Speculations

Toby woke up, transitioning from sleepy to awake rather quickly as he circled around Maximus. It was Milo the cat which was still not waking up. It let out a deep meow then went back to sleep, the fat on his body moving visibly when it breathed. Everytime Maximus tried waking it up the cat would show its head, let out a meow, then go back to sleep. It was roughly twenty minutes later that Maximus left the room with Toby walking behind him and Milo on his shoulder. Still sleeping.

Maximus held a device in his pocket as he went out on a walk. It was made by Seraphina, who said it would block every camera in a radius of one kilometer. He had no idea how it worked as he was still new to the technology of this world.

Putting food in the personal bowls of both pets, he watched as the sleepy Milo slowly opened his eyes. It looked like he only had food and sleep in his life. Just in ten minutes they both finished their food then he left the home with them in tow. Evelyn gave him a glance as she watched him leave with the pets.

When he reached a crowded enough area, he turned on the device. If the device gave out any signals when it turned on, he hoped whoever tracked it would be confused by the crowd. With his mind empty, he began thinking about the glance with Evelyn gave him earlier and realized,

'Wait, does she know about their awakening?'

Now walking his pets to a not-so-crowded place, he bent down and asked them in an extremely hushed voice, not expecting to get any answer but was surprised,

"Did any of you show your ability to Evelyn?"

And his two pets looked his way for a second then shook their heads. Raising an eyebrow, he thought, 'Does awakening abilities and turning into a supernatural being enhance the brain? Or what they call 'spirituality' in those novels?'

Taking advantage of the situation he kept asking in an extremely low voice,

"Does she know about your increased intelligence?"

This time both of his pets just kept tilting their heads, realizing something, he asked,

"You are not sure?"

They nodded. 'That seems like trouble. Well, I'll deal with that later.'

"Let's see how much your intelligence has increased, if I teach you signs and what to do in certain situations, can you remember them?"

They nodded. 'Wow, I can work with them in certain situations then.'

"Can you read?"

They nodded.

"Can you write?"

This time they both nodded and later showed one of their paws and tried wiggling their fingers. He quickly got what they were saying,

"You can write but your body limits you?"

They nodded. 'Well, that's not a problem. From what I've seen so far, maybe Seraphina will have a gadget for such a thing.'

"Alright, you both are good. Come, let's use your abilities for something."

This time he walked them over to a completely empty alleyway. It was completely deserted, with even the buildings on its sides mostly empty as the residents were moving out. Apparently someone had bought this land and was going to completely restructure it.

"So Milo has fire ability and Toby has water ability, correct?"

They shook their heads. This time Maximus was surprised again. He wanted to ask what else but realized it wasn't a question they could respond to, but he still asked, what if they could surprise him again?

"What else can you do?"

Both of them had different reactions, Milo kept tapping at the ground while Toby waved his paw around in the air. Oh well, they definitely did surprise him again, he cross checked with them to make sure,

"So Milo, you can also control the earth? And Toby, can you also control the air?"

Both of them nodded their heads.

"Anything else?"

Both of them shook their heads. Now that he knew everything, he began instructing them.

"Milo, look at that paper, try burning it. And Toby, you will put out the fire with your water, alright? Just like the first time when Milo burned my beer can and Toby put out the fire quick enough that nothing around it burned."

But this time, even after staring at them for ten seconds, both of them didn't even move an inch. He even looked at the paper, wondering if they don't need to use their body to shoot elements from their paws and can simply manifest it anywhere?

But nothing happened. He looked at them and asked,

"You can't?"

Both of them shook their heads. Now he was confused. He could definitely use his ability more than once when he awakened Reality Manipulation for the first time. After pondering about it for nearly twenty seconds, he remembered about the warning Seraphina had given them.

'Wait!!! Could it be that that thread is really the reason I can recover naturally and they can't?'

He looked at them with a frown, during which both of them shifted around nervously. But he wasn't thinking about them.

He asked, "Did any of you use your ability at all after that first time?"

Both of them shook their heads.

Something was wrong, he couldn't point it out. He grabbed his hair, ruffling it roughly and moving about in the alleyway. He couldn't even register the pungent smell which he inhaled when he accidentally walked near to something and kept walking around randomly, completely lost trying to think or search for something. Finally something striked, causing his eyes to go wide.

'Wait wait wait, yes, I could definitely use my ability more than once when I first awakened it. And when Seraphina reminded us, she said not to use our ability. So it means our 'fuel' won't keep going down right? It would just stay as it is when we don't use our abilities, definitely not empty itself with time.

'So does that mean I am using a different 'fuel' and they are using some other 'fuel'? Are my pets using the same 'fuel' as me but can't use their ability because this 'fuel' is the one which is affected by that 'thread'?

'Wait, that brings about a lot of different points into the picture.'