Braun’s body twisted and shifted in the air, changing into wacky shapes that could only described as cartoonish. His face elongated and his limbs turned formless, expanding in size. Sickly pale flames also formed from the palms of his hands, yet they didn’t feel hot to the touch.

They instead felt cold, and intuitively, he knew that if they were to brush a person’s soul, it would deal a significant amount of damage to their spiritual status.

Besides the cold sensation of the strange fire, frost also began to gather around the periphery of his body, with the temperature around him dropping significantly.

So there’s also temperature dropping and minor frost manipulation. Braun assessed in his mind and proceeded to test out more of his abilities.

Green light gathered around his palms, which then protruded outwards, forming two simple spheres of spiritual energy.

They changed form and shape in random intervals, turning into simple 3d structures like cubes and prisms, allowing Braun to gain a greater understanding of how to control his spiritual energy.

So, all in all, I gained some common abilities of ghosts depicted in legends. For a Level 1 ability, this sure is powerful. Braun hummed as he slowly turned corporeal, his feet landing on the ground with a light thud.

Most of his experiments were finally done, and he gained a preliminary understanding of all of his new power’s abilities, Ghost.

However, there was still one last ability that he wanted to test out, and it was the reason why he rushed to kill the kid when he realized their ability. If this were to succeed, his worries regarding the limits of his puppetry skills would be solved in one fell swoop.

…

Braun didn’t have to wait for long for his test subject to appear.

As the time ticked and 5:30 pm arrived, the door that led to the inside of the house opened with a click, and a middle-aged man with thick brown hair, and dark brown eyes, wearing a simple suit, walked in with a smile on his face.

After a long, exhausting day at work, getting to see his family would bring him a great level of joy, but that wouldn’t come anytime soon.

From the spiritual plane of existence, illusory silvery green threads shot out of Braun’s fingertips, poking through the man’s body and coiling around a milky white sphere near the center of the man’s body.

The man’s body froze, the light in his eyes disappearing for a split second.

Braun willed his threads to tighten around the man’s soul; when the threads came into contact with the soul, a strange barrage of information entered his mind—of vision, of smell, of taste, of touch, of sound, all belonging to the man in front of him.

He was at first disoriented by the two streams of sensory information flooding his single mind, but he quickly adjusted and muted out all of the distractions in his mind.

When he finally opened his eyes, he saw from two different perspectives at ones, with one staring at a middle-aged man, and another one staring at his own face. Getting over the strange view, he finally began to test whether his hypothesis would prove to be true or not.

As he tried to raise his right arm, the man in front of him raised his right arm too, following Braun’s will like a puppet.

When he saw this, Braun’s smile deepened and he slowly pulled back, increasing the distance away from his puppet more and more.

Ten meters. Twenty meters. Fifty meters. One hundred meters.

He measured his level of control over the man’s body at greater distances, evaluating at what optimal distance should he operate for his puppets.

When he reached the one-hundred-meter mark, the light in the man’s eyes reappeared as he regained consciousness.

“H-Huh?” he mumbled in a dazed manner, looking around the living room with bewildered thoughts.

What was I doing again? He asked himself, wondering just what he was doing in the living room.

Braun reappeared in the living room in the blink of an eye, exhibiting an extreme level of speed as a ghost, and with a casual wave of his arm coated in spiritual energy, cut the man’s soul in half along with his physical body.

A bloody red line formed from the man’s upper left shoulder down to the right side of his torso before his body slowly split in half.

So that’s what it’s like to destroy someone’s soul… Braun rubbed his chin as his figure slowly turned half-corporeal; half-illusory, half-real.

Just like Kaya’s partial transformation, his figure remained ghostly enough so that he could float in the air, but also real enough that he could do what he was about to do next.

Opening his mouth that elongated beyond normalcy, he swallowed the man’s upper body in one bite, which when seen by an outsider, would appear as if a warped human figure had the upper half of a man’s body floating inside their stomach.

I should be able to control my puppets from a greater distance once Ghost reaches Level 2, but for now, 100 meters with incredibly rough control is far greater than when I control people with physical threads.

…

Overall, Braun had made a gargantuan amount of gains in this short ordeal. Not only did he gain a new ability, but he also confirmed a lot of things regarding the mysteries of super crystals and how they would interact with the anomaly known as himself, a being capable of harnessing the power behind the existence of the crystals themselves.

Arriving inside his living quarters within the southwestern branch, he sat on his chair and closed his eyes, inspecting the metaphysical space within his body.

Although less than half a day had passed since he acquired the Ghost ability, it had already broken past Level 1 and was well on its way to reaching Level 2 just like his threads.

Due to the heaven-defying nature of Zenithral Power, as long as one of his abilities reaches a higher level, then the rest would easily catch up with the qualitative change experienced by his zenithral power—from his superpowers to the evolution of his own body and even external objects.

It was an extremely unfair ability for one person to have, but Braun didn’t care, he was more than delighted to exploit the nature of his abilities to their utmost.

