I am not sure for how long I was out of it. I was not able to hear or see anything.

I assumed that it was just me dreaming, because I think I remember feeling… sad. Distraught.

I mean, sure, I got hit pretty bad, but that’s not really what that was, it was like it belonged to someone else. Okay, maybe it was not the first time I had a similar feeling, but I am not sure if that was not just me being delirious.

Besides that, I don’t remember much.

When I came to, I was… lying somewhere.

The ground was warm… and soft. Wait, that was not ground, it was sand. Even without moving, I was able to tell that much.

Speaking of moving… there was a problem… I actually could not.

Something was lying on top of me. Something heavy… I was… covered with… tarp?

I tried opening my eyes, to see what the hell happened, but I could not. That’s when I realized that something was very wrong.

It was not like I had no strength or something. Sure, I was feeling exhausted, but to open your eyes is not a taxing task, right?

I tried feeling around me, but also could not. I was only able to lie there and listen to deafening silence. There was not even a wind sound. Nothing. Like in a soundproof room. If I still had a working fleshy body, the loudest sound would be my heart beating, but that was obviously not the case.

Right… I was a bit different.

I was exhausted. Both physically and mana-wise. Well, in my case that was probably the same thing…

I started thinking. Why was I not able to move or see? Was my mana situation really that bad?

It would explain me not being able to move… And I did get hit pretty hard. That was the last thing I remembered, so I had to guess that it was just the damage from the spell the guy hit me with.

But, wouldn’t the spell get absorbed? At least partially? Even when I got hit with light magic before, I was able to get something from it. It was delayed, sure, but it was still there. For me to be completely exhausted? Strange…

I tried opening my eyes again, but after another failure I started thinking…

How was I able to see in the first place?

Before, I had that weird double-vision based on mana… So wouldn't I be able to do it even without opening my eyes?

I tried focusing on the mana around me…

And I actually succeeded.

Not in seeing, no. I was able to sense mana flowing through me. It was a bit of a strange sensation, and pretty uncomfortable on top of that.

Imagine suddenly being able to feel your blood flowing in your veins. You never think about it, but it’s there. You only are able to notice when you’re missing extensive amounts of it.

And in my case, that was precisely what was happening.

I realized that… I was leaking.

Even without being able to fully see the flames of mana, I could feel the energy getting drained from me… just spilling all over, just to be absorbed by me again and leave me.

It was like I was lying in a pool of my own blood. Invisible, magical blood that I was promptly… eh, drinking.

Disgusting.

I knew that I had to stop it somehow to be able to recover, but that was not an easy task, let me tell you that.

First, I had to find out exactly where the “leak” was.

That was actually the easiest step. And most horrifying.

My mana was pouring out via my neck.

At first, I thought that maybe it’s just my neck that was broken. Again.

But then, last time when I had that problem I was not leaking mana all over the place. No, the wound had to be deeper than that.

Someone slit my throat? I mean, maybe…

I tried speaking, but since I had trouble even opening my eyes, I didn’t have much hope for that. And of course nothing came out of my mouth.

I focused just on my head, trying to assess my damage, but… I couldn’t feel anything.

It was weird.

I was able to tell where my mana was escaping me, yet I was not able to tell what was happening otherwise. Every part of my body was unresponsive.

Should I try casting a spell?

It was a bit risky.

First off, I had not a lot of mana to work with, the strange process of self-absorption was continuing. I was losing mana at a similar rate to me regaining it… maybe even a bit more was coming back to me than not…

I was probably just absorbing some of it from the area, besides my own “blood” that is, so I guess I could just wait for a while to stand up or something…

Second, if I was to cast anything, the spell would definitely absorb the “leak” or at least majority of it and leave me with not much to work with…

But again, that could help me.

If I was to cast something that would be able to… I don’t know, raise me up or something… If I was to be able to see or move again, I’d be able to regain it soon. After all, there’s always a lot of plants nearby in this world, everywhere is covered by greenery and…

Wait. Not everywhere.

I remembered where I was last time.

I was on an island. Rocky and barren island. There was no greenery for me to absorb here, so that would be problematic. Sure, there was that residue, but would that be enough… Was that even still there? After our fight it probably got used up in the chaos… or…

Wait a second. Was I even still on the island?

Of course not!

There was no sand there! And besides, I couldn’t hear the sea. The falls were silent, that’s true, but there still would be some sound from the sea waves, right?

I tried focusing on my hearing, but I couldn’t hear a thing. No people, no wind, no nothing.

That is why I got startled when I suddenly felt something touch me.

I wanted to flinch and move away, sit up, or anything, really. But I couldn’t move.

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I felt… like someone pulled something off from me. I also got hit with a warmth, of what I assume was sun.

So I was indeed covered with something…

That also made me notice… I was feeling the warmth all over my body, besides one spot: my head.

Everything else was now getting warm and toasty, especially my arms. I felt that was a bit strange, but I guess it was the “newest” part of my body, so it was possible that those were just the most sensitive to light or something… they did look crystal clear, after all…

Just as I was pondering what exactly was I feeling and what was going on with me, I felt something new.

Someone’s hand.

That someone grabbed me by my hand and… started inspecting it…?

It was the weirdest feeling. Gloved hands were inspecting every single finger of mine, just to suddenly stop, pull a bit and then stop again.

I wanted to ask, “what the hell is going on”. But of course, I couldn’t.

And then it came.

Even without hearing, I felt a dull thud and a rather large, hard object hit me right in the elbow.

Once.

Twice.

And again.

Another.

And finally, something snapped.

I didn’t feel any pain, but I knew very well what just happened.

Someone just cut off my arm.

