"There's really nothing I can do here. Jin-senpai, you're not willing to keep her company, so as an alien with nowhere to channel her energy, she ends up using me as her personal punching bag."
Sorata shrugged, offering a deadpan retort. "I think you owe me a meal, Jin-senpai. After all, I'm taking the blame for you."
"Huh! Your comebacks are getting sharp, Sora. Did something happen that I don't know about?" Mitaka Jin's eyes narrowed, a glint of suspicion flashing through them.
"Hehe…"
Just then, Sengoku Chihiro walked in through the entrance, a dark "hehe" on her lips and stormy vibes practically rolling off her. Judging by the time, Sorata didn't need to guess, her matchmaking attempt had clearly ended in disaster.
Tapping into Kanda Sorata's instincts, he casually remarked, "Chihiro-sensei, back already? Another failed attempt, huh?"
"Hmph. I was tricked! There wasn't a doctor at all. That guy totally faked his credentials. I saw through it. The audacity!" Chihiro snapped, her tone fierce and bitter.
"Uh... isn't that a bit of the pot calling the kettle black? Didn't Sensei say she was twenty-seven years old?" Sorata recalled how Chihiro always claimed to be forever twenty-seven in front of the dorm residents. No doubt, she pulled the same stunt during the meetup.
"Sigh… If only all the happy people in the world would just disappear," she muttered, clasping her hands together as if praying with saintly conviction.
"Chihiro, don't give up! Junior said if you can't find a husband, he'll marry you instead!"
From the top of the stairs, Misaki's lively voice rang out. She and Mashiro had already finished unpacking and descended with bright, mischievous energy.
"Hey, hey, Senpai, stop spreading weird rumors. I never said that," Sorata protested, exasperated.
Chihiro's gaze swept past him and landed on Shiina Mashiro. "Didn't expect you'd actually come."
"Mmm."
The girl behind Misaki gave a soft hum. Her face was blank, her eyes carrying a glimmer of curiosity as she silently watched the chaos unfold.
That evening, they held the Sakura Dormitory's long-standing tradition: the welcome hot pot party. Everyone took turns introducing themselves to Mashiro, then dug in with great enthusiasm. As expected, Akasaka Ryuunosuke, Sorata's reclusive neighbor, didn't show up.
By the time dinner ended and they'd cleaned everything up, it was already past eleven. Sorata returned to his room, shut the old wooden door, showered, and collapsed onto the futon.
Mew...
The black kitten, Hope, crept out from under the bed, sniffed around, then yawned and settled comfortably by his pillow.
A moment later, the white kitten, Hikari, pounced right onto Sorata's stomach, kneading it with soft paws before curling up to rest.
Her glowing eyes peered down at him as if interrogating him over the new woman who'd just joined their lives.
"You two better sleep tight tonight and don't mess with me, alright?" Sorata muttered. He didn't care whether the cats understood him as he closed his eyes, his consciousness sinking deep into his body.
It was time, he was ready to begin condensing the bloodline imprint.
---
The power of bloodlines wasn't magic or fantasy. It lay hidden in the very structure of life, genetic cells. Whether it was a human, dragon, or deity's offspring, the essence remained the same.
However, the genetic makeup of divine beings or high-tier extraordinary entities wasn't just physical, it existed in a mysterious state between energy and matter.
Deep within these cells, if one magnified them millions of times, they'd uncover information chains, subtle threads of law, too tiny to perceive with the naked eye.
These chains acted like preloaded scripts written by the universe itself, resonating with natural laws. As such beings grew, their strength and abilities awakened naturally, terrifyingly.
Back when Sorata had first obtained his Innate Chaos True God-Demon-level bloodline, he'd spent time researching it. He'd learned that even bloodlines of that level weren't fundamentally different, just infinitely more advanced, containing deeply embedded Great rune structures.
Yet even if he understood how to change his own genes, his weak spiritual power made it nearly impossible. Without help, even the simplest extraordinary transformation would take him a year to complete.
Let alone condensing something like the Golden Superman bloodline, which was as complex as creating a self-sustaining microscopic world and then infusing it into his being.
Fortunately, the awakening of his True Spirit changed everything. Unlike gods or immortals, the True Spirit could bend rules, allowing him to use his spiritual energy to reconstruct himself.
Instead of attempting the god-tier version, Sorata settled on condensing a basic Kryptonian bloodline imprint. The gap in difficulty between that and the "Golden" version was like comparing a level 3 rookie to a maxed-out level 99 veteran.
"Absorb solar energy, evolve the body, increase speed… flight, strength, invulnerable skin…"
Within his sea of consciousness, his True Spirit controlled streams of spiritual power. Like silk weaving a cosmic tapestry, they spun and interlaced to form a 3D imprint.
One by one, 3,600 runes of law wove themselves into a bloodline imprint cell, perfect, stable, and functional.
Although this imprint wasn't a god-tier feat, fusing it into a human body was still a delicate process. The body was like a universe, especially the spinal cord, which held key functions like blood production and gene replication.
With precision, Sorata guided the Superman imprint toward the lumbar vertebrae, the best insertion point.
Then came the final, most critical step, transforming that virtual construct into reality, embedding it into his very DNA.
Buzz!!
No one could see it, but within Sorata's transparent soul, a faint glimmer of True Spirit Light flickered, an almost imperceptible white glow that merged with the Superman imprint.
Hiss...
Even summoning just a thread of that light caused Sorata's body to tremble. He gasped, eyes snapping open in the dark, his face pale and cold sweat trickling down his neck.
"That took… so much out of me."
Condensing the bloodline imprint had already depleted his spiritual energy. Channeling even a sliver of True Spirit had drained his soul itself.
"But... it's done. First step complete."
From now on, he only needed time, and patience, to let the transformation progress naturally. Drained beyond measure, Sorata passed out almost instantly.
---
When sunlight finally streamed through the curtains and his seven o'clock alarm blared, Sorata groaned awake.
His spirit hadn't recovered much overnight, only about ten percent. Without any advanced spiritual cultivation techniques, he still felt sluggish and drained.
"Maybe I'll just skip school today..." he muttered, the idea slipping lazily into his thoughts.
Honestly, as a former True God-Demon level being, high school felt utterly meaningless. He had more knowledge in his mind than any textbook could offer. Even without power, he could live comfortably in this world.
But as he remained sprawled on his futon, familiar sounds echoed from the hallway, Jin's voice, Misaki's thunderous steps running downstairs...
And then,
BANG!!
The fragile door, already loose so the cats could come and go, crashed to the ground.
Misaki burst in like a tornado. "Junior, get up!! It's the first day of school!"
Without waiting for a reply, she shot out the front door like a human typhoon.
Sorata lay frozen, stunned by the destruction.
"She just... broke my door... Is she going to fix that or...?"
---