Miles looked at his father and mother, running around the bed he was lying on. Evelyn had a frown on her face, while Malcolm couldn’t understand what was going on. He looked surprised, marveled, and dumbfounded. Miles looked at his body and felt the sheet he was lying on was was brownish-red in color. It felt sticky and smelled of heavy iron.

He tried to remember what had happened, but his head was fuzzy. He could only remember a day ago, he was there to use the fourth strengthening serum. Because his father and mother had insisted, he let them supervise him. But after the serum was injected into his body… all was blank. He could remember the pain crushing his bones, destroying his flesh. But, he was still very much awake at the time.

He was ready for those after all. He knew the serum would crush his bones and destroy his skin and muscles to rebuild him from the start. It was an overall betterment of the serum supplied. Although it hurt like hell, it was manageable thanks to the energy helping the recreation of muscles and bone tissues while mediating the pain.

But what came after it was hundreds of times more painful. Miles at first thought it was serum causing it. But he felt that the pain was originating from something else. When the pain started, it started to stress his bones and muscles. Because newly built muscles and bones were weak and tender, the stress was too heavy to shoulder. He was crumbling inside out and Miles felt like he was about to die.

Just when he thought he would die, a warm current originated from his heart and circulated his body. He wasn’t sure what had happened, but the feeling was similar to the Exaltedness of the Creator. The energy circulated in his body in such manner and tried to mend the opposite force, in doing so destroying it. When two powers clashed, he lost his consciousness and had just woken up.

“Mom, Dad,” Miles called the duo weakly. When they heard their son’s voice, the duo looked at him with relief.

“Mil, you are awake!” Evelyn threw herself over her son. “You are finally awake.” She said silently as if she was chanting to herself.

“Let the boy breathe, Eve,” Malcolm said from the side but he had a goofy smile on his face too.

“What happened?” Miles asked hardly. His mouth was dry and his voice was raucous. Evelyn grabbed a cup of water and helped Miles drink it.

“Where to start?” Malcolm and Evelyn looked at each other for a minute then Malcolm sighed. “What you did today was unprecedented. No one ever used the first Strengthening Serum before leveling up at least High-tier and lived, let alone higher-tiered Serums.

As for the last serum of the G-Series… Not even hunters at the peak of the Form-Rank would dare to use it on a whim. But today, you used that cursed medicine with nothing but your body.” Malcolm started. Miles already knew this much, but he also knew what caused him to hurt this much wasn’t the medicine.

“Medicine was still not that destructive. It was after all something meant to strengthen humans. If it wasn’t, it would have long vanished from the market.” Evelyn picked up from where Malcolm left and explained. “What really caused all that damage was your ancient gene, Miles.”

When Miles heard what his mother said, his eyes opened wide. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Could his ancient gene cause him this much damage? How was that possible? From the ancient text he found in the secret room, he learned that ancient genes had more than one way to awaken. The normal way was to use Superpower Serums, created by Mother AI. But according to the text he found, ancient genes varied too. In some cases, because of the potential of the ancient gene, regular superpower serums fell short to awaken the ancient genes.

The text explained it as a small and big rock. A small rock was easier to move but had little potential. Compared to the small rock, the big rock was harder to move and had enormous potential. The text said those who could not awaken their ancient genes with the superpower serum, could use Strengthening Serums to create a force that could move even the mountains. In the end, a superpower with great potential would be born.

Miles was expecting this to happen, but he wasn’t expecting his superpower to cause him harm. This wasn’t mentioned in the text at all.

“What happened?” Miles looked at his parents unquietly. Since his family is still wearing frowns and unsightly faces, there must still be something wrong with his body.

“I don’t know how to explain this, but as far as I understand the serum caused stress over your ancient gene. We had never seen anything like it before. It is like you took the process from the reverse. In normal cases, the person uses the superpower serum and after stabilizing the body and ancient genes to a certain point, uses the strengthening serum. By the time they use the fourth serum, they are already well merged with their powers and there are no side effects to speak of.

But in your case, you took the strengthening serums first, and when you reached for a cap, the ancient gene in your body reacted to it because it was dormant and never awoke.” Evelyn explained fervently. She lost her demeanor for a second and forgot that her son was still hurt.

“What does that mean?” Miles asked with trepidation. He felt something bad was going on.

“The strain must have jolted your ancient gene and awakened it. It was something we never think of. In an analogy it is like moving a rock—” She continued while Miles was looking at his mother with awe. She was indeed a genius. From a little amount of clue, she could gather so much information. “—your ancient gene is the big rock. Do you get it?”

“So, I have a superpower now?” Miles asked hopefully but the look on his parents made him realize he was wrong. Dead wrong.

“Miles—” Malcolm started, and Evelyn continued, “Although your ancient gene was a bigger rock compared to the others, the force you tried to move was enough to move the mountains. So when you applied that force to your ancient gene, it was like crushing rock with a giant hammer.”

Miles couldn’t open his mouth. He stuttered but no word formed. He couldn’t even think at this point.

“Your ancient gene got destroyed, Miles.”