8 The Symbol

'A princess?'

Boros found it strange that Carla is a princess. Mostly because she didn't have much class and ladylike personality. She was more like one of those innocent girls from the county side, because of her open and cheerful personality.

Boros, however, didn't go too much into it. The main reason was that he trusted her. Another reason would be because she knew so much about the world, some things that would be all right be kept secret from the common folk. Such as gossips and happenings that occurred in the higher echelon of the western continent.

"That's right!"

Carla replied with a cheerful voice, but hidden in her cheerfulness was a heaviness that Boros could not explain by himself. Whatever it is that bothers her must be because of her role as the Princess.

'So, your brother is the king, huh? How does that work, does every monster island have its own ruler?'

Despite talking with Boros for a good while now, she mostly dodged talking about the Monster Isles, she simply told him some basics. It made sense now that she didn't want to talk about it as it was not really a subject that made her feel comfortable.

"Yes, my brother is Dante Silverscale, he rules over the Reptilian Island, which is one of the bigger islands in the Monster Isles. There are a few more Kingdoms in the Monster Isles, but all of them, including our kingdom, are just minor factions compared to the two Great Continents."

Hearing Carla and trying to piece some things together Boros asked: 'Is your brother the reason you are hiding?'

Carla was surprised for a moment but she hurriedly tried to clear any misunderstandings.

" No, no, no. My brother is always good to me, and so are my parents. I love my family a lot, and they love me as well. My brother is actually one of the reasons I was able to stay here in peace for so long already. The reason I hid away here, as an overseer of the dungeon is of political nature... You see, my family is one of the noble-born races, but we are not the only ones that inhabit this island. On this island live hundreds of reptile based races, and they are split into three factions. The Royal family of Gorgons, the Silverscales. Then there is a noble faction which is controlled by another gorgon family, the Nightfangs. The noble faction also has other races but the Nightfangs hold the most power in the faction. The third faction is a merchant faction led by a dragonewt Ashley family..."

After explaining until this point, Carla processed to explain more in-depth how the power of these factions was split. The short version is like this:" Silverscales are the strongest because of their special bloodline inherited ability. Next up are the Nightfangs. Their power lays in the military strength split among all of the mobels as well as their control over a shadow organisation of spies and assassins about which only select few know about. And third and not much weaker than the nobles are Ashley's. They drive the markets and the economy of the whole island. They are the voice of the people if you will. "

After an hour of talking about the forces that inhabit the Reptilian Island, Carla embarrassedly coughed, realising she once again got too into the story that she forgot why she was saying all of that.

" The reason I hid is because of the Nightfangs. They are trying to increase their power so that they can overthrow the Silverscales from the throne. They want me to marry into their family, but my brother is doing everything within his power to peacefully negotiate with them. Even though my family is the strongest on the island, not too long ago, the eldest son of the Nightfangs was accepted into the Academy of Magic on the Western Continent. Ever since then they started to throw their weight around. "

Boros finally got a hold of what was going on. So they use the acceptance into the academy as a sword to press on the necks of those who don't do as they please. Isn't this just using the power of others to win your own argument? They know that Carla's brother can't start a war with them because that would mean that he is indirectly opposing the academy. And if he does accept their terms he would be throwing his sister under the bus... Or a chariot? Whatever they have here that is equivalent to a bus from my past life.

It really is amazing that her brother has been holding them off for this long already without a war breaking out.

Boros thought what he could do to help Carla out of this predicament...

Power!

All this talking FINALLY gave Boros a wake-up call. All this time he has been lazing around in his hidey-hole while such things are happening to someone he swore to himself he would protect. He didn't swear it because they are soul mates, but rather because Carla has been nothing but good to him since the moment they met.

Boros rose his head up high, a look of determination appeared in his eyes :

'Carla, tell me how to become stronger!'

Such random determination made Carla wonder. Does he want to become stronger to help her? But whether he wants to be stronger for her or for himself, there is one thing that was for sure. He needs to become stronger if he wants to live.

"There are many ways to become stronger, but they all require determination, talent, time and experience. The determination is here for now, but we will see once the painful parts kick in. You don't have experience in battle from what you told me about your past life, but you do have a lot of random knowledge, some of it might come in handy. We have a little more than a week if we count the time that I am going to stay here, any more than that depends on how things play out on my brother's side. And lastly... Hmmm... "

When it came time to talk about talent, Carla suddenly stopped talking and just grunted out a few sounds as if in deep thought.

Boros wasn't sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing. It couldn't be that he had no talent?

Now that I think about it I am a monster so things should work differently for him than they work on Carla.

"Boros, there isn't really much we can do if you are in that room. It would be better if you manage to make your way towards me, or to the outside, there I can come to get you."

Boros found this argument to be reasonable, there really isn't much to do here other than kill and eat his siblings. But he had neither time nor reason to do that other than to eat.

Upon thinking about eating, Boros realised that he hasn't eaten anything since the time he drank that weird liquid.

Speaking of which... Boros came up with an idea that could possibly make him very strong even within a relatively short time.

'Carla, you mentioned that mana based monsters have a mana-core, right?'

"Yes, but how is that related to anything?"

