When Ralph came home, he found a gold box on his desk.
Ralph put the box with life stones and fruit on the floor and opened the golden box.
Inside, there was a military uniform like the Golden Star members wore, and identification plates with a chain.
Ralph's name, blood type, patent ... Rank 5. In addition to the squadron to which Ralph belongs, were engraved on the identification plates.
The military uniform is a mixture of white and black, which reminds Ralph of the school uniform.
"They didn't even warn me and already decided everything." Ralph murmured.
"Whatever."
Ralph took a shower and cleaned his wounds, and put another dressing on. Fortunately, the wounds were almost healed.
"Will I be able to use this kind of ability one day? A healing skill ..." Ralph spoke to himself.
After dressing, Ralph took the box with the mission reward.
Ralph didn't hesitate and started to extract energy from one of the stones.
After a long time, the stone shattered and Ralph opened his eyes.
-As I thought, they only help me a little ... My control of Aura seems to have improved a little, but it is not something significant.
Ralph then began to absorb the rest of the life stones.
Without him noticing, a dawn and an entire day passed. But he didn't feel tired, probably due to the vitality within the life stones.
Ralph clenched his fists and used the [Inner Vision] ability and Aura itself to visualize himself.
The aura within him now looks like a well of still water, calm, controlled. And his Latent Energy, much more powerful than before, travels his body with rich vitality.
Ralph then noticed something, his hair grew to his shoulder ... However, all the hair on his body also grew, making Ralph look like a caveman.
Ralph spent a good deal of time cutting all the hair he grew up, but decided not to cut his hair, instead ... Using all the knowledge he has accumulated, he has stimulated his own vitality.
His hair slowly grew along with all the hair on his body, and after half an hour, Ralph's hair was halfway up his ass. Ralph then stopped stimulating vitality.
Ralph then began to breathe heavily and to perspire.
-That's really tiring, I'm feeling very hungry. Fortunately, the vitality obtained with the Life Stones has not yet dissipated, or else I would be in an even more precarious situation.
Despite that, Ralph smiled happily, he noticed that his wounds healed completely.
Ralph didn't care what he looked like and went to the kitchen to do something to eat.
After an hour, the kitchen was a mess, and the refrigerator ... empty.
Ralph was sitting on the porch with his hands on his belly and whistling happily.
-A good meal after such fatigue, it reminds me of training ...
Ralph thought nostalgically.
~ Ding.
Suddenly, someone rang the apartment bell.
"Hmm? Who is it?" Ralph got up from the floor and went to the door, completely forgetting his appearance.
When using the transcendent sense, Ralph was shocked to find out who it was.
Ralph opened the door and said:
"What a surprise, what brings you here."
"Arrrhhhhh" Touka, who was startled by Ralph's appearance, shouted.
Ralph noticed his mistake and used his ability to change his appearance.
"You ... is that your real appearance?" Touka swallowed his own saliva and asked.
A vein appeared on Ralph's forehead and he smiled as he said:
"That was an accident, you arrived at an unfortunate hour, go away and come later."
Ralph then started to close the door but was stopped by Touka, who said with a cold expression:
"I came here already, is that how you get guests?"
Ralph blew out a breath and said:
"I don't remember inviting you."
Touka ground his teeth and said:
"If you don't let me in, you can forget what we had agreed, I won't tell you anything I know. And you can forget about the art you are practicing, without me you don't have much future with it either."
Ralph smiled bitterly and said while disabling his ability:
"As long as you don't mind my appearance, you can come in."
Touka hesitated for a brief moment when he saw the caveman, but entered the apartment.
After seeing that there was only a chair and a table in the living room of Ralph's apartment, Touka twisted the corners of his mouth and looked strangely at Ralph.
"Don't look at me like that, I live alone." Ralph said as he made another chair appear.
"You can sit in that chair, I sit in this one." Ralph said with a smile, which looked frightening at the sight of Touka.
"You ... How about cutting all that hair? This is really weird." Touka spoke weakly.
Ralph rolled his eyes for a moment and thought of something.
Suddenly, Ralph's entire body burned, but his clothes and hair were unaffected.
In an instant, all the excess hair on his body turned to ashes that fell to the floor.
Touka's eyes widened when she saw Ralph's control and said:
"That was pretty amazing ... But aren't you going to cut your hair?"
Ralph put his hand on his chin and remembered the characters in Chinese novels that Torvi used to read.
Most of the male characters had tied long hair. Would that style look good on him?
Ralph thought for a moment and decided. His hair then began to float and make strange movements in the air. After a few seconds, his hair was tied in the back of his head, and his hair reaches the middle of his back.
"What do you think?" Ralph asked Touka without any shyness.
"... why are you asking my opinion." Touka sincerely found Ralph's new style a little interesting, but she didn't want to admit it.
"Forget it then, if you don't want to answer." Ralph smiled slightly and then looked into Touka's eyes.
"What do you want? I don't remember telling me you were coming."
"Sigh ... You are really cold, I thought we were friends." Touka rolled his eyes and spoke.
