Quietly but nervously, the entire class followed Professor Keren to the exam site. Ben recognised the path; he saw the gymnasium where he had trained with Aria looming in the distance, growing larger with every step. A large crowd of students was already lined up outside. He felt a knot of nervousness in his stomach, but not fear. He knew what he had to do, and he believed he could do it.
As Class A1 arrived, all eyes turned toward them. A wave of whispers passed through the other students. Some voices held respect, acknowledging their power and well-deserved spot. Others were laced with resentment, as if their success was merely a gift from Lady Luck. Ben paid them no mind. After all, even within his own class, no one had approved of his strength.
He would show them. He would prove himself not just as one of them, but as someone above them, a promising hero.
A few minutes later, Professor Keren's voice cut through the murmur. "Let us go inside. Good luck to you all. I expect to see every student from this class back in A1 when we are done."
As they entered the gigantic gymnasium, Ben looked around, memories of his training sessions flooding back. Suddenly, a sharp pain shot from his stomach to his head. The world began to spin. This wasn't nervousness; something inside him felt profoundly off. His head grew heavy on his neck... was this really just anxiety? No, he had been through worse. This was something else.
Ben quickly approached Professor Keren. "I need to use the restroom," he managed, his voice tight.
She gave a curt nod, and he hurried away. On his way, his eyes began to water uncontrollably.
What is going on with me? He thought, finding no answers.
He stumbled into the restroom and splashed cold water from the sink onto his face, trying to shock his system back to normal. As the water dripped down his chin, he heard a voice. His head was throbbing so intensely he couldn't make out the words. Lifting his head, his blurry eyes found the source of the voice in the mirror's reflection: a tall, lanky guy with blond hair, the tips dyed a smoky grey, and an oversized hat perched stylishly on half his head.
Ben turned around to face the stranger. He wasn't in the mood for company, and his reaction showed it. "Who are you? What do you want?" he shouted, barely hearing his own voice over the pounding in his skull.
The student, unfazed, moved closer until his lips were near Ben's ear. "My name is Adin," he said, his voice calm but assertive. "And I know what is wrong with you." Without hesitation, Adin placed both his hands on the sides of Ben's head. A strange, modified essence flowed from his palms.
Ben's eyes, now bloodshot and wide, saw flashes of light. His head felt like it was splitting open. What seemed like a lifetime of agony was over in a single, excruciating second.
Ben stumbled back, confused. His senses were returning. The world stopped spinning, his vision sharpened, and his hearing cleared, bringing the dripping faucet and the distant cheers from the gym into focus.
"Who are you?" Ben asked again, a look of shocked confusion on his face. "What did you do?"
"Again with the questions? What about a 'thank you'?" Adin retorted.
"Thank you," Ben said, the words feeling foreign. "But seriously, how did you do that? What was happening to me?"
"Well, I guess you have a lot of questions," Adin said, puffing out his chest with a hint of pride. "As I was saying, my name is Adin. My essence gives me the power of body manipulation, which lets me enhance my own senses and… influence others. My educated guess is that you've been poisoned. Unless you usually cut your forearm sideways?" Adin pointed to a four-centimetre-long gash on Ben's arm that he hadn't even noticed.
'How did I miss this?' Ben thought, swiftly turning to the mirror to get a better look.
"Your body is fighting something inside; I could feel it when I touched you," Adin explained sincerely. "I don't know what your class rank or your power is, but after just one look at your body's condition, I don't think you should go through with the exams today."
"What?! No way! Too much depends on it; I can't fail these exams no matter what!" Ben burst out, a wave of instant anger overriding his confusion.
"So I can assume you are one of the elite class, right?" Like a mind reader, Adin was right again.
"Yes, I'm A1, and I can't lose that spot," Ben said, his tone aggressive. "But how did you know that?"
"Let's just say I'm kind of a mind reader," Adin replied, that same note of pride in his voice.
It seemed to be just his personality, but Ben was far from impressed. He instantly took a few steps back, his body shifting into what looked like a battle stance.
"This is some creepy shit, dude. I don't care who you are, get out of my head!" Ben yelled.
He felt strange. He usually wasn't the type to anger so quickly, but then again, no one liked having their mind read. After all, it was some creepy shit.
Adin backed off, hands raised. "Whoa, easy. I'm not reading your mind now. It was a lucky guess; only the A1 kids are that desperate. Look, I get it. It's creepy. I'll back off. But that poison is still in you."
"I'll fight through it," Ben said, already turning with determination. "I'm ready to go."
"No, wait, hold up. You have a death wish or something?" Adin smirked with shock. "You're crazy. Come here, man, I'll help you."
