The next three months passed quickly.
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.
Beads of sweat dropped to the cold metal floor. Aleph's entire body was oozing with sweat… and blood.
"Multiplying the negatives…"
In his eyes lay a pale blue light. His aura went to a complete change, as if he was someone who couldn't exist amongst mortals.
The intrusive thoughts of the being known as Merlin appeared in his mind now and then. Without his sheer focus, Aleph might've gone off course for his goal today.
After learning a lot about the reversed curse technique, he decided to use the [Diary of a Magus]. It pushed him into a strange state where he "acted" as Merlin, borrowing his ideas, thoughts, and knowledge.
Psshk-!
Aleph gritted his teeth and left a long gash at his left arm. His white bones were completely exposed as liters of blood came out from it. His heart fell into an excited state, constantly pumping out blood to make up for the ones he lost.
The Knight Killer became stained by his own blood.
"Like the contaminated mana from the Land of Shadow. Or the nature of the Underworld. Perhaps, the state where Albion's Corpse was found..?"
Numerous strange thoughts came to Aleph's mind. He shouldn't have known about these things, yet he did. It was as if the spirit of Merlin possessed his mind, giving rise to countless insights.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
It has been twenty minutes since Aleph used the diary. His entire body kept on losing blood, though his situation was still stable due to his strengthened body. Nevertheless, a hollowed out feeling started to creep from his feet.
"...I got it."
Aleph wore a smug look. Blood kept oozing out from his arms and legs. His face was stained with dried blood.
The creeping feeling of death slowly came closer.
'This… It's the thing missing from that space.'
In the past three months, he tried learning the reversed curse technique by dying in the training space. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to do so.
This was the only method Satoru Gojo spoke of regarding the reversed curse technique. He was able to learn it when his heart and lungs were punctured severely. It was also one of the few "training courses" he offered to everyone who might want to learn from it.
Unfortunately, nobody learned it that way.
Reversed curse technique relied heavily on innate talent.
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.
The senzu bean in Aleph's mouth remained still. The ones from Kashimo's world had Satoru and Shoko, two users of reversed curse technique on standby. Of course, he had to prepare for the worst.
In the end, his life outweighed the risks for the reversed curse technique.
Drip.
A trail of blood came from Aleph's tracks as he went into the cold storage. Inside the most secured container lay a large transparent container filled with murky black fluid.
As early as a month ago, he took out [Albion's Remains] from his reward as the first one to undergo the MANTIS surgery. It was a portion of a nonhuman arm more than several dozen meters in size. The moment it was taken out, the concentration of honkai energy dropped sharply.
That's right, it dropped sharply.
It was as if this body part was enough to suppress the world itself.
It emitted such a strong pressure far surpassing the danger of all the Herrschers Aleph met.
His only saving grace was how the arm slowly 'melted'. After some time, it turned into this set of black fluid enough to fill an entire barrel.
With Great Sage's help, the preparations were carried out. That included the risks as well as the way to use these remains.
"A physical entity that is half conceptual… It is completely different from emperor-class beasts…"
Aleph was hesitant, at first, to use it on himself. However, he couldn't simply ignore the rewards brought to him. The Random Box remains unused simply because Aleph wanted to gauge its potential danger.
If he couldn't even handle [Albion's Remains], it might take a while for it to be opened.
The power of [Albion's Remains] was evident. If it weren't for the fact he took it out on the lowest basement level of the third institute, it would've caused a large fuss throughout the third institute. That, and the suppression from his Sphere Boundary.
"I'll give my full trust to you."
{Result: Subsequent simulations increased the success rate by 0.21%. It is currently 81.97%...}
As if responding to him, Great Sage sent out its new update.
"If that's it…"
A three-fifths crystal shone inside his chest. Placing his entire right arm inside the operation area of Albion's container, Aleph—
"Keuk!"
—began operating on himself.
*****
Death.
For the third time, Aleph felt it was breathing behind his neck. His [Deathly Intuition] was ringing so loud it caused a buzzing sensation on his head.
"Did… succeed..?"
It was a world of pure darkness. When Aleph opened his eyes, he found himself in the middle of a prairie.
"Huh..?"
Buzz-!
Another loud ringing sound came inside his head. The next moment, he found himself back in the cold storage. He was slumped down with his right hand stuck inside the container's hole. The dried black-red blood solidified into his skin.
Aleph immediately recognized their origin.
'The surgery… how was it..?'
A familiar voice gave him the answer.
{Result: A partial success. The cursed energy inside [Albion's Remains] briefly remained inside your body. To cope with the situation, everything that came from it was temporarily stored inside the Sephira Crystal…}
His sight turned blue. The fragmented crystal inside his chest had turned jet black. Albion was extremely strong. This was the only way to 'utilize' his remains; by temporarily storing it inside the [Sephira Crystal] and gradually letting it assimilate to his body.
Still, it left numerous aftereffects. Since it went through his body first, these were inevitable.
He scanned his entire body, only to find some rather drastic changes.
He was placed in his Active ICHOR State. The black scales were spread all over his arms and legs. The length of the horn in his forehead remained the same, though he felt several scales crawling up from his neck.
Aleph's progress into the Active Honkai Reaction form grew sharply. He could feel that he could transform further if he wanted to.
Albion's Remains are suspected to have a strong resentment, something that runs similarly to cursed energy. By giving his body such a huge amount of it all at once, that was the time when the chances of learning RCT became higher.
A while later, Aleph reverted to his former state. The [Adaptation] technique allowed him to have a far greater control of his ICHOR. It was a gift that he received from his near-death encounter.
[Cursed Energy (Converted): 2110 → 2400]
His cursed energy spiked by another three hundred or so points. Other than that, there remained no visible changes.
"No…"
Aleph thought of something in his mind. Looking at his badly battered appearance, he didn't chew the senzu beans inside his mouth.
Click.
Click.
Spark-!
A metaphysical sound rang in his mind.
Moments later, an imaginary 'sizzling' sound came from his body. There weren't any signs of physical alterations, but Aleph's [Elemental Sight] saw his black-purple cursed energy 'burning'.
That's right, burning.
"Reversed… curse energy."
It didn't take long before he found himself in a pristine state. Even the surgical marks on his right arm disappeared. The gashing wounds on his arms and legs weren't to be seen.
"...I did it."
Aleph knew about Merlin. He was the magus who taught the King of Camelot, Arturia Pendragon. He also knew about his feat of operating on Arturia to give her the Red Dragon's Core.
Aleph planned to learn reversed curse technique from his insights at first, but he came with this "backup plan" that maximized the benefits of [Diary of a Magus].
In the end, that plan succeeded. With Great Sage and Elemental Sight, he has far more leeway compared to before.
Just then, a series of alarms woke him up from a daze.
"DEFCON Two..?"
Four months after the fourth herrscher, the fifth major eruption occurred.
*****
A/N: Alright, slice-of-life is over.