Looking at the potion before him, Kevin naturally planned to produce it. This was almost the most balanced and expected standard effect after these materials fused. Previous effects had been more vague.
To judge whether a potion's effect was powerful, the key was whether its description was clear. Though the description before him still seemed vague and abstract, among expressions of this type of potion effect, it was already quite clear. Anyway, once the potion was made, drinking a sip and experiencing it would reveal its power. If it didn't meet requirements, he could simply record it as a preparation method—that counted as experience.
In fact, such waste wasn't uncommon. Many potions Kevin had made during this time had strange effects, many useless. For example, potions that made you constantly fart, turned your skin red, or caused harmless allergic reactions. Just record them as experience.
Kevin adjusted his state, closed his eyes, took a deep breath, then placed his hands on the potion station base. His body instantly entered "Zetsu" state, and Nen continuously surged into the station. He saw the station spin rapidly—production time kept increasing.
Sweat, which hadn't appeared on Kevin's face in a long time, began to flow. It had been a long while since this happened when making potions—it only occurred in the beginning when his potential Nen was insufficient. The production process lasted about forty minutes before Kevin felt the station's Nen absorption gradually slow, then stop.
The station halted; materials on the tray had completely disappeared, and a potion tube appeared in the base hole. Kevin pulled it out—the liquid inside had distinct colors, off-white and dark black intertwined in a spiral pattern.
"B-class—it's undoubtedly B-class." Kevin made this judgment based on Nen consumed.
In Kevin's evaluation standards, potions requiring less than 10,000 Nen for production were C-class. Potions requiring more than 10,000 Nen up to 100,000 Nen, he considered B-class. After this period of training, his potential Nen was around 23,000 to nearly 24,000. This time, making the potion consumed about half his energy—meaning it cost over 10,000 Nen, just reaching minimum B-class standard. Therefore, this was undoubtedly a B-class potion.
"What exactly will this potion's effect be?" Kevin couldn't help but ponder.
He had made a potion using similar materials once before. However, last time he used shed antlers of a Double-Headed Wolf—just residual shells—and the gold-based petals were the most common variety, not the higher quality gold-patterned petals like now. The auxiliary materials were also ordinary purchases, with compatibility issues. Though he didn't take that potion, he witnessed the [Essence Sensing Potion]'s effect firsthand.
In that angry situation, Mito still remained calm, controlling his emotions to the extreme. From his fiery red eyes, one could see anger still existed, but emotions were firmly controlled—a very peculiar state. From this, Kevin deduced the potion tube in his hand was highly likely also closely related to emotion and will.
However, the specific effect would only be known after personally taking it. This time, no need for excessive frugality. After all, whether Double-Headed Wolf horn or petals, quantity was relatively sufficient. The wolf horn was palm-sized and solid—after grinding to powder, it could be divided into many portions.
The next day, early morning, Kevin arrived at the training ground. Pairo and Kurapika were actually earlier than him, already training on their own.
"Damn it, Pairo! Stop randomly changing what I see!" Kurapika shouted complainingly while running. Because as he ran, he would suddenly inexplicably flicker, or sharply turn a corner and run in a circle, or even be scared into suddenly stopping. And Pairo was actually following behind him with eyes closed, running crookedly while laughing. He was also trying to act with eyes closed.
"I'm training you. I already have the ability to construct illusions, so it's hard to guarantee others won't. And my illusion is only visual—it merely creates visual deception for your eyes. You can't rely solely on your eyes for observation."
Pairo was training his body while also training his Nen ability. His Nen ability was extremely easy to break through; using "Ren" could almost break it. So he had to resolve the battle when his initial modification of the enemy's illusion was detected—which meant modifying subtly and meticulously, like water moistening things silently.
Of course, this was hard on Kurapika—he could only endure the interference while persisting in physical training, which also counted as a unique training method.
"Uncle Kevin!" Kurapika spotted Kevin and waved. Pairo also opened his eyes and waved.
Kevin smiled and waved back, signaling them to continue. He walked to the training ground center, closed his eyes, and meditated silently.
This was a deep learning method he'd developed for himself. First, a period of meditation to clear his mind could effectively enhance his perception of potion effects afterward. To some extent, this strengthened his sensory abilities and reinforced subconscious judgment—simply put, strengthening his intuition. This was insight gained from long-term practice with potions.
As meditation deepened, the "Ten" on his body, uncontrollably, tightly wrapped around him, forming an eggshell-like object—airtight and motionless. This meditation lasted half an hour.
