14 Six Months

For the next six months, during Saturdays, Hayden and Daniel trained from 5:00 AM to 7:00 PM nonstop, only stopping for bathroom breaks, and with Hayden using essence energy to substitute for his food.

Apparently, Level 1 wielders are not supposed to be able to use essence energy to enhance their bodies until they become Level 2, yet, for some reason, Hayden and Daniel is able to do so. This irregularity was confirmed as them being incredibly compatible with essence energy as even though it's uncommon, it wasn't that rare. Even then, their compatibilities varied greatly, with Hayden's essence energy enhancement more powerful than Daniel's.

For the first five months, meaning, 20 sessions, Hayden trained and mastered ten martial arts, greatly shocking the Walong Sinag ng Araw and Anthony. For each martial art, Hayden trained nonstop with the master of their respective martial arts across the country for two sessions, and on the last two hours of the second session, Hayden was already beating down the masters.

Hayden's crazed training and absorption of knowledge made the masters terrified, refusing to see Hayden on the third session, hence, Hayden already moved on to the next martial art on his list. This, coupled with his terrifying talent, allowed Hayden to master the martial arts.

In order, Hayden learned Muay Thai, Capoeira, Krav Maga, Taekwondo, Aikido, Judo, Karate, Boxing, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, and Kali Eskrima, the knife martial arts of the Philippines, and how to throw knives.

At the end of the five months, at the 13th session, Hayden was challenged by the 'genius' trainees within Puting Araw, agreeing, he imposed the condition that all of them must attack him all at once. There were ten of them at the time, and Hayden was able to beat them all without them even being able to touch a hair of Hayden, thoroughly crushing their confidence.

In that fight, he showed extraordinary combat analyzation skill, with some of them using long ranged Abilities against Hayden as Hayden permitted the usage of Abilities as he intended to use Divine Perception against the ten of them.

Flawlessly combining the ten different martial arts he learned, the movement of Capoeira along with the punches and footwork of Boxing, the attacks of Muay Thai, the holds of Aikido combined with the force nullification or redirection of Aikido and the throws of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, the kicks from Taekwondo, the weak point targeting of Krav Maga, and knife techniques of Kali Eskrima, Hayden was able to win within five minutes.

When the three members of Walong Sinag ng Araw currently in the Makati Branch of Puting Araw heard of this, rushing towards the fight, Hayden already won, dumbfounding them enormously. Naturally, the fight was non-lethal, however, the ten so-called prodigies suffered injuries because of Hayden not holding back his strength, even using essence energy to enhance his own.

On top of that, to achieve this, Hayden continued working out, working out in the gym of the underground facility. In that five months, Hayden was already capable of lifting 150 kilograms, and when enhanced by essence energy, he is able to lift this 150-kilogram weight with a single hand as easy as drinking water. With that in mind, Hayden was sure of his win as these 'prodigal trainees' were only greenhorns that hasn't even experienced killing a person with their own hands, hence, in the fight, Hayden showed them true killing intent. In their eyes, Hayden appeared as though a demon who cannot be hit at all.

Fortunately, Hayden was able to hold back his truly lethal techniques, otherwise, the ten students would've been killed on the spot. The ten trainees also knew that Hayden 'held back' from actually damaging them, feeling that they would've been killed if Hayden did have a real fight against the ten of them.

After winning, Hayden proceeded to train with guns, showing amazing accuracy and precision, even while moving. He also trained dual wielding pistols. When his pistol trainer saw this, his eyes almost jumped out as Hayden was performing stunts that will only be seen in movies.

Hayden was actually performing gun kata! A fictional martial art! Needless to say, in the world of wielders, gun kata was not that rare, however, to do so when touching a gun for the first time? That was the feat that shocked his gun trainer.

Feeling defeated, his pistol trainer gave up after four hours with Hayden, saying that Hayden was already good enough in using guns, to the point that he was able to use gun kata.

"I mean, the kid can do a backflip while hitting mobile targets with a pistol!" The trainer said with an exasperated voice to Anthony. "That kid is too much for me! Hitting mobile targets while flipping in mid-air with perfect accuracy and precision? Even I can't do that! He's a monster!"

Anthony, who heard this, was surprised. Wasn't that the first time that Hayden will touch a gun? It has only been four hours! For Anthony though, his mind was already numb from when he witnessed the past feats of Hayden that he showed in martial arts. With that, he made Hayden go train with a sniper rifle, which also didn't last long.