"Bullshit, at most we are just colleagues." Ralph scoffed.
Touka looked deeply at Ralph.
-This guy, he doesn't seem to make friends easily.
Mirai Touka thought.
"Do you remember our agreement? I heard you did well on your first assignment, and I wanted to congratulate you. In addition to fulfilling my part of the agreement." Touka explained without looking away from Ralph.
Ralph didn't notice anything wrong with Touka's expression and then said:
"I don't think that is exactly an agreement ... But I will choose to believe you."
Touka blew out a light breath and looked around. There was crockery in the sink, and food on the table, and the house didn't look clean ...
"How can you live here?" Touka asked with disgust.
"Honestly, I only use this place as a stopover today, I don't plan on living here forever." Ralph hardly understood Touka.
A vein appeared on Touka's forehead and she can't help screaming:
"This dirt ... How can you live in the middle of so much dirt."
Ralph was taken by surprise, but he thought of something quickly and said with a frown:
"That's my problem, if you didn't like the place, feel free to do whatever you want."
Touka took a deep breath and made a decision.
"Before I teach you anything, let's clean this place up. Where are the cleaning equipment?" Touka got up and spoke seriously.
Ralph smiled and made cleaning equipment appear out of nowhere.
"That's enough?" To Touka's surprise, Ralph was not against the idea.
"Yes, let's start." Touka took one of the brooms that Ralph showed up and said.
"Sorry but I can't help it." Ralph shook his head.
"Huh? Do you want me to clean this place myself?" Touka got angry.
"It's just that I've been very tired since before you arrived, I was practicing and that's why I was in that state ... Besides, I have to make an effort to keep this cleaning equipment within reality." Ralph spoke with a hand on his head and a bitter smile.
Touka walked over to Ralph and, with a somber expression, put a hand on his shoulder.
Suddenly, Ralph felt an Aura intrude into his body.
Ralph knew the game was good as well as lost and just sighed. Touka should have analyzed his condition with her transcendent sense.
"So ... are you going to help me or not?" Touka spoke with a dark smile.
"Okay ... It's not like I'm against cleaning or anything ..." Ralph got up and took a mop.
From there, the two began to do general cleaning in Ralph's apartment.
Ralph was annoyed and surprised to see how Touka is obsessed with cleanliness. It cleaned everything that the eye could see and human hands could reach.
Even the refrigerator was cleaned inside.
"What's your problem, why don't you have food in your own home?" Touka asked Ralph, who replied crossly:
"This is not your problem."
After an hour of work, the house had a new look. The sink had no dirty dishes left, and there was not a speck of dust on the floor.
Ralph sighed when he saw that the cleaning was over and made the cleaning equipment disappear.
"Now we can talk like civilized people." Touka nodded and smiled.
"..." Ralph remained silent and pondered why Touka was acting this way since they are not friends.
-Does she really like me or something?
Ralph put his hand on his chin and thought.
Touka suddenly turned towards Ralph and frowned, for some reason she felt uncomfortable at the sight of Ralph, despite being for just a moment.
"What are you thinking, is it a pervert?" Touka asked in a sharp tone.
"Why are you acting like you're my friend?" Ralph went straight.
"...What are you talking about?" Touka asked back.
"You come to my house uninvited, clean my house without asking, and still complain about my lifestyle ..." Ralph started to speak.
Touka then understood.
-This guy ... He actually has this kind of problem, huh.
"Listen here-" Touka was about to teach Ralph a lesson but was interrupted by him, who said:
"Or maybe you like me or something? If that's the case, you better give up, you're not my type."
The moment Ralph finished speaking, he realized that he spoke too much.
Touka started to smile widely, but in a sinister way. And she also started to approach Ralph.
"Listen here, you bastard. Don't think that the world revolves around you and that you understand everyone ... Your logic doesn't always apply to others." Touka spoke and put a hand on Ralph's shoulder.
"It's not why I came here, that I cleaned your house, and pointed out some of your problems, that I really care about you. I did these things, just because I felt like it."
Touka's hand slowly went from his shoulder to Ralph's neck.
Ralph swallowed his own saliva, this is the first time in a long time that he agrees with someone's sermon.
"You understood?" Touka asked with closed eyes and a smile.
Ralph took a deep breath and decided to follow his instincts.
"I understand, please let me go." Ralph said slowly.
Touka, however, did not let go of Ralph's neck. She just looked at him seriously and said nothing more.
In that instant, Ralph's instinct beeped and he distanced himself from Touka in an instant.
"I admit I was wrong, but that doesn't mean you can act as you like." Ralph spoke in a cold tone.
Touka seemed to wake up from a trance and looked at Ralph with a confused expression.
"If you use your tranced sense like that again, I don't mind adding one more enemy to my list." Ralph touched his neck and said calmly, without taking his eyes off Touka.
Touka remained silent.
"What is your problem?" Ralph asked confused to see how strange Touka was.
"You ... What happened to you? How ..." Touka looked at Ralph strangely.
"..."