By then, Pairo and Kurapika sat in the rest area, quietly drinking water and observing Kevin's state.
"He's reached a level we can't understand," Kurapika murmured. Pairo nodded in agreement.
Suddenly, Kevin opened his eyes. A syringe appeared in his hand. He inserted the potion and directly injected it into his thigh.
The medicinal effect instantly spread throughout his body. With the syringe's enhancement, this perception became very obvious. After meditating to maintain clear mind and sharp intuition, this perception grew even stronger.
He could feel the potion's power instantly spread throughout his body, penetrating every corner. Then, most of the power gathered and surged into his brain. This indicated the potion's main effect targeted the brain.
With this perception, Kevin closed his eyes again.
Everything was pitch black, yet seemed somewhat unusual. With the potion's help, he sensed light spots in the distance—sources of others' emotions and will. Undoubtedly, Pairo and Kurapika—and Kevin hadn't used "Ren" to scan. He could even judge their good and evil emotions through this perception. These weren't emotions they emitted toward others, but toward Kevin.
Their clear goodwill made the two particularly prominent in Kevin's emotional perception after closing his eyes.
Kevin also sensed situations further away. However, the farther the distance, the blurrier the perception—he could only detect another light spot emitting goodwill approaching them.
At this time... Rosana? As the light spot neared, the door opened—Rosana walked in. She saw the scene, and from a distance, her son made a shushing gesture. Rosana nodded understandingly and quietly joined them.
This sensing distance was already considerable. Unlike "Ren," it didn't use Nen to scan. In other words, enemies couldn't detect this "scanning" behavior—allowing him to locate enemies without alerting them. Especially when enemies harbored malice, this will perception didn't shift based on their subjective thoughts. Even if enemies merely observed without other actions, they emitted emotions—good or evil.
This was very good. Kevin's intuition grew stronger with training, but intuition was intuition—without Ren, he couldn't know enemies' specific locations. Once he used Ren, it told enemies he'd discovered them, alerting them and losing the advantage of shifting from enemy hidden and him exposed to enemy exposed and him hidden.
"But the sensing distance still isn't far enough," Kevin thought.
Suddenly, an idea struck. He readjusted his "Ren," letting it spread outward like normal. Under normal circumstances, his Ren stopped after spreading 20 meters. But through this 20-meter extension, his will perception range instantly expanded countless times, forming a huge spherical will perception field that directly enveloped distant manor buildings.
Within this range, everyone emitted goodwill toward him—merely their own perception of good and evil manifesting. Those emotional perception signals of unknown origin moved around within Kevin's perception.
Kevin retracted his perception and opened his eyes.
He felt this potion's function should be more than just this—it definitely had other effects. Because he didn't feel any control over his emotions, meaning it lacked the ability to control one's own emotions like the [Essence Sensing Potion]. However, the emotional detection function he'd just experienced was indeed present.
He had seen Mito use a potion with similar effects—which was why Mito could still fight enemies accurately after having his eyes gouged out, during the potion's active duration. Kevin recalled the potion's description: "Nen will provide feedback and change based on the good and evil will of others and oneself."
How should this sentence be understood?
Kevin looked toward the rest area and beckoned. Kurapika and Pairo both pointed to themselves, asking if he meant them. Kevin nodded.
The two walked over.
"Uncle, is something wrong?" Pairo asked, confused.
Kevin nodded. "I'm going to use you two as test subjects for a bit—help me test my new ability."
Though confused, they nodded.
Kevin extended his Nen toward them. His Nen received feedback.
"Huh?" Kevin couldn't help exclaiming. Was this the kind of feedback he got?
This feedback was very peculiar, but combined with the Double-Headed Wolf's legend, he could understand why such strange feedback appeared. Simply put, after Kevin's Nen surged into their bodies, the feedback he received was actually a certain view of good and evil from the two. In layman's terms, Kevin could perceive the other party's values through this method. The closer the other party's values were to his, the more obvious the feedback—his Nen would become softer. The reverse also held true.
Could this be the ability the Double-Headed Wolf used to discern whether humans were benevolent? From the feedback, Pairo's values were similar to Kevin's, while Kurapika's values were even more "righteous" than Kevin's. Their values here were reshaped after experiencing the clan's annihilation. Pairo being similar meant he was once even kinder than Kevin; Kurapika was now even kinder and had stronger principles.
