"How long have I been in there?" Jyorta muttered, glancing around to see a couple other nurses place some items in their respective shelves, prepare the tools, etc.
"Around 6 hours in reality. You can assume time flows thrice faster in there." Vaika's voice resounded in his ear.
"So, it is morning now," Jyorta nodded, feeling embarrassed, bowing in apology, "Ma'am, your shift was supposed to end by midnight. I'm sorry to have taken up so much of your time and extend your shift hours."
"It's fine," Vaika waved her hands, "Initiating the Cadets who have obtained Regen is one of my duties. So, if there is a candidate who will appear for one, I am bound to finish it. And, whether you arrived then or not, I would have had to stay all today here anyway."
Seeing Jyorta's confusion, Vaika smiled, "Didn't your friend also obtain Regen? She would probably arrive around 9-10 AM, judging by what I heard. So, I cannot go home until I finish her initiation too."
"Wouldn't your health be affected by working overtime like this?" Jyorta said, concerned. After all, the physique of Espers was no different from normal humans. So, staying awake through the whole night after one's shift ended and even continuing to work the subsequent day would put a severe toll on her body.
Moreover, she wasn't just sitting and passing time during her work but was maintaining a powerful hallucination. Jyorta knew how much strain his mind bore when he used a hallucination. It wasn't something he could maintain for more than 10 minutes. And, most of his hallucinations were simple, only changing his actual position by a metre.
But Vaika maintained Crimson Desert for the whole night. Jyorta didn't realise how much her mind was strained because of it. Faint memories were starting to resound in his mind while the aura in his body churned, circulating as it passed through all sensory organs, using the stimulus to transmit information to his brain.
Vaika smiled, not intending to continue on the topic, "Once I finish Haesha's initiation, I'll be allowed to rest for a day. So, all's fine in the end."
"Would Haesha experience the same as me?" Jyorta looked around, keeping his voice to a minimum, unwilling to allow the other nurses to listen.
Vaika chuckled, gently emitting psychic energy to create a barrier around themselves, "Yes, but she won't be witnessing the tattoo engraving process. Her initiation is only concerning the Unranked Skill, Regen. I have no plans to show her anything beyond necessary. After all, details of the Crimson Desert are my closely guarded secrets. I imparted them to you because I chose you as my successor."
Jyorta felt proud that someone as incredible as Vaika chose him as her successor. He then thought for a moment before saying, "Ma'am, there should have been other Cadets who train the aura personification of hallucination too right? How come I'm the only one who became your successor?"
"Well," Vaika tapped her chin, closing her eyes in thought for a couple of seconds, "Consider your friend Haesha, for example. Suppose she is suitable to use the aura personification of hallucination. As for Warriors, the mental strain from using the aura personification of hallucination would be too much for them to bear."
As Jyorta nodded, she continued, "Haesha's prime advantage as an Esper lies in how she can wield her psychic energy and the delicate methods she could employ. If we pit her hallucination against yours…"
"She would lose horribly," Seeing his confusion, Vaika detailed further, "Haesha's hallucination would excel in changing climate. As for the rest, they would be inferior. But in your case, you excel in modelling and creating constructs with your psychic energy, which is exactly what you need for a hallucination. There is not much difference in the way you manipulate aura and psychic energy."
She raised the index and middle finger of her right, creating a swirl of psychic energy on the index finger and a swirl of aura on the middle finger. The psychic energy swirl was incredibly fast, creating gales instantly. It showed the speeds a Wave Controller's psychic energy could take, approaching a speed of 100 metres per second.
As for the aura swirl, it was many times slower. Its motion was also sluggish, and it wasn't as closely packed as the psychic energy. Instead of creating a gale, the aura swirl began to pull in the aura lingering in the air.
"In your hallucinations, you can create any constructs without trouble. You are weaker relatively in terms of the climatic factors, but you excel in every other field. And, for a hallucination, a prime factor is necessary, something I only noticed in you." Vaika stared at him, making eye contact, her expression serious.
As Jyorta stared back with curiosity, Vaika stated, "Your understanding of the human psyche is beyond what anyone else I saw possess. And, from the examples I witnessed, you are swiftly able to understand Frenzy Beasts too. This way, your hallucinations can easily pull in and affect your targets."
