Chapter 38: Supernatural Ability
Cheng Qisheng was observing herself.
She poked the back of her hand.
Using just a little force, she could feel the faintest trace of pain.
She looked in the mirror again. Her face was still the same face. Thanks to consistently exercising and maintaining a healthy diet, the gauntness caused by years of being bedridden had gradually filled out, leaving a bit of healthy flesh on her cheeks.
She looked just like an ordinary young adult.
Then she turned her attention to the awakened ability users who had been brought back to the Safe City. Some were still burning with high fevers, while others had already recovered rapidly and begun experimenting with their newfound abilities.
“Come on! Swing at me right here!”
One ability user resident grinned excitedly as he stuck his head out toward his friend.
“Slash my neck!”
His friend was equally thrilled, his face practically screaming, “I’m about to put my entire life’s strength into this!” He raised his blade and swung with all his might.
Clang!
It sounded as though the sword had struck solid metal, leaving a chip in the blade.
Another resident breathed fire, though he couldn’t control it very well, setting the entire room ablaze until clergy members, who had already prepared for this possibility, extinguished the flames with fire extinguishers.
Some reached into thin air and conjured balls of water. Some bounced around the courtyard like fleas. Others successfully made plants bloom with a touch. One after another, the newly awakened ability user residents enthusiastically tested their various abilities while the clergy stood nearby, carefully recording the results.
That was simply how the Blue Sea people were.
Awakening supernatural abilities was supposed to be a serious, momentous event, yet somehow they managed to turn it into something that looked like the filming of a comedy.
Fortunately, Cheng Qisheng had long since grown used to it.
Go ahead and fool around. As long as nobody dies.
As she observed each resident who had awakened supernatural powers, she noticed that regardless of their specialization, their abilities always manifested externally.
For example, the resident who had insisted on having his head chopped off belonged to the Strength-type, whose abilities primarily enhanced the physical body.
The residents who could breathe fire, conjure water spheres, or make plants bloom belonged to the Element-type.
The one hopping around the courtyard belonged to the Speed-type.
As for Wang Moning, her ability was related to time. She could perceive the state of an object or living being at different points in time, which also explained how she had been able to see Cheng Qisheng’s five hundred years of memories.
In combat, it was an exceptionally useful ability, as it was essentially a form of precognition, allowing her to see her opponent’s next move in advance.
If Wang Moning continued to grow stronger, then after advancing through enough ranks, she might one day truly be able to foresee the distant future.
For now, however, her ability was completely beyond her control.
Her eyes had been injured, leaving her vision blurry. Yet as long as they remained open, everything she looked at appeared with overlapping afterimages of different points in time. The longer she kept looking, the weaker her body became.
The archbishops had no choice but to wrap layer after layer of bandages around her eyes to prevent her from unconsciously continuing to use her ability.
“Were your eyes damaged because you saw too many visions of the future?”
Standing nearby, a deacon recorded Wang Moning’s medical information while the White-Robed Archbishop carefully wrapped fresh bandages over her eyes.
Sitting quietly on the hospital bed, Wang Moning replied softly,
“No.”
“It happened after I gained this ability… and looked at our God.”
The White-Robed Archbishop froze in the middle of wrapping the bandages.
The deacon’s pen stopped moving across the medical chart.
Even the other ability user residents in the isolation ward’s neighboring cubicles stopped experimenting with their abilities.
Having only just awakened, no matter what kind of supernatural power they possessed, their hearing had become extraordinarily sharp. Every one of them had heard Wang Moning’s words clearly.
The ward, which had been deafeningly noisy just moments before, fell into absolute silence.
Every gaze turned toward the blindfolded Wang Moning.
After what felt like half a minute, the White-Robed Archbishop finally asked in a trembling voice,
“…What did you see?”
Our God…
If only he could glimpse the Great God just once… Even if the price were permanent blindness, he would accept it willingly.
“I didn’t see anything.”
Wang Moning turned her head. There were still dried bloodstains on her clothes from where blood had streamed from her eyes earlier.
“I simply looked. Just that one glance—the glance in which I saw nothing at all—almost killed me.”
Strangely, after hearing her words, everyone’s first thought was the same:
Ah… of course it would be like that.
How could the Great Creator God be something a mere mortal could casually behold?
Wang Moning continued, “It was our God who saved me. God bestowed a blessing upon me and preserved my life.”
She murmured to herself, “I understood it…”
“One cannot look directly upon Her. One cannot hear Her. One cannot pursue Her.”
