Chapter 3: Development

A month passed by.

All around me was water. I sold half of my possessions and managed to buy an island by the coast of Africa. It was bountiful and filled with greenery and wildlife, but I immediately had the island cleared off of any wild animal, insect and vegetation.

I didn't want to shoot myself in the foot by letting the enemies thrive in my base.

Of course, in the cases where there were semi-mutated monsters, I killed them with my bolt skills. Thankfully, the skill tree had constant skill point requirements and didn't exponentially increase when levelling one skill. If it costs 10 skill points to unlock, it also constantly requires 10 skill points to level.

My neutral Bolt skill was already level 5, spending 25 skill points. Each of my elemental bolts were already level 5, allowing me to fight those with certain elemental affinities. At the same time, I wanted to unlock the 2nd tier skill that required all elemental bolts unlocked, which was named Elemental Maelstorm, an AOE skill. This was quite beneficial in the future.

My clones were already doing their respective tasks, making the daily tasks easy and simple to complete. So far in the past month, I have released an additional 5 clones, all of which are there to aid the day-to-day functions of my properties as well as businesses.

Of course, in the past month, news about people awakening with superpowers appeared, so I was able to chuck off their suspicions against me as my power, which was "cloning", as that was what seemed to appear.

I immediately hired people to create a fortress for the next 1 month, paying them for overtime and yet making sure nothing was being short-changed, he hired the very best rather than the cheap ones from China or SEA companies. Although they made beautiful structures, what I needed was sturdiness and protection.

As I waited for the construction to be over, I was travelling all over the world, specifically in the Amazon forest and the Sahara desert.

---

In the Amazon forest

A gigantic beast could be seen surrounded by several people, all with their weapons and respective powers.

"Everyone, the beast is almost dead, persevere!"

""""Yes!""""

As they responded, they were launching their attacks towards the towering beast in harmony and with rhythm, as if there was a musical piece playing around them and guiding their every move. However, it was more of a coordinated teamwork, teamwork forged in just a month.

So many things happened in just one month.

The series of events that occurred in that fateful day, and the people affected awakening superpowers.

This team was considered to be an elite team formed by the strongest countries, with the United Nations controlling the overall situation. From a mere coalition of countries who wants peace to a coalition of people with strong superpowers, the UN became a symbol and at the same time, the manifestation of power in Earth.

Of course, countries not in the UN also had their own people with superpowers. Even terror groups had their own people with superpowers.

Going back. The people in right now in the Amazon were considered to be a group of trained elites with superpowers, or "Espers". These espers received basic, intermediate, and expert training concerning fighting, ambushing, and even assassinating based on their superpowers.

Now, as they were fighting against the beast, it didn't just lay low and served its life on a platter; rather, it fought back.

Immediately, it roared, as if calling out for blood. However, in that single roar, the harmony was disrupted, as one of them immediately fainted, afflicted with the beast's ability.

Yeah. Sadly, beasts that mutated also gained powers, but retained their primal instincts. in the past month, more and more cases of wild animals turning into mutated ones continued to rise, as well as majority of the known household pets were also changing, with some gaining wisdom and sentience.

"Damn it, cover your ears! Don't repeat #23's mistake!"

"""""Yessir!"""""

These group of people knew how to use their equipment properly, even producing a set of earplugs from their suits that perfectly fit each one of them. The leader immediately got #23's body away from the beast's range and replaced her position.

The beast became agitated. It immediately attacked once again, using its claws that were now glowing. Of course, seeing this, the people surrounding the beast immediately backed off, but not before one of them got grazed by the claws. Immediately, the arm of the person began to emit a sizzling sound. The person beside him immediately cut off the rest of the arm, and froze it, making sure no blood loss occurred.

The man nodded in thanks and continued their long-ranged assault.

After a while, the beast was at its last throes of life. However, before they finally managed to kill it off completely, a man appeared from the sky, surrounded with bolts of different colors, which immediately launched towards the beast, ultimately killing it.

Upon landing, the man caused the body to be smashed into bits, causing the man's expression to change a bit, before responding,

"Oh. Damn."

The man somersaulted in the air before perfectly landing upward and facing the encirclement of the the espers. He nodded at them and immediately left the premises, just before collecting the remains of the beast.

Of course, this man was no other than Paolo.