Chapter 79 - 78: Axolot Wood.

I was seated in Mark's house, 

"Congratulations!! so when are you giving me a party?" asked Mark.

"Party for?"

"You have won the competition, you will give me a party right?" 

"No, I am not giving your fat ass a party." 

I thought he would pull my cheeks or something, but he walked away and sat in the corner of the room as a dense black cloud of depression hovered over him.

"I know, I have gotten fat, you don't need to say it to me. Even the other day, when I was eating my food in peace, my son came to me as he said "Papa you have gotten fat.". What am I supposed to do? I have one leg missing. I can't move much to exercise!. Being fat was not my choice!!" 

"Ah-- I am kind of --- you know--- I am sorry," I said. 

"Don't mind him, he gets moody from time to time nowadays," said Aunt Bruna, she continued to kick him as she said, "Get up, you have one leg missing that doesn't mean that you can eat food for of three people. "Being fat was not my choice", your fat ass made that choice as you kept eating food without any stop."

Yikes, currently I am watching a grown man getting bullied by his wife.

Huh? Crying? is he crying? 

"You can call me anything!! but don't call me that!!" begged Mark.

"What? I shouldn't call you fat? or I shouldn't call you old?"

"You went ahead and called me that!! you called me that!!" Cried Mark even louder. 

Holding onto Aunt Bruna's leg he tried to wipe his snot over her clothes, 

"Oi don't wipe your snot on me! fine, fine I won't call you that. But don't wipe your snot on me!!" 

Later both of them settled down, 

"So anyways Grey, why did you come here?" asked Aunt Bruna. 

"Actually about artifact---" 

"Oh, yes, what S rank artifact did you choose?" asked Mark. 

"About that, Aunt Bruna what am I going to say to you, do it without questioning my motive," I said in a serious tone. 

"Yes, I trust you." 

"So then----", I pointed towards Mark as I said, "Hold him down." 

"Roger that," said Aunt Bruna as she walked towards Mark. 

"What are you going to do? what are you both planning? Stay away from me?!" said Mark as he tried to run away. 

But he was caught by Aunt Bruna. Grabbing hold of him, she pinned him down. 

I grabbed Mark's handicapped leg, 

"Aunt Bruna, shove a cloth or something in his mouth cause it is going to hurt like hell." 

"What are--wuuwjfwydgwihiuhdfsfuihfiujf" Before he could complete the sentence, Aunt Bruna shoved cloth in his mouth. 

She didn't question my motive since she saw the thing I was holding in my hand.

I took out a knife as I made a small cut on Mark's amputated knee. I did that to draw blood out of Mark into the thing I was holding in my head. 

As I fed Mark's blood to the things, Its roots started spreading out and started penetrating their way through Mark's legs. With that came an excruciating pain shot up Mark's legs to his brain.

I could see the roots crawling under his skin.

Ugh, that must be really painful!! 

His scream for pain was muffled by the cloth that was stuffed in his mouth. To cope up with the pain, he slammed his hand back and forth on the ground.

After a minute filled with the movement of roots under his leg's skin and the muffled scream and struggle of Mark. The process was over the thing had taken its structure.

"Aunt Bruna, you can take off the cloth from his mouth." 

As the cloth was taken out of his mouth, he was heavily panting for fresh breath, covered with cold sweat, he struggled to speak.

"Wha----- what were you doing? I thought I was going to---" 

Before he could complete his sentence, his focus shifted to his handicapped leg. The thing was, it was not handicapped anymore.

In the place of the leg that was once gone, there was another leg. But it was leg made out of wood.

Recognizing the thing that was attached to his leg, Mark spoke up,

"isn't---- Isn't that--- Axolot wood?", after touching Axolot wood once more to reconfirm, "Grey, where did you get it---"

Before I could answer his question, he himself realized where did I get it from, "Your S rank artifact, you chose this?" 

"Yes," I replied.

"But why? why would you do that? why would you use your chance of getting an S rank item on an old man like me?" 

"Huh? why shouldn't I?" I said. 

Aunt Bruna placed her hand over my shoulder as she said, "That idiot won't understand if you don't say it to him directly."

"Oh, is he that dense?" 

"Very dense, it took him years to realize that I am in love with him." 

"Oh, then I would have to tell him directly.", I shifted my attention to mark, as I said, "Of course, I would give it to you. since the last four years, you took care of me as your own child. It won't be the farfetched thing to say that I view you as my father figure." 

"Oh...." said Mark as he left the room.

"Where are you going?" asked Aunt Bruna. 

"Just the other room, I just remembered the work I had to do."

"Oh okay." 

Later he walked out of the room.

Aunt Bruna turned to me, in a whispering tone, she spoke up, "Did you see how he was trying his best to not cry."

"Yes,"

"I am sure, he went to the other room just to cry," said Aunt Bruna as she let out a laugh. 

"Dad, are you crying?!!" I heard his Son's voice from the other room.

"Look!! I told you!!" said Aunt Bruna as she looked at me. 

I couldn't but help let out a chuckle. 

{Author: Axolot wood is a piece that comes out of Axolot tree. The specialty of this wood is that it attaches itself to a host.  Once attached, the wood takes the form of the host's disability, regenerating their disabled part.

In Mark's case, the wood attached itself to his leg, taking from of his missing leg. At first, it will be a wooden leg. But in a few days, the wooden leg will convert into a human leg as more and more wooden cell gets converted into human cells. Taking an appearance of a human leg.

The dried-up wood from the Axolot tree, which later attaches itself to an organism and helps the organism with any disability. Of course, the Axolot also has a benefit in this. 

After the death, the creature decomposes back to the soil. The wood uses these nutrients to grow back to a tree. It's a type of win-win scenario where both of the parties are benefiting from the relationship.}

"Oh, by the way, he is not supposed to be moving much for two or three days, until the wooden leg turns into a real one," I said as I started walking out.

"Where are you going?" asked Aunt Bruna.

"Oh, I have some work to do, so I will take my leave." 

"Oh, I have made fried chicken for lunch today, so why don't you join us?" 

"The work can wait, let's eat fried chicken."

78-2

After eating lunch at Mark's house, I went to the outskirt of the forest. There was work that I needed to do. 

Well, calling it 'work' would be wrong. It was more of an ----umm, experiment? yes! experiment would be the right word for it.

Besides Mana, there were two different types of energy in my body. I'll get to the topic of two different types of energy later.

First, I will talk about my mana core. The thing about my mana core is--- It's very small. 

It was very small, to begin with, but it kept growing a little bit until the age of eight. The age where I was exposed to the dark aura.

The dark aura in my body gathered around my mana core, limiting its growth. But that was not a curse, it was a blessing in disguise. 

Even though my mana core was small from the beginning, but the quality of mana in my body was better than a normal human. Due to the dark aura limiting the growth of my mana core, the mana that is gathered in my core is closely concentrated together, causing my core to have a highly condensed amount of mana.

Aside from Mana, my body also seems to contain two different types of energy, Divinity and Demonic energy. I have absolutely no idea where I got the divinity from, but I apparently possess divinity. 

If I had to guess, I most probably got it from that demi-god, Arianrhod. 

The demonic energy is the residue of Demoness Ami that she left behind in my body.

Thinking about her makes my heartache...

The reason I came to this forest was to test both of these powers.