Ben turned back, his eyes filled with resolve. "Can you do that?" he asked, curiosity cutting through his urgency.
"I can nullify the pain and the symptoms a little." Adin took a step forward and held Ben's head with both hands, his thumbs placed on his temples, before Ben could react. He started explaining the procedure. "Right now, your immune system is crashing because it doesn't have enough soldiers to fight with. So, by accelerating your white blood cell regeneration, we can help your body fight off the poison." Adin kept talking to himself, detailing everything he did. "And let's add a little cocktail of painkillers to the mix," he said, starting to name the chemical ingredients.
Ben felt grossed, like Adin was inside him and there was no end to it. After five minutes of blabbering, Adin took a step back and lifted his hands like a musician at the end of a show. This guy is weird! Ben thought to himself. But he couldn't complain; this weirdo had just saved his exam rank, and possibly his entire future.
Suddenly, Adin added the fine print. "This will help you for a while, but I can't make it go away. Just do what you can to get a good score. I feel you; I got dropped to D-Class by bad luck."
"Wait, so I'm not fixed?" Ben suddenly felt angry for foolishly getting his hopes up. He let this man feel his body and it wasn't even a sure thing!
"Hell no! What do you think I am, a god? You do need to get to a hospital. Like right now! I can't even identify the toxin that was injected into you."
"Fuck. Okay, then I need to do this fast, right?" Ben came to his senses. He couldn't blame Adin; the guy had helped him. But now he was in a race against time, and Ben knew that with the way his body felt before the treatment, he wouldn't have been able to move a muscle.
"As fast as you can," Adin said.
Ben did a U-turn and burst out of the restroom, sprinting toward the exam hall. Adin didn't move. He was still stuck in place, a look of envy in his eyes. He saw in Ben the great resolve, motivation, and willingness to sacrifice that he himself had once possessed.
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Adin was a very popular kid. He had many friends, was a natural at sports, and aced his classes without seeming to try. But everything changed when he was eight years old and his powers manifested.
Suddenly, he could see into people's internal structures as if with X-ray vision. He could feel the flowers dying when his foot swung over the ground to score the final goal. Most jarringly, he could hear his friends' thoughts. Some were jealous of his innate talents, some wished for his failure, and some even acted on it. None of them truly saw him as a friend.
Adin spent many days depressed after learning what was in the minds of others. He couldn't address it without revealing he could read their thoughts, and that was "some creepy shit." He realised he had to learn to control his powers. The flashes of thoughts entered his brain unbidden; he never activated them, he just accepted them. It was never too much, as if his body knew its own limits, but one or two always slipped through.
Many kids his age had already received their essence powers and formed a complete core. Some were already showing signs of great control. While most young essence users would exhaust their power in a single act and lose consciousness, often leading their parents to keep them home for weeks to learn control, Adin was different. It took him only five days to achieve perfect command. He also realized his powers were far more complex than he thought.
He had previously seen himself as just a mind reader or manipulator. He tried to test this by giving a command to a snake he found outside. The snake didn't listen and bit him, injecting its venom. In a panic, Adin reached out his hand and instantly understood the snake's entire physiology. Horrified and acting on instinct, he didn't issue a command. Instead, he seized direct control of the snake's body, forcing its muscles to contract in a wave from its tail upward, compelling it to twist the snake's own head into its mouth and begin consuming itself.
Shocked by what he had done, he swore never to manipulate a living body like that again. But he had just discovered he could control the inside of another's body.
Feeling the poison spread, he quickly scanned his own body and began fighting it from within. Every time a cell died, he created a new one in its place. Every time a hormone was depleted, he replenished it. He fought for several hours until he was healed.
This revelation confirmed something to Adin: he could manipulate his own and others' bodies. He gave up everything to pursue a full understanding of his power, spending days and nights studying biology and the mind. He became incredibly knowledgeable in both fields, but he never experimented on others, only on himself. He didn't want to be responsible for a mistake that could hurt someone, and he had no one to give him consent, having become a reclusive introvert who only left his room to ace school exams.
But it wasn't enough. After years of anticipation, he finally took the entrance exam for the Essence Academy. His luck, however, wasn't on his side. Every test involved fighting another essence user or a robot, and his power wasn't suited for combat, especially without hurting others. He gave up on most of the tests and wound up in D Class.
He was about to give up!
But now, treating Ben's body *with his consent of course* was the first time he had ever manipulated anyone but himself. The experience, combined with seeing Ben's fierce determination, reminded Adin how much it all used to mean to him. He had to form a plan. He would find a way to beat those tests, even with a non-combat essence.