"The potency of a hallucination is not its realism but its ability to affect the target's mind." Vaika's voice resounded in his mind, resonating with his thoughts.
'My previous life's experiences gave me an accurate interpretation of the human heart. I have interacted and mingled with humans from all walks of life, witnessed the white, grey, and black parts of human society. I see, so that experience makes my hallucinations dangerous to my targets. Also, by digesting the memories of others, I can understand humans and Frenzy Beasts of various races at a deeper, comprehensive level. All that further enhances the potency of my hallucinations.'
Jyorta nodded, understanding his strengths better. He then gazed in surprise as Vaika continue to speak, "Moreover, in the aspect of enhancing your brain, most of the Nurturing effect is concentrated on your ability to think. And, this makes you the best candidate for becoming my successor, because my development as an Esper is the same as you. Haesha's development is skewed towards the actuation part, so she is not suitable. Every Esper that could wield hallucination didn't possess the necessary faculty to become my successor."
"Maybe I am a bit awesome myself?" Jyorta chuckled, scratching his cheek.
Vaika raised her index finger, placing her thumb right beneath the tip, smiling, "A little."
She then snapped her finger, retracting her psychic energy. She unleashed a psychic arm, pulling out a scalpel from a nearby tray. "Now, show me your Regen."
Without any warning, she made an incision on his palm, causing blood to ooze out. Jyorta yelped at the sudden attack, watching blood ooze out of the incision on his left palm. His mind whirred in thought as his eyesight turned blurry. Some foreign instinct guided him as he unleashed his psychic arm.
He kept the length only at 60 centimetres, way below what he was officially capable of, showing incredible fortitude of the mental restraints he had put on himself—to never unleash his actual power while in public.
His psychic arm curled in the air, slowly approaching the incision as he gazed at the dripping blood. A faint ringing sound echoed in his mind as something seemed to have been stirred up within him. His heart thumped faster while he felt electricity course through his body, shocking and numbing the path it traversed through.
Thump! Thump!
His five senses expanded their sensitivity, tuning to incredible precision. Jyorta could even feel the sweat oozing out of the pores on his temples, the flow of blood in his body, and the faint convulsions of his internals.
In such a highly attuned state, a signal seemed to resound through his central nervous system, actuating a mysterious effect from the substance that had fused into it.
Activate!
His psychic arm turned pale blue, possessing a transparent nature while the surface had faint lustre, reflecting his clear, brown eyes suffused with wisdom. The pale blue psychic arm looked like a condensation of clear water; faint ripples were generated on its surface as the moisture content in the air spiked all of a sudden.
Jyorta's mind felt fresh, as if he had washed away all the fatigue in his body. The tip of the psychic arm touched the incision on his left palm, seeping into it a little. The energy in it fused with the ends of the cut, generating cells by consuming the pale blue psychic energy.
An instinct was transmitted back to his nervous system, guiding him the way he had to move his psychic energy, the amount he had to fuse in a certain spot, the spot he had to start with, the order he had to proceed in order to heal it fully, etc.
It wasn't an influx of memories burdening him, but an instinct that guided him through his nervous system. He didn't even need to act upon it, the message transmissions through his nervous system actuated all necessary motions of both his body and his unleashed psychic arm. So, even if he slept for this duration, the area was bound to heal up without any problems.
The edges of the incision closed up, the cells reconnecting with each other, expanding along the cut area as the wound closed up. Even the loss of blood was replenished by the infused pale blue psychic energy.
His pain disappeared as Jyorta retracted his psychic arm, looking at his palm that was fully healed. He then wiped off the blood with his kerchief, noticing the pristine state of his palm, as if he wasn't wounded in the first place.
"Good, you are able to use it without problems," At some point in time, a register appeared in Vaika's hands as she scribbled many details on it while watching Jyorta's actions. Finally, when she was done, Vaika looked at the dazed Jyorta before her, smiling as she asked, "So, how is the fabled Regen?"
Jyorta sighed in amazement, commenting his honest thoughts, "It is peerless."
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