Staring at the crystal representing his second ability and the green flame in the center, he intuitively knew that if he wanted to, he could fuse the two crystals together and transform them into one single ability, which would of course once again bring a catastrophic level of pain that would have normally driven him insane.

Although doing so would just limit my gains right now. I’m still not confident about fusing the two abilities together into one new power, and might just accidentally cause one of the crystals to assimilate the other, making only one stronger ability remain.

But, this isn’t without its benefits. Braun rubbed his chin. When I created the spiritual threads from before by using both of my powers simultaneously, there was a conflict in the activation of those abilities.

Luckily, the two are quite compatible and aren’t that resistant to one another, but if one day, I used two different abilities belonging to the opposite ends of a spectrum or had to use too many different abilities at once, then I might have to start fusing crystals together to overcome the problem of conflicting powers.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Braun assessed, processing his gains and the mysteries he finally uncovered.

In just a day, his Zenithiral Power had made significant progress, and it had greatly shortened the original time he thought it would take for his threads to reach Level 3.

This sudden opportunity gave him more confidence in his future and made him consider changing some of his plans.

…

Inside Nuwesca City’s police station, a group of men and women gathered in front of a bulletin board, with strange looks on their faces.

“Another group of missing people,” one of them mumbled with a helpless tone. “This time, it’s a group of three—Fawn Neel, Mark Neel, and Eddy Neel.”

“A whole family that disappeared out of nowhere…” a woman muttered, their tone full of incredulity.

Throughout the past few weeks, the cases of missing people within the city had increased by a handful amount. In total, more than ten people had already disappeared from the city, as if they were cut off from reality altogether.

There were no traces, no tracks, or anything to indicate as to what happened to them.

Against these cases full of mystery, these ordinary people would have no way of ever coming to the truth.

Braun was of course the reason behind all of these mysterious disappearances, and these weren’t the only ones he had practiced his puppetry with. From stray cats, dogs, and beggars sleeping in alleys, he practiced and toyed with their bodies before eventually eating them whole.

With his threads and the ability to remain undetected from the eyes of Aegis, Braun’s crimes were indeed perfect, with no traces to be tracked.

Well, traces that could be tracked through normal means specifically. In the face of the world’s varied superpowers, Braun himself wasn’t assured that he could ever leave behind no tracks when committing crimes, but even if they were to find his tracks, he was more than confident enough to escape most situations.

…

Another week passed in the blink of an eye and Braun had dedicated most of his time to perfecting his craft. During this timeframe, his understanding of the domain of souls had greatly increased, allowing him to unveil more of the intricacies of the universe.

While his body may have already reached the peak of Level 1 and was just a step away from reaching Level 2, his soul was surprisingly well developed even though it was underutilized prior to acquiring the ability to transform into a ghost.

I originally had a Level 1 Soul if there was a category for that, but now, it’s already reached the peak of Level 1 and is on par with my physical body in terms of quality.

The only thing left was for him to make a qualitative breakthrough by getting more nutrients and strengthening the soul through his makeshift spiritual cultivation where he would utilize his zenithral energy to nurture his soul.

As he wiped away the water on his face, he stared at his reflection in the mirror and grinned. After constantly evolving his body for nearly two months already, his appearance had radically changed, with looks on par with those of models.

It didn’t mean much to Braun though; now that he got a taste of real power, the matter of looks became just a mere delight to him and not something that he envied like before when he was still just merely above average in terms of looks.

He brushed back his hair and returned to his bedroom, putting on his underwear before wearing the classic skintight bodysuit provided by Aegis.

Then, just like what his fellow teammates do, he puts on another layer of clothes on top of the black bodysuit to add his own sense of fashion into the mix. Of course, Braun’s fashion style could only be considered decent as he didn’t bother putting too much thought into his outfit and simply draped on an oversized white shirt and baggy black pants for added comfort.

With Aegis’ developed technology, the bodysuit they constantly wore was as light and as comfortable as wearing air, meaning it practically felt like wearing nothing. This was every single one of his teammates wore an extra layer of clothing because if they didn’t, it practically felt like they were walking around naked.

Maybe that’s why Kaya’s wearing no extra layers… She’s probably a pervert.

After walking for a while, he soon arrived at the base’s Central Hub and found most of his team chilling at their group’s usual corner.

Jonas was reading his books with a cup of tea, Nora and Terry were busy sweating at a fighting video game, and surprisingly, Kaya was also outside watching the two play condescendingly.

Only Karsen was truly ‘busy’ as he sat on a nearby work desk, and appeared to be busy with his computer, but one look and they’d see him gambling in some random game that may or may not be utilizing real money.

Braun casually approached them and grabbed a book from the bookshelf placed right beside Jonas. Sitting down beside Kaya, he glanced at the fight Terry and Nora were having before remarking, “You look arrogant as hell right now.”

