THE MYSTERIOUS OBJECT

Hours after the experiment was conducted-

"How could the portion not work?" Mr Han was the one who fell into an extreme dilemma. He didn't expect that the portion which took both his and Xiao Chang's effort for such long years would not come into fruition. He checked David's body again and again, but couldn't find any difference between his body structure, aura crevices, or his flesh.

The roots and herbs which went into the creation of this portion were too valuable and versatile. Most of them were flesh tempering and bone refining herbs, used by hunters to strengthen their physical attributes and enhance their Qi capacity. Yet a non-awakener like David didn't even see any change in his body.

While Mr Han was lost within his comprehension of this absurd phenomena, Nathan sighed a breath of relief after seeing this. Although he was disappointed that David wasn't able to go through some kind of drastic changes, the current situation meant that he would grow up healthy like a normal person and the side effects from the procedure weren't present in his body. This was a good news.

Any undermining results would have resulted in Mia creating a havoc and having a grudge against the organization and the people who started this experiment. He could bring himself to be hated by the daughter of his teachers. If such a situation occured, she would possibly try to kill Mr Han and the man beside him. Kaiser would not only incur a loss in the form of death but also lose a talented hunter like her to death or some other organization.

"I am assigning another hunter to take care of David's training and would personally monitor the whole regime." Nathan signaled towards one of the guards near him and spoke. "Bring out high-grade portions for David to soak in from tomorrow. No more experimental portions are allowed to be used on him."

Mr. Han interfered. "That was the only capsule of a portion which was ever created by me and Xiao. There isn't any left for David to try out in future." He then looked at Mia." I would still like to be in charge of your brother's training."

"You have already shown your true colours for me to ever believe in you again. I would want my brother to die in the hands of someone obsessed with past relations." Mia said with an aggressive voice. She no longer believed in Mr. Han and was strictly against him being involved in her brother's training schedule.

"The portion was something your father had put most of his post parental life creating. It was his wish for David to try it and see if it could bring about a miraculous change in his body and modify it to accept more energy and help him become a capable hunter. Here is the component list for everything that went into the portion. You could check the detailed information about them and judge for yourself whether this would be detrimental for your brother." Mr. Han handed the list down to Mia.

After going through the list of ingredients, Mia was visibly shocked.

As one of the top students herself, she could identify most of the herbs as extremely valuable and be useful for cultivating and improving the body and Qi capacity.

"Where did he obtain the recipe for this portion." Mia asked.

Mr. Han signaled at Nathan, who then ordered the whole set of guards to leave the compound.

"It was found in the Norway dungeon during the joint excavation of Kaiser and the Aurelius guild. He managed to find it and decided to research on it since him having two children would have some obvious results in the future. He poured in a lot of his fortune and working hours into this research and this is the final things we managed to make." Mr. Han said.

Nathan was instantly attracted to the conversation. The joint excavation was one of the biggest projects Kaiser has ever undertaken, and it was also one of the excavations which finally helped Kaiser to rise to its position today.

"I and Xiao were tasked with leading the operation and during the excavation, we managed to get hold of ancient records. The recipe which is used to create this portion was related enhancement of a Hunter's body." Mr. Han said

"Wouldn't a recipe from an unknown ancient dungeon be wasted within the current hunter world which came into being due to the gates?" Mia asked.

"That is exactly what the normal mind perceives, but the dungeon record proved to us that Gates had appeared within our world in the past too. It was the reason for the sudden rise of mythologies and powerful figures throughout history. We can safely assume that this recipe originated from a gate or was at least theorized by a hunter. It was a human who created this and hence me and Xiao hypothesized that it will be effective on humans." Mr. Han said.

"So, your assumption is the basis of a life-threatening experiment on my brother." Mia is even angrier at her father and Mr. Han now.

"We have made multiple tests, both on lower life forms and humans and did found some improvements. There is no way your father and I would risk David's life unless we are completely confirmed about this fact. I assure you this was the only thing which Xiao wanted to use on David. Since it has failed, we will now be shifting to modern alternatives." Mr. Han said in a clam voice.

