I. The Butcher's Silence and the Micro-Forge
The silence that descended upon the cave entrance was heavy, a suffocating blanket of dust, ozone, and the copper tang of spilled life. It was not a peaceful silence; it was the held breath of a predator sensing a shift in the food chain. The Bulldog Ants, thousands of them, had retreated to the lip of their disturbed nest, forming a seething black line of twitching antennae and clicking mandibles. They watched. They assessed. They did not attack.
In the animal kingdom, injury usually invited immediate predation. But the hive mind paused. They recognized a predator—not by its size or its strength, but by its terrifying willingness to destroy itself to achieve a kill.
Absolutum sat in the center of this silent arena, examining his own body. The regeneration process was active, but it was not passive healing. It was active manufacturing.
[SYSTEM STATUS: SCAVENGED MATERIALS DETECTED.] [INITIATING SUB-ROUTINE: PLASTICITY INDUCTION (MICRO-SCALE).]
He looked at his hands. He had jammed the severed mandibles of the Bulldog Ants onto his fingertips during the chaos. Now, the System was finalizing the bond.
The tips of his phalanges (finger bones) did not merely knit together; they softened. Under the influence of the Marrow Aura, the calcium matrix became viscous, like hot wax. The bone flowed into the hollow cavities of the jagged ant mandibles, expanding to fill every microscopic crevice of the chitin.
Click. Click. Click.
The bone re-hardened instantly. The mandibles were no longer held by friction; they were fused, socketed perfectly into the bone. They were now extensions of his skeletal geometry—serrated, organic scalpels.
He looked at his left leg—the brittle ruin of Elven bone he had hastily patched with ant head-plates.
[MOLDING: CHITIN INLAY.]
The System applied the same logic. The fractured Elven femur didn't just heal under the ant plates; it rose up to meet them. The bone edges liquefied and curled over the lips of the chitin plates, locking them in place like gemstones in a ring setting. The "crude splints" were transformed into Segmented Chitin Inlay Armor, creating a composite structure that was stronger than the original bone.
Objective: Stabilization. Method: Radical Surgical Intervention.
He turned his eyeless gaze toward the mountain of flesh that was the Porcupine Alpha. It lay on its side, a ruined fortress of charcoal hide and broken quills.
"Begin," he whispered, the word grinding like stones in a riverbed.
II. The Harvest of the Alpha
Absolutum dragged himself toward the carcass. The movement was pathetic, a dragging crawl, but his new mandible-fingers twitched with anticipation. His mind overlaid a spectral grid of anatomy upon the beast's corpse.
Target: Right Femur of the Porcupine Alpha. Structural Requirement: High-Density Load Bearing.
He reached the beast. The hide was a callous-reinforced dermis, nearly an inch thick. Absolutum drove the newly fused ant-mandible index finger into the meat of the thigh.
It didn't slice; it parted the flesh like a zipper. The fusion of bone and chitin provided absolute rigidity, allowing him to apply maximum torque without the tool slipping.
The resistance of the muscle was immense. The beast's muscle density was nearly three times that of a human. To the Martial Archive mind, it was beautiful. To his current skeletal frame, it was a wall.
Absolutum used the leverage of his skeletal elbows, ratcheting his arms back and forth. The mandible-scalpels chewed through the fascia with terrifying efficiency.
Blood, thick and dark like oil, coated his white arm bones, but the fused mandibles did not waver.
Anatomy Analysis: The vastus lateralis is fused with the tendon sheath. Connective tissue reinforced with trace earth-element deposits.
He worked with a terrifying, emotionless rhythm. Slice. Tear. Pry. He separated the heavy muscle fascia, peeling back the layers of meat to expose the prize beneath.
The bone was not white. It was the color of old ivory stained with deep, rusted iron, mottled with the stress lines of a creature that lived by charging into stone walls.
With a wet, sickening snick, he located the hip socket. The ligaments here were thick as ropes. He applied torque, twisting the heavy leg until the connective tissue reached its breaking point. He severed the joint capsule, the sound like a wet branch snapping.
Absolutum pulled. The bone came free with a chaotic suction sound.
He held it up to the dim light. It was ugly. It was magnificent.
The Porcupine Femur was short, incredibly thick, and curved slightly—a natural shock absorber. It pulsed with a low, throbbing heat.
[ITEM IDENTIFIED: Porcupine Alpha Femur (Right).] [GRADE: Exceptional (Marrow Density 400% of Host Baseline).] [COMPATIBILITY ANALYSIS: Geometric mismatch. Density mismatch. Resonance potential: 74%.]
III. The Price of Improvement
The System's voice cut through his assessment, projecting a holographic schematic over his right leg—the one he hadn't patched with ant armor. The red warning lines pulsed over the splintered Elven tibia.
[PROPOSAL: Tibial Replacement.] [LOGIC: The host's right tibia is structurally compromised. The Porcupine Femur possesses the density required to anchor the Quill Recoil.]