If that was not enough, it didn’t take them a minute to go after my second arm. But this time, they aimed for my fingers first.

It was a lot easier for them. Whoever they were, that was not the first time they did that.

Then they covered me back up again, and I assume that they left me alone once more.

Damn.

Playing with someone’s corpse?

That’s fucked.

Okay, I was not really a corpse, but still. I was a person. That was even worse then, right?

Sure, I might not be the best person out there, but still, that’s not okay.

But that was not the end of this weird sensation.

When they left me and I again was trying to feel my body, trying to move, I realized something else.

My arms were gone, there was no doubt about that.

Yet, I could still feel it.

Just the arm though.

It was lying somewhere on something hard… wood? No, it was a rock…

I wanted to move it, feel it, but of course I couldn’t. I just felt a colder surface, nothing more.

I wanted to sigh, but I couldn’t.

I focused on trying to regenerate my mana. Maybe try to contain my leaking.

For the brief moment that I was exposed to the sun, I felt a bit better, but not much. The new wounds were now also draining mana from me, in a desperate attempt to mend themself, making me weaker and weaker, until I passed out once more.

When I woke up, I was again uncovered.

I think it was the combination of the sun’s warmth and the sudden hit of that hard object that woke me.

Wake up just to feel my limbs being chopped off again? Fucking brilliant.

For one, I was thankful that I no longer had my fleshy body. I don’t know what would I have done if the same scenario would play out to my old self.

Probably nothing, because I would be indubitably dead.

Was that what Kon felt? Back when he was a slave at first? His… owner…

I am sure I still had it better though… not feeling pain was a VERY big difference.

Speaking of. What happened to him? And For?

Last thing I remembered was me being hit in the face with a spell. I couldn’t, for the life of me, remember what happened to the two. Did they take only me? I mean, he was strangely interested in me just after I revealed my name…

Why though?

Did he know me somehow?

I mean, it wasn’t impossible… especially after seeing how he was clothed under the “wraps”. Those looked pretty modern, and definitely not something I’d expect after someone from here.

Then again, I didn’t know much about the Wildnorth and its inhabitants. It’s possible that those were just regular clothes from there and it was just a coincidence, that’s it.

And then, there was also that medallion and the staff.

As I thought before, the staff had to have something to do with old technology, somehow manipulated and molded to fit their needs, however impossible that seems.

I was honestly astounded that they managed to somehow get it to be working in tandem with magic.

The medallion though…

It told a different story. It was familiar.

There was no way it was not a piece of Origin Crystal.

One look at its effect was enough to convince me, especially after I knew that it even managed to nullify one of my spells.

But then, so did the staff.

Why didn’t he just use it again?

It used a lot more mana, sure, at least that’s what I thought after seeing their mana during the fight…

And the medallion did not cost him anything to use, so I could tell it was superior, yet he still didn’t have him on beforehand… at least I thought so,

Any intelligent person that owned something like this would have the thing on them constantly. Unless…

Unless there was some other cost that was associated with using it…?

I was overthinking, for sure. If anything it was probably some other, more mundane reason for him to not have it. Like…

Like for example it being rare.

It would make sense. After all, the Origin Crystals weren’t exactly everywhere…

Wait. That’s why they were chasing Axelrod?!

He did try creating one, didn’t he?! The Edge was his creation, and while that was not exactly a complete experiment, he had some success…

Did they just catch wind of his failure or at least partial failure and decide it was time for him to “pay up”, so to speak…

But then, he did recognize what I was made of, right…? Why didn’t he try to question me about it or something? If anything, he was more interested in us not getting in his way than in us personally. Hell, he wanted us to leave multiple times.

Okay, sure, he did attack and eventually managed to subdue me, so I guess he did succeed, but that was the most inefficient way I could think of…

Unless… he was playing for time?

Maybe?

What was the point though? To have time to survey the island?

Fuck no, he had no idea about the tablet or anything. We were the ones that told him about it. If not for that he’d be gone and I would…

Yeah, I would what?

Well, I would definitely not be here… wherever that was. And not used as a crystal mine to those fuckers, because that was definitely what was going on.

They were essentially harvesting my body. Every time I regenerated to a decent degree, that I was again able to feel my limbs, they came and broke them off again.

I want to say that was the worst thing that I have had the opportunity to experience, but that would be a lie.

It was still pretty bad though.

Every few hours, someone would come and mangle me, just to get a bit of crystal.

After a while I wanted to stop regenerating, seeing how they would react, but it was harder than I expected. I’d never expect to even try something like that… I mean, it was counterintuitive, like, who in their right mind would even do that?! To think that!?

Okay, maybe it was not the best person to speak about being in the “right mind”, but still, come on!

Speaking of my mental health, the situation was definitely not helping.

The overall harvesting aside, because I pretty quickly got numb to it, as it was just as if someone was constantly trying to cut your hair or nails: not painful, yet not subtle enough to not take notice.

I was talking more about the fact that I was unable to move, hear, or speak. And even the feeling was… less than stellar, I want to say.

I honestly was starting to believe that I was having hallucinations.

At first, it started small.

It was just like someone was moving my fingers.

I noticed that after one of the times they cut off my arm, so of course I told myself that was just my imagination.

One day I felt like I was getting moved, but then realized that it was just the feeling in my lost arm, while the legs and the torso were still in one spot.

Strange.

Sooner or later, I fell into a state of sleep, not thinking, just existing. Barely.

I was in and out like that for a long time. I want to say days, weeks…

Hell, I don’t know how long. It might have very well been months: I couldn’t really track time with me snapping in and out of consciousness. The only reliable thing was the occasional harvesting. It seems like they never missed an occasion to get something from me…

Until, one day, they got greedy.