Huntress came forward to calm Mia down and spoke in support of Mr. Han. "Han is the closest friend of your father like I was to your mother. He would never desire anything bad for David. Trust him." Huntress said.

Mia did feel that Mr Han was not the enemy here, but after this event, she couldn't help but be less confident with him.

"I promise you that I will not try anything like this. We will just follow the basic training regiment which your father and I devised for him. You could monitor it in your free time, and will be given regular reports just like our leader." Mr Han. assured her.

Mia finally complied with Mr. Han's request. She took David to his bedroom and left for training at the institute.

.........

David's consciousness-

The feeling which he went through during the inhuman beating by Mr. Han was that of extreme pain and suffering. After a period of time, he simply gave up resistance and tried to think positive in these circumstances. He tried to remember all the good memories he had ever since childhood.

Eventually his tired out and injured body reached the limits of his forbearance and gave up consciousness. He felt darkness slowly devouring him into a space of nothingness. Although he fainted from the torture, his subconscious was kick-started by this phenomenon. If one could see the inside of David's body, they would see a faint source of light emitted from the corner of his heart, below the left ventricle.

As Mr. Han's suggested earlier, the amount of energy that a Hunter could hold depended on his Qi storage capacity. Although the theory until now only suggested some unique Qi crevices within the body, theoreticians suggested that there were more uncovered areas that required research in.

The faint source of light suddenly went through a momentary change and faint lines of energy began to extend out of it flowing through David's body. These faint lines began to mix with his skeleton, blood vessels, muscles, flesh and even his blood cells. After a small period of time, it finally grew dim and remained static.

It felt like a sleeping creature that was yet to awaken.

The beating was followed by Mr. Han immersing David into the experimental portion. Unknown to others, the portion was only activated after David's blood, which was missing with the strange energy mixed with it. The portion began to seep in but was instantly soaked by the source of light. It was as if the portion didn't even get the time to affect David's physique.

After the whole portion was absorbed by it, thin lines projected out once again and mixed with David's whole body. The source of light was vibrating with an even greater frequency than before, yet David's body didn't showcase any changes.The lines were thicker and stronger than before. Even the numbers seems to have increased, but the amount of energy wasn't enough.

The mysterious phenomena were constantly manipulating David's body structure towards an unprecedented advancement. The only thing which remained to be discovered was whether the advancement was beneficial or detrimental for him.

......

David's unconscious mind-

Nightmares was a constant inconvenience to David ever since the death of his parents. Every time he sleeps, he could see the face of his mom soaked in blood lifeless, while his father was dying in his hands. The same memory morphed into different scenarios and every time was a brand-new nightmare.

This time it took place above the ocean, while his parents were taking part in an excursion activity. Their airship was attacked by a horde of plethoric birds, a morph of vulture when they came into contact with the man being released from the gates. The ship was destroyed and the crew members were attacked.

His parents began to fight them, but the sheer advantage of numbers soon threw them into jeopardy. Xiao was fighting three birds simultaneously when two sneaked behind him. They tried to sneak attack him. He managed to fend off one of those attacks, but the other one got through and pierced Xiao's chest.

It was during this time that the whole horde instantly rushed towards the injured, and David was forced to awaken from his dream, sweating pouring all over his face.

"Another horrifying dream about your parents dying." Mr. Han's voice sounded from beside him. David was surprised by the sudden incoming, and jumped out of the bed, just to find Mr. Han sitting in a nearby chair.

"You shouldn't startle people in the dark like that." David made it a point to criticize Mr. Han's activity.

"I would try to refrain from doing so. We need to return to training for the upcoming awakening ceremony."

"You mean the training where you beat me mercilessly to near death." David was trying to be sarcastic, but all it got from Mr. Han was a cruel smile.

"That was me being considerate, but since you want to switch gears, we will tune it up to merciless." David's back was instantly drenched in a cold sweat.