TBATE - Corrupted Blessing

9 : Unboxing

Grey Vritra

I just arrived at Seris's mansion and now inside my room. I immediately changed my clothes into a more comfortable one being a simple shirt and a sweatpants. I then brought out my old dimension ring from the new one Agrona gave me.

I wore my old ring on my pinky finger as it wouldn't fit on my ring finger anymore. Wearing it, I imbued it with mana and emptied all of the things inside.

All of the my old things are now out of the ring and now on top of my bed. I immediately grabbed ny old sword Dawn's ballad and tried to unsheath it but it did not budge. The sword felt like an old stick just laying around the side for years.

“Does it not recognize me as its owner?"

I thought and tried to unsheath it again applying more force than before. And the same as the last time it didn't budge. Taking in a huge breath, I activated my will and unsheathed it again but this time it worked.

The sword still looked the same but now doesn't have it's old teal color in it. It now just looks like an ordinary steel sword.

“I manage to unsheath it but it's not the same as before. How can I restore it back?"

I thought pondering about the possibilities on how to awaken my old sword back. Then I remembered how, when I first held it on my hands I cited its name and the sword absorbed my blood and adjusted its size, so I tried it.

“Dawn's Ballad W.K. IV"

I said and the sword started shaking and sucked the mana out of my right arm. It's absorbing a lot but not that much for me. A yellow core mage would probably die if they're the one in my position right now.

I'm now on bottleneck mid silver because my core purifies itself on it's own, it easily did something other people would be able to achieve in decades in two weeks. Being an Asura really is a huge help that it's already unfair.

The sword stopped absorbing my mana and stopped shaking. Then bright purple light engulfed the whole room that I'm in.

“What the hell just happened?"

I thought and saw the sword I'm holding in my right arm now just a stone? I held the stone on my arms trying to study it. The stone then  moved and dug through my skin and went inside my palm crawling up to my wrist.

“urkk Aghh! W-what the hell?!" I shouted, feeling the pain inside my wrist. I gritted ny teeth to stop myself from screaming and imbued ice mana into my whole right arm to freeze it. I managed to froze it and the stone stopped moving inside. I melted it with fire mana and saw my arms healed like nothing ever happened.

“Another Asuran perk, this feels so unfair."

I watched the pool of water on the floor evaporate as I use fire mana to clean up the wet floor. I observed my wrist for a while and didn't notice anything special except that the stone inside is still absorbing mana little by little.

I pondered about all the possibilities on what will happen to the stone when it finally absorbs enough mana.

“Will I have a new and upgraded sword? maybe whatever mana I absorb will be imbued on it?"

I thought thinking of a fire imbued sword cutting down through enemies as I grinned. I then looked at the black box just to my left and my grin became wider.

“A sword with a decay type mana, doesn't that sound appealing? "

I thought and grabbed the box. Opening it I saw a horn, The horn is so dark I couldn't even see it properly when I first looked at it. Taking it out outside the box, The horn is shaped like an hartebeest's and only measuring half a foot. There's a sign that the horn is not complete because of the cracks on it's base signifying that it have been forcefully removed.
Now that got me curious.

“Is this horn important to Agrona? What is its connection with him? Why does he seems emotional just holding the box containing this?"

I thought, I would like to ask Agrona about it but I won't gamble it. He already gave it to me and I don't want to die again. Setting the horn aside I checked the other objects on my bed.

A few of them are my mask as Note, Sylvia's feather that I don't know how it went inside the ring, My old ordinary sword from the Helsteas and a lot of beast cores from my adventuring days. One of it is the core of the Elderwood Guardian I killed. I planned to give it to Tessia after I confess but it won't have any use. I can't absorb the core as it won't even make my core go up to the next stage because of my now high mana pool capacity.

“This would be a perfect addition to my gift right?"

I thought smiling a little. I put all the items in my new dimension ring and grabbed the horn. I sat in a lotus position and meditated absorbing the man inside the horn.

The mana inside the horn is so rich and there's so many of it in there. I keep absorbing the mana when my core started to burn. It felt like it's getting eaten by thousands of maggots and hundreds of insects, it felt like it was rotting.

I immediately arrived on the conclusion that I'm now starting to absorb the Vritra mana residing inside the horn. I continued to absorb it enduring the pain in my core. Because of the extreme pain I couldn't even tell if time is still running and how many minutes have passed.

//////

It felt like eternity but I finally finished absorbing all the mana inside the horn. I opened my eyes and immediately felt everything in my surrounding. I was drenched in sweat, a lot of sweat. It's already dark outside even though I started meditating just after eating lunch this noon.

“Just how much time have passed since I absorb everything out of thi horn?"

I thought when a sudden realization hit me.

“Eh? why's the horn still in my hands? it didn't disentigrate?"

But then my eyes grew wide when I realized what it means if a core doesn't disappear even though you absorbed all of the mana inside.

“That means there is a will inside of it" I spoke outloud.

That makes sense as Seris said that a Vritra's horns is an extension of their core. Does this mean the owner of this horn is so strong that he managed to put his will in the horns instead of putting it in the core?

It seems like I'm gonna give Caera three gifts at the same time. I chuckled and put the horns on top of the bed. Knowing that I need to clean up, I grabbed some clothes with a towel and headed towards the bathroom to take a bath.

Entering the bathroom I hanged my clothes and the towel on a metal rack and entered the shower. I'm about to take my current clothes off when I instinctively looked at the mirror.

“Huh?"

That's the only thing my mouth managed to let out as I saw two onyx colored horns protruding on the side of my head and bending down and ending near my cheeks.

_________

I'll now update everyday

10-29-23