Nexus Ascension: My Comprehension Defies the Heaven

Chapter 40: Merging all the techniques

An hour later, Grey was back home after taking the ultra-fast train that ran on air. Though Sector 1 and Sector 6 looked close on paper, the truth was that Nova City was massive—larger than a mid-sized country back on Earth. Traveling between the two was like crossing entire states in his old world, each sector separated by layers of skyways, districts, and towering megastructures.

Fortunately, with this world’s ever-advancing technology, distance was never a problem. The ultra-fast anti-gravity trains cut the journey down to just an hour, humming silently across tracks of compressed air and supported by floating arrays.

The moment he arrived home, Grey wasted no time.

The whole ”Fate Insight” matter still weighed heavily on his mind, but he didn’t let it consume him. From what he understood, the omen of death looming over Lia could be avoided as long as she stayed home near the City Lord. If she did that, the danger would pass on its own in a day or two.

The tricky part was how fate itself worked. He couldn’t just speak it out loud—doing so would only make it worse. The information he received was clear: directly exposing fate accelerated its arrival.

If he told someone they were about to stumble into great fortune, fate would rush to fulfill it earlier. And death was no different. The moment it was revealed, fate would hasten it, forcing it to completion. Fate was impartial, like a river current that bent to no one’s will, but once disturbed, it crashed forward with unstoppable momentum.

However, he set those thoughts aside for now. His attention shifted to the brand-new evolutionary path he had just purchased—the Esper Evolutionary Path.

Grey’s eyes gleamed as he placed the digital scroll on his desk. Just thinking about it made his blood stir.

Compared to ordinary evolutionary paths, the Esper Path was mysterious and elusive. It was said that Espers could wield abilities that bent the laws of reality itself—telekinesis, mind control, even glimpses into other dimensions that ordinary humans could never perceive.

Speaking of dimensions, he wanted to glimpse into a dimension as well.

”Information Layer.” Grey’s eyes flashed as he recalled the first time his entire vision shifted into a completely different dimension—a dimension made entirely of information.

He didn’t know how to describe it, but it felt like a place where all answers existed, where knowledge flowed like rivers and truths were stripped bare. Just the memory of it left his chest trembling with anticipation.

”I might be able to access that dimension again once I awaken my mind,” Grey thought.

Since he was creating his own evolutionary path, Evolver Resonance wouldn’t affect him. By the time he finished reading the Esper Path, his completely broken ability would refine it into something that eliminated Evolver Resonance entirely—something that could be seamlessly integrated into his evolutionary path.

The Esper Path had four distinct evolutionary stages, corresponding to the four ranks of evolution:

1. Mind Resonance Stage

2. Consciousness Expansion Stage

3. Psychic Core Formation Stage

4. Soul Condensation Stage

One would continuously temper their soul and mind, growing stronger and affecting reality more profoundly. Additionally, Espers awakened unique powers for the first time when they underwent metamorphosis. Since Grey had already undergone metamorphosis, he wasn’t sure if he would awaken something like that or not.

With that in mind, he began reading the Esper Path in detail—starting with the basics, then moving on to the Chapter on Mind Resonance.

Time passed swiftly, and before Grey knew it, he had already comprehended the entire evolutionary path.

[Your comprehension defies the heavens! By reading the Esper Evolutionary Path, you’ve effectively understood the Mind Awakening phenomenon and created the skill ’Primal Thought Ignition.’]

Relevant information about the newly acquired skill appeared in Grey’s mind.

”Success!” Grey exclaimed in delight.

But he didn’t stop there. After comprehending the Esper Path, he immediately opened the Mind and Soul Tempering Technique he had bought from the Golden Chamber. Soon, his ability was triggered once again.

[Your comprehension defies the heavens! By reading ”Mind-Soul Refinement Technique,” you’ve grasped the essence of tempering one’s mind and soul and comprehended the skill ’Nexus Core Mind Technique.’]

”It’s done.” Grey wore a satisfied expression.

He now possessed a technique to awaken the mind and temper it with Nexus energy. With that finished, he immediately shifted his focus to the body tempering techniques he had purchased.

