Bestowal and Regret

The night sky glittered.

He-El flew through the night sky, the gale whipping his hair into disarray like blades, his cloak snapping in the wind. His eyes were gently warm, and a smile touched his lips. He was very satisfied with this harvest.

As expected, the wisdom of the many was still necessary. There would always be outstanding individuals capable of bursting forth with astonishing flashes of brilliance.

His first use of psychic abilities left He-El deeply shaken.

Before he had psychic abilities, He-El had assumed that viewing someone's memories would be like reading a book or watching a movie—freely switching frames, pausing, and so on.

But once he possessed psychic skills himself, he discovered that it was nothing like how human literature and films described it.

The first time He-El used psychic abilities was when his fingertip touched Edward's brow and he looked through his memories.

Edward's entire life was instantly placed within his mind.

And by placed, it meant everything about Edward—from the moment of his birth, every sight his eyes had ever seen, even things Edward himself had never noticed, his reflections on life, everything he had learned, every thought he had ever had, the complete experiences of an entire personality—was directly placed into He-El's mind.

If an ordinary person possessed psychic abilities and read another person's memories as he had, they would immediately be overwhelmed by the thoughts and memories of a complete personality, resulting in mental chaos, tangled memories, split personalities, schizophrenia, and an inability to distinguish themselves from the other.

A mind was open to another mind.

Especially for those without psychic powers, it was difficult to defend against the mind.

As long as you possessed psychic abilities, looking into someone's mind took almost no time. Their entire life, every thought they had ever had, every landscape they had ever seen, even memories they had forgotten, would be placed into your mind one by one.

It was nothing like turning pages in a book, nor was it like pausing frames in a film.

Whether one could endure the experiential memories of an entire personality, whether they would suffer backlash from it, depended on whether they possessed a powerful enough brain to contain and process the information.

He-El did, so it caused no great problem. It was merely a little crammed at first, before his immense computational ability of thought separated it out, extracting useful experiences thread by thread.

He became even more certain, and even more impatient to spread superpowers among humanity.

"Humanity really is incredibly creative."

He-El sighed as he flew through the sky.

As he slowly reviewed Edward's experience in psychologically manipulating people and combined it with his psychic abilities, he gained a great deal.

But what delighted He-El most were the ideas Edward had once conceived.

Those ideas were his imaginings about manipulating minds.

They were imagined applications of psychic abilities.

Those ideas simply opened He-El's eyes. He called Edward a true genius and decided he needed to protect him well.

Though he did not possess psychic abilities, he could imagine many applications for manipulating them. They were seven or eight parts out of ten accurate, not much different from the skills He-El's brain had instantly developed when he first acquired psychic abilities.

Freeze-Frame Viewing, Mind Control, Mind Refraction, Personality Creation, Mind Severance, Mist Corridor, Consciousness Collapse, Mind-Frequency Communication, Mind Barrier, God's Whisper...

Edward had ideas from angles He-El had not considered. The moment those thoughts entered He-El's mind, he made them real with a single thought.

Those ideas from every marvelous angle were truly breathtaking.

He-El immediately decided to take good care of him.

"Dawn, keep Edward Yorton under close observation. Send him a superpower gene serum first."

He-El issued the order while flying through the sky, unable to resist sending Edward Yorton a superpower gene serum first.

He looked forward to Edward awakening psychic abilities as well.

The superpower gene serum formed the user's most outstanding superpower based on their genes and the inclinations of their consciousness.

Edward had devoted his entire life to human psychology and consciousness, yearning to control human minds. There was a high chance that using the superpower gene serum would grant him psychic abilities.

He-El looked forward to Edward gaining psychic abilities, developing even more interesting powers, and sparking brilliant collisions with him.

After absorbing Edward's experience in manipulating human nature, He-El had yet to develop a Thought Imprint, but he had gained a deeper understanding of consciousness, will, thoughts, thinking, ideas, and the logic of memories. He had taken a great step forward.

He could immediately create a shallow yet powerful closed loop of thought-direction logic, a Thought Imprint even stronger than the one in The Three-Body Problem. But what he needed was not a Thought Imprint that influenced a portion of the neural network when certain information entered the brain, causing the brain to make a judgment without thinking and believe that information to be true.

Whether in genes or in the mind, living beings naturally possessed an imprint called "survival."

By delving deep into the mind, He-El intended to create a Thought Imprint deeper than the innate survival imprint of living beings—one that would not affect the recipient's talents, abilities, thinking, thoughts, or ideas in the slightest.

That was the perfect skill he wanted.

"I need a large number of experiments."

Beneath the glittering night sky, He-El had already digested every one of Edward's thoughts. He knew that creating the Thought Imprint he wanted would still require a great many experiments.

His gaze swept over Earth beneath the night sky, toward this experimental ground.

As He-El flew toward Anchorage Base, he abruptly shot straight upward and flew directly into space.

Washington, D.C., Yorton Manor.

A courier from Dawn Dispatch personally handed a long box to Edward, the master of the manor, who had just returned home.

Edward narrowed his eyes, a sharp glint flashing within them.

He had thought that after returning home, he would need to carefully observe the alien's actions again and manipulate him from another angle by "eliminating criminals." Yet he had not expected He-El to send him a gift.

The brown box was not large, and its packaging was not particularly exquisite. It was long and narrow, just the right size to hold in one hand.

Edward opened the box. A vial of crystal-clear, blood-red liquid gleamed scarlet beneath the lights. It was unusually beautiful, possessing a magnificent allure.

He calmed himself, set down the superpower gene serum, and picked up the letter enclosed in the box.

"Mr. Edward, as the foremost representative of a certain field among Earth's humans, your experience has helped the Master save considerable time. The Master specifically instructed us to deliver a superpower serum to you."

"He hopes you can create an astonishing ability capable of harming the Master."

"Respectfully, Dawn."

Edward narrowed his eyes, dangerous intent flickering within them.

He gently set down the letter, his gaze turning toward the magnificent superpower gene serum.

"No wonder Jupiter hates you so bitterly. Alien, you truly are far too arrogant." Edward sighed with considerable emotion.

"Then I will make you regret it so deeply that it tears your heart apart!"

His hand reached for the serum.