"That kid is a monster!" Another trainer was in front of Anthony within thirty minutes, not even an hour has passed! "His shooting skill is godlike! You know what he did? He hit a target in our sniping simulation room with actual simulated environmental factors behind a fucking simulated wall! You know how long he aimed? A second! He did all the calculations in his head within a second, shot the sniper gun, and perfectly shot the target in the fucking middle of the head! That monster! I cannot teach him anything more as there's nothing to teach! Literally! He even knew the principle that a sniper should not stay in a single position! In fucking addition, he fucking did a sniper shot like he was in a video game! You know what he did? You know what he did!? He jumped sideways, took an aim with the sniper, and shot with perfect accuracy towards the moving target inside a simulated concrete building! At first, I thought it was blind luck, but then, he did it another time! While moving, the kid was sniping, creating the illusion that there were multiple snipers all around!"

Anthony was greatly shocked when the expert sniper stormed off. Hayden could do such a thing? Isn't that kid too multi-talented? Anthony sighed as he thought of what a monster he brought into Puting Araw. It could both be a blessing and a curse when Hayden decides to leave in the future. Anthony steeled himself to not let Hayden go no matter the cost.

Afterwards, he thought of putting Hayden to train with Blue Agents. The result? Within a month, Hayden got a perfect evaluation in espionage, reconnaissance, tracking down targets using the clues left behind by the target, and logistics support. Furthermore, the Blue Agents who were teaching Hayden was left impressed, some even vied for him to become a true Blue Agent!

At the end of the sixth month, Hayden mastered all these skills and was given the title of an Initiate. Meanwhile, in the six months that Hayden was cooking up a storm, Daniel was left unnoticed because of Hayden hogging the spotlight.

Daniel's creative usage with his Ability, God Eyes, was met with a good evaluation from the Walong Sinag ng Araw. Daniel mastered the martial arts of Karate as well within the six months, not as talented as Hayden, but still considered a worthy talent.

Daniel's wide array of weapons using God Eyes did not pale in comparison to Hayden's feats of monster-like learning capability, and in terms of pure combat prowess, Daniel and Hayden was evaluated to be at equal standing.

There were also improvements on the other aspects of Hayden's life. In school, Hayden was always called on by the teacher to answer mathematical equations and he obliges. Every exam, he always got perfect marks as he memorized all the textbooks that were given. Other than the aforementioned improvements, he was invited to the basketball team and became one of the starting five players, winning the National Youth Tournament during September with his teammates. Hayden carried the match by doing trick shots, passes, and dribbles that only existed in anime or, in the least, high-level basketball, and to top it all off, he became better the more he played in the court, without being exhausted at all. All of this gave him the moniker, 'Emperor of the Court.'

He didn't only show his great physical athleticism. Every subject in his 1st Quarter Finals examinations, were perfect, being acknowledged as the smartest student in his batch. Lastly, when he showed his piano skills to the class, along with his dancing skills, they were stunned.

When Faye tried to teach Hayden a choreography, Hayden got everything right the first time and even took advanced training, not attending the next few sessions due to mastering the choreography already. Whenever Hayden showed her the choreography perfectly, precisely how she performed it, she was annoyed of how he did it all so flawlessly and the fact that she can't force Hayden to go on more practices because he was too perfect! On the other hand, him playing the keyboard with any song allowed him to get an absolute 100 in his music class, and his singing was not at all subpar with his perfect pitch. He was even almost cast as a main character with his rising popularity but sternly declined, thinking that the spotlight was already too much for him.

His social skills vastly improved as well, although he still didn't talk much, he can converse with people easily now, effortlessly picking up social cues and following up smoothly. He also smiled a lot more, stealing the hearts of women, wanting to ask him out, which he politely refused.

As for his physical appearance, he became taller stemming from the nourishment of the essence energy. He was shocked when, in six months, he already grew exactly 10.213 centimeters, becoming 173.691 centimeters tall. His physique also became sculpted to the point that it can, and can only be, described with the word 'perfect,' sporting perfect male body proportions without being overly large nor muscular.

His finance was also solved as his Streamlink career took off. In July, he was unexpectedly featured by Ares in his stream, the top 1 most powerful player of War of Honor in the world hailing from Italy. Ares said the words, "I hope I'll be able to face him in the Pro Assembly in the future," because of being absolutely impressed by Hayden's Downpour mechanics and his skill in other superhumans.

The Pro Assembly was where the Apex Rank players from various countries meet. The Philippine Apex Rankers have always been weak relative to other countries' rankers, disappearing from the pro Assembly scene. Now that Hayden, Supremacy, appeared, and that Ares publicly acknowledged him, the Philippine server became rowdy.

