Kaden waited just a bit longer for the time bubble to dissipate a bit and gathered strength. Then, while he still held advantage, he charged up a Fire Beam. He was not surprised to notice, the mana that took some effort to move and cast into the spell, now came out effortlessly. Not only that, it contained far more mana than he had been able to support before. Even more so, his body seemed to send forth extra mana to enhance it too.

"My body is basically made to cast a spell like this", Kaden realized.

He then released the spell through the bubble which almost immediately ceased to be as the Fire Beam shot at Reverend.

"What?!" Reverend shouted in surprise. For him, the entire event had likely looked like an explosion, where Kaden suddenly transformed into a beast in an instant. He was barely able to block the beam with his hammer, which seemed to get red hot and suffer damage. The force still knocked him back too forcing him against his own shield.

Kaden screeched and charged forward.

"What are you?" Reverend shouted, still in confusion. Then. "Beast... beast with mask of man!!! So it shall be my burden! I must destroy you!"

"Gods are pathetic parasites", Kaden said with a new somewhat raspy voice. "I will send you to them to explain how you failed."

This seemed to trigger some kind of fury within Reverend. Someone had insulted his precious gods.

Kaden was testing more of his old spells and released a Flame Blast. All his spells seemed to be enhanced heavily. At any rate, he intended to simply overpower Reverend and kill him.

Still, it wasn't entirely one sided. Reverend's zeal seemed to combine with his rage once he decided Kaden had to be this specific monster from the prophecy. While it did seem to match, Kaden didn't care. At any rate, Reverend was in some kind of religious rage and started to release spells from everywhere. Some of these struck Kaden, but the weaker ones basically bounced off from Kaden's new layer of feathers. They were extremely strong, yet flexible.

Other than that, Reverend was flinging about his hammer in chaotic manner. There was no longer sign of his previous calm demeanor where he adjusted to every move and laid traps.

It seemed Reverend didn't know enough of phoenixes either. They were extremely good at endurance fights. Kaden was now enjoying this benefit to the fullest. The bigger attacks he was able to deal with where before he might have been crushed by them easily.

Yet, Kaden might have already attempted to finish the fight, but he was somewhat unfamiliar with his body. Still, he felt somehow oddly familiar with it too at the same time. If Reverend stayed the way he was, Kaden expected to be able to handle it.

Kaden used the combat to familiarize himself with his body and used Reverend as target practice. The man still had enough sense to avoid and block them.

Eventually the outer shield started to flicker and then disapeared. This caused Reverend go even greater fury than before. Kaden noted that the holy book seemed to have dimmed.

"It probably can be filled with mana and then it will do these tricks tied to it", Kaden thought to himself. "I want to try something now that my movements arent restricted. I have wanted to do something like this for a long time..."

Kaden leaped towards Reverend, who even in his zeal, did block the attack, but Kaden had not even tried to truly attack. He wanted to try his wings. He instead grabbed a good hold of the man with his talons and started to beat his wings. He was obviously even more unfamiliar with wings than the rest of his body, but he felt he had some existing feelings, perhaps instincts, of how it worked. Not to mention with his strength, picking up a man from the ground and flying up was extremely easy.

Reverend wasn't going to just accept being picked up so he struggled furiously, eventually freeing himself and subsequently falling. Kaden had not reached the height he would have prefered to, but it was enough. Falling wasn't usually fatal to someone at Condensation stage, but gravity continued to be problem until one could ignore it completely. In this case, though, the height was enough to cause a momentary stun.

This also allowed Kaden to swoop down directly on top of his just stunned opponent. At the moment his talons pierced the man and he grabbed a good hold, he let out at Flame Burst, igniting him.

Reverend was not screaming. He was merely showing that furious zeal and would not show any signs of weakness despite that he was going to die.

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As parts of the man got charred, Kaden had the desire to feed, so he did so. He started eating Reverend alive. He didn't get to do much, though.

"The holy writ condemns you, spawn of heresy!" Reverend shouted while seemingly being able to ignore the fact that he was burning and being eaten alive.

The book he had suddenly started to glow and Kaden could sense whatever mana in it to gather together with Reverend's.

"Another damn self destruction", Kaden cursed in his mind. Yet, he had a working method to interrupt it quickly.

Kaden pulled out Vengeance from his bag. He had a passing thought as he realized he had no trouble grasping objects as before. His talons still worked as hands.

He struck Vengeance into Revered whose face twisted in rage and pain. Vengeance was not going to damage his soul, at least not much, but as always it consumed and disturbed mana. Enough to prevent it from being gathered into a bomb.

