(The Time Stilled World, Leo's POV)
For a while after ascending, Leo took his time introspecting the changes made to his body, as he allowed himself a few quiet breaths to truly feel the difference between the man he was an hour ago and the being he had now become, as the faint residual heat of the mutation still curled through his veins like embers refusing to die.
He slowly raised his hand and turned it palm upward as mana gathered instinctively beneath his skin, not because he commanded it to move but because his newly evolved cells now possessed the natural capacity to hold far more power than before, as though every fiber of his being had been hollowed, reforged and expanded to rise far beyond the cramped limits of a Transcendent.