In the past six months with his blood and sweat and consistent wins without a single loss at all, Hayden became the rank 1 Apex Ranker in the Philippine server, and his Streamlink blew as a result of all these. Now, he had over 6.5 million supporters, earning him 8,000,000 credits in the past six months alone, an earning he never expected.

He gave the 100,000 credit reimbursement from the Aswang attack to his parents as a show of thanks, and discussed him establishing his financial independency. Despite his financial independency though, Hayden still lived in his parent's house, the only difference made was that Hayden was paying some of the bills to relieve some of his parent's burden. He even gave them another separate 100,000 credits for them to go on a vacation.

They couldn't ask for a more perfect son, his dad and mom in tears as his grades in school could not simply be regarded as excellent and can be described as absolutely outstanding, his athleticism through the roof, being a national-tier basketball player, and his financial stability already established at such a young age of 16. With this in mind, his two parents decided that they would use the vacation money on Christmas, wanting Hayden to come with them in South Korea.

Naturally, Hayden didn't decline this, and was even happy to accept. Subsequent to that, he bought weapons from Puting Araw, two karambit knives made of Shojin Alloy, developed by Professor Shojin in 2036. The Shojin Alloy is considered the strongest and lightest alloy in the world from its creation date until now. Furthermore, Shojin Alloy was cheap and economical, revolutionizing the entire world, from cars, to kitchen knives, which was what Hayden used in the fight against Aswang.

The pair of Shojin Alloy karambit knives costed a mere 2,500 credits. It was more expensive as it was made to be combat-ready, unlike Shojin Alloy kitchen knives, which can be as low as 500 credits each. He bought five sets of Shojin Alloy throwing knives along with the karambit knives, each set containing ten knives and priced at 1,000 credits

Hayden also bought two Third Model Black Piercers, pistols that fired 9mm bullets that traveled at supersonic speed, coming with a complimentary silencer that toned down the volume of fire by 150 decibels, lasting for a hundred thousand shots. The bullets were usually made of Shojin Steel, increasing its penetrative power and pure firepower. (3)

He bought fifty magazines filled with bullets for the Black Piercers, each magazine having 30 bullets inside. Moreover, he bought a Sinukuan (1), the strongest sniper rifle that had a range of ten kilometers with another free silencer, and a tactical black light armored suit that looked like it came from a fictional movie that protected the user from bullets of Black Piercer's caliber for five times on each spot (2).

In that timeframe, Hayden ordered a white kitsune mask as well without the knowledge of Puting Araw. He thought of this as an alternative identity when dealing with a separate matter altogether. He would call himself 'White Fox' when he uses this mask, to not associate himself to Puting Araw at times.

Lastly, he has completely mastered 23 new languages in that six months, namely, Korean, Japanese, Chinese Mandarin, Spanish, Malay, Bengali, Portuguese, French, Italian, Russian, German, Swedish, Hindi, Swahili, Arabic, Amharic, Yoruba, Malay, Turkish, Persian, Kurdish, Urdu, and Vietnamese. Some languages, he learned for the fun and interest, while the others were learnt based on practicality. Along with Filipino and English, Hayden can now speak, read, and write in a total of 25 languages fluently, and as if all of the language he learned was his mother tongue, having no accent of a Filipino at all. All of this made him an official polyglot, except that it wasn't known by people, causing it to not be official whatsoever.

…..

December 8, 2057, Friday. The last subject of the 2nd Quarter Finals examinations was being held nationwide. On 11:30, Hayden finished the last test 30 minutes earlier, like he did on all his other tests.

He submitted it without delaying, then went out of the classroom carrying his bag. He didn't plan to stay on the classroom as it was too crowded for him. On the hallway, he met with his best friend, Daniel, the first wielder he ever encountered.

"You finished already, top one?" Daniel mocked Hayden without ill intention. Daniel was actually a smart guy, if Hayden didn't acquire Divine Perception, Daniel would be smarter than him. After all, contrary to Hayden's expectations, Daniel was the second smartest person in the entire batch before Hayden appeared, currently being the third due to Hayden pushing the first and Daniel backwards. "How dare you use your Ability for your own gain!"

"Psh," Hayden shrugged Daniel off. "Not like I'm using it for evil. I'm only learning things, absorbing knowledge, how bad is that?"

"Tsk," Daniel laughed. "So serious, jeez. I was joking."

Subsequently, Daniel patted Hayden's back. Daniel also grew in these past six months, becoming 179 centimeters, taller than Hayden by a few centimeters.

At that moment, Hayden's phone vibrated inside his pockets. Fishing it out, then looking on the caller, he saw it was Anthony, the director of Puting Araw's main branch.

