Steel and Mana

Chapter 83 – Monster Bones

Bringing back the giant piece of CC was more complicated than I expected. Because we now had multiple formations running, helping all the constructions going on in the city, we needed to shut them off until they got escorted through the streets, bringing the thing back to the palace. The event gathered many people, who watched curiously what was dragged along the main street, and they were more shocked by the humongous bones than the giant CC. I wonder what they would say if we could manage to bring the skull away... but that and many other parts of the demon couldn't fit through the castle gates, so most of it was left behind in the valley.

"Are you sure that it's a good idea to have it here, My Lord?" Oleg asked, to which I answered with a shrug, standing in the light snowfall in the middle of our garden.

"It's only a temporary solution. I already told Sasha and Merlin that no magic is to be used around the palace for now. Kraus is coming over, and we will begin breaking off multiple chunks of this massive CC. It will be our first time doing it on such a big specimen... By my calculation, we will reduce its size to what the imperial books call a 'Human-sized' CC."

"Human-sized?" He asked, and I simply handed him a book we printed a few weeks back.

"It is the Imperial measurement system that we also opted to use. It is kinda weird, but all of the books are written with their measurements and naming system, and I am not keen on redefining it again. It is already a pain to convert the blueprints we buy to our metric system... Doing it with magic and runes? Ehh... Nah. I will adapt."

"I don't get it." He replied honestly, only flipping through the book before returning it.

"No worries. The main thing is we are going to break it into multiple pieces and into different sizes."

"Sovereign!"

"Here he is!" I chuckled, hearing Merlin's happy shout as he rushed in, my Forgemaster hurrying after him, awed by the giant CC sitting in my garden.

"We have brought the tools!" Merlin added, raising chisels that were made out of CC, ready to start working. "I am a bit disappointed, though..."

"Why?" I asked, smiling, nodding at Kraus, who bowed with visible excitement on his face.

"Because this is fully charged up!" Merlin answered, sighing, stroking the opaque, giant crystal. "No human can do something like this..."

That was true. All the literature I scanned said the same thing. Human-sized CC was the biggest that anybody could charge or use. Anything bigger than that and trying to charge it would be like pouring water into a filter dish and expecting it to fill up. Well... this damned beast did just that. There has to be something that we don't know or something that we, humans, are incapable of.

"I can't wait to study the bones!" Merlin chuckled, making me blink my eyes and return to the conversation.

"Sasha is doing just that." I nodded as I was just as curious about them. "It is already confirmed that the behemoth's skeleton is engraved with naturally formed runes. The whole thing was like a walking, breathing, and living formation."

"Sovereign, is it true?" My Forgemaster interjected, gulping multiple times as I retold him the events and picked a smaller bone out of my pocket, showing it to him. "How...?" He asked the same question that I did while checking the bones in the valley. How indeed...

"Secrets of nature are there to be discovered, cracked, and understood! So, first, we will start breaking this!" I pointed at the core of that demon, "Let us focus on what we can do. We will measure it and draw the lines where we will begin cutting it! Be careful, and Merlin, contain yourself! Don't even think about magic; I don't want you to melt my city!"

"Don't worry, Sovereign! I came prepared!" He laughed happily, raising his sleeves and showing that he was wearing two bracelets, cutting off his own magic, the same way as Mikki-2 was confined within Mikan. I won't lie... I was surprised at the little imp's readiness.

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"I'm tired!"

"Let me massage you!" Luna shouted, already stepping behind my wife, rubbing her shoulders while we were sitting in our room, enjoying cold milk after bathing, and wearing only towels around our bodies.

"My mind is what tired..." She moaned softly, still enjoying her fingers, smiling from ear to ear.

"You need to laze around more, like Luna." I added jokingly, making our maid pout.

"Louise said the same..." Sasha mumbled, and this time, I had to agree with Mom.

"She is right!" Luna nodded, echoing the conclusion, "When will you announce it publicly?"

"The pregnancy?" I hummed, thinking, looking at my wives, "When it is visible but not before that.

"I don't think we need to make a big deal out of it..." She whispered, but of course, we acted as if we didn't hear it. Of course, we would! Because it is. The heir to Avalon is going to be born... that has to be celebrated.

Right now, only a few people know about it. Besides us, there were Oleg, Merlin, and Mikan, who were the most excited after hearing the news. She immediately told us that she would play the role of the midwife, explaining that she has assisted in more than a hundred childbirths since her training began. It was one thing where she never made a mistake, which was to be expected. I think...

"You two can go and sleep if you are tired," I yawned and stretched, picking up Sasha's notebook, "I will still stay up and go over your findings."

"I will do that!" She answered with another yawn, followed by Luna as the two retreated to our bed.

