The part of the ruin where we were standing was completely glassed.

Along with the sand, the combination of sudden mana release and heat managed to turn the sand into glass and on top of that the buildings were now covered in soot. Some were missing even more pieces than before.

Damn.

-Kon, For, you alright?

I didn’t get an answer, so I scanned my surroundings with mana sense.

Yeah, they were still alive. Somewhat.

I felt their presence in one of the buildings, where I last saw them running towards.

But… They were alone.

-Don’t move.

I said directly into the guy's mind, on which he only squeaked and curled on the sand.

I took a peek inside the building, and inside was as destroyed as it was outside. Glassed floor, charred walls… plus charred Kon and For.

Both of them were completely black. Clothes torn and burning, I could tell that they were tossed towards one of the walls and were lying there unmoving.

-Fuck…

I quickly jumped towards them and started searching through For’s bags.

I was sure that she had the mana fruit with her. No time like now for one of those.

But, there was a small problem.

As soon as I reached for her bag… it crumbled right in front of my eyes.

For a second I thought it was my fault: that I just drained the item completely along with its contents, but the lack of mana flowing through me was the clear indicator that it was not the case.

The bag was already at the edge of crumbling to dust, and my touch was enough for me to destroy it completely. Along with its contents.

Damn it.

I had to hurry and give them mana, because their flames were dwindling in my eyes. But how?

Wait. Those people did use my parts to share mana between them. Could I use them as well?

I mean, I was under its influence, so were they. At least that’s what it seemed like before, so wouldn’t it mean that if I was to drain mana they’d gotten it too?

But the problem was, there was nothing to drain here.

Okay, there was some residue from the earlier battle, but that was hardly anything: their spells, crude or not, were efficient at least. They managed to burn through the majority of the energy in the air, leaving me with nothing.

Well, on the off chance, there was still one fresh source of mana lying outside…

But he was already almost unconscious, thanks to my draining.

Then, I remembered. Didn’t Kon already do something like that…?

Yeah, when you thought about it, he once managed to share some mana with me… and if he could, so could I.

I focused on the area next to me and I attempted to gather a bit of mana from my own form, just like I’ve done multiple times. This time, I did not imbue it with any element.

Easy enough. In a blink of an eye, an orb of mana formed next to me.

The next step was the experimental one though.

If Kon was conscious, I would be able to just instruct him to absorb the energy into himself, to use as he sees fit, but that was not possible in the current situation.

I had to do that for him.

Just as I was wondering how should I approach this to not fuck it up, I realized that even without me doing anything, the mana orb was slowly floating towards the two unconscious people…

No, not only floating. They were draining it by themselves.

-Are you awake?!

No answer.

I guess they were doing that purely passively?

I mean… they had within them pieces of Origin Crystal, so it was not unfathomable development… Maybe a bit lucky in the current situation. I am not sure what would I’ve done if that didn’t happen…

I wasn’t complaining though.

The mana stream was stable, and soon started picking up on speed, so I had to infuse a bit more of my resources to keep the process going, since I was not sure if it would happen again if I was to let the orb run out.

I kept this up until I was sure that they were no longer on the verge of disappearing, and their presences were stable. Which took several minutes.

And I also have to admit that it did drain me quite a bit. Besides the fact that I was not in the best shape myself, I realized that they had a lot more capacity than before.

Be it because of the battle, or just because of the time, I am sure that their Origin Crystals had evolved.

How long did she mention that I was missing? Month?

I knew that the assimilation was going to happen sooner or later, but actually seeing the progress was something else…

Wait. Assimilation.

I took a closer look at their forms. See if they changed.

I didn’t expect to find anything worth notice, so imagine my surprise when I almost instantly found some changes.

For was the most obvious. So much that I couldn't believe that I hadn't noticed it before.

Her neck, just where we’ve sealed our pact, had a scar running down towards the chest and probably below.

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At first it just seemed like an ordinary scar, just some old wound, but I could tell that below that, her flesh was changed. My enhanced sight was telling me that in that spot there was something very, very mana-dense.

I risked it and tapped it briefly.

No reaction.

I didn’t drain her.

Which meant that it was indeed the Origin Crystal taking hold over her form.

-Damn… pretty fast…

I moved my attention to Kon.

His was a bit harder to notice, maybe because he didn’t have any visible scars, or just that he was still wearing most of his wraps: in the middle of the chest.

His was more defined though. Even without second sight, when I moved away his clothes I was easily able to tell that about half of his torso was already not made out of regular flesh. I could literally look into his ribcage, see the bones and some innards even.

A bit disturbing.

But not different from me at the beginning of my “transformation”.

Besides that startling information, they seemed mostly alright, especially after they regained a bit of their mana.

I was not going to try and give them more in fear of passing out myself, so instead I just started scouting surroundings, having a very bad feeling.

Sadly, my worries were justified.

When I first noticed that there were just the two of them besides us here, I had that unpleasant feeling about the kids missing.

