Kael Hound said nothing and watched them devour their food. The tea was for settling their stomachs. This would be the first food in seven days after all; the stomach might reject it, but the tea did well.

The food was mostly meat and fruit, with little bread and grains.

Kael would make small comments as he watched them, but they all ignored him as they ate. The only thing important here was food; nothing else mattered. For now.

"Take it easy on that meat, Alex. Don’t choke yourself on the bone!"

"And you, Stallus, you’ve been eating more grains than meat. But you need the meat more! You need to start building your strength so opponents won’t throw you around during fights."

"Azaroth, you eat too little."

"You eat too much, Catena. Don’t rush; it’s not going anywhere."

Azaroth took that time to think about his training with Corvus. The thread of thick red essence that he was asked to make was like a sword. A blunt, thick one. If a sword could stretch twenty feet and be used like a rope.

He could harden it or make it flexible like a rope. Corvus told him he would be able to make three of them when he got more essence in his core.

Even though he hadn’t used it like that, Azaroth could see the potential because he could even make the rope coil on itself and use it as a ball for brute force.

He wondered how sharp he could make it. It’s like having an extra hand—but made of essence. Azaroth sighed mentally; like everything of Corvus’s, he hadn’t told him the name of the skill.

But what Corvus said was still in his head. That the core was only a vessel and he won’t learn real Chaos techniques until —

Kael Hound clapped loudly, diverting all attention to him.

"When I told you that it would take five days, well, I lied. Not really, though, because it did take five days for your attunement, but what increased it was your other one. Your physical attributes," he told them.

"What do you mean?" Azaroth demanded. It was hard enough that he had to mess with their cores; now he also messed with their bodies?

"I make you stronger. Not instantly, but the effects will soon kick in."

Azaroth paused as he heard that. Anything that would make him stronger was always welcomed. Even if it messed with his body.

"How? What do you mean you make us stronger?" Stallus asked.

"Something else was introduced into your bodies. A medicine that was introduced directly into your blood. It’s dangerous but..."

"What!" Alex interrupted. "Why do you put some dangerous poison in our body?"

Kael ignored him. "It will heighten your senses, make them sharp. We’ll talk about it later. For now, let’s focus on the next step."

"Now that you have attuned essence, we should begin your skill learning," Kael said.

At least he waited until they finished eating before he took them to the training space. He lined them up and stood in front of them, then he provided four papers. On them were the skills of their techniques.

"These are basic skills. Meant only for your current level. It’s probably all your core can handle right now."

He passed them the papers, and they studied the different symbols and angles drawn on them. Just looking at them and trying to hold them in his mind was causing him a slight headache.

But that was what he and the others sat down to do. Unlike his training with the chaos techniques, he would have to memorize the formation.

"This is what you will do for the rest of this week. You’ll memorize your formation and then you’ll learn to forge well with your essence. You must stretch your essence to cover all your body. It’ll be less effective because your essence is not good enough, but it’ll serve you well now."

"Start!"

And they started. They would memorize while they trained with their essence. Azaroth focused on his right hand and made the essence cover it, thickly at first.

The fire essence was like liquid fire but less red, and with his will, he started moving it to his elbow and higher, making it thinner and at the same time making sure it wasn’t too thin or it would become ineffective.

By the end of the first day, Azaroth had covered the whole of his right hand and part of his head. Essence is a funny thing. It reacted to the body—the user’s—as if it was air. Unless used against an opponent, essence had almost no effect on its users.

And you won’t even know it was on your body.

They ate and retired for the night. Even as tired as he was, Azaroth still returned to the training grounds where he met Stallus already practicing her form.

As Kael Hound said earlier, with the new enchantments he gave them, they should be improving in raw physical powers but should it be this fast?

Azaroth watched her. Her sword flowed from one form to the other like water. Her feet barely tapped the floor as she glided. She was not only training her sword form, she was also doing what Kael told them to do, forging her body with essence while doing it.

Impressive, Azaroth thought, as he also settled into his own. He removed his sword and started practicing his forms, and forging his own body too.

As usual, none of them spoke to each other, only their weapons did the talking.

A bit into the training and Azaroth noticed that his body had begun undergoing some changes too. The strength in his hands had increased, and his balance was well.

His eyesight too. He smiled. Kael Hound had really outdone himself this time. The pain Azaroth felt didn’t matter; what mattered was that he gained something from it. Strength.

And that was how he spent the first day after coming out of unending pains.