As expected, they were secluded youths from another world, untainted. Though Kevin didn't consider himself a great person, he felt he lived up to his parents' teachings and didn't fail society and teachers. With this ability, he could judge whether the two were heading toward extremes.
"Pretty good," Kevin thought. "Though this ability is strange, having more skills is never bad—and this is essentially functional, requiring no extra training or strengthening."
Having understood feedback of others' good and evil, how would his own feedback manifest? Kevin clenched his fist, injected Nen, and looked at the two before him. This look made them instinctively step back half a pace.
"Stand still. Let me hit you."
The two pursed their lips and widened their eyes. Though they knew Kevin wouldn't hit hard, they couldn't help feeling nervous.
Kevin gave them no time to react.
Suddenly, his fist flashed. Before they could respond, it landed on their stomachs.
"Uh—huh?" After taking the punch, they instinctively flinched, then scratched their heads confusedly.
"Didn't feel anything?" Kurapika puzzled. He could feel Kevin had used force, but there was no pain.
"Huh? My stamina recovered—like I didn't exercise at all," Pairo said in surprise.
Kurapika quickly checked and found the same change.
Kevin held his fist, suddenly understanding: So that's how it is. The punch carried no malice—purely goodwill. His Nen responded to this goodwill and, carrying the Nen, entered their bodies, restoring stamina.
After throwing this punch, Kevin understood its effect. Though not a "healing punch," it could definitely be called a "mana punch." Based on his goodwill, Nen provided corresponding feedback, restoring stamina and even relieving mental fatigue.
"What kind of ability is this?" Kurapika asked curiously.
Kevin didn't explain further and threw another punch. This time Kurapika took it solidly but only staggered—still no pain.
"Feel any change?"
Kurapika nodded, jumped a few times, and threw punches. "Uh... my punches are more powerful?" he said uncertainly.
Pairo simply approached and let him punch. They often sparred, so Kurapika threw one.
"Heavier than before," Pairo judged.
Alright, now confirmed. Kevin understood how his ability's effect unleashed.
Essentially, this was an Enhancement ability. A punch carrying goodwill allowed his Nen with Enhancement characteristics to merge into the other person's body, strengthening a certain characteristic. This strengthening was based on Kevin's own judgment—one punch could only provide one type of strengthening.
The degree of strengthening wouldn't be overly exaggerated, but would use Kevin's own standards as a reference. Enhancement-type Nen, even without Nen ability aid, naturally strengthened various body aspects. Otherwise, Enhancement wouldn't be called the type with the strongest offensive and defensive capabilities.
This goodwill punch could fully be called a "Strengthening Punch."
"Quite interesting." A smile appeared on Kevin's face as he looked at his fist, his interest greatly piqued. Though current strengthening effects weren't obvious—extremely limited even when using his Nen on a new Nen user like Kurapika—it was very interesting. And foreseeably, as his strength increased, the strengthening effect would improve. Especially when the strength gap between parties was larger, the effect might be more significant.
"What if I punch with malice? Will it, based on Enhancement characteristics combined with malice, make my attack more destructive?" Kevin thought.
Inferring from the opposite of the "Strengthening Punch," it should be like that. With malice, perhaps it could strengthen the punch's penetration, destructive power, or impact force.
Kevin walked to the sandbag area. With malice, he suddenly punched the sandbag. Though he couldn't completely control his emotions, he could consciously inject goodwill or malice.
"Bang!"
With one punch, a penetrating hole appeared in the sandbag's center. Sand flowed out. The sandbag didn't completely burst—this punch strengthened penetration. A punch carrying malice increased penetration ability.
"Amazing," Kevin couldn't help praising.
The potion's description seemed abstract, but actual effects when used were very unique. Some possibility of varying from person to person. Essentially, it achieved various effects by using good and evil will to carry one's Nen.
Most importantly, this ability was very compatible with him and required no extra effort to train or study. As his strength increased, the effects he could achieve would become more outstanding—whether the "Goodwill Punch" strengthening others or the "Malicious Punch" attacking others.
And...
Kevin looked ahead, his arm accumulating power. His Nen erupted, forming dense hexagons before his fist. Malice strengthened this punch's impact force.
"Ha!" He let out a loud shout.
Boom! With a sound of air exploding, the air visibly compressed into a circle, then spread out. The sandbag was directly sent flying, exploding mid-air. Sand rained down like drops.
Behind Kevin, Kurapika and Pairo stood rooted, mouths agape, staring blankly at the scene.
Patreon Seasay