Chaos Heir

Garret held back a sigh while his eyes scanned the intricate report scrolling on his console. Data belonging to dozens of features flowed through his vision each second, but nothing escaped his attention.

The gasps and loud comments inside the lab tried to distract Garret, but his concentration never faltered. He didn't get the title of prodigy randomly. His work ethic, focus, and knowledge were spectacular. Also, Garret didn't share his fellow scientists' worries or excitement.

The other scientists in the massive lab were glued to various screens, attracted by the bloody images they showed. The headquarters' scanners were pointed at the new battlefield, coordinating with the Leviathan's equipment to enhance their resolution. A chaotic and violent battle unfolded before the crew, creating a moment of tense entertainment.

Garret didn't give the screens a single glance. The scientist knew the battle was important. That was the most numerous pack the army had faced in their six months on Senerth. However, Garret couldn't share his colleagues' excitement. A set-in-stone result couldn't stir that emotion.

Of course, the battlefield was unpredictable, and Garret was no military genius. That field had been part of his family education, but his talents lay elsewhere, encompassing vast and specialized scientific subjects.

Still, that precisely was the reason behind Garret's confidence. His console was showing the results of Prince Khan's latest tests. The numbers pointed to a clear conclusion, and they never lied, even when it came to an existence as unique as Prince Khan's.

The test results were self-explanatory. Prince Khan had long since bordered numbers similar to evolved warriors, and the last training session with the toxic pool seemed to have completed the final step. Garret couldn't see anything human on the console data. He only witnessed the wonders of those legendary existences.

So, Garret couldn't feel any interest in the battle. The monsters in that region were as strong as third-level warriors, with some bordering the fourth level. The alpha also was a fearsome creature, but the opposite side had Prince Khan, and nothing survived his passage. It wasn't even a matter of alien arts, really. The numbers alone pointed to that conclusion.

Garret leaned back on his chair, rubbing the corners of his eyes before refocusing on the console. He spotted the flaw in that data, and his entire education told him something was wrong. Yet, his experiences in Baoway had forced him to discard those biases.

Of course, Garret knew the answer to that question, but everything around Prince Khan followed different rules. His existence seemed to spite the entire scientific field, so Garret wouldn't feel surprised to experience something as mundane as a headache from overwork.

It didn't help that the console reinforced Garret's belief. Prince Khan's data belonged to the evolved realm, but his attunement with mana barely placed him at the fourth level. It had recently climbed back to eighty-one points, but the number didn't have any correlation with Prince Khan's power.

'Physical evolution complete?' Garret typed on the console, taking mental notes. 'Higher attunement with mana required for completion? Further investigation is required.'

Garret finally allowed himself to sigh as he leaned even deeper into the chair and removed his hands from the console. Those stretches of work after Prince Khan's training sessions were always long, leaving Garret slightly exhausted.

'Bringing so much of that substance was a mistake,' Garret realized after thinking about the training sessions. 'The unforeseen reactions have gotten milder by the day. I should have accounted for that.'

Being better safe than sorry wasn't exactly a mistake. Prince Khan preferred it that way since it involved his training. However, Garret was a perfectionist, and his position demanded an incredible level of competence. He was slightly above a guest on Baoway, so he had to prove himself through his work.

'Accounting for the additional weight of the spare substance,' Garret calculated, 'Adding the space freed in their absence... I lost the Nognes family a lot of Credits.'

No one would blame Garret for the issue. No one would mention it, either. Yet, Garret had noticed it so he would know, meaning he had to do better for himself and his family.

Garret pushed his exhaustion away and refocused on the console. After a few commands, the list of data disappeared and was replaced by a picture of Senerth. A quarter of that image was red, highlighting the territory controlled by Prince Khan's army.

The picture could be deceiving. Theoretically, the army could have achieved far more in six months, but Senerth's peculiar fauna had gotten in its way.

The wider the conquered area was, the more creatures it would attract. The disturbance created by the army also didn't go unnoticed, bringing distant packs to the horizon. The current battle was one of the many caused by the expansion.

That development had both positive and negative aspects. On the one hand, the increased number of battles was bound to put a strain on the army. Also, attracting distant packs would widen the other monsters' hunting grounds, strengthening their future power and promising harsher battlefields.

On the other, Senerth's fauna was rapidly dwindling, flushing out many packs hiding in underground lairs. The conquest's following steps would feature fewer battles, and their increased harshness hardly mattered with Prince Khan at the forefront.

'Bombing the planet would have still been better,' Garret thought before a round of cheers brought his attention to one of the distant screens.

The screen showcased a lifeless sea of fur interrupted by occasional masses of muscles. The battle had ended, and the scanners zoomed in on a distant figure standing atop a fuming hill of corpses. The grey smoke seemed to avoid Prince Khan's body, revealing him in all his gory, wild splendor.

Comments and compliments immediately reached Garret's ears, almost making him snort. He had grown used to that gossip but still found it distasteful and ignorant. His colleagues addressed Prince Khan as some kind of unfathomable genius, but he knew the true meaning of that word. Garret knew it better than most.

Garret knew what being a genius entailed as a fellow carrier of the title. Most people used that word as an excuse for incompetence or lack of effort. Sure, talent could play a role, but it was merely a tiny step in a sea of harsher requirements.

Garret's gaze grew distant, recalling all the effort it had taken him to get where he was. Those thoughts weren't limited to himself, either. Unlike the other scientists, Garret knew exactly what Prince Khan was putting himself through to obtain that kind of power.

The toxic pool was pure torture, but Prince Khan didn't stop there. He spent most of his free time outside the army's perimeter, dealing with packs on his own or training alone in the wilderness. Prince Khan even made that insane routine look easy, outperforming everyone on the battlefield. Being relentless was his talent, and becoming a genius was nothing more than

a numerical result, and the numbers never lied.

'I should break the good news to him,' Garret recalled. 'The next training session will

probably be the last.'

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