During those painfully-earned seconds, Kyon managed to take out the vial that he had prepared beforehand. With a swift movement, he poured its transparent contents into Martin's cup. Kyon had tasted a tiny drop to make sure the medicine was tasteless. The dosage was many times higher than necessary because Kyon wanted to be on the safe side and speed up the effect. According to Kyon's calculations, it was enough to numb a horse. Martin would pass out in less than a minute.

Martin put the toolbox on the table in front of Kyon and said defiantly:

«So, what would you say? I got these precious things from Flitz, my former master.»

Kyon smiled, took a sip from his cup, and took out the tools carefully, closely examining each of them.

Kyon was taking his time, and it annoyed Martin a lot. He sat on the chair with a heavy sigh and picked up his cup, wishing it was chamomile tea. The first sip struck him as strange, but he couldn’t concentrate on his feelings when Kyon exclaimed pretentiously:

«These tools are trash. I’m wasting my time.» - Kyon shook his head and sipped his tea, seconds away from choking at the vicious roar of the boss:

«Damn it, boy. Don't you dare insult my precious instruments! Tell me about your talents or I'll find out by myself!» - Martin's patience was wearing thin.

Kyon had to come up with something quick. {Why aren't you asleep?!}

Kyon remembered reading in the book that Martha had so generously brought to him about the the man with a unique body who could move mountains. He immediately began to list all his talents, exaggerating greatly and distorting the facts from the story.

«Uhm... What the hell are you talking about?! Are you playing a prank on me, boy?» - Martin drank his tea in one shot, dragged Kyon the collar from the table and threw him into the public chair.

Kyon was seized with panic. He had nothing to say, he knew nothing about this world. Martin would instantly smell a rat if he said something wrong.

«You have only wasted my time, and I hate it when someone wastes my time. Now let uncle Martin examine you.» - A spark of greed and excitement flashed in his eyes. He had been waiting for this moment for too long.

He put a spherical crystal to Kyon’s body and infused it with energy. A gentle wind made ripples in the air when the device buzzed quietly, ready to detect the slightest traces of hidden energy.

Kyon felt odd. The crystal attracted everything it approached like a magnet. Martin carefully ran the device over the nine key points.

When Kyon was about to panic, Martin yawned.

{Why does the medicine take so long to kick in? It's been more than a minute. What if he suspects something and calls the guards?}

Kyon had hidden his Synergy as deep as possible.

When Martin reached Kyon’s head, the crystal suddenly started glowing with a light azure light. Kyon felt the crystal sucking Synergy out of him like a vacuum cleaner.

«W-what is it?» - Martin opened his mouth in shock, but he couldn’t suppress another yawn.

Kyon took a calculated risk and stopped withholding Synergy. It rushed immediately towards the device. There was a soft ringing sound, and the solid rock crystal cracked. Martin stared at the broken tool in his hands. What the hell?

{Come on, you can't be so tough. More than two minutes have passed!} – Kyon glanced anxiously from Martin to the device.

Martin threw away the crystal and put on his glasses. His device could examine the body from the inside, through the bones. His movements were awkward. One earpiece wouldn’t get tucked behind the ear as if Martin was drunk. He explained his condition with excessive anxiety.

Finally, he solved the problem with the glasses and stared at Kyon's nose:

«The tenth element! What... What is it?! WHAT ELEMENT IS THIS?!»

Martin felt dizzy, his head spinning and throbbing. He squeezed his temples wearily. The 10th element had never been mentioned in the books or the legends, but the device couldn't lie: the10th key flickered faintly through Kyon’s skull.

There existed different subtypes of the elements, as well as modified ones, but their number never exceeded nine. It was impossible, simply unthinkable! The boy had a new, previously unknown element!

However, Martin didn’t have time to estimate Kyon’s value on the black market. The room started spinning too fast, black spots floating in front of his eyes, his ears clogged. It might be high blood pressure or overexcitement. It was such a stress, after all! Martin closed his heavy eyelids, trying to relieve dizziness. He couldn’t open his eyes again. Everything was fuzzy. He couldn't focus and figure out what was causing his condition. The sounds on the outside seemed to have slammed shut. It was so peaceful and quiet... He just wanted to have a little... rest. Just lie down for a second...

Martin staggered and fell to one side, not yet completely asleep but unable to control his body. The next moment he passed out. He had no idea that the day he thought to be the beginning of his triumph was, in fact, his last day.

Kyon breathed a sigh of relief. He felt like a hare that had made it into the burrow with the sound of the clanking predator jaws.