Watching her drawings and notes, comparing them to the little bone pieces on my coffee table, I couldn't help but be amazed. We were now certain that all those runes were naturally formed, leaving imprints on the creature's bone structure. They were naturally formed and not by someone or something. One theory was that the CC that was within its body created a genuine magic circle, just like when a mage uses a spell, and it appears around them. This then left its building blocks inscribed into the skeleton of the creature, creating a whole, complete inner system. It was marvelous.

Identifying the most repeated runes, Sasha concluded that the beast was most likely capable of casting earth-based spells. As to what that really meant, we had no idea. We can discard the thought of it being able to harden its body, or it would have already done that. Was it capable of manipulating rocks? I also doubted that. Maybe it ate rocks... but it's implausible, or why would it have attacked us?

Maybe it was capable of manipulating gravity? Or was its powers alongside something magnetic? Perhaps it could have created earthquakes... well, whatever it was, we will never know, luckily for us. Not that it was necessary to know it for sure. What was invaluable was how they worked. Funnily enough, I already looked at them as the skeletons for my future plans.

By my understanding, magic formations worked because they all formed a circle, the representation of a closed system. I looked at it like a completed line of code with a start and endpoint, defined clearly within its own language. It told the function and behavior of the spell and compiled it into an executable. Playing puzzles with the skeleton, I noticed that this was also true for the monster, as the runes did draw a circle, but it was in 3D, following the bodily structure of the beast. It was like shadow-plays on a wall; you just had to look at it from the perfect angle. If you lined it up correctly, you could see that it had multiple magic formations within its body, surrounding the giant CC as its core.

"This is what I was missing, I think..." I mumbled, my mind already coming up with new blueprints as I was trying to understand their roles.

Those closed systems were all responsible for different functions inside the creature. They were like a magical set of organs or something similar... I could feel that a great breakthrough awaited us; we just had to understand and replicate it.

These different circles were all connected with lines of runes, like nodes being connected in a program, forming one colossal formation, a massive magical system that was operating under its skin and muscles. What I needed was for us to crack this system and become capable of recreating it. Combining it with CC strands could be the key to how to link up a multitude of formations.

I have been fascinated by the idea since the time Merlin's power showed itself. I also knew from the books of the Empress that there are spells that can be broken down into smaller parts, performed by weaker, less talented mages. That point was reinforced by Mikki-2, the little bastard, and her recollections. If so... then that means, in theory, there is a way to string a multitude of these spells together, creating something new.

The issue is, right now, it feels as if I am trying to write a code while being blindfolded. I know its language, meaning the runes; I just need to comprehend and discover the rules for making the program work. Well, one thing I have is time and two genius mages with me, so it shouldn't be that hard... haha... Tsk... I just jinxed myself, didn't I?

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It took over a week to break up the giant CC and chisel it into looking like some rough-looking Egyptian obelisk. Now, it was indeed a human-sized one as it stood at the height and width of Oleg, whom we used as a measurement. That one was taken away and placed into the treasury, while the rest was gathered into multiple boxes while we were standing in an emptied-out room of the palace, transformed into a workshop.

"We should be good!" Merlin laughed, shaking his gloved hands and speaking through the mask that I made him wear while we worked. I was worried if something went wrong and we broke the CC into powder, he would inhale it... I can't risk losing him.

"We will take a full inventory of the skull and fist-sized CC before taking them to the raw materials warehouse. Kraus!"

"Yes, Sovereign?" He asked, saluting, waiting for my orders, wiping the sweat from his forehead after our last day of work.

"Chose some from the fist-sized CC so you can shape them into future tools to be used by the Forgemasters. It will be hereditary as these will be only used in carving and cutting CC." I smiled, making him nod happily.

"What about the pebbles?" Merlin asked, watching the biggest iron cart that was filled to the brim with uneven, small pieces of CC.

"We will start using them." I murmured, crossing my arms, thinking and understanding why Yuri managed to buy us enough CC.

While breaking it apart, this one slab alone showed us how brittle it is when CC meets with CC. It reminded me of how obsidian was so easily broken apart, leaving us with multiple crumbs that we further separated and collected in a mining cart.

"Sovereign, if the Empire has CC mines, I can't imagine how much they must have!" Kraus sighed, looking at the haul, and I couldn't help but nod. Their resources were on a completely different level, and I could imagine them having vaults the size of my palace filled to the brim. Just by mining it, tons of pebble-sized variants could go missing, and nobody would bat an eye.

"The only thing we miss is CC strands..." Merlin mumbled, complaining a little. We tried making some, but it was futile, and we failed multiple times with all our attempts. We even tried using strands to shave another off, but it didn't work, and instead, it broke off like icicles hanging from the drainage.

"Be happy with what we have!" I clapped his shoulders, shaking away all my thoughts, being glad for what we had. "This is already much more than what we have started out with! With Yuri returning and adding her haul to the pile, I think we secured enough CC to run the city for multiple years and even have some extra for experimenting."

"I wouldn't worry, My Lord!" Merlin exclaimed with a wide grin, "I am sure, one day, we will have our own mine!"