“The Great Creator God… is an existence of that nature.”
The room remained silent.
Everyone unconsciously held their breath.
Yes.
That was exactly what the Great Creator God should be.
It was only fitting.
The deity had not even punished the believer who had dared to peer at Her. She had merely existed there. Simply glimpsing a trace of Her radiance had been enough to nearly blind an ability user believer.
Such… was the greatness of God.
The White-Robed Archbishop also stood motionless for a long while. It wasn’t merely because he was overwhelmed with awe. Remaining silently in place was his way of expressing reverence toward the Great God.
At last, he gently patted Wang Moning on the shoulder.
“My child, you are fortunate. Our God has protected you. You will not truly become blind.”
“But next time… do not try to look again.”
Wang Moning nodded.
She had already learned her lesson well enough. The reason she had shared this information was also to warn any Blue Sea people who awakened similar abilities.
Don’t try to peer into Her. You will die.
She could sense that the harm she had suffered had not been God’s intention.
It was like a person taking a bath. A little water overflowed from the bathtub, and an ant happened to crawl beside it, becoming trapped in that tiny puddle and drowning.
The ant dies beside the human’s bathtub, and the human may never even realize the ant was there.
That was exactly what Wang Moning had experienced.
She considered herself fortunate.
Her God had noticed that tiny “ant” and reached into the water to lift her out.
Our God!
Thank You for Your tolerance, Your mercy, and Your compassion.
Wang Moning prayed devoutly in her heart. By now, she carried herself with even greater piety than many native Blue Sea believers.
Cheng Qisheng looked at the chain of faith connecting Wang Moning to her. It was much thicker than before, and it was still growing stronger.
She reached out and gently patted Wang Moning on the head.
Then, while she was at it, she went around the isolation ward and gave everyone else a pat on the head as well before deciding to head out for a walk.
Even a time-related supernatural ability had manifested immediately upon awakening.
So why had her own ability never manifested?
Cheng Qisheng was clearly a Mental-type ability user. Yet aside from extending her “feelers”—her mental power—into another world and remotely patting her followers on the head, she had discovered no other ability that could physically manifest in reality.
According to her research on ability users, those things couldn’t really be considered supernatural abilities. They were simply the result of possessing exceptionally powerful mental strength, allowing her consciousness to extend outward over a vast distance.
It was much like how all ability users experienced a significant enhancement to their physical capabilities. Nearly everyone grew a little taller, became noticeably stronger, and gained faster speed and sharper reflexes.
Those were merely the standard enhancements that came with becoming an ability user.
Their true abilities were things like breathing fire, conjuring spheres of water, or the overlapping visions of time that Wang Moning experienced.
The resident who had transformed into a mermaid had even gained the ability to breathe underwater for short periods.
Cheng Qisheng had tried every method she could think of at home, but she still couldn’t figure out what her true supernatural ability was.
That was why she had decided to go outside and take a look around.
This time, she left her residential complex, cautiously hailed a taxi, and went straight to a shopping mall.
She spent most of the day leisurely wandering around, enjoying the experience of ordinary human life.
Nothing happened.
Not until she drank one milk tea too many and had to use the mall’s restroom.
In truth, Cheng Qisheng didn’t like using public restrooms.
Just as she’d thought before, she disliked having other people come into her home, and she also disliked entering other people’s “homes.”
A shopping mall restroom was obviously one of the places she hated most.
Especially now that she had become an ability user. Her five senses had noticeably sharpened. No matter how thoroughly the restroom had been cleaned, she could still spot tiny stains and catch faint unpleasant odors.
But Cheng Qisheng was a rational person who believed in healthy living.
Before leaving home, she had deliberately chosen a mall about forty minutes away by car.
Back when she had been bedridden, she could endure not using the restroom for the sake of the bigger picture.
Now that she finally had hope of making a full recovery, she should take better care of her body.
That’s what a health-conscious person should do, Cheng Qisheng thought as she pushed open the restroom door.
The door swung open.
Cheng Qisheng stood frozen in the doorway.
“…Whoa.”
She paused for a second before she couldn’t help saying it again.
“…Whoa~”
Cheng Qisheng thought she finally understood what her supernatural ability was.
Right in front of her…
…was her home.
The home that should have been a forty-minute drive away.
Yet here, in a shopping mall far from her apartment, all it had taken was one gentle push on a door—
—and it had appeared right before her.
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