Darkness.
A vast, shifting void.
Marco had no idea how long he had been floating there. He wasn't sure how he could escape. He just drifted, instinctively, magnetically following a path.
Then, he saw it.
A soft silvery-white glow shone ahead. It flickered, then turned dull grey before igniting into a brilliant yellow blaze.
His vision blurred.
Now, he was the one burning.
And from afar, a mass of darkness watched him burning all while hovering above his previous position.
Marco's eyes shot open.
He gasped for air, his body drenched in sweat. His gaze darted around the room with uneven breaths. A sigh of relief escaped him as he took in the familiar setting of his dormitory.
Was that a dream?
No.
It wasn't.
Because he could feel it.....a connection. A thread of something bound to his core. A slight pull was all he needed to control that something.
And Marco did just that.
Small white dust particles circled around his palm. Their volume was so minuscule that he had to look closely to even see them.
But he knew. Unconsciously, instinctively.
'Sodium.'
For some reason, his core had suddenly gained a bit of sodium. It wasn't much—just enough to trigger a reaction with air or water.
But… it would never disappear.
Because his core had gained the ability to produce them.
Just like those attuned to sodium.
How?
Marco had a vague idea.
He recalled the moment his consciousness had shifted to that of Zero's. At that exact moment, Zero had just used an MC cube of sodium.
'Is that the reason?'
Then, a memory surfaced.
The moment before his transmigration.
When he had observed that element through the quantum scope, his position had interchanged with it at that moment.
Like he had been inside the chamber, convulsing in its place.
A shiver ran down his spine.
Then, his thoughts returned to the dream.
To that horrifying moment when he had switched places with the burning sodium.
What he saw at that time as burning sodium was in the position that was supposed to be his…
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Wasn't him.
But—
A monster. A dark mass of convulsing monster.
Realistically speaking, that space was his core, and only he in his soul form could enter there. Then that monster was him… or more accurately, his soul.
Marco took a deep breath. An eerie thought suddenly came into his mind.
'Did that element replace my soul?'
Impossible! Physically, Chemic-…
'BEEP.'
A sudden alarm jolted him from bed. A blue screen projected from his forearm.
[Class timings today.
1. General theories of Resonant core. (From 9 to 11AM), at eastern block.
2. General practical of elemental control. (From 1 to 4 PM), at training pagoda, west. ]
Only at that moment did Marco find he had been sleeping or dreaming for a whole night. The time was already 8 AM; he internally cursed before rushing to get ready.
Marco barely made it in time.
The professor, a woman in her thirties glanced at him lazily giving a small nod at his entry. The moment he stepped inside dozens of eyes latched onto him.
If he were any other teenager he might have felt intimidated by the attention. But he wasn’t.
To him, these students were babies whom barely learning to walk. Carriers of teenage hormones.
Without hesitation he took an empty seat at the back nodding at the lone boy sitting beside him.
“Marco…”
“Eh… erm… Silas.”
Silas shifted nervously, his fingers twitching. A flicker of panic crossed his face.
Marco raised a brow.
‘This boy knows me. Or rather… the old me.’
Before he could dig deeper, the professor’s voice cut through his thoughts.
“Alright, let’s begin.”
“All attuned and unattuned individuals possess a Resonant Core—an internal structure that manifests around their heart.”
She waved her hand slightly, and a holographic diagram appeared in the air, illustrating a glowing core.
“For Attuned, their elemental column is fixed inside the core. This column serves as both a storage unit and a spiritual construct, acting as a bridge between their element and body.”
Marco listened intently. The class was an entirely new experience for him, diving into major details about Resonant Cores. He absorbed every word, comparing it to what he had already pieced together about his own core.
He also learned the fundamental differences between Attuned and Unattuned individuals.
Attuned individuals possessed elemental columns within their bodies that produced elements on their own. To increase production rates and capacity, they had to kill Voidlings of the same elemental affinity and absorb nodes.
The professor didn't explain much about nodes saying it would be explained in next class.
Unattuned individuals on the other hand could only use MC cubes to fill their Resonant Core with elements. They couldn’t naturally generate them, but they could manipulate the properties of any element they had in core.
A key advantage of the Unattuned was that they weren’t restricted to a single elemental group. Unlike the Attuned, who were locked into elemental groups based on their variant number and the quality of their elemental column, the Unattuned could switch between elements freely as long as they had MC cubes to sustain them.
Variant Number determines how many elemental columns a Resonant Core can hold, essentially how many elemental groups the user can access.
Elemental Column Quality defines how many elements a single elemental column can carry. However, it can only hold elements from the same group.
Both attuned and unattuned had their advantages and disadvantages.
Marco believed that the Attuned had a head start, as they didn’t need to worry about resources. Meanwhile, the Unattuned had to constantly obtain MC cubes to fill their cores with desired elements.
And powerful MC cubes?
Those required an enormous amount of credits if they were even available for purchase at all.
The class ended after one and a half hours.
Marco waited for the last student to leave before leaning back in his seat, lost in thought.
His situation was different. He was attuned to an element. That much was certain.
But he had no idea what it was, except for one property it had shown.
The ability to shift consciousness and copy elements in the shifted position to be his attuned element.
That’s how sodium had become one of his attuned elements.
He was sure of it because he could feel the sodium regenerating even after he used it.
So…
Did that mean his variant number could increase as he was exposed to people or entities with different elements? For all he knew, variant number was fixed, and so was the quality of the elemental column.
It appeared to be he was an anomaly. Marco grinned slightly. Only testing could prove it.
Regardless, Marco was certain of one thing.
His attuned element, which he named Transpose, was not normal.
He rubbed his chin, deep in contemplation.
His next class was a practical session on elemental control.
He might be able to gather clues from there.
With a shrug, he stood up from his seat and headed toward the cafeteria.
First things first… he needed to fill his stomach. He couldn’t wait to taste some tasty food or perhaps a shift in consciousness. Marco smirked at his own joking.
‘How funny a person I am.’