CH206

He felt his thoughts expand as he went to take a break after the hours of work he’d just gone through, straining his minds and skills in ways he didn’t think possible. It didn’t leave him with an extra mind, but helped to ease the burden of trying to repair the being he’d come to know as the talos Inux.

Having done the best he could for the time being, he went out to the living room where everyone was waiting. When he’d realised that what he found was more than a little unusual they’d returned to Thera’s family with him in tow, hoping to get Lux’s help in healing him to figure out just what to do. That was when they discovered the problem, learning more as they spoke in his few minutes of consciousness. While whether he was alive or not was a debate Ben didn’t care about, it was clear that healing spells didn’t work. The reason being that his body had been entirely artificially constructed by a god and designed to be a weapon, something to fight and defend the people of his homeworld before it was lost like so many others.

“Were you up all night?” Thera asked in concern, leaving him to give her an awkward smile.

“Even now I shouldn’t be leaving his side. The enchantments that seem to keep him alive… well it’s bad. If what he said was true then the god that made him is dead, and even if it wasn’t they probably wouldn’t be able to do anything so he’s been falling into a state of decay for centuries. I don’t suppose you’ve had any luck finding Falk?”

Ben knew he wasn’t good enough to deal with this. The enchantments were like nothing he’d ever seen before, while they had the familiar weaving structure that Anailia seemed to use as well, that didn’t mean he knew what they were supposed to do. Worse was the fact that the complexity was so extreme that even his upkeep was barely doing anything, the only reason he’d been able to do the little he could was thanks to the buffs to his mana and regeneration that Lux had applied to him.

It seemed that Inux had come there specifically because of the same rumours Mercy had believed, that there was a master enchanter around who might be able to help him, but unlike the vampire, he had a completely different problem, one that couldn’t be solved with the right knowledge and clever application of skills. It needed a level of expertise and technique that he simply didn’t possess, leaving him only one person he could think to turn to.

Unfortunately for everyone, Pelenia shook her head. “I’ve sent people to try to locate him anywhere I think likely, as well as sent some to monitor the gate and head to Stonewall in case he’d gotten back early, but it may be a while and he never did like to share much about his clients. We may not find him any time soon.”

He grit his teeth. From the hours he’d spent watching him, he knew that the talos didn’t have much time. His body was breaking down, there was nothing he could do to stop it, only slow it down. Even trying to get Falk was grasping at straws he knew, from what he could tell the enchantments that made up his body pulled from all affinities as well as non-affinity magic, no matter how much Falk was keeping from him about his status, he wouldn’t be able to use everything.

Still, maybe if we work together we could manage. I just need to keep the guy alive until then and we can at least try something.

“Alright, then I need to get back to it in the meantime. Sorry Thera but I don’t think I can move him again so I’ll have to stay here a while.”

“Don’t worry about it, there’s no real rush to get back to Stonewall anyway so I can just practice more with dad.”

“Cool, and Lux, I’m sorry I know you have a baby to deal with and all but do you think you could buff me occasionally?”

“The ones I apply should last for an entire day, I’ll make sure to stop by when I can to help.” The light affinity buffs of a great spirit were nothing to scoff at, providing a massive boost to both his mana pool and regeneration rate while they were applied. While he would normally never use something like that no matter how useful it might seem on account of the fact that it would inhibit his own growth rates in those areas while applied, he couldn’t be picky about it now.

“Thank you,” He told the spirit, giving them all a nod before running back to work on the ancient automaton.

Standing over its unconscious form, he wanted to think of it as asleep but knew that wasn’t quite right. Asleep implied it was resting, but it was more like it had been powered off. At least he was pretty sure it wasn’t dreaming, but he didn’t have a firm enough understanding of just what the enchantments in it were supposed to do to be confident of that.

Who am I kidding, I can’t be confident about any of this. At best I can keep fixing things before they break, but I can’t put back together what’s already broken, at least not the way it originally was. Maybe I can make some other enchantments to fill the gaps without affecting what’s already there, but at the same time there’s no way anything I make wouldn’t just be pulled apart by the decay of the rest of it so what’s even the point?

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That doesn’t mean I shouldn’t try though, I can’t just let someone die in front of me.

I felt a mind and skills when I connected with him Myriad, besides, he came here to ask for help, that’s alive enough for my books.

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