Findings

'What happened?' I was in a room laying in bed. My motion of rising up was stopped by the pain. Through holes in my shirt, I could see bandages on my stomach.

"Hey! Is anyone there!" Considering they took care of me and saved me I didn't feel any danger.

Doors opened, a tall teenager opened the door, he had black hair like mine, I recognized his face.

"Hey, Luke."

"Leon?" It was my classmate.

"You feeling any better?"

"Yes. Thank you for saving me." It was obvious he saved me, also, I felt much worse than before since my adrenaline died down but I decided to not say it anyway.

"Good."

"How did you end up here?"

"Hungry?"

"Yea" I didn't eat for who knows how long.

"Here, let's talk while we eat." He stopped his motion of throwing me a can and gave it to me while helping me sit.

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We were talking for a good two hours. Short story long, he jumped out of the window when it all started and rushed in the same destination as me and Tyler, he was taking a break in the house I wanted to get in, he saw me outside and rushed to help me. After that bringing me here and bandaged me with bandage he found along the way.

"Sorry, I need to go to the bathroom" I was sleeping for ten hours and didn't have time since then to go.

"Need any help?" Leon was really a nice guy. Much nicer than anyone in the class, including me. He was the one closest to me wanting to be friends with.

"It's fine I can go alone." With a thankful face, I slowly made my way through the halls. It was a nice house, the modernized vintage theme was going around.

After I finished we went to sit in the living room since it was much better than that small room. There I saw something that piqued my interest.

"Holyy... Where did you find this?" Confusion and a small hint of excitement were inside my voice as I picked up something from a couch. There was a katana, like real katana of steel and all that.

"Hahaha. I got lucky, I found it in one of the houses I went to."

"Is it even legal to have something like this in your home?"

"Well... I'm not sure. The owner also had some other stuff, guess he was a collector"

"Did you take anything else from there?" I asked excitedly hoping there was something I could use.

"It's true there were other weapons, but I didn't take them, I was scared of being slowed down. Sorry" He said apologetically.

"It's fine, you don't have to be sorry about it. How far is that house?" Thought of having a real weapon in time like this was too alluring.

"Unfortunately It's one of the first houses I went to. It's too far away."

"Ehh... Nothing you can do about it. I have something else in mind to use as a weapon."

I decided on the same weapon as before. It's easy to make, quite strong, replaceable and I already got used to the wight, curtain holder. I mean... If it was proven already as a good weapon why not use it. One in this house was also made of hard and strong plastic.

"Wow, that's smart... Did you make that at the hotel too?" Said Leon surprised looking at sharpened plastic in my hand.

"Yea I did. Not sure about being smart, but this is a good quick to make weapon I'm sure about that."

I'm not gonna lie... I was quite proud of discovering this. It was much better than a chair, or glass since It has long-range. It's also easy to make. I'm bragging about it and I'm not ashamed of it.

"I just ran barehanded before finding the katana..."

"Hahaha, I would live throughout that if I could have a weapon like yours now."

"Now that you have a weapon, think we can go?" Leon changed to being a little more serious as he asked me.

"I don't think that's a good idea. Tomorrow I will be ready." I followed with a serious answer. I felt bad and useless while saying this. Truth to be told, I wouldn't be ready even tomorrow, but it would be much better than today I imagined.

I was hoping that Leon would stay, he seemed like a nice guy and he had the same goal as me. But. if he were to go now I wouldn't follow.

"That's fine." My serious thinking was stopped just like that. He just answered me with a laid back attitude like it didn't matter at all. I felt happy.

We were chatting for hours. We called our families, fortunately, both were good. But my Dad still wasn't home...

I realized something important, I forgot what was Leon's power, I knew of one power but saw two faces when I remembered it, one was of Leon. I didn't pay much attention to who was saying it rather what were they saying.

"Hey, what's your power? Sorry, I forgot, hehe."

"Lol, really you forgot? On the web, they called it a reinforcement. I can raise my power and senses but I can also increase defense of my skin or strength of my muscles."

