After the meeting ended, Cain had to rest for the night. He wanted to get the operation done as soon as possible. Delaying things was just a wish to failure.
“So have you decided what to do with that dragon corpse?” Alice asked as she rested on Cain’s bed with Selena and Gracie.
Cain stared at them with a wry smile and scratched his cheek, “Well, I’m going to implant its heart in my body.”
It took Alice a few seconds to process what he said, Sofia was confused and Selena failed to even grasp what he was talking about. “HOLD UP!” Alice yelled.
“Be a bit quiet, it’s midnight!” Cain tried to calm her down. Sofia finally caught up and joined in “I didn’t understand it wrong, right?” She was worried as well.
Seeing the other two girls act like that, Selena understood that Cain was up to no good with what she brought. “Is it my mistake-nya?” She gasped.
“Calm a bit, it isn’t like that!” Cain rushed to calm them but he was failing.
“It isn’t like that? Care to explain what you meant then?” Alice gave him a sharp glare. There is no way she misunderstood as she has her 20 wisdom.
Cain thought about it for a moment, “I do have two hearts, one is extra so I wanted to change him into that of the dragon.”
Alice lashed at him with Sofia, “That’s still bad!”
Probably it’s better if he explained what will that allow him to achieve and why it’s worth going into all that trouble for.
“After I evolved into an abomination I had two hearts and two brains. The two brains allow me to cast two spells simultaneously. The two hearts just increased my endurance. But now but doing this, the dragon heart will allow me to grow stronger the more I worked it. The Draconis fundamentum will also…”
“Wait there’s more?” Sofia grabbed him.
‘I slipped, I shouldn’t have mentioned that.’
“Listen to me, there is no risk involved. I do have two hearts after all.” Cain lied, he can still bleed to death.
“What if you bled to death?” Alice glared at him with an angry face.
‘I shouldn’t have argued with her, she is too hard to get behind.’
“That won’t happen, I still have your healing magic,” Cain replied with a forced smile.
“But…” Alice cried but was stopped by a voice behind her.
“Let master do what he wants.” Gracie finally spoke, her voice was both calm and sharp.
“What did you say? Do you know what he was talking about?” Alice growled at her.
“She is right, such a procedure is dangerous!” Sofia added up.
Selena who was a bit confused decided to side with Alice and Sofia, “That’s true-nya, I didn’t bring the prey so you can hurt yourself.”
Gracie glared at them with a passive face, “Master wishes to go with it, let him do what he wants.” Gracie replied. She was the only one on Cain’s side.
“No, we won’t let him, don’t interfere,” Sofia growled at her, using the slave bind she has to exert her will.
Gracie didn’t move, she just glared at Sofia for a moment. “So be it. Masters will take priority!” As Gracie said that, Sofia felt her control rapidly break. CRACK! The magic spell binding Gracie as a slave to Sofia shattered as the maid got engulfed with shadow magic.
[Dispel Magic] Cain immediately stopped everything before it could escalate further. Cain didn’t expect it to happen but it did.
There was a big weakness to Slave magic, the normal one that is. You can’t enslave someone that is stronger than you or have a bigger soul. Cain was able to keep his hold over Sylph since his soul was bigger.
Sofia was a bit weaker than Gracie. And even in soul comparison, Sofia couldn’t compare to Gracie who lived through hell.
“Now you have to calm down. Alice, it’s just like the day I completed your transformation. There is no risk at all!” Cain tried to shift the conversation toward him. He didn’t want cracks to appear between them.
It took him the whole night and a lot of sweet talks to get them to agree.
The next day, Cain used the magic Zaleria left in her hut to teleport there and opened a portal to the maze. The operation will be carried out inside the maze with Zaleria’s tools. Anything that is missing will be replaced with magic. The first hour was spent moving stuff inside the maze and preparing everything.
As if time was flying. Cain found himself standing in front of the operating table with everything ready to start the procedure.
“I will first use magic to prepare the place, please be careful.” Cain lifted his hands up and started releasing waves of [Cleansing] that Alice could use with her holy magic.
[Sylph’s Private Sanctum] The entire place was covered with an aura of peace and magic, all magic-related effects can be amplified a little bit inside.
[Astral Projection] Cain laid on the table and used the spell. For a second his vision blurred and he then could see his body sleeping on the table. His astral body was connected to his physical body by a silvery thread.
‘Nice, the first part worked perfectly. All I need to do now is make sure I have a way of communicating with them.’ Cain thought as he clapped his hands [Weird]
That spell simply broke the barrier between what is astral in nature and what is considered normal. Allowing the weird nature of the world to show its true self.
“It worked, we can both see and hear you,” Zaleria said as she looked up.
“Then everything is ready, please start the operation by taking the dragon’s organs out first.” Cain started guiding them when he can through the operation.
They started with the dragon corpse, those things don’t spoil that easily. After that, the operation started for real.
The two witches worked meticulously to keep Cain alive and make the operation successful.
All the girls were waiting outside the maze when both Zaleria and Bela walked out. “How was it?” Alice rushed toward them. She was feeling sucking her holy magic like crazy so she could feel that the operation didn’t go smoothly.
“We had some rough edges but it was successful. He is asleep now, you can go see him.” Zaleria said and the girls rushed inside.
Bela was left standing there beside Zaleria when Amaya walked into the room. She was allowed in since she already know what was going on there.
Bela stared at Amaya for a few seconds before vanishing into the snow and hiding inside the maze. Her dead heart was beating faster than at any moment in her life. What kind of monster was that girl? The sheer amount of necrotic magic hiding in her body was disgusting.
Amaya stared at Zaleria in confusion, “Did I do something wrong?”
Zaleria looked at her, “Nothing that is your mistake, it’s just the army waiting behind your back.” When Zaleria looked at Amaya with her draconic eyes. She could see all the undead linked to her by Cain.
Amaya had a scarier aura than a lich like Bela. She was smelling like the catastrophe dungeon if it was compressed into a single girl.
“Yeah, It’s Cain’s fault.” Zaleria gave up on thinking.