even say anything, just stared at the old man.
"Aren’t you going to ask anything? Who am I?" Merlin couldn’t remember having a normal conversation in ages. His mental capacity and his spells meant that he could predict any speech and action of any mortal, but those who had a chance of becoming gods were different.
He couldn’t even kill Kayden or interfere much in his destiny. In a way, he was bound by the threats from the heavens. The old man couldn’t even move an inch before he was simply erased from existence.
"You are the strongest in the situation, you call the shots," Kayden said curtly and remained quiet. The god laughed and tried to use his divine aura to impress Kayden, leaving him a day or two trapped in a trance would not be abusive at all.
"What the hell is that?" For the first time in millions of years, the god cursed in surprise. Kayden was looking at him waiting still. The young man was not bewitched by her divine aura. Only peak mortals could do this easily without any effort, and such people were rare.
Merlin had 17 planets in his possession, and the number of humans at that level barely reached 1000. This was a very small number considering that he had thousands of trillions of people in total.
"Sorry about that, my body acts on its own sometimes." Merlin came up with a ridiculous excuse and continued as if nothing had happened. "I am Merlin, the god of this region, you must not know what this is, never mind." Merlin seemed nervous, but in reality, he just didn’t know how to talk to Kayden.
Time had accustomed him to dealing with people that he could read or predict every thought and action, his ability to predict was so great that he could tell just from the first few years of a person’s life their entire future based on known circumstances.
His spiritual sense was capable of reading every inch of this planet and predicting everyone’s potential, he could easily tell who the new gods would be so, at least in theory, people with a higher destiny counted on a constant called luck.