[WARNING: Procedure requires manual removal of host tibia. Pain inhibitors: Unavailable.]
Absolutum looked at the schematic, then at his leg. The Elven bone was beautiful geometry, but pathetic utility.
Pain is merely high-fidelity data, he reminded himself.
He dropped the heavy Porcupine bone into the dust. He gripped his own right knee.
With the cold detachment of a mechanic, he drove his mandible-tipped fingers into the soft connective tissue of his own knee joint. The fused mandibles sliced through his own cartilage with ease.
He dug deep.
The sensation was blinding. It was a violation of the self. He felt the scrape of chitin against his own patella. He felt the elastic snap of his own anterior cruciate ligament as he hooked it with the ant-mandible and severed it.
He didn't scream. He just vibrated.
He moved to the ankle. Same process. Sever. Pry. Disconnect.
He gripped the shattered shaft of his Elven tibia. He twisted.
The sound was a dry, terrifying pop. He tore the shattered remains of his lower leg free from his body. He held the splintered, white bone for a second—a piece of himself, now garbage—and tossed it onto the pile of ant corpses.
He was now an amputee. A void waiting to be filled.
IV. The Welding of Souls
He lifted the bloody, heavy Porcupine Femur.
The geometry was wrong. It was a thigh bone (femur) meant to replace a shin bone (tibia). It was too thick, too short, and the joint surfaces were inverted.
Physics does not care about names. It cares about load distribution. Force it.
He jammed the heavy bone into the space where his shin should be. He shoved the beast's heavy hip joint into the ruined cup of his Elven knee.
"Integrate," he rasped.
[INITIATING INTEGRATION.] [CONSUMING BONE MARROW AURA... 100% OUTPUT.]
The Ossis Perfectio Matrix roared to life.
It wasn't healing; it was welding. Green fire erupted around the mismatched joints.
[SYSTEM INTERVENTION: PLASTICITY INDUCTION (MACRO-SCALE).]
Just as it had done with the ant mandibles, the System now attacked the massive Porcupine bone. The structure hissed and softened.
First, the portions shifted—the bone compressed in length to match the exact span of the missing tibia, the excess mass folded inward to double the density.
Once the dimensions were set, the System took over as a sculptor. The bone became pliable, like hot wax. The mismatched ball joint at the knee did not just dissolve; it was physically molded, flattened and shaped into a perfect, heavy tibial plateau to accept the Elven femoral condyles. The distal end was pressed and contoured to lock seamlessly into the ankle talus.
It was a perfect fit, yet it retained its savage nature. The shaft remained thick and bowed, a dense anchor capable of rooting the quills, but the connection points were now flawless, seamless transitions of biology.
V. The Anchor Leg
The green fire faded into a dull, smoldering gray. Absolutum slumped forward, exhausted.
Slowly, mechanically, he stood up.
The change was immediate. His left leg was a composite of Elven bone and Chitin Inlay. His right leg, below the knee, was a paradox. The bone was twice as thick, dark and heavy, bowing slightly outward. But the joints were perfect. The transition from white Elven bone to dark Porcupine ivory was seamless, smooth to the touch.
He took a step. Thud.
The weight difference was massive. The new leg dragged. But when he planted it, he felt something he hadn't felt since waking up: Stability.
He stomped the ground. The rock cracked under the heel. The bone didn't even vibrate.
[INTEGRATION COMPLETE.] [NEW COMPONENT: The Anchor Tibia (Porcupine variant).] [STATUS: Structural Integrity increased to 14% (Right Leg only).] [PASSIVE EFFECT: Quill Rooting. The dense marrow of this bone can now sustain the pressure of the Porcupine Quill Ossification (PQO) without shattering.]
VI. The First Volley
Absolutum needed to know. Knowledge without application was just theory. The ants were still watching.
The System highlighted a distant boulder, roughly the size of a torso.
[TEST REQUIRED. Validate PQO stabilization.]
Absolutum planted his new, heavy right leg deep into the dirt, twisting the foot to lock the molded ankle joint. He used it as the fulcrum.
He channeled the Aura. Technique: Side Stance, Iron Root.
He targeted the marrow of the new bone. He commanded the quills to rise.
[PQO ACTIVATION: Localized Eruption.]
THWIP-THUNK.
Three six-inch bone quills did not just grow; they were fired. They erupted from the surface of his new shin bone with the sound of a pneumatic rivet gun.
The quills shot out with the velocity of a crossbow bolt, blurring through the air. They struck the boulder with a terrifying CRACK, burying themselves inches deep into the stone.
The recoil shuddered through his leg. The heavy Porcupine bone absorbed the shockwave, dispersing it into the ground.
No fracture. No pain. Just the heavy, dull thud of a successful firing mechanism.
[SUCCESS. Recoil absorbed. Self-damage: 0%.]
Absolutum ran a hand over the holes in his shin where the quills had exited. The bone was already sealing over with a wet click.
He looked at his legs—one armored in molded insect chitin, the other anchored by a beast's bone.
One down. 205 to go.