I mean, of course, there was the chance that they escaped when shit hit the fan, but…

Who am I kidding.

I clearly felt what happened before.

The explosions were paired. Doubled in my ears. And that was not just an echo.

Those were the pairs, kids and their “guardians” blowing up.

I knew that they were paired for a reason…

But wait, what about the one connected to For? She was… well, alive, so shouldn’t that be the case for the one she was responsible for?

Apparently not.

As I later realized, the “binding” was baked into the necklaces they were wearing. And For had her taken away when they realized that something was not right.

On the other hand, Kon was fine apparently…

Maybe connected to the “boss”?

I started wondering why exactly did he not blow himself up too?

I mean, sure, I was on top of that. But he never attempted to.

But before I went back and started dealing with that problem, I first had to clean up a bit.

I grabbed Kon and For and got them out of that glassed building, one by one carrying them to the one that was not yet glassed. It was a lot more ruined though, the roof was barely giving any shade to hide underneath, but it had to be good enough for now.

After a few delicate attempts, I realized that I could finally touch them without any problem. That was not the best news in the world, yet in the current circumstances it was the best piece of information that I’ve gotten so far, so there was that at least.

It meant that they were now a bit more protected against magic. That was probably what saved them here in the first place.

I propped both of them against each other, at the corner of the building where the shade still was and directed my interest towards the last person.

“The boss”, or whatever. The young man that was constantly spying at me during my wandering from and about.

But, when he realized that I was approaching him he immediately froze and closed his eyes, pretending to not see me, trying to fake being unconscious.

The fear that he was emanating was absolutely overwhelming.

I am unsure what exactly he knew about me nor what he really thought, but judging by the amount of raw emotion he was emanating, my image was nothing but the worst.

Not like he was completely wrong. If he knew about the calamity back in my world…

I shuddered and sat next to him.

-So. I think it’s time we had a chat.

He did not reply, but as he heard my voice, his emotions only intensified.

-First off, let me get those…

I grabbed the remaining necklace that he still had on him, probably bound to Kon, and looked closer at it.

There was no mistaking it. It was definitely made out of my own flesh.

Even to my inexperienced eyes, I could feel the same mana emanate from it, and when I put it next to my own mana, it was doubly obvious.

The form was also somewhat similar.

It was one singular irregular rock, probably splintered off my own body at some point, with a singular hole in the middle, through which there was a thin string woven through.

While not completely see-through, it was tinted into greyer shade, something like dirty glass. Simple and easy to make, supposedly.

What caught my attention was the string itself, though.

It was… normal. Too normal to me.

Nothing like the materials I’ve seen used all over the Axelrod's domain. It was closer to a synthetic material.

If the earlier discoveries were not enough, that was another indicator that that group had indeed a connection to my old world.

-Pretty interesting stuff… - I mumbled and wrapped the necklace around my wrist, creating a makeshift bracelet. - I don’t know if I should be honored or what… you used my own flesh to make those things…

Still no reply.

-But that’s not important. I have other questions.

I stared right at his face, tightening his bindings a bit and raising him to my eye level.

-Why do you care?

His response was so genuine it sort of caught me off-guard, yet he didn’t even speak.

His emotions turned from the fear to absolute disbelief that I was even asking that question.

-I understand. Revenge. Yeah, that’s a factor. But for it to burn so bright for so many years… and so far away? There has to be something more?

He did not say anything, just was staring at me.

-I mean, okay, I did fail. We did fail. But why does it matter here? Don’t you think that some people deserve a fresh start? It’s not like here I…

I got interrupted, but not by the guy I was questioning. Instead, I felt the two I left behind move.

They woke up already?

Without a word I just stopped talking and dragged him with me to the spot where I left them.

They were… surprised, to say the least.

Kon flinched, seeing as someone was approaching, but almost immediately realized that it was me. Same with For.

Although both were just barely able to stand, they immediately stepped forwards.

-Mor! You’re alive!

-How are both of you doing?

-Been better - groaned For, grabbing his chest. - You were right about that…

-Yeah… your transformation…

-It’s not that bad - For immediately stepped in. - You did warn us that using mana would probably hasten the process…

-Yeah… we still are the same people though.

-No intrusive thoughts? No nothing?

-Only thoughts that were intrusive were about that group dragging me all over the place - said Kon.

-Yeah, speaking of… what happened to them exactly?

-Same thing that happened to elves back on the island.

-Wha…

The realization soon kicked in. I could tell that from both of their faces.

Kon slumped on the ground and just lowered his head.

-Why are we alive then?! Wouldn't that…

-Origin Crystal.

-Right…

-Don’t get me wrong, you were pretty fucked up, but your new bodies managed to absorb enough of my mana to keep you kicking.

She sighed. Clearly not happy about what happened, but didn’t say much about it.

Considering the fact that before she was… a bit emotional, so to speak, about the kids, the current lack of reaction gave me some food for thought.

I guess the crystal not influencing them wasn’t exactly as true as they wanted it to be…