The Strange Secret Unraveled By A Suspicious Peer

"I am Aiden, a student of the academy, and I will expose the truth behind Nathan, right now."

"You want to do what..?" Nathan inquired, confused from this whole situation, "In the training hall?"

At this point, everyone was starting to notice and gather around the four of them, and that included Athena and Thomas.

"He must've purposely chose the training hall in order to do this, since he most probably wanted you to witness this too."

"What do you mean "you're gonna expose his secret"? What secrets could a guy like him be hiding?"

"Hm? Is he really hiding something?"

"Wouldn't the instructors have found out by now if he was actually a threat though?"

"Hm? Aren't all of you suspicious? Nathan's sudden change in his personality and appearance, alongside the fact that he lost his memory somehow."

"That's…"

Some of them began to suspect Nathan, but it also turned out that most of them were suspicious of him from the beginning.

"Who knows, he could even be linked to the appearance of the Titan Beast roaming around-"

"That's not true!" Athena yelled, "That's basically impossible, since Titan Beasts are known to be anomalies that exist with only one purpose, which is to erase all life."

"We also can't rule out the fact that he may have come into contact with a spirit, in exchange for giving him power, he might've gave them his body in return."

"That.. could actually be true.."

They were slowly being convinced by him that he had hidden intentions, as Aiden's claims strengthened their suspicions further.

"Wait! How can you say all that without any evidence!"

"Well, your appearance did change, and.."

"Yeah, it sorta adds up."

"Don't tell me..! All of you are actually getting convinced by false accusations..! Nathan is my friend, he would never do that," Luna said, "How do we know that you aren't doing this just because you have a grudge against him!" She continued, as she pointed at Aiden.

He sighed.

"Anyway, I hope to sort this out today, and the only way we can do that, is by battling, right here, right now."

The crowd surrounding them cheered.

"Huh? But what about the crowd, wouldn't they be affected?"

"That's impossible, almost every single one of us has received a blessing from the Celestials."

He grinned, but it disappeared after a second, this guy definitely had a plan in mind.

"If he isn't, then he won't mess up and reveal his true identity and he'll get to go free, but if he is, then he'll no longer be a qualifier, and he'll get kicked out the spaceship."

"Fuck.. what am I supposed to do now?" Nathan whispered, "It's obvious that they won't let me go, so am I supposed to fight and get myself killed?"

"Fine.. I'll do it."

Anxiousness overwhelmed him, as he was incredibly scared of death, but there was literally nothing he could do.

"Nathan!" Luna shouted out of frustration, slightly confused that he actually accepted.

"Then, let's start."

They both stood on opposite sides of the room, and the crowd grew even larger, with more people hoping to see this fight that looks as if it was going to be one-sided.

Aiden pricked his finger, which bled into the ground, and that single drop of blood swirled and spread, and somehow turned into a large pool of blood.

"He can manipulate blood..!"

"My ability, Sea of Blood, allows my body to have a near infinite source of blood, so I don't even need to worry about running out."

That alone made Nathan despair even more.

From that pool of blood, emerged a humanoid being.

Nathan clenched his hand, it seemed like he was really going to die today.

Aiden lifted his hand and waved it slightly at Nathan, and it flung itself at him.

He just narrowly avoided the incoming attack.

"It seems you can't do anything without your power, and even before, you couldn't even access you inner core energies, but a crazy person you still managed to pass, heh, I guess they just accept anyone, huh!?"

Aiden lifted the finger that he pricked, and mimicked himself shooting finger guns, but, this time it was really shooting bullets, which were also really just blood bullets.

He very narrowly was able to avoid most of the shots, but some still managed to hit him.

The bullets hurt less than he imagined, but the pain was still immense.

"I'll make you pay!"

The humanoid blood monster attacked him from behind, surprising him and allowing Aiden to land some more hits.

"Nathan, try and utilise the inner core energies in your body by focusing and bringing it out! Even though you won't be able to do it properly, it's worth a shot!"

"She's trying to meaninglessly interfere, even though their efforts will go to waste, for after the end of this battle, something terrible will happen to him."

His options were extremely limited, and he could only try to bring out his inner core energies and gain the attention of a Celestial for only a few seconds at a time, as he also had to deal with the attacks coming from Aiden.

He tried to imagine himself pulling out something from within his body, and somehow, it worked.

Finally, after suffering major damage from Aiden's attacks, he focused, and finally saw a small light.

He caught a glimpse of an near microscopic, mysterious, glowing golden orb floating around him.

"I'm.. going to faint soon, but as long as I can land one good hit, I'll be more than satisfied."

He slowly turned around, and noticed a small trail of light around himself, and he thought he was hallucinating for a moment.

Then, he noticed that time had stopped, no, rather, it had slowed down significantly.

"What even is this?"

He tried to grab the trail of light, but unexpectedly, it phased through his hand.

"What is this, a human? A mere human has managed to breach the Infinite Sea of Consciousness?"

He looked up, only to see.. eyes, these eyes seemed to have been watching the entire universe, searching for something.

He was unnerved, but he also felt like most of them meant him no harm, they were friendly, most of them, at least.

Staring into each and every one of these eyes, it was like they secretly told him that they contained the essence of the universe, essentially meaning that they were born the same time as the universe, and held the answers to all questions pertaining to the universe.

If he was to stare into any one of these eyes for too long, he would find himself lost within those eyes, that contained the boundless void, and could erase his consciousness in a second.

"What are you?" He asked, "Are you..?"

"We are Celestials." When he heard their overpowering, godlike voices for the first time, Nathan actually thought that he died again.

He blinked, and suddenly, all the other eyes had disappeared, and only one eye was left, and the space around him started to transform.

Until, he found himself standing on a golden palm, with two eyes looking straight at him.

The pupils of those eyes resembled the night sky, and the stars that shined bright.

"I cannot believe that a weak human like you could speak to me.. very few have come into contact with me, for everything and everyone that had received my blessing is bound to change the entire universe, one way or another."

For some reason, the Celestial was arrogant, which Nathan thought was unlike their beautiful voice.

"Who.. are you?"

"I am Astrayla."

"The Celestial Lady Who Wanders Space, one of those many beings that ascended from birth and became a Celestial."

"Then.. could you.. give me some power, please?"

He would beg if he had to, because he needed this power to defeat Aiden.

"Hmph. Usually, I would, but it seems like the influence of the [Everlasting Gods] has also reached you, which stops you from using your own power."

"Alongside that, I also cannot interfere with this world directly as it would count as "breaking the rules", so there is not much that I can afford to do."

"..Do you mean the fact that I can't use my inner core energies due to a disability, or something like that?"

"Take it however you wish. But, still, I guess there is something that I could do."

"You have most definitely peaked my interest due to the nature of your soul, I feel, no, I know that you are not of this world, I wonder, if I was to give you a relic of mine, maybe one from an ancient Era, how would you change the world?"