Arriving back at his house, Andrew wuickly took a seat on his bed and steadied his mind.
"So system, lets get ready and fuse this ey?"
[Fusing will undergo in 5 seconds, please ready your mind host! This might hurt a bit so please be ready!]
"Wait what, why would it hurt? Everyone elses talents awoke with no problems—" Andrew thought, before he felt a sharp pain start permeating his body.
He quickly grabbed a pillow to muffle his screams, he bit the corner of it as hard as he could.
He had never felt a pain like this in his life, it felt as if his entire cell structure was being realigned.
[3 minutes till fusing complete, please bear with the process…]
"Damn it system… Fuck you…." Andrew thought, as this was the only thing he could actually think at this point.
It hurt so bad it felt as if his mind had gone completely blank.
Shortly after thinking this, Andrew passed out.
…
Upon waking up, Andrew looked at the clock which displayed 3PM
"Goddamn, I passed out for over 5 hours?"
Wuickly checking his status panel with blurry eyes, Andrew saw that the talent dusion was a success.
Looking at his stats they had indeed doubled from 15 to 30. His already good mental state felt the clearest its been since he got to this world.
Paying attention to his entire body, he felt as if every cell was supercharged, it felt like he had established a new level of mind body communication.
He looked at his stat panel once more, and there he saw his high level skill full body manipulation was now at the Lesser Accomplishment stage.
"I feel as if i could punch through a boulder right now… and for some reason i dont believe this is just an illusion." Andrew thought, clenching his fists hard.
He walked into his kitchen and picked up a knife, it wasnt the sharpest by any means but he needed to ten something.
First he attempted to gently puncture the skin, but he was met with a lot of resistance.
"Here goes nothing…"
Andrew brought the knife up a bit higher, and then slammed it down onto the top of his hand.
Sure enough, there was only but a slight flesh wound, most of the force had actually been distributed back into the knife, which was obvious from how the tip bent.
As the knife was already kinda ruined, Andrew thought why not just ruin it completely now?
He wanted to text his overall grip strength, so he grabbed the blade and squeezed with increasingly more pressure.
the knife quickly distored around his fingers, in which Andrew heaved a sigh of relief.
"About 50 percent of my strength, same as before the awakening but now that my skins a lot tougher it makes cheap metal break before i break…"
Andrew smiled, he had felt that this was a great success.
Looking back at the top of his hand, he realized the small cut he received had also almost completely healed over.
It wasnt deep by any means, but it was still suprising nonetheless.
"Even small injuries to the skin seem to heal its a few dozen seconds… definitely was worth the effort!"
The ability to regenerate was also a stat he presumed, as well as his full body manipulation skill.
Andrew truly felt that every aspect of his being had been multiplied bh 2, and he knew this was probably the greatest blessing he could receive at this point in time.
"With the full body manipulation skill, every attack using my physical body wont be as simple as merely 2X the power…"
"Utlizing the entire kinetic chain, faster agility and faster power throughput, tighter joints and more elastic fascia, enhanced nervous system response…"
"Everything synergizes with each other for even greater results!"
Andrew couldnt help but laugh maniacally, but quickly stopped because he started feeling like an edgy teenager.
Now he was thinking about a big crux of a problem though, Andrew had realized that there was no way he could show off this talent.
Mainly because there was a large central database of everyone who had awakened a talent, this usually isnt too much of a problem because people will awaken similar talents regardless.
However this one he had just copied was unique, he suspected it was probably one of a kind or highly unlikely that someone else would awaken the same one.
"This is originally the protagonists talent afterall, theres no way something like this wouldnt raise suspicion…"
"Meaning im gonna have to hide the fact that i "awakened", and im gonna have to downplay my stats while also pretty much sabotaging myself the next time i need to copy another one."
Andrew sighed, he knew that he was in a bit of a pickle.
As of now he didnt have nearly enough power to actually protect his secret, he also knew thag regardless of what he did, someone with no awakened talent would raise a lot of suspicion if they suddenly started getting crazy power boosts.
"System, what can you do for me regarding this problem?"
[I can hide the hosts talent from showing up if they decide to re-evaluate your talent, but thats about it.]
"Okay… that solves that issue, but theres still the issue if they suspect i got some forutuious opportunity…"
If they suspected Andrew had landed upon a great opportunity, there might not be crazy immediate consequences, but he knew in this world where power was everything, jealousy would be evoked and he would still be unable to stop others from coveting it.
No matter which angle ge viewed it at, it lead him back in a loop.
"So what im gonna have to do, is purposefully underperform and the next talent i copy will have to be one thats decent enough for me to cover up a sudden surge in ability…"
Andrew was starting to map out possibilities in his head, he already kind of knew which talent would be most optimal for this.
"Mid grade, level 5 or level 6 agility talent could help me out."
"System, do these talents compound in each other multiplicatively, or is it additive?"
[host can experience additive increases only, meaning 4X + 2X = 6X, not multiplicative.]
Andrew sighed again, this was better than nothing but it was a little bit annoying in some regards, only as far as that he himself was greedy for more power.
"Honestly, this is for the best, it will look a lot less suspect with this arrangement."
"But for now, i dont need to think too far ahead, ive already mapped out my next move so now i can get started on my journey."
Andrew quickly loaded onto the web, the content being quite different than in his past life.
Here, you could find all types of very ridimentary cultuvation arts.
"First things first, i really only need a basic body tempering technique. Well learn an intermediate grade art in class, with the genius class learning an advanced grade."
"I need to find something that can stack upon the one we will be learning, accoridng to the curriculum the body tempering to the school protocol is broad, tempering the skin muscle muscle bone nervous system and organs."
As long as andrew could find something complementary, that would be enough, even if he had to sacrifice immediate breadth.
As he scrilled through the free martial library, he saw one that peaked his interest the most.
He quickly clicked on it, and upon reading the description of this, he smiled.
"This one will for certain be my target…."
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