9 CH 9

Giving a nod to Mr. Varner, Edythe gracefully came up next to me and sat with me on the desk. I gave a smirk at her actions before leaning over to her and whispering, "Never knew you were such a genius."

"Lets just say I know a few things about a lot of things and leave it at that" Edythe said before poking me playfully on the arm "Anyway, if it was not for you, I would never have showed off like this to let hem agree to my schedule."

She then seemed to think about something else before continuing, "My brother on the other hand wouldn't even have needed to show off, he would probably just charm the female teachers and get their help. I dislike such methods, hence my need to show off to get my way."

I felt a bit uneasy when she talked about charming people "Well I am glad you are not using your looks to charm the teachers. Showing off is more preferable than that."

"Oh, is someone being jealous thinking that I would act like that?" Edythe said with a teasing smirk.

Though she said it teasingly, her remark made me realize that it could be true and I might really be feeling jealous "You know what, I think you are probably right. I might have been feeling jealous and envious when imagining you flirting with the teachers like that."

"Oh, um, okay." Edythe said with a surprised expression.

My unexpected confession that I might have been jealous put a brake on her rhythm. Shaking her head slightly, she gave a light punch to my upper arm, while shifting closer to me at our desk.

We were now sitting extremely close to each other, my senses extremely aware of her closeness and the slight amount of contact our skin would have every time we shifted in our seats.

My whole body felt as if there was an inferno burning right underneath my skin, struggling to get free every time our arms or legs touched.

This feeling continued for the rest of the day, as I saw that Edythe had really managed to convince the authorities to make her schedule mirror mine.

She even joined me for lunch, though she barely ate anything, a few pieces of fries and a sip of soda at the most.

She also informed me about various things I had missed. Apparently, Tyler Crowley, the one who nearly killed Bella with his van, had also joined Bella's Lost Puppy Fan Club, just like Eric and Mike.

He could see him vying for her attention through his stalking, similar to Mike and Eric, who had apparently redoubled their efforts.

-x-x-x-x-x-

My life fell into a routine with that, going to school, meet with Edythe, spend the day in boring lessons, spend some time after school with Edythe before coming back home.

The only difference was in my practice schedule for my power. Since Edythe was no longer living with me, it gave me time to focus on practicing my powers.

I used the basement of my house, while also stocking it with weights and machines for physical training. I had an intuition that my powers would be more powerful based on how good my base physique is.

The next few weeks saw an increase in my affinity with my powers. I was able to coat my whole body in any of the basic materials I tried in just a few seconds.

If I was in a rush, it was possible for me to coat any part of my body which is touching the material in just a few milliseconds, but the area covered would be limited due to the rush job.

For eg: I tried instant transformation of my arm while holding a piece of rock and I was able to transform up to my upper arm in an instant. But after that my progress would slow bit by bit until in a few seconds pass for my whole body to be covered.

Honestly, the restriction of a few seconds was not a major restriction, as even the fastest animal in the wild would take more than a few seconds to attack me fatally.

Someone, would have to be right next to me to be able to hurt me fatally in the span of a few seconds, or have the ability to move faster than the wind. I also gained a basic mastery in healing myself with my transformation.

MAMMOTHS had mentioned that material control will let me patch myself up while in transformed state, and it turned out to be a miraculous ability. No matter of I am cut, bruised, have broken bones or torn muscles, I was able to repair and recover from all of them in under a minute.

I had not yet tried regrowing any part of my body like gouged out fingers or cut off finger sand limbs. But I was confident that after my powers grow more, I will be able to regenerate lost parts of my body too, becoming really hard to hurt or kill.

However, there was also a downside or limitation to my ability. While the transformation is negligible in energy cost, healing and recovering takes a decent chunk out of my stamina and mental energy each time.

I was sure that regeneration would take up just as much, if not exponentially more. Hence there was only one way to do it, make my base physique stronger.

I trained like crazy, pushing my body beyond limits everyday, abusing my transformation and healing to recover and develop faster than any scientist would have thought possible for a human. But then again, I doubted I was one anymore.

After one month, I realized that there was a qualitative change in my physique. Due to repeated transformation and healing of my body which had been nearly run ragged each day, my muscles and bones had somehow absorbed some of the transformation energy to evolve.

My body which was becoming bulked up due to my training, started to slim up and become more aesthetically pleasing. My muscles had somehow condensed and combined to evolve my body to something more than human.

This transformation had increased by body's strength, speed, perception, stamina, durability, and even natural strength and healing.

A quick test had showed that I could handle over 300 pounds of weight easily now, something which had nearly taken all my strength to just endure for a few seconds with my earlier physique.

This transformation of my base body was a pleasant surprise, as it also exponentially increased the power of my material transformations. I finally could transform my entire body within a second.

However it was currently limited to solid and durable materials, like steel or wood. Semi-solid or liquid materials were still hard for me to execute even partially.

Exploring the functions of MAMMOTHS after my physique upgrade gave me another pleasant surprise. Any material, which I have successfully performed a full body transformation with, will be registered as a permanent signature/sample in MAMMOTHS.

This sample will allow me to transform in that material even if I don't have it anywhere around me. However, as a limitation to using a sample, the speed of transformation will be slower compared to transforming using actual material on hand.

I continued my daily practice routine without a single deviation on any day. My new powers and body had only given me more motivation to master my powers. Who knew what else is hidden inside me and what my limits are?

-x-x-x-x-x-x-

"Hey Krishna, what are your plans for the spring dance?" Edythe asked me one day as we hurried to the school building to escape the pouring rain.

The weather had turned snowy a few weeks ago, but had reverted back to rainy since then. We entered the building first and shook of rain water from our coats before walking towards our class.

"Well, I honestly don't have any experience in dancing" I admitted "Never had a girl ask me out either. Hence, I was thinking I would just skip it maybe."

"Well, what if I asked you out?" Edythe asked after a little while while glancing at me.

"I would be honored to accompany you Edythe Cullen" I said with a smile "But honestly I am hopeless at dancing, you will have to train me if you don't want me to embarrass you in front of your family."

"Deal, we will have an hour of practice everyday after school." Edythe as she took the initiative to hold my hand "I suppose it means we are kind of going out now?"

"Sure, but I think it is a moot point by now, don't you think? Nearly the entire school already believed without a doubt that we were going out." I pointed out to her, earning a small chuckle.

"True, but I am kind of old fashioned sometimes" Edythe admitted with a grin "I like to make things official, especially if I am going to commit to a relationship."

"Believe it or not, this is the first time I have been in a relationship. Hence, making things official kind of helps me relax my nervousness." Edythe said, a shy tone creeping up in her voice.

"Hey, its fine Edythe." I assured her while gently squeezing her hand "Believe it or not this is a first for me too. I guess we will just look what future has in store for us together."

"Ya, I guess we will" She admitted with a smile.