At noon the next day, in the training grounds beneath the Hunter Association.
Cheadle held a slice of cake, eating it one dainty bite at a time.
"Hmm..."
"So, in short, combining Ripple with Nen greatly enhanced your Nen Aura's offensive and defensive capabilities?"
"Yes. And I feel like my potential aura reserves keep increasing whenever I circulate Ripple through my body. After coming into contact with Nen, Ripple itself also grew considerably stronger!"
"Also, if I treat the [Nen] emitted outside my body as an object and wrap Ripple around it, it seems to take on different properties."
Dio raised a finger on his right hand and gathered Nen Aura at its tip, then directed Ripple toward it.
A dazzling golden light flashed!
Dio's Ripple naturally fused with the Nen Aura inside his body, turning the white Nen Aura gold. A golden current crackled around it.
Cheadle suddenly remembered something and asked:
"Have you tried Water Divination with your aura in this state?"
Her question reminded Dio that he really hadn't tried it. Perhaps his Nen category would change under these conditions.
He prepared another glass of water, placed a leaf on its surface, and used [Ren] on the glass again. This time, however, he carefully wrapped his Nen in [Sunlight Yellow Overdrive].
As before, the water turned gold. This time, however, its volume increased as well. Seeing this, Cheadle suddenly stepped forward, dipped a finger into it, and tasted it. Her eyes lit up as she said:
"Just as I thought, the water tastes sweet now. Your Nen currently displays the characteristics of three categories: [Transmutation], [Emission], and [Enhancement]."
"In other words, it's [Specialization]!"
The combination of Ripple and Nen had now displayed the properties of [Enhancement] and [Transmutation], in addition to his natural category, [Emission].
Dio's Nen now encompassed all three of the categories best suited to combat. That meant his future combat capabilities would probably soon surpass Cheadle's, even though she was also a [Specialization] user, since her abilities leaned more toward [Conjuration]!
"Dio, when you develop your Nen Ability, you should build it around Ripple. With properties this good, developing an Emission ability alone would be such a waste."
"All right! But there's one more thing I want to test."
As he spoke, Dio placed his hands on either side of the glass again. Amid his peculiar breathing, a crimson light wrapped around his Nen Aura.
Cheadle paused in surprise, then hurried forward to taste the water again-
"Ahh! That's so spicy!"
Cheadle hadn't expected the water to take on the spicy flavor she handled worst. For a moment, she actually cried out.
Hearing her reaction, Dio stepped forward curiously and tasted it too.
Hiss-not spicy!
Dio secretly sucked in a breath of cool air. He hadn't expected the change in flavor to be so intense this time, but it also confirmed his earlier guess:
"Different Overdrives display different properties, especially those two different forms of energy, [Sunlight Yellow] and [Scarlet]. By that logic, [Turquoise] and [Metal Silver] should have different properties too!"
"For now, I'll call this combination of Ripple and Nen [Ripple Nen]."
Cheadle then hurriedly gave him a few instructions about the [Mountain] training method before dashing off to find some milk.
Dio, meanwhile, was privately glad he'd just tested the combination of Ripple and Nen. He was actually far more familiar with Ripple than with Nen at this point.
If the two abilities had proved incompatible, he might have chosen to develop Nen for its greater potential and reluctantly abandoned Ripple.
But now it seemed that training Ripple not only caused no interference, it even strengthened his Nen. His next choice was simple.
Divide his attention and train Ripple and Nen simultaneously!
In fact, the two were compatible. Ripple training relied on breathing techniques, while Nen training relied on repeated bursts of [Ren]. There was no conflict between them.
With his goal set, Dio wasted no time resuming his day's training. He needed to keep familiarizing himself with [Ren] and [Ten].
Cheadle, meanwhile, hurried back to the medical university first. She still had plenty to do, including preparing the record of the previous Secret Court hearing.
Although Dio had served as the clerk at the time, Cheadle didn't think he could reproduce the record word for word after so much time had passed.
Rather than put Dio in a difficult position, Cheadle, who had possessed a photographic memory since childhood, quietly took on the task herself without mentioning it to him.
The greater one's abilities, the greater one's responsibilities. Hailed as a genius since childhood, Cheadle was already accustomed to shouldering more responsibility, even when she didn't need to do certain things herself, even when no one would appreciate her quiet efforts.
In that respect, Cheadle and Dio were actually alike: he had taken everything upon himself almost as soon as he arrived in this world, treating the elimination of wanted criminals as his own responsibility.
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