"You have failed", Kaden told Reverend. "With this I can act freely. Your churches will burn, your gods will curse your soul for your failure. Die knowing this! Its your fault."

Kaden felt the need to mock fools like this. People who blindly trusted gods. The effect was obvious, Reverend's zeal was turning into despair as he no longer could stop Kaden.

With all that needed to be said, Kaden finally decided to put an end to the fight. He basically tore off Reverend's head by using his new, sharp and powerful, beak to bite at his neck. Blood spewed out a bit, staining Kaden's golden feathers with crimson red. He didn't care. He could clean them later.

He was hungry.

Kaden had completed the actual evolution process with minimal resources available. He looked around, now with even better sight. There was no one else around. There were a few corpses nearby, likely Emina's work, but she was not among them. Alive or dead, Kaden could not find her either.

Speaking of looking around. Kaden noted he had some extra sense. He could not really tell what it was, but it seemed to work through his now very large plume. For a moment he wondered what the feel was until he looked carefully what he was sensing. It was the now familiar life mana.

"It makes sense", Kaden noted this discovery. He could sense no major sources of life, that is people, other than himself. He wasn't yet sure of the maximum distance. At least he could not see anything within the range at the time.

There was time to recuperate. There was no one to disturb him anymore for the time being. It was time to perform more detailed inspection on himself.

He had already noted the fact that he could grab things like before. That was good.

"But there is no way I will be able to pass as human", Kaden confirmed as he looked over himself. Then he tried something else.

Kaden was able to stand up. He wasn't certain, if natural phoenixes could do that, but he probably wasn't one, at least not compeletely. He felt like he could even fight like that, but he felt somewhat uncomfortable with it.

"Am I complete?" Kaden wondered. He had not felt he was human. He felt more closeness to beasts, phoenixes specifically. His human life had ended already a long time ago. This was new life, given to him by Anuu, a phoenix.

Kaden, while standing up, was a bit larger than he was before, but still within limits of human size, if wings were ignored. His wings would be impossible to hide even from greater distance. Close distance, anyone could notice he was not a human even with a disguise. Not even considered a mutant.

"I need to get clever, if I'm going to interact with humans", Kaden realized. There were still people to kill. "I cannot go to cities, but perhaps I can find my targets outside or attract them to me."

He needed to take time to see what was possible.

Yet, there was one thing he could now do. Since he was basically a beast, he even considered himself a beast, he could go deep into beast territory, or Cari territory. They weren't any weaker than humans. There were opportunities and benefits to be gained. New ways to grow strong. Gain understanding of Cari that very few, if any, humans could ever get.

Kaden pulled out Vengeance out of Reverend's corpse. He was about to put it away, but he noted something odd about it. It had cracks on it, but it didn't seem like it was breaking. It seemed to be growing. It was somehow larger than before and was merely shedding some external layer away.

"It does consume mana", Kaden thought. "But as far as I understand enchanted items, it was made for vengeance and it will require vengeance mana. Maybe its tied to me, but will require correct kind of mana to truly grow. I should go kill someone and see what happens. Hmmm."

Kaden pondered it for a while. It was likely at limit too due to himself and having absorbed mana. But it did not have the vengeance mana to support its existence advancing. It was just a blade infused with certain type of mana. In many ways, just like living things could advance, inanimate objects could too, but it wasn't as complex being as, say a human, so it needed less. Yet, it still needed things.

Kaden put Vengeance away. He would remember the blade and its needs too.

He continued to eat Reverend. He expected to feel some growth of mana, but all he could do was to refil himself after the fight and evolution. He then put aside his desires and used Devour. The effect was basically same in terms of actual gains. It didn't matter if it was a bit more efficient method to absorb mana, it still looked the same at the end.

"Condensation stage and likely Lower Cari stage is the one where I need to gather enormous amount of mana", Kaden realized. "There is a reason why so few True Magi or Cari stage exist."

Most in Condensation stage and Lower Cari were at the start of it. Probably over two thirds of humans at Condensation stage were at early Condensation stage. Nearly one third at mid and a small fraction were at advanced or peak.

"I must find large source of mana", Kaden though to himself. A single Reverend who was early Condensation stage wouldn't be much at all. "I also need to be more efficient with it. I should have the strength to make Devour stronger too."

There were many things to do.

But first, Kaden decided to continue eating, actually eating. He was pretty sure Devour wouldn't help him that much this time. The flesh of his fallen adversary was delicious.