Boros smirked. While he was a human, besides his love of reading fantasy of all kinds, he also had a phase when he was fascinated by the occult, so much so that he spent some of his teens working on theories and researching the ways to decipher the power of symbolism.

Obviously, he didn't succeed and was very sullen about it for a while, until he moved on with his life.

But what if he failed due to not having any energy supporting the symbols? Shouldn't the mana core be able to supply that energy?

If that turns out to be the case, he would be able to do some very interesting things, primarily to strengthen himself.

Boros bit the tip of his own tail, forcing some blood to the very tip of the tail.

Boros proceeded to draw a symbol which he came up with, using his tail as a brush. His painting canvas was the ground just outside of the hidey-hole. The symbol was supposed to represent fire. It even looked like a small tongue of fire... If you were looking at it drunk, without wearing your glasses and while it was immersed in water... And even then, it would barely pass as fire.

It really didn't make sense, not looking like anything a sane person would draw. Well, it was more like a doodle a child would make.

Carla looked at the drawn symbol, with slight concern for Boroses sanity.

"Hey Boros, is that your attempt at drawing magic symbols?"

'Hmmm, I swear it looked something like this... Maybe it really was a blank. This is the four years of my research on the occult. I made a whole list of symbols that were most likely to hold magical power.'

" Don't make it hard on yourself. You yourself said that magic was not developed in your world. It took many millennia for the magic to come to the point it stands at now."

What Carla said made sense, but Boros still felt like there should be some kind of reaction. Isnt that how it always goes? The hero of the story does something unrelated to anything, but because he is a hero of the story it turns out to be something amazing.

'Huwaaah!' Boros exhaled when a thought suddenly came to him.

A symbol.

But not a symbol he came up with in his past life, nor one he saw then either.

No!

This was... Yes, it was something that appeared when I drank that strange liquid. I feel like I saw a lot of things at that moment, but at the same time like I didn't see anything...

It is hard to describe. It was like a mirage inside my mind. It showed something big, but I only saw a small part of it that was both real and unreal, both there and nowhere.

I wonder what would happen if I drew this on the floor. Let's try it out.

What could possibly go wrong? Worst case scenario it is one more doodle.

Boros reopened the wound on his tail to get a bit more fresh blood for the symbol.

30 seconds later, the symbol was drawn.

The symbol looked like it came from a dream when the last line was drawn, the symbol stopped looking like a drawing and appeared more like a vision. It morphed and shifted taking on many different forms.

Like the stars dancing within Boroses mind when he drank that strange water. Only this time it looked more like shadowy tendrils than stars.

Carla wanted to try and grasp what was it that Boros drew, but it looked nothing like something that came from this world.

"Boros, are you alright?"

Boros remained silent for a minute, two minutes, finally five minutes passed.

Carla looked at Boros, her eyes filled with concern. Boros didn't move for even the tiniest bit. Even his breathing was so slow that it was not possible to tell if he was breathing at all.

What should I do?! He is not moving and he is not responsive! It can't be because he drank the starlight condensation, right? It would have affected much earlier if it were, and he wouldn't have successfully... Do I go there to get him?

No, I can not go down there, that is a hidden room, leaving it is alright, but once someone enters it, the entrance to it is permanently revealed.

"Boros! Snap out of it!"

Carla now stood between her chair and the mirror-like anomaly, shouting at the frozen Boros.

Please be alright!

'Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!'

Just as Carla was about to rush out of the room she stayed in, a soul-piercing scream startled her.

The scream was not heard by her ears, but through the mental link that connected her and Boros. The scream was full of pain and agony. If she didn't see him tossing and turning, she would have believed that he was being tortured by the most brutal of devices.

"Boros! What is happening to you!?"

Carla was already panicking, but now she no longer thought about the possible consequences of entering the hidden room.

It was painfully clear that Boros was not playing with her.

His body twisted and turned, bending in ways and shapes no snake would want to bend into.

'My head!'

Boros shouted, using all of the strength left inside him. His consciousness was hanging by the tread.

The way Boroses seizure made him hit the walls of the hidey-hole made it so that the blood from his tail, as well as the nosebleed he got shortly after the seizure started, painted the walls and the ground.

Seeing the bloody scene made Carla lose the last bit of hope that he would pull through it by himself. She jumped over the table, knocking some papers that were on it to fly all over the room.

Meanwhile, Boros couldn't hold onto any longer.

The pain made it seem like his body was being torn apart one atom at a time. The sound of his bones breaking due to the pressure from his own muscles echoed through the whole cave. That cracking noise made the scene all the more gruesome.

The commotion of his pained breathing made it sound like he was trying to breathe while a car was sitting on his chest.

Boros had no eyelids that would close his eyes, but still, the darkness slowly took over his whole field of view.

The moment Boros lost his consciousness, Carla was just about to reach for the doorknob in the room she was in.

The time it took for her to get from the chair to the door was actually within less than three seconds.

But just as her hand touched the door, her hand froze in place. Even her whole body could do nothing but stay where it was.

The time was suddenly like it froze.

Boroses body no longer moved, while Carla stood in place, the focus lost from her eyes. The only things that still moved were the cold sweat dripping down Carla's forehead and the papers that were still in the air after being kicked off of the table.