Crusader King-Chapter 130: Beneath the Statue(16)

As Cades finally wholly activated the active, the name of which he now finally felt deep within his mind, 'Polarization', he opened his eyes and smiled ever so slightly, realizing that his assumption of how the active worked and handled itself was correct indeed, realizing that his legs had become awfully difficult to move, realizing that he was perhaps stuck until he simply deactivated that active, panicking for just a singular moment before he realized that and soon after finally realizing something entirely else, realizing that this active didn't have to be active everywhere at once.

Slowly and carefully he began to concentrate and started to shift the energy of the active, the automatic activation of his mana, away utilizing his own, superior utilization capabilities over his own mana, something that was however special in this active as well as some of the other actives, such as for example the overload active seemed to have equal rights as he himself and he was fairly certain that a constantly active one, such as Manug's beauty, would have an overarching authority over magical energy or whatever it used, while this one seemed to be designed to be used in such a way, by shifting energies and slowly walking forward just like Cades was now trying to do.

And indeed, he succeeded after a few tries, all of which ended with him either being stuck to the ground, with the gravel somehow serving as the ground itself, or as him being stuck to the gravel and not the ground, ending up with an impromptu footwear, an idea which he decided to remember for later if he ever got a constant and figured out how he would, maybe, just maybe, be able to turn actives into constant active hybrids, an idea that had been spooking around in the back corners of his mind for quite some time, an idea that had a lot to do with the tiny shred of hope that was somehow still left within him after he had decided to banish all of it to the back of his mind, together with most of what others would call 'Cades'.

Finally, after just a few tries, numbering up to be about a dozen in total, most of which ending with him simply being stuck to the ground rather than gaining a shoe, he walked forward in a weird way, one akin to as if you were stuck to a gigantic flytrap and slowly making your way forward to someone to love, as if to save them, Cades however, was simply walking towards the corpse of the monster he had killed, his arms stretched forward, as if to embrace it in a deeply emotional hug, something that was turned to naught as he fell over once more, this time ending with his face in the stones and actually being stabbed ever so slightly, causing a great deal of pain to his already severely damaged face, though his other eye was luckily still fine after the right one had been turned basically immune to pain and into a show that reminded one of a piece of wood, one where you could now see something disturbingly white right underneath it after the top layer had been scratched up, a line at that, a wavy line with multiple dents and what seemed to be a tiny crack that was moving like a snake.

He just laid there in the gravel for about half a minute, thinking, realizing just what this meant, realizing how this could be used, realizing that he would be far more steadfast in his adventurers, and that in the most literal way possible, by being stuck to the ground when powerful foes hit him, by not being flung off of the gigantic chains like a ragdoll, something he had been afraid of since he got to this place, a fear that had been deepened when he had been subjected to himself without wings, something that he still hadn't quite digested with, something that, for himself at least, meant that he had lost his identity as an ehetrian, and then it was deepened even further when Manug had told him that there were beings in the endless light and in the endless darkness above that were just waiting to hunt down and devourer anyone that flew in this accursed realm. frёeωebɳovel.com

But after that, when he had felt the miniscule but stabbing pain in his head vanish, a pain that most likely came from the just as small crack in what seemed to be his very bone, something that happened at an surprisingly fast speed even for a being of the transcribe-rank, something that Cades had realized to be a rank propelled by it's own inherent intent, such as when he fought with a blade, as his own intent reinforced his blade, made it sharper, made it stronger, more durable, simply better in all categories, but either way Cades finally stood up, deactivating his new active completely, intent to use it some more later and finally start with his new arm, something that he almost felt he had been planning hours ago despite it only having been about a hour, or maybe two.. Cades wasn't certain, he didn't even know how much time he had spent with the active after all, though he did know that the corpse had already run cold when he returned from wherever he had been, if he had even been, Cades had almost no certainty about really anything related to this field, aside from interpretation, perhaps because of his rank, the very thing that seemed to allow him to survey intent.

He started taking the last few steps towards the corpse that was still in a pristine condition, just as when he had slain it first, and quickly put his hand on the place where he had pushed his blade into, the first middle part from the head, and quickly turned his attention to the second middle part from the head, intending to first salvage whatever he could from the second one and then try to find anything that didn't turn into soup within the first one, the one that seemed to contain the mana organ as far as he could tell, perhaps why his overload had been even stronger within it.

Luckily he didn't really need the mana organ, he just needed mana stones that had most likely formed within this ancient being, and luckily mana stones were quite difficult to destroy with both magical lightning and immense heat, likely still residing within the now maltreated mana organ, still usable just like the mana arteries or whatever transported mana within this body, an insect was after all different from a human, but Cades knew that it had to have had something to transport it's mana through it's body, and he knew that he would need to use that within his arm.