After a silence that lasted a minute, Touka sat down and said:
"I'm sorry, I lost control."
"...Whatever." Ralph blew out a breath and sat down too.
"Tell me, Ralph-san, have you been in any serious accident recently?" Touka suddenly asked.
Ralph was surprised by the sudden question and said:
"No. I was only shot and stabbed, but nothing too serious."
"Pfft, you kind of looked cool saying that." Touka couldn't contain his laughter and said.
"Right? But why did you ask that?" Ralph looked at Touka suspiciously.
Touka looked for a moment and then said:
"It's just ... Shouldn't you be dead?"
Ralph's pupil contracted.
Touka did not notice any extreme changes in Ralph's expression, and continued:
"When I analyzed your body more deeply, I noticed something strange ... Your body itself is healthy, the problem is your soul."
"My soul?" Ralph was surprised.
"Yes, how can I say that ... It is the opposite of a zombie, who is possessed by a living soul, despite being corrupt. His body is alive, but his soul is dead." Touka explained.
Ralph was shocked and blinked and tried to analyze a problem with his own tranced sense, but he didn't notice anything wrong.
"But something is wrong. A dead soul shouldn't have conscience, so your soul appears to be dead, but it really isn't ...? I don't quite understand, I never heard of anything like that." Touka put her hand on her chin and started to murmur.
"What is the difference between a dead soul and a living one? Besides one being dead and another not." Ralph asked.
"A dead soul enters an illusory state, and is slowly absorbed into the world." Touka explained.
"This is your problem, your soul is in an illusory state, but it is not being absorbed by the world, and you are aware!"
Ralph frowned and said:
"I never noticed anything like a soul inside me."
"This already proves your problem, every Aura master who opened the trance sense can visualize Aura itself inside, as if he were looking in a mirror." Touka spoke and shook his head.
"And that ... Can it hinder me in my future practice?" Ralph asked nervously.
"Obviously, to strengthen Aura itself, the traditional method involves tempering the soul itself, this is the most efficient method." Touka spoke and sighed.
"Too bad, your talent is just so great."
Ralph came in thought about that for a moment and blew out a sigh of relief.
"It is not as serious as I thought." Ralph spoke with a bitter smile.
"Huh? Isn't it that serious?" Touka was surprised to hear Ralph.
"It seems that my destiny is really that." Ralph spoke and went over to a box in the corner of the room. He opened it and took a fruit.
"... A mystical fruit." Touka recognized the fruit.
Ralph didn't think much and ate the fruit in a few bites, which surprised Touka.
[Detected an auxiliary substance, do you want to convert the substance into points or do you want to absorb the substance yourself?] A message appeared to Ralph, who was surprised. This 'thing' is generally not so interactive.
-Turn into points.
[His 'Latent Energy' stat has increased by 11 points thanks to the auxiliary substance.]
[One of his stats passed the 10 point mark, his level increased by 1.]
Ralph could feel it, naturally with each breath ... the huge energy flowing in his body, he even had trouble controlling it all at once.
Touka, who was watching, noticed a sudden change in Ralph.
-This energy, how is that possible !? A mere mystical fruit should not have this effect.
Touka thought.
Ralph noticed something ... No matter how many enemies he fought, he never won as much as he did today.
-Apply five points in intelligence, apply to five points in Will Power.
[Two of his stats surpassed the ten point mark, his level has increased twice.]
Ralph could feel it, the world slowing down, the flame of determination within himself, and control over his own energy increasing.
The energy that was running wildly through his body became calm as still water.
This was funny to Ralph, in a single day, fate decided to give him a huge reward for all his effort, and the trigger was a fruit.
-Apply six points in intelligence, apply six points in Will power, apply eight points ... in vitality.
Ralph used all the points he won.
The same sensations came again, and also ... Ralph felt a different kind of energy build up inside him, it was his vitality.
The reason he did this is that he found that stimulating his own vitality can accelerate the healing process.
"My status"
[Ralph Karman
Age: 20 (Soul) 15 (Body)
Level: 4
Talents: Infinite; Aura; ...
Situation: Healthy; Psychologically influenced by Imamoto Ralph;
Skills: Indomitable spirit (Passive); Aura sensitivity, lv6; Inner Vision, lv5; Aura Fusion, lv6; Space illusion, lv0;
Beast Skills: Illusion, lv5 (Mastered);
Stats:
Strenght: (Standard)
Agility: (Standard)
Intelligence: 20
Dexterity: (Standard)
Vitality: 8
Resistance: (Standard)
Will Power: 20
Latent Energy: 20
Available stats points: 0]
-I think I understand now. No matter how hard I try, I will continue to depend on it, on fate.
Ralph closed his eyes.
"You, what happened, what did you do?" Touka asked in a shaky voice.
She could feel that not only did Ralph's energy more than double, but that great vitality arose within Ralph. This is absolutely not something that a mere mystical fruit can do.
"Do you want to try?" Ralph asked and looked at Touka with a defiant smile.
Touka took a while to understand and scoffed:
"Don't overestimate yourself."