His goal was to build a perfect evolutionary path that strengthened every aspect of himself equally. If one part of him was weaker than the others, how could he call it perfect?

His body, mind, soul, and energy—everything would grow stronger. Normally, this would demand enormous resources, but Grey intended to make it nearly as efficient as a typical evolutionary path, so it wouldn’t take countless years to advance.

Of course, talent played a crucial role in most evolutionary paths. Many people were stuck at the First Rank for their entire lives. The members of the Tiger Claw Gang Grey had eliminated, for example, had been stuck at Level 2 and had resorted to using a corrupted pill just to break through to barely reach the limit of level 2, closer to the third level.

But Grey planned to completely eliminate the need for talent. He intended to create a minor evolutionary path that didn’t utilize Nexus energy for the people of Blue Star. Otherwise, it would become a huge problem if his path’s threshold turned out to be even higher than the three top evolutionary paths.

Shaking that thought away, Grey focused on the body tempering techniques. As Manager Earl had mentioned, most evolvers only opted for Body Tempering and Skin Refining, since they were the easiest and most cost-efficient methods. Attempting marrow cleansing, organ refinement, or blood purification required massive amounts of cosmic energy, as well as rare, pure resources. A single misstep could be lethal.

But did that concern Grey?

No!

He would read all the body tempering techniques and merge them together!

[By comprehending all the body tempering techniques, you’ve refined and adjusted them into a single skill: ’Unified Nexus Tempering Technique.’]

He didn’t stop there; he moved on to the energy refining techniques he bought and combined them together, merging them with his breathing technique.

[By comprehending and merging all the energy refining techniques, you’ve refined and adjusted them into a single skill: ’Nexus Vortex Refinement Technique.’]

”It’s complete.” Grey smiled. ”It’s finally time to create my evolutionary path!”

[By comprehending and merging all the body tempering, energy refining and Mind-Soul tempering techniques, you’ve refined and adjusted them into a single technique: ’Nexus Ascension Scripture’]

But he didn’t stop there.

”It’s complete.” Grey let out a satisfied breath, a faint smile tugging at his lips. ”It’s finally time to forge my own evolutionary path.”

[By comprehending and merging all body tempering, energy refining, and Mind-Soul tempering techniques, you have reconstructed and unified them into a single supreme scripture: ’Nexus Ascension Scripture’]

But Grey didn’t stop there.

”Now... for the minor path—one that others can cultivate.” He had already planned for this moment long ago.

Since he couldn’t upload his own path he would upload a minor version of it

A path modeled after his Nexus Evolutionary Path, but based on a weaker variant of energy.

Nexus energy surged into his palm, condensing into a flickering sphere of flame.

”Remove the True Origin energy sequence... and what’s left should be... this.”

Buzz!

The flame twisted, its radiant glow dimming—shifting into a pale shade of grey.

[Your comprehension defies the heavens! By altering the structure of your primary energy, you have derived a lesser energy: ???]

”It’s unnamed, which means... this energy has never appeared in this world.” Grey’s eyes lit up.

But it made sense, only he had the ability to see through energy patterns after all.

He then thought for a moment before speaking with certainty.

”Aether. From now on, this energy will be called Aether Energy.”

It was a force infinitely close to Nexus Energy; destined to walk beside it, but never surpass it.

[Your comprehension defies the heavens! You have created ’Aether Breathing Technique’]

[Your comprehension defies the heavens! You have created ’Aether Ascension Scripture’]

With that, his minor evolutionary path was fully constructed.

”This will allow the distribution of the path and help me with the so-called Ultimate Leap,” Grey mused.

The Ultimate Leap—no one truly knew what it meant, yet it had been circulating across the internet for years. According to the rumors, the Ultimate Leap referred to a stage where one transcended to a higher level of existence, and to achieve it, spreading one’s own evolutionary path was a crucial requirement. That was also the reason why countless people attempted to create their own evolutionary paths.

By distributing his path, Grey could effectively prepare himself for that moment.