"Yes?" Hayden wore a mischievous smile on his face. "Why did you call, I'm in a test, you know? Jeez, what do you want?"

"I know you're done, smarty pants…" Anthony was incensed due to Hayden's behavior. "Your first assignment is here. For now, you two will be on a team with Engkanto, one of the Walong Sinag ng Araw."

���Him?" Hayden remembered Engkanto, the one who killed the dragon. "Why are we put in such a high-leveled team? Wouldn't the others complain?"

"Actually," Anthony said with a wry smile. "All of the Walong Sinag ng Araw decided that you two will be put on his team, yet, not at the same time. You two will be acting by yourselves, not on the actual team of Engkanto, but, Engkanto will be your adviser, and troop leader. This was done as the members of the Walong Sinag ng Araw thought you two are powerful enough. They even did an exception for the two of you, once you finished one of Engkanto's mission, you two will instantly become Initiates, once you finish three, you will become Official Agents, and once you become Level 2, will be given First Rank Special Agent status without delay."

"Why though?" Hayden wore a puzzled expression. "Isn't that too much of a preferential treatment? I mean, we will accept it, yet, we will be puzzled as to why we're being treated so favorably.��

"Well, you guys are two freaks!" Anthony couldn't help himself. "One is a battle machine with a skillset that a regular human would take a lifetime to learn, while the other has an overpowered Ability to the point that he can be considered a one-man army!"

"Aren't you mistaking something?" Hayden chortled. "We're both that! I'm a one-man army, Daniel's a one-man army\u003e I'm a battle machine, Daniel's a battle machine."

"Oh for goodness sake." Anthony face slapped himself, unable to refute what Hayden said. "Just report here later at 6:00 PM, it's Saturday tomorrow anyways."

"Okay, okay." Hayden cut the call. Next, Hayden told Daniel what Anthony said to him verbatim. "We have to report later at night, at 6:00 PM."

"Sure, sure." Daniel was as laidback as Hayden was. "I'm curious as to what our first mission will be…"

…..

1 Sinukuan – Based from the Goddess Apúng Sinukuan, the Kapampangan Sun God of War and Death who is said to live on Mount Arayat.

2 Light armored futuristic suit – Just imagine something along the lines of this:

https://www.google.com/search?q=black+stealth+suit\u0026tbm=isch\u0026hl=en\u0026chips=q:black+stealth+suit,g_1:futuristic:Jgj9jUt0qWY%3D\u0026hl=en\u0026ved=2ahUKEwj-0fXizpLpAhUqzIsBHb2ODc4Q4lYoAXoECAEQFw\u0026biw=1349\u0026bih=657#imgrc=jvTNHH8SGr0nRM

3 World Lore Time: In 2036, Professor Sora Shojin, materials scientist, from the University of Tokyo, combined various metals as an experiment. Accidentally, he created what will be known as the Shojin Alloy, an inexpensive piece of material that was extremely durable and light material that a thin sheet of five millimeters can withstand a handgun bullet fired from an old era pistol at point blank range. In 2037, Shojin Alloy was patented, which was quickly bought by various car companies and firearms manufacturer for licensing. By 2040, Shojin Alloy replaced almost every steel component in all newly manufactured objects. Now that it was 2057, Shojin Alloy is the most common alloy in the entire world.

2030-2040 was termed as the Decade of Advancement, where Shojin Alloy, kinetic energy absorption ceramic that absorbed kinetic energy, silencers that actually silenced guns by toning down the sound by 150 decibels, component materializers, perfected bionic limbs, and many more. One of the most notable technology that was created during the Decade of Advancement is the food pills that packed a full meal in a single pill, created by Nigerian doctor and food scientist Dr. Abeo Eze of Nigerian Institute of Food Science and Technology.

Another notable technology presented in the Decade of Advancement was the holographic technology invented by the US government. The holographic technology used various materials that were expensive, even till now, thus, it still isn't widely used as researchers are currently trying to find a substitute material for Fluxstones, a rare mineral that was discovered in 2031 that has light emitting and interference properties, which made the holographic technology possible.

Lastly, the gravitational field manipulator was created, allowing people to experience the outer space within Earth. It was an amazing advancement in the field of Physics by Dr. William Smith, a professor of Geophysics and Atomic Physics.

There were many amazing scientists who rose to fame during the Decade of Advancement, which gave the Nobel Committee a huge headache for the entire decade. There was even an exception where two Nobel Prize in Physics were given due to the vastly great contribution of those two winners in the field of Chemistry at that time, a truly unprecedented event.