"Dude that's a pretty good ability. When you raise your power don't you just raise the strength of your muscles and bones or something?"

"No. It's different. I can feel some infinite energy... I don't feel like it's Mana, but that just might be me though. I can use that infinite energy to reinforce skin or muscles and so on. But when I use that energy and think of my hand in general my strength in my hand grows higher and my punches does more damage."

It wasn't a perfect explanation, but it's not like he understands it perfectly either.

Throughout a day I tried to change the shape of layers on my hand. Before on the internet, it was called Layers, but now I wasn't sure how to call it. I got better at modifying it. I could prolong and sharpen rocks on my fingers to good 5-6 cm. The problem was I could only hold it for 20 seconds at max, after that I would feel exhausted.

I needed around 10-15 minutes to get back to my max stamina, and every time I recovered I felt like I could store a little bit more stamina, every time I got back to max strength I could extend rocks on my fingers for around 0.5 millimeters more, it changed sometimes.

'Wait, they say the weapon is an extension of your body right? Couldn't I cover my weapon in rocks than?' This was a very important discovery if I was right. Maybe I will never have to worry about breaking the weapon again. Immediately I grabbed my new spear.

'Layer' Thinking about using my ability I felt rocks connecting my hand and the spear. I opened my eyes, they were closed since it was easier to concentrate. There was a thin layer of rocks surrounding a small part of my spear where my hand was, but it also went a little bit outside of my grip.

'Yes! But why didn't anyone think of this?' It was a success, this felt much easier than sharpening my fingers, guess this was level down than that. I had a good base to work with, It really did feel like it was part of my body, and instead of extending the rocks It felt like covering my hand, but harder.

There was a small problem. I tried to let go of the spear... It didn't work. Next, I tried to split the layer connecting my hand with the spear. It worked, however, rocks on the spear dissipated after just a few seconds.

'This is slightly disappointing, It will be hard to maneuver in combat like this. But... it didn't dissipate immediately, will I be able to make it last longer not connected to my hand in the future? If I will, would I be able to make it stay permanently in the world? Then will people who got steel layers be able to produce an infinite amount of resources of steel in the future? There is still so much I don't know...' Information was most important in an unknown situation and I had almost none of it.

I got another idea of what to do. I grabbed the desk. I tried to use my ability.

'Wow... It actually worked.' It seems like it didn't work with just weapons, I could also make layers on other stuff.

"..."

"Can I use this on humans and monsters too?" This was a game-changer, I would be able to limit the movement of my opponents. Unfortunately, I knew I will have to face off against humans.

'Also, will I be able to modify layers I made on other stuff?' Concentrating on the thin layer on a wooden table I tried to do the same I did on my fingers. Nothing happened, except I couldn't breathe anymore.

'Huff. Huff. Mate, that's tooo tiring. But if I got tired that means I can do it, I just don't have enough stamina. Doesn't this basically mean that if I cover the ground in the layer I would be able to make defensive walls or spikes or stuff like that? Also, if it works on humans wouldn't I be able to make spikes going inside while they are covered in a layer? I really need to find out more... But for now, I need to rest... First I tested with my fingers than I tried spear and now this, I don't have enough energy for all this activity..."

I laid in a bed to rest for 15 minutes. It still wasn't time for sleeping and I also wanted to try layering Leon's finger. 'It's not harmful so it should be fine.' I thought

The rest was now over, I went to Leon.

"Hey, Leon. I wanna try something"

"Sure, whatsup."

I explained to him everything I found out, and also what I wanted to find out.

"Are you sure? I won't lose a finger or something" Leon was skeptical.

"I'm positive." I was sure it won't stay since I would die if it does.

He extended his finger unwillingly and I grabbed it before he could change his mind. Was I evil? I tried to cover it.

I started losing consciousness, my vision started to turn black and pain pierced my head, but I kept going.

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Only thing I saw was a drop of dirt before falling on the ground.