It had been a month since Jay acquired Identification when the first qualitative change finally occurred.

It was the weekend, and Jay was doing his rounds at a shopping mall two jeepney rides away from home.

By this time, he had been doing this stuff for a month already, but his enthusiasm had never waned.

There was something magical about feeling himself improve, especially in his case, where the rate of improvement over time was quite high.

Of course, he was only human. Eventually, he would grow tired of doing the same thing repeatedly, and he also had other responsibilities to consider.

As a compromise, he allotted a few hours every day for this activity, giving him enough respite to prevent burnout and time to carry out other responsibilities.

Jay was already browsing for more than an hour, and he was beginning to feel hungry, so he went out of the department store to look for food.

On the way, he rested his hand on the escalator while mindlessly using Identification on it.

He was casually perusing the acquired information while glancing around the mall when he felt a sudden sensation akin to a brain freeze.

However, the feeling was already gone before he even had the time to scrunch his face.

He didn't even have time to think about what had just happened when a large volume of information suddenly bombarded his mind.

All of a sudden, he could grasp the basic information of every entity, both living and inanimate, that had contact with the escalator within a short period before the usage of Identification.

However, the mental strain from the drastically increased volume wasn't something he could handle even for a short while, so he had to empty his thoughts and let go of the acquired information reluctantly.

His initial observation was that he gained the ability to see the 'history' of the target, albeit only within a short time before the present.

Nevertheless, it was a major upgrade that had great potential.

In its extremity, he might even be able to trace the 'history' of a pebble to the formation of the Earth itself.

Of course, he would already be a god by then, doing things far more important than Identifying random stones.

After getting beef shawarma from a food stall, Jay swiftly found himself an empty bench nearby.

He wanted to try Identification on it, since he figured that a bench would probably provide a significantly lower density of information compared to an escalator, based on the speculated number of users over time between them.

The information density of the bench was indeed within his capacity, albeit with a bit of strain.

Even so, he believed that it wouldn't take long for his cognitive abilities to adapt as long as he exercised Identification cautiously.

At the moment, the worst-case scenario for him would be to accidentally use Identification on the columns, which were considered an integral part of the structure of the mall.

The sheer volume of information from the 'history' of the entire mall probably wasn't something a mortal could handle. His head might instantly explode after an attempt.

After testing his ability on the bench, a thought came to Jay.

He turned his gaze towards a nearby empty bench and tried to use Identification on it.

Surprisingly, its information showed up in his head. However, the information from its 'history' was missing, which was a bit disappointing.

Nevertheless, it was a drastic improvement that opened up a lot of possibilities.

Of course, he had to do a few tests first to avoid stupid mistakes later.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

The first thing Jay did afterward was look at Facetome, the premier social networking site in his country.

He scrolled past random memes to find an image of anything that existed in real life.

He had to scroll for a few seconds until he found a picture of a reviewer booklet for sale, posted by a senior in his department.

Unfortunately, there was no reaction when he tried Identification on the image of the booklet.

He was a bit disappointed for a moment, but he quickly recovered afterward.

There was no point in mulling over what could've been when he was already fortunate enough to have the recent major enhancement.

The next thing he tested was the range.

He went to the mall atrium and tried looking at the farthest thing his negative 5.0 eyeglasses could afford him.

He gradually focused on a barely visible life-sized Jolluboat figure at the entrance of a popular fast-food chain with the same name.

There were people around the figure, but it didn't matter since his ability was considered single-target according to gaming jargon.

Fortunately, he succeeded this time, much to his relief.

Furthermore, the quality of information was comparable to that of the nearby bench earlier.

It seemed like he would have to invest in binoculars sometime soon.

Of course, whether it would work or not remained to be seen, although it seemed hopeful since he was technically already in avail of assisted vision through his eyeglasses.

It might have seemed like his options had expanded widely, but Jay knew that he would have to be even more careful from now on.

Previously, he would avoid using Identification on people.

He couldn't be certain if other people possessed abilities of their own and might discover him 'spying' on them, which could lead to conflicts he wasn't equipped to handle.

To be fair, he was inclined to think that such people had always existed in every era.

Myths and legends couldn't have come out of nowhere.

Even if they were exaggerated over time from word of mouth, they still had to come from something.

Of course, these sources might have been outright fabrications by themselves, but there was still a slight chance that some of them had some sort of reasonable basis.

In any case, he didn't want to meet them anytime soon unless he was certain that he held a significant advantage over the other party.

But this was a conundrum by itself. How could he ever hope to understand them when he wouldn't even take the initiative to find and observe them?

Nevertheless, he could only rely on himself in the end, which was why he had to keep improving regardless of external factors.

Unfortunately for him, fate had a way of messing things up when one least expects it.

-

Somewhere else in the same mall, the long-haired observer was on his day off and was taking his siblings' children out to play.

They were planning to have some snacks at Jolluboat, which was a premier food destination for many people in the country, both young and old.

The kids in the group immediately saw the life-sized figure of Jolluboat, an anthropomorphized boat with a happy smile, and ran up to it while dragging everyone with them.

The older kids in the group, affected by the joyful atmosphere, brought out their phones and took pictures of the little children beside the mascot.

Eventually, they even dragged their uncle with them. The latter could only go with the flow as he didn't want to ruin their smiling faces.

He was resting his arms around the shoulders of the mascot with a helpless smile when he felt a slight tingling sensation coming from the figure beside him.

He was quite sensitive to metaphysical fluctuations, especially if the source was in direct contact with him. He didn't sense any form of threat, however.

Most likely, it was a reconnaissance or divination attempt aimed at the mascot beside him.

If the unknown ascendant had designated him as the target, he would've noticed it earlier and even launched a direct counter-investigation in the blink of an eye.

It was supposed to be his day off, but it's not as if other people had the obligation to honor it.

Of course, he wasn't going to let it ruin his moment with his nieces and nephews.

People might see an awkward middle-aged man having his picture taken next to a Jolluboat figure, but a lot was happening behind the scenes.

Immediately after he sensed the fluctuation, he unfolded a dynamic projection of the entire mall in his mental space, where he could monitor the movements of everyone in the vicinity in real time.

It was only a general form of observation though, as he couldn't focus his perception on random people in prevention of offending other ascendants.

To reduce the burden on his mind, he narrowed down his options to living beings.

Most ascendants could only exert the purest form of their ability near their physical bodies, while those few that could employ an external medium were almost impossible to trace and probably had something better to do than cast their abilities on a random Jolluboat figure.

After half a minute of observation, he had already noticed seventy-two people whose line of sight had been focused on the Jolluboat figure at least for a moment during this period.

He noted their exact positions when their sight coincided with the mascot. He would approach these locations later to look for traces of metaphysical fluctuations.

Touch was the most common medium of ability usage, but sight was the most convenient.

Also, he was the only one touching the mascot during this period, which eliminated the possibility of application through touch, so he focused on the latter sense.

On the other hand, people who relied on other senses were much harder to observe without focusing his ability on them, rendering an attempt at investigation pointless.

Nevertheless, he still took note of everyone in the immediate vicinity just in case he was forced to investigate in this direction.

Among the seventy-two tagged people, one stood out the most.

It was a tall, bespectacled young man who had been squinting hard in his direction.

The young man in question had spent the longest time looking at the mascot, while also seeming to be deep in thought.

Clearly, the young man was the prime suspect, but that wasn't enough to discount other possibilities. He still had to personally visit every spot in person.

-

Jay, unaware that his attempts at concealment had already failed, was casually walking towards the department store.

This time, he would buy something in celebration of the recent development, much to the relief of some clerks who had already become familiar with him.