Kaya’s eyes flickered when he heard Braun’s remark, and was surprised to see him sitting right beside her. She was way too engrossed in the game the two were having that he didn’t even notice Braun until he spoke.

“Really?” She brushed back her hair and maintained a neutral expression, with the condescending look in her eyes disappearing.

Amongst the southwestern branch’s team of supers, Kaya was the member whom he had the least amount of interactions with. While he didn’t bother making meaningful relationships with the rest of his team and focused most of his time on doing his personal projects in silence, she was still quite the anomaly.

This made Braun a little curious about her, but not by much. He simply decided to socialize a bit more with his team before going into another round of secluded cultivation, just so that he wouldn’t appear too strange to the rest of them.

“Yep, you were looking at them play like you were thinking ‘I’m leagues better than these two noobs’. You even had a subtle smile on your face,” jested Braun.

Kaya remained impassive, but Braun could tell that her ears were twitching, potentially due to embarrassment; however, it seemed that she was used to having a poker face and didn’t appear embarrassed at all.

Braun inwardly chuckled at her reaction and ignored her. If she’s introverted and doesn’t even bother to interact with him, then he might as well not put in the effort.

It only made things less painful for them when he had to betray them at a moment’s notice.

Just as he was about to open the book in his hand and read the first page, a loud alarm suddenly rang across the entirety of the base. The rest of the team stood up as helmets covered their faces, and in the next moment, they heard the mechanical voice’s announcement.

[A swarm of Level 2 monsters detected!]

…

At the periphery of Civer City, within the border separating Civer Forest and the city, a huge, hulking tree stood with its roots acting as legs, supporting its massive frame.

Branches and sharp wooden branches flailed around wildly, causing massive levels of destruction to the surrounding area.

High up in the air, Christopher’s eyes lit up with white light as he waved his hand up into the sky, reversing gravity around the massive living tree.

Unable to resist the upward force, the monster tree flew into the sky, with its hollow eyes turning into slits as it stared daggers at Christopher. It willed its roots and branches to strike forward, covering a large portion of the sky with wood and falling leaves.

Christopher harrumphed and pressed both of his hands together, causing a gravity well to appear, with the center being the tree itself. All of its extended roots and branches, alongside falling leaves and twigs, fell inwards to the monster, stabbing into its own body.

Then, with a wave of his hand, an invisible crescent-shaped blade made out of condensed space shot forward toward the tree, slicing through its trunk right in the middle. His hand didn’t stop swinging though as more blades shot forward, dissecting the monster completely, turning it into shredded wood, with a large crystal shimmering in the middle of the air.

He lightly waved his hand and space warped, causing the crystal to reappear in his grasp. Inspecting it with an aloof gaze as if he hadn’t just killed a Level 3 Monster so casually, white light began to glow around the crystal and he soon absorbed it into his body.

Inside the metaphysical space within his body, he saw a new crystal appear, with white light quickly drowning the entirety of the newly appeared crystal.

When he opened his eyes, he saw his teacher already in front of him, standing on air as if it were solid ground. It seemed that she was wearing an artifact to achieve such a feat as with a single look, he could see the glowing pair of shoes that she wore made out of leather covered in glowing runes.

“Congratulations,” she said with a grin. “You’re practically ready for graduation!”

“Huh?” Christopher appeared genuinely surprised by the assessment.

“You’re actually surprised it was this fast?” Abbie King rolled her eyes and pointed at the distant forest with numerous uprooted trees. “You’ve gained preliminary mastery over your ability, your knowledge of Aegis’ rules and regulations are almost on par with mine, and your strength is nothing to scoff at—at this point, the only thing you lack to become a Regional Director is practical experience in our line of work.”

“I see.” Christopher hummed.

“Sigh, now I have to find a way to facilitate your experience.” Abbie King helplessly slumped her shoulders and crossed her arms. “I didn’t expect you to grow so fast. How annoying!”

Christopher could only laugh at his teacher’s outrage and secretly looked back at the distant forest, his eyes flickering with white light.

Unrivaled talent…

When he recalled that saying and saw the forest, he couldn’t help but vividly remember the night that had transpired during that event, and mumbled soundlessly, “I wonder what you’re doing out there, Braun.”

…

“Where the heck did these birds come from?!” Braun cursed with a dazed expression as he watched the rapidly approaching group of birds in the distance, each a quarter of an average human’s size.

Surrounding their group was a ferocious gale of wind, making the group of birds appear like a tsunami of wind ready to devour the city whole.

Even though they were a mix between Level 1 and Level 2, their similar abilities combined together to achieve a qualitative change, bringing the group’s strength to a high realm even for Level 3 entities.

“Calm down,” muttered Karsen. “Just act according to plan, and we’ll be done with them in no time at all.”

Cards flew out of his pockets and gathered in the air, forming a protective wall behind him, separating the city from the flock of rapidly approaching birds.

If you say so. Braun inwardly jested and crouched down; threads protruded from his fingertips, covering his body in silver.