Tristan woke up to find that his automatically generated healing alloy had done wonders putting his brain back together. He almost wished it hadn’t, so he could go back to sleep. Unfortunately, rest was not going to be happening now that his skull throbbed, so he decided to do something productive and take a look at the surroundings with his metal sense.

The ambient essence in the hideout had grown substantially. Vulcan was still leaning up against the wall, and the drake was still napping in the same position it had been for the last week. Tristan wondered how a reptile was handling the cold so well. The temple’s books made it seem like they struggled with the cold. He assumed that it had something to do with fire essence, but Tristan could get no definitive answers at the moment.

“Rise and shine,” Vulcan chirped into Tristan’s head.

Tristan glared at Vulcan. Morning people were the worst, but he still croaked back, “Good morning,”

He focused on his hands, wondering what he would see. They were an irritated red color and swollen like he had broken a bone. Tristan had expected a silvery tinge but little else to change. Who would have thought that the human body would dislike being filled with metal? Well, everyone who had been stabbed, which was most people that Tristan had known.

“Why are my hands swelling?” Tristan asked.

“You gave yourself ten billion microscopic splinters, it will take a bit to heal,” Vulcan explained, “Now are you ready for step two? It’s a lot simpler than step one.” Tristan nodded, not quite ready to verbally engage with Vulcan, “You get to use alloy to fuse the kharkodine to the essence in your body. The best part is your alloy force is always part of any force you use, just go put your hands in the alchemy bath we made, the rest will happen naturally.”

Tristan felt like there were some logical flaws. He could not control essence outside of his body - how then could he force a fusion between his arms and an exterior object? Tristan knew it was possible with the correct force, gravity and its constituents - magnetism and attraction - could all do it. Absorption could also achieve it. Tristan almost facepalmed, that was an obvious answer.

Hobbling to the bucket Tristan looked down into the grainy mixture. This is what had been raising the essence concentration, Tristan would have noticed more but it was essence tinged with the force of absorption. He knelt over the bucket and shoved his arms in, up to his elbows.

“Don’t throw up in the bucket, you don’t want to fuse vomit to your arms,” Vulcan casually said.

“What!” A thoroughly startled Tristan squawked, “Why would I…” Cold permeated his body and it felt like something massive was putting pressure on his very being.

“Mr. I know more than Vulcan decided to do this with his arms attached,” Vulcan said. Tristan stared at the ancient being, he expected an ‘I told you so’ from his mom or Luke. He didn’t care much for it coming from Vulcan, so before his attention was completely absorbed, Tristan pushed Vulcan over, “Hey, what was that for? Set me back up.”

Unfortunately, for Vulcan, Tristan was fully focused on not puking in the bucket. The pressure mounted but was resisted. It seemed to retreat for a moment before returning twice as strong. Tristan’s whole being shuddered, he had felt this before, though never in such a quiet environment.

The coldness, what Tristan assumed to be the remnants of Ripple’s kern was trying to break his kern. He frowned… did everyone have it wrong, was the kern not the heart, but the soul? Or was the soul a component of the heart? A metaphysical representation? Tristan didn’t know, but he did know how to break it.

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The pressure tried to crush him like an egg. He did end up vomiting, though it was almost as much blood as stomach acid. Gut injuries were very bad, but they took a while to kill. The healing reservoir he kept was mostly full, so he went to work on breaking his kern.

He did not need to be picky, he just needed to be fast. Screw constructs, rolls of wire, and springs all formed and fell to the floor in rapid succession. Tristan had practiced more free constructing these more than any other objects due to Harp’s involvement. If any of the craftsmen had survived, they would cry at the sheer amount of useful materials that would be left behind.

Tristan could sense his resistance being weakened in real time. It was not that whatever material the kern was made of was weakened, just that the essence supporting it was missing now. Part of Tristan had been hoping to break his kern right here, he was only one or two breakings away from tier five. That might give him the ability to fight the drake.

This was not to be. His kern was cracked, but not shattered. Once broken, the kharkodine ore that had been dissolved into the essence slurry started seeping through. Tristan shivered at the feeling of cold that crept over him. He felt other less pleasant sensations, he felt as if he was drowning while still breathing and there was the ever present pressure as he was pressed like an overinflated water skin.

Still, it was far from the worst thing he had ever been put through. He watched in fascination as the bucket slowly emptied. Some of the contents dissipated back into ambient essence, a larger portion was wasted breaking into his kern, and most importantly most was fused directly into his body.

The entire process only took a half hour as the hard work had already been accomplished. It would be better to say that the process had taken three weeks and two days, but few people actually cared about the work that went into a success. And it was a success, the cold feeling subsided everywhere but Tristan’s arms. They were a good two or three degrees colder than before.

Tristan was just happy the burning feeling was gone. He slowly wiped the excess slurry off and frowned. Tristan had done limited alchemy before, but he had never expected to change how he looked. Instead of skin, the same black of the tortoise’s shells greeted him. He tapped it with a finger.

His motions were sluggish and difficult, the effort to move had changed. Muscles put up more resistance to being flexed, while at the same time, the unnoticeable air resistance that affected everything was absent. It was not a large difference, but it would be something he would need to get used to.

Still, he had the dexterity to slap his finger against one forearm. The mat black flesh clinked on contact and two dull red circles expanded, one on his arm and one on his finger. Once the absorbed energy was completely released, it faded away. Tristan was more interested in the clinking noise. He scooped up a handful of screws off the floor and released them onto his arm. They tinkled like they were hitting a lightly padded steel pole.

Tristan smiled, he was made out of metal now. He poked himself again, watching the red rings expand again. There had to be a way to test these. Tristan clenched his fist, took a few moments to put his thumb in the correct spot, and punched the wall. He grinned when he barely felt it. The wall was made of hard packed frozen dirt, and Tristan had put a print of his knuckles in it.

Then he realized a problem. Tristan had barely felt it. Frowning, he touched his face, then his hair. The stimuli he got from his hands were minimal when he touched his clothes and he struggled to differentiate them from his hair by touch alone, Tristan knew this was not an entirely positive outcome. It was one that he should have expected, absorption would not discriminate between an attack and simple touch.

Tristan pondered what he had lost, not much now that he thought of it. Maybe when he was powerful and had time to waste on luxuries, his opinions might change. For now, it was all upsides. He punched the wall once more and his grin grew. He would like to do more tests with it, but the initial results were promising.

“If you could stop touching yourself and get over here, I would be grateful,” Vulcan asked from his place on the floor.

Tristan absentmindedly picked up the lamp post, “What do you think I will be able to do with these?”

“Really? Not even an apology,” Vulcan huffed, before proceeding to explain, “I assume they will act like standard natural artifacts that are based on forces, they should absorb natural phenomena that manifest as radiation. Impacts, nuclear waste, heat, there are a lot of possibilities. A tier eighteen piece of kharkodine should get you all of them, but we won’t know until we toss you a chunk of uranium.”

“What’s uranium?” Tristan asked. If Vulcan mentioned the metal it would be wise to keep an eye out for it.

“Err, we use it to make mushrooms,” Vulcan said.

Tristan instantly lost interest in the material, “Why do you think of drugs when you lack a body?”