“Ahhh!!” in the midst of meditating Kadyn howled in agony. Cyan light emitted from his right hand, but he didn’t seem to notice, as his eyes were closed and the body was covered in sweat, trembling. 

However, when he opened his eyes, when his pain alleviated somewhat, he was shocked beyond words. His hand that was completely normal sometime before, had morphed into a claw. Covered in red scales, cyan light was emitting from the cracks on the scales, and the fingers were no more fingers, they had turned into pincers of crab, and his hand had turned into a dragon claw.

Kadyn wiped the sweat out of his forehead and fell on his butt as he tried to intake long-deep breaths — to calm himself. After that, he examined his hand. He could feel that it had become a lot stronger, but that was exactly the cause of his concern. Why did his hand morph into something like this? Why did it become stronger? He had no idea. He felt a creepy feeling, his heart was screaming, his body was spasming, but he could do nothing, he knew nothing. 

He looked at his hand and clenched it into a fist, a cracking sound came. He could not tell how strong it had become, but he felt a frightening strength from within. After that, he sighed and stood up.

When he walked out of his meditation chamber, it was already morning. The rain had just stopped. He looked at his hand and wrapped a white cloth on it. He didn’t want to show it to others until he didn’t find what was going on. Was it a curse or something else? He didn’t know, but he knew that this change might scare others, so he decided to hide it for the time being.

Kadyn thought for a moment and then went towards the house. It was around 6 o’clock in the morning, and everyone was already up. Rayna was cooking, and Elora was helping her. Zelie and Cecelia were talking to each other while Nefia was sitting at the corner of the hall, her head on Slyff’s shoulder. Others were also present.

They turned towards the entrance as soon as he appeared. “What happened to your hand?” asked Khrom abruptly, attracting everyone’s attention towards Kadyn’s hand.

“Oh, it’s nothing,” Kadyn said, as he settled on a couch. Then he looked towards everyone and said. “I have decided something.”

Everyone looked at him. He proceeded. “I have decided to revoke the Hall of Formation and turn it into a Hall of Intelligence.” His gaze roamed on their curious faces, then said. “As you know you can only earn energy points by working for the shop. However, someone like Slyff doesn’t have talent like potion-making, nor could he forge artefacts. So he would have a much harder time to earn them as compared to Elora and even Dion. That would affect your growth.”

When he saw the contemplative look on their faces he continued. “Other than the Hall of Intelligence, I have decided to open a restaurant.”

“A restaurant?” Everyone eyed him with incredulous looks.

Kadyn smiled before explaining. “As you know our shop is in the Food Market, it would be weird if we don’t have anything to do with food.” Kadyn chuckled when he saw a confused look on their face. “Actually, the main reason I want to open a restaurant is because it would let sister Rayna earn energy points.”

“Huh?” they ogled at him, so he didn’t maintain the suspense and went on. “As you know that selling potions and artefacts lets us earn energy points, don’t you think that we can do the same with the restaurant.”

“Wow, you are right,” their eyes shone in understanding. They all have become his employees so he needed to make a way to let them earn energy points so they could read more books inside the library and enjoy all the facilities that the shop had to offer.

“Other than that,” he said. “You can also work in the medicine field, and if other halls need some helpers, you can also work for them. Of course, you will earn energy points for everything you do.”

“But why did you decide to close the Formation Hall?” Cecelia asked. “Weren’t you learning formations?”

“Well,” Kadyn scratched his head in embarrassment before blurting it out. “After many trials and errors, I realised that the formation master profession isn’t for me. I couldn’t learn it.”

“Well…” no one knew what to say when they looked at his red face.

“Tada! Breakfast is ready!” At this moment a voice came from behind them. Elora and Rayna were driving a trolley on which they were carrying food.

Kadyn turned around and a deep frown appeared on his face. “What happened to your hair?” he asked, as he saw Elora’s hair were of a different colour.

“Oh, this,” Elora said as she caressed her green hair gently. “This happened in the morning.”

“What happened in the morning?” Kadyn frowned.

“Uh, I mean when I woke up my hair had already turned green.”

“What?” Kadyn opened his eyes wide and his mind instantly drifted towards the change in his hand. ‘Does her change is similar to mine, or am I overthinking?’

He wanted to ask more, but he didn’t think that it was convenient to talk about it in front of everyone, so he decided to find Elora later. “What happened to your hand?” asked Elora when she noticed a white cloth wrapped around his hand.

“Oh, it’s nothing, ” Kadyn said. “I got a little injured when I was practising.”

“Show me,” Elora hurriedly went to him. “I will heal it.”

“No, let’s have breakfast first.” Kadyn didn’t wait for her to finish and sat at the dining table. Everyone found it weird when Kadyn rejected Elora’s offer. If he was really injured, shouldn’t he let her heal? But then they shook their heads and started to eat breakfast.

When they were done, Kadyn looked at his sister and said.. “We need to talk.”