Martin was a hard nut to crack. He was too powerful. That’s why it took so much time before the sedative had taken effect.

Fortunately for Kyon, Martin was too excited and didn't notice that he was beginning to doze off. He blamed his weariness for emotions and a sleepless night.

Martin was snoring peacefully on the floor, unaware of the fierce fire in Kyon’s eyes, the boy that he thought was worth a fortune. Kyon knew everything about the human body. Among other things, he knew how to kill without leaving visible physical injuries.

He turned Martin's body onto the back, got a pulse on his neck and clamped the carotid artery. It ceased the flow of blood to the brain. In a few minutes, the irreversible effect was to begin.

The seconds of suspense dragged into a long minute. All of a sudden, the strong hand grabbed Kyon's wrist lightning fast.

Dumbfounded, he continued to squeeze the artery with all his might. He couldn’t understand how Martin had come to his senses. His thin bones were desperately cracking under the iron grip. His arm was about to break, but Kyon wouldn’t ease the pressure.

Martin's eyes opened slightly, his blurred gaze unsuccessfully tried to focus on the murderer. His consciousness was in oblivion, that’s why he used only 30% of his physical strength, which was almost enough to break the boy's bones.

It was a crucial moment. Martin's eyes closed and never opened again. His weak hand fell to the floor with a thud. It was the end.

Kyon could barely stand. If he had not blocked the pain, he would have screamed, attracting the attention of the guards outside.

It was his first murder that wasn't a simulation.

Now he had to make it look like an accident. It took him a great effort to drag the dead body behind the rack that separated the room. He took the bun Mob had given him the other day and stuffed a piece right into Martin’s throat, the other piece went in his hand. It looked like he had choked. Of course, the autopsy would show that Martin had died of an ischemic stroke, but Kyon needed some obvious cause of death for the guards. Otherwise, they would kill him on the spot without sorting things out. At the time of death, there were only two of them in the office. However, Martin could possibly choke on the dry bun due to profound cerebral hypoxia.

It was supposed to look that Martin choked on his favorite bun (isn’t it ironic!) that he always had stashed a plenty. Who knew that today there would be no buns in the diet of the boss... It was pure luck that Mob had so timely decided to woo the boy (or rather, Martha) with his gift.

Kyon had to swallow the empty vial. He couldn’t leave any evidence behind.

It was a curious scene: a corpse lying on the floor, and Kyon sitting in the armchair, sipping his tea and leafing through a book.

{It's high time.}

Kyon didn't know that the signal of Martin’s death had reached the headquarters, but it didn’t matter anyway.

He came to the door, cleared his throat and yelled like a madman:

«Help! He is suffocating! Suffocating!»

The two guards rushed into the room, pushing each other. They stared in horror at Martin, who was blue in the face, clutching at his throat.

«Oh, shit! Quick, give him CPR!» - exclaimed the guard who ran in first. He staggered back and nearly knocked over his colleague.

«Do it yourself! I'll call the doctor!» - The second one weaseled out of it.

The first one tried to get to the lifeless body. He started chest compressions, his fingers interlocked. A piece of bun flew out of Martin's throat like a cannon.

«It doesn't help! Damn it! Damn it!» - He pressed his ear to Martin's chest, trying to feel the heartbeat and whispered, scared: - «He is dead...» - He turned to Kyon, who was standing frozen nearby, and shouted: - «Why the fuck didn't you cry out for help at once!? Fucking bitch!»

Their wrath was righteous. If Martin was dead, they would be fired at the very least, no matter how it had happened. However, Kyon didn't have much sympathy for these two. - {They shouldn’t have kicked Rogash.} But he had to finish the game:

«I was sitting behind this chair and couldn’t hear a thing! When he had been silent for too long, I decided to take a look!» - He muttered in a whimpering voice. Kyon pointed to the chair that was turned back to Martin. He couldn't possibly see what was going on in the background. He had also moved the body further, behind the rack to get the story straight. Everything was above board.

The second guard had already called Martha:

«Emergency in the formation department! You have a life to save!»

«Coming!» - Martha immediately responded to the call. She didn't panic, just packed the necessary instruments and medicine as quickly as possible (a professional always keeps such things in the right place) and rushed to help. When she was on the way, she remembered about the bad feeling Kyon kept telling her about. {Is he a prophet or something?}

The guard had initiated the resuscitations: a pathetic imitation of artificial respiration and indirect heart massage. He was desperately clinging to the vague hope of bringing his boss to life.