POWER

The next day, Kojo and the others sat in the gardens of the palace. Kojo had managed to tell them everything that had happened, with the exception of the attack by Maven. Every time he got to that part, the girls would cut him off.

He sighed just as Eden poured him a cup of tea.

"The rate at which things are going, we'd better get stronger. The threats that are appearing nowadays are not only crafty but strong. We don't even know what their true intentions are. Then there's this whole Supreme Enchantment thing."

"I've read of something like that in the school library about beings who'd attained transcendence, awakening abilities that could bend the laws of existence, but I don't know how true it is," Adriana said.

"Well, it seems like a really cool thing to have. Do you have one, Sasha?" Lin asked.

"Who, me? No. Why do you ask?" Sasha said with a mouthful of food.

"Well, you were one of the only Elites in the world," Lin replied.

"Elite?" Kojo questioned.

(The Elites are the top ten strongest people in the world. They have been ranked due to them being so extraordinarily powerful they can destroy the world.)

"What rank were you, Sasha?" Kojo asked.

"I was rank six, but I've probably dropped to seven ever since you beat me. The ranks are constantly changing. A rank 7 can shoot up to rank 2 if they perform feats greater than said rank two, and vice versa."

"Do you know the others?" Rey enquired.

"Hmm. Well, I guess. Starting from the bottom;

* The Unseen.

He or she is a swordsman that wanders the savage lands. I'm saying that because no one's ever seen them and lived to tell the tale.

* Aphraxad.

Some dude who spends all his time in a cave. Head like a boring guy. He wouldn't fight me until I threatened to destroy his cave. I can tell he was fighting me seriously, which caused me to get bored and leave. He has the ability to affect darkness. It's said he once covered the entire world with darkness just because it was too hot."

"I don't remember that," Adriana said.

"That's because it happened over 59 years ago," Sasha replied, taking a sip of tea.

"Next is the Goblin King.

He's a swordsman like me but uses flames to an unfathomable degree. His flames are so hot they can burn your very soul. I was able to rise in the rankings by killing that Wraith dragon that appeared at our border, but now I have to drop down to his level," Sasha whined, resting her head on the table.

"Um, I don't think it's a big deal. If you want, I can forfeit—" Kojo said, trying to comfort her, but she sprang up and hugged him.

"I'm not bothered as long as it's darling. Besides, the rankings are constantly changing with new people being added and some being taken out," Sasha said, rubbing her face on him.

"O-okay. So who are the others?"

"Well, there's me at rank 7 and you at 6. Ranks 5 to three remain unknown. All that we do know is that they are living cataclysms with power capable of ending the world and even going beyond that; they're so much of a threat we don't even know who falls under which rank."

Sharone, Koniko, and Lin tensed up.

"Do you know their names?" Rey asked.

"The Blood Princess, Vampire.

The Beast of the White Flame, Demihuman.

The Gale of Wailing and Despair."

The table fell silent for a while.

(Suspicious.)

"Huh?"

"Rank 2 is.... Uh, some dude who has the ability to mess with names. I don't remember his name. I never really got to fight him though. Meh, it's probably not that important," Sasha said, brushing it off with a wave of her hand.

"After all, all of the Elite are capable world-enders, and we were only arranged based on how impressive our accolades are."

"So who's rank one?" Kojo asked, curious.

"Who else? The Archsaint of the Church of Undying Light, Yukio Hayashi. Okay, us being in the same level applies to everyone from rank 10 to rank 2. She's on a whole different level. Even I wouldn't be able to fight her," Sasha said with a laugh.

"So about the existence of these Supreme Enchantments. How do we get strong enough to acquire them?" Sharone asked, changing the subject.

"Well, they are extremely rare," Lin said.

"Based on what Kojo said, it's so rare entire centuries can pass without a single awakened," Koniko said.

"Uh, um, about that. I have a Supreme Enchantment," Rey said timidly, raising his hand. They all turned and stared at him.

"Huh?!" they exclaimed in unison. They then bombarded him with questions like how, why, and when he got that ability.

"Guys, calm down. I don't know how to explain myself. The only thing I know is that I awoke with the power, Resonance Amplification. I thought it was weird for me to awaken such an ability, but it falls in line with what we just talked about. I thought you knew about it, Kojo, since you were the one who healed my magic circuits. I did end up with a couple of new abilities, so I thought this was your doing."

They all turned to look at Kojo.

"What, of course, I knew," he said, giving a nervous laugh.

"Sysia, when did this happen?" he thought.

(I was going to tell you that you awakened a remarkable ability; you basically gave away a broken ability like it was nothing.)

"I thought those were copies."

(There were copies, but that was the only exception.)

"Kojo, can you help me awaken one too?" Adriana pleaded. "Any way you can, I'll do anything."

Kojo didn't know what to say.

"Listen, I didn't actively give the ability to Rey."

(You did though.)

"Shut up," Kojo whispered. He then cleared his throat and continued.

"His awakening was purely on him, so if you want to know the how and the why, you should ask him," Kojo quickly diverted all attention to Rey. The girls pounced on him and began asking all kinds of questions. Kojo let out a sigh of relief.

Eden observed the conversation from a small distance behind Kojo within the summer hut. Unknown to everyone, he actually possessed a Supreme Enchantment. His ability, Chaos Theory, enabled him to manipulate probability, manifesting one out of the endless options where he had the advantage or changing it outright. That, and him possessing the Urrsyn, Kaleidoscopic eyes that enabled him to see all uncertainties pertaining to an event. With this, he should have outmatched and defeated Kojo, but he'd somehow managed to negate his abilities.

He smiled, remembering their first encounter. During their fight, he was sure he'd killed Kojo a thousand times, yet an improbable situation would come up at the last second, and he'd escape. He'd specifically aimed for his head but somehow severed only his arm, which Kojo then decided to use as a weapon, detonating it. This situation began long before they fought, even during his fight against Saleem.

Eden knew very well how powerful Supreme Enchantments are, so he kept quiet, thinking that it was Kojo's intention to keep hidden the fact that he had helped Rey awaken.

"As expected of master," he said with a charming smile, looking at Kojo with admiration, and he was right to come to that conclusion.

In their world, Supreme Enchantments were the ultimate expressions of strength and were so potent that the only way to counter one was with another more powerful one.

Sysia was disappointed. If she had a physical body, she'd shake her head, but all she could do was sigh. Sysia, too, came to the same result. She wanted to tell Kojo that his ability, Universal Negation, which rewrote what he believed as impossible according to his will to be negated, was one of those abilities, but she decided against it.

(Kojo was too ignorant of things, and it's time I taught him a lesson about self-awareness.

(You know what, I think I'll let him suffer for a bit longer,) Sysia thought to herself.

"Anyway, this serious talk is really boring me," Kojo said, stretching and then slumping on his seat. He noticed the king and queen walking through the garden with their daughter Klara. He got a brief glimpse of Billiam scrubbing the hallway and looking at his parents with pleading eyes before the door closed shut.

Kojo smiled as he'd just had an idea.

"Okay," he said, sitting upright.

"Hmm?" The others looked at him questioningly.

"How about I introduce you to the concept of sports?" he asked with a grin.