Stanely’s mornings were always spent around training. Gray acted as his personal trainer and trained him in every aspect that might be necessary.

By now, Stanley was used to multiple types of guns, with proficiency at the handheld ones. Even Gray was surprised at how quickly he was used to a gun and how accurate he was with it.

He was surprised to learn that Stanley was using his power of foresight for aiming, which was helping him so much.

Knowing that Gray had told him something within the first week they trained.

"I will have them make a custom weapon for you that you will surely love to use. The engineers would love a good puzzle like that certainly."

Stanley had wondered what his weapon would be since that day.

He had spent the rest of the month trying to learn the ways of this new world, trying to understand what everything was and to get adapted as much as he could to it.

Most people in the association stayed away from him just because of who he was, so he was rather alone a lot of the time.

He learned most of what he could from the computer in his room. He also went out to the city to learn a bit about this new world, but Gray would be with him at all times to watch over him.

Stanley did what he could and adapted as well as he could. By now, he could mix into a group of people and not stand out as long as he just talked about daily life.

There were still a lot of things for him to learn, but he also had a lot of time. He would eventually learn it all.

Sheila had left the association as she had mentioned and had gone somewhere, where she was going to do some work. She returned 2 weeks after leaving and told him about the task that she did in a Southern City in Pandene.

Stanley recalled the map of the world and remembered that Pandene was at the bottom of the continent on the left side.

"It was quite difficult, mind you. I had to sneak into a gang’s hideout without being found and note the number of people that were there and find out their faces," she said. "It’s hard to do that when they have sensors all around."

"They didn’t see you?" Stanley asked.

"They can’t," Sheila said. "My concealment is way too difficult to see even with sensors. It can dupe any and all forms of observation."

"I see," Stanley said. "And what happened to the gang?’

"Well, once I got what info I could, the fighters I was assigned to went in and killed them all," she said.

"He... killed them?" Stanley asked.

"Of course," Sheila said. "We deal with the worst of the worst criminals, Stanley. Killing them is the only thing we can do. Imprisoning them is simply not a good idea."

"Is... that so?" he asked.

"They did the same at your town too," she said. "The ones that were too hard to handle in the prison around the mines were taken to the second prison, where they just waited for the Shadow Nova to come and kill them."

Stanley said nothing. There was too much killing in this world, and no matter where he was, he was going to be forced to witness it, to be part of it.

"I guess... these ones deserved it, right?" he asked.

"Human trafficking, getting young teenagers addicted to drugs, kidnapping, rapes, murders, you name it. They did it all. They deserved to all die," Sheila said, seething in anger as she remembered what she had seen from the people in the gangs that she had infiltrated."

"I see," he said. "That’s quite a horrible job."

"It’s the only job," she said. "I wonder what your first task will be. You’re going to get one soon right?"

"Hmm, I think so," Stanley said. "They mentioned it was going to be in a month, so it should be coming around."

"It should be soon then," Sheila said.

"Oh right," Stanley remembered. "I got two new powers."

"What?" Sheila’s eyes narrowed. "Two more? With 7 thousand souls only?"

Stanley shrugged. "They’re not very good, however," he said.

"Is that so?" Sheila asked. "Tell me, I want to know. I’ll judge whether they’re good or not."

"Well..." Stanley hesitated. "The first one is just for my body alone. My body is aging differently now. I age at a much slower rate than everyone. About... 3 times, I think?"

"What?" Sheila looked surprised. "Are you saying I’ll be 60 years old by the time you look like 30?"

"Uhh... yes?" Stanley said. He wasn’t sure if the math made sense, but that was the gist of it.

"God! I’m jealous. Now you can be young forever like Amy," she said.

"I still age," Stanley said. "Unlike Amy who looks 25 when she should be 80."

"Don’t remind me," Sheila said angrily. "What’s the next one?"

"Oh right, it’s... a weird one. Let me show you directly," he said.

"Okay," Sheila got curious.

"Look at the time," Stanely said.

Sheila frowned and looked down at the watch in her hand. It glowed on and showed a time.

"It’s 4:46," she said and looked back at him. "How will that help you?"

"Okay, look at me," Stanley said and got closer before he started explaining. "At first when I unlocked this new power, I thought of what I could do to use it. I didn’t really understand it at all."

"But after training with Gray, I realized how I could improve this new power. It has a lot of downsides and is very limited to how I can use it, but the times I can, it works beautifully."

Sheila sighed. "Are you gonna tell me what it is then?" she asked.

Stanley grinned. "Look at the time," he said.

"I already did," she said looking down at her clock. "It’s 4—"

Her words stuck to her throat when she saw the rest of it. "It’s... 4:53?" she asked, confused out of her mind. "Wasn’t it just 4:46?"

Stanley laughed at her confusion. "See? That’s my power," he said, leaning back on his chair. "I can change your perception of time, both faster and slower."

Sheila’s eyes were wide. "You made me miss 7 minutes in a matter of 10 seconds?" she asked.

"Kind of," Stanley said.

"That’s an amazing power!" Sheila exclaimed.

"Not really," Stanley said. "As I mentioned, it has too many downsides."

"What downsides?" she asked.

"Well... try talking," Stanley said.

"Whatdoyouwantmetosay?" Sheila spoke and immediately stopped. "Whawasthat?’

Stanley stopped using his powers. "Even if I slow down your perception of time, you aren’t really being slowed. So if you do anything normal, it appears to you as super speed. So when you speak, you speak normally, which makes it sound like you’re the fastest speaker in the entire world."

"Oh," Sheila said. "I see."

"If you move your arms you figure out what’s happening. If you look around at the people, you figure out what’s happening. If you even so much as focus on your own breathing, you figure out what’s happening."

"And when they figure out what’s happening, my power stops working on them for some reason."

"The best way I have found to use this power is by making people focus on me while using it, but that is only helpful the first time around," Stanley said. "As I said, not that useful."

Sheila nodded. "Now that you put it that way, it does sound kind of useless," she said. "But... you’re a Branching Nova, aren’t you? You will either get more powers in the future... or your old ones will evolve. This power may evolve to be something useful."

Stanley thought for a moment. "That’s possible..." he said. "But I will need more souls for that. I don’t think I’m getting any more souls."

"You’re a fighter in the AAA," Sheila said. "You’ll get a steady supply of souls, although not in the thousands certainly."

"I suppose you’re right," Stanley said. "I wonder when my first mission is going to start."

It was 2 days later.

After training with Gray that morning, Stanley had only arrived at the cafeteria when he was urgently called to the director’s office through a simple watch that he wore on his wrist now.

He hadn’t been to the director’s office before, but he knew where it was. He got into the elevator on his own, pressed the button that took him to the topmost floor of the hub, and walked out of it.

He looked at the rocky ceiling here which was so close to him. He looked down at the hundreds of meters to the ground which he would die if he tried to jump from here.

He walked around the tower and arrived in front of the director’s office. He walked in and found two ladies, who didn’t react well when they saw him.

They tried their best to show an unbothered face, but they were definitely bothered by his presence. Whether a Nova or a Dull, people always stayed away from him.

He was used to this by now and spoke. "I was called by the director," he said.

"He’s in there," they pointed to the door. "You can go in."

"Thank you," Stanley said and walked up to the door. He was surprised to see that the door to the director’s office was a wooden door, which was nonexistent in the association.

He knocked on it, and once given permission, pushed it open to see the director sitting on his desk.

"Come in," he said when he saw Stanely. "Your mission is here."