Julius slowly looked around the circle of hooded bodies. There were 8 people inside the circle of varying appearances, many looking rather normal (as normal as could be in a place like this) whereas others were very clearly physically warped. Well, he was sure that, if he looked for long enough, he would see how twisted the others truly were, but there was no time for that. This was a battle and only half of the group would leave the circle.

As the possibly chosen geared up to fight Julius stood where he was and tried to decide on a target. It would be safe to assume that his quota was one target, if only 4 of them could come out alive, and it would also be logical to assume the other candidates knew that, so, ignoring those not sound of mind, that would mean the other chosen would fight only one person as well. Although he supposed that he would need to watch out for attacks from other chosen with wide areas of effect. At any rate, since his stamina wasn't good, he didn't have much choice but to either put down one target or have someone take two. And he wasn't going to let go of this opportunity to closely study chosen in action, even if some were fake chosen.

To that end Julius went over the targets in his head. The fiery figure was out from the get-go, it was simply a bad match up for him. His methods of attacking from a distance would be more or less completely nullified. Julius could weather the flames to get close to the target, which would be good for him since physically they were probably quite close. But then he would be at a distinct disadvantage of having taken damage, and while he was likely to win, it was a little too much to risk when there were other targets he could go for instead. This also ruled out the woman who had melted into the shadows and the man with the lance. At best Julius could go one-for-one with the woman, driving a knife into her eye if she emerged from the shadows, but it would be difficult to avoid taking a heavy wound. The man with the lances was out for that reason too, as Julius could conceivably melt down the man's blood and flesh constructs but not before he took serious damage. Still, there was a more fundamental reason Julius didn't want to take them on. Because, while this was certainly a prime opportunity to see chosen in action, he wasn't a fan of wasting his time.

Julius began walking towards his target. What he had learned from the cult, through various methods of observation, was the nature of the powers he'd gained and that of his fellow chosen. There were, broadly speaking, 3 ways a power could manifest, through the body, the mind, or the soul. The 'how' of the manifestation was what interested Julius the most but he had no doubt that studying 2 out of 3 of these ways of power would only bring more questions. As he was now, powers stemming from soul corruption were impossible to study since there was no organ in the body pertaining to it. It was rather dubious as to whether or not it existed at all, but it was apparently where his powers had manifested from. Powers stemming from the mind were similarly inscrutable, despite having an obvious physical presence. The mind was simply too complex, giving very little away when taken from the dead, and being difficult to observe whilst still in the living. He estimated it would take several lifetimes to fully study the human brain, before even considering the warped minds of the cult. It would simply take too long to study, therefore, there was only one target that interested Julius.

He stopped in front of the man-beast, directing his hollow gaze at the man's physique. It could hardly be called a man now, a twisted monstrosity of flesh and bone, barely held together with wild instincts. The beast-man took Julius's stare as a challenge and barrelled towards the frail doctor. In response the blond haired man took a scalpel from his coat. The human body was an endless enigma, but Julius wasn't interested in questions he had no hope of answering. He would get his answers in time, he'd unlock the secrets of the body, mind, and the soul, if it existed. But to do all those things he had to make it out of this alive and intact.

As the beast-man lumbered closer, Julius held up his blade towards it. It seemed so small and fragile compared to the mountain of flesh charging toward him, but it was a tool he lived by. He knew it inside out, and he knew most of all that the flesh of man could never stand against it. It was the culmination of his life so far, and it would be the tool he used to cut open his path to the future.