The Heartblood was naturally the first of the ingredients to take effect. It gave the saltwater a faint reddish hue, causing it to bubble violently. Entering Percy’s body, it made his heart beat faster, the rapid throbs echoing in his ears reminding him of his trollsfury potion. Only, the ritual would last days, not minutes.

Things weren’t as bad until the secondary ingredients kicked in. The Abyssal Moss caused the temperature of Percy’s body to fall off a cliff, making him feel as if somebody had emptied a bucket of snow into his veins. Thankfully, it wasn’t all that different from handling Micky’s soul-freezing ice mana, so he could endure it – if barely.

The toxins were a hundred times more troublesome than Percy could have ever imagined, however. He had expected his body to go numb, much like Kassorith’s had, but that wasn’t at all what happened. Percy watched his arms and chest turn purple, his flesh swelling as dark lines branched through his circulatory system.

Some body parts had indeed gone numb, but waves of excruciating agony gripped others. It felt like a million needles were stabbing at him from inside out, trying to rip him to shreds. His skin dried and flaked off, dark blood spilling into the bath and changing its colour again. Percy instantly understood that this wasn’t sustainable.

‘Shit, I won’t even last a minute like this!’ he thought, gritting his teeth.

Knowing he couldn’t afford to waste more time, he emptied the first of the Green healing potions from his spatial seal directly into his stomach. A wave of vitality spread out of the organ, washing over his mutating flesh, bringing him some relief.

This was Percy’s first time ever drinking a potion of a higher grade than his own – he hadn’t tried the Guild’s potions until after reaching Orange – so it was quite a novel experience. On paper, the Green liquid contained as much life mana as nine doses of Orange potion, but it was a lot more effective in practice, because Percy’s body was far more sensitive to the potent mana.

Even so, the brief healing failed to completely reverse the damage to his body. It merely slowed down the decay, though the itchy sensation it brought him was almost as unpleasant as the pain. That said, Percy didn’t care how he felt – he was busy monitoring the effect of the potion, trying to calculate how long his stash would last.

‘It’s already about to fade. I’ll need to drink two or even three doses per minute just to stabilize my condition. At this rate, I’ll run out of Green potions in under two hours!’

His heart sank as he realized that the hundreds of twice-compressed doses he had painstakingly brewed wouldn’t even last for five percent of the ritual’s duration. The idea of enduring the dangerous bath for days with nothing but Yellow potions filled him with dread. Even though he’d prepared a lot of supplies in advance, it appeared that he had still underestimated how potent the demigod’s blood was – especially to a Yellow specimen of a species the lineage had never been meant for.

‘Do you want me to pull you out?’ Micky asked, his voice tinged with worry.

‘Don’t,’ Percy hurriedly said. ‘It’s too early to give up. I’m still in control.’

He forced himself to calm down, reminding himself that the ritual’s effects were heavily front-loaded. If he wasn’t mistaken, Kassorith had absorbed about eighty percent of the benefits during the first day. Percy had no idea how much the first two hours would do for him, but he hoped that the rest of the bath wouldn’t be nearly as unpleasant.

Sure enough, Percy had to consume the Green potions much less frequently by the end of the first hour. Each now lingered inside his mutilated frame for close to a full minute before running out, which meant that his stash would easily last an additional hour over his earlier estimate – probably even more, if the trend continued.

Naturally, he was quite ecstatic about this development, and not only because he finally saw hope of surviving the ordeal. More importantly, the fact that his resistance to the ingredients had climbed so fast was definitive proof that his human body could actually inherit the Thess’kalan mutation – something he hadn’t been sure of!

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

‘I wonder how much of a boost I’ll receive…’

Well, there wasn’t any point in guessing. He’d have his answers soon enough.

The Green potions ran out about half an hour after daybreak, making Percy’s situation a whole lot more dangerous again. The Yellow potions weren’t nearly as effective, even when he consumed three or four of them at a time, and the odds of him and Micky getting discovered by an enemy had also risen together with the sun. Percy would have prayed to Phoebe to watch over him, but he was worried the titaness might actually hear the prayer, and he still wasn’t sure she could be trusted.

Thankfully, the damage the alien ritual inflicted on his body had lessened enough by now that the weaker potions could keep him alive, though the process hadn’t grown any less painful. Every second brought with it more agony than any other physical injury Percy had incurred over the years. At least, it still paled in comparison to the soul pain his bloodline and traits had regularly caused him, allowing him to endure it relatively easily.

Micky and the clone stood next to the container the whole time, carefully scanning their surroundings for any sign of an enemy. In theory, flying high would have given them a better vantage point, but it would have also raised the odds of somebody noticing them. Percy’s companions hadn’t said anything, though he knew they were both paying him close attention, their barely concealed anxiety gushing through the cords.

Everyone relaxed when the sun set for the second time, knowing that the worst of it was behind them. The dark blanket of night had enveloped them once more, shielding them from detection. Even the ritual was less dangerous by now. Percy’s body was still a mess, but he felt like he could endure the rest of the bath even without the potions.

‘I must have surpassed Kassorith’s starting point already,’ Percy guessed.

Opening his Status, he checked his mutations to see if anything new had appeared, though there was nothing but his Sovereign’s Eye there. Shrugging, he drank a few more healing potions – mostly to relieve some of his lingering pain from earlier – as he continued to wait for the ritual to end.

The second day was as uneventful as the first one. Percy and Micky were less concerned, because they knew he had already absorbed most of the benefits. The water in the makeshift vat was nearly black, due to the toxins’ effect on his previously unmutated blood, the stench of rot and decay filling the small island. Micky was forced to construct a thin dome around Percy to contain the scent, venting the air into the sea and funnelling some clean oxygen into the dome every few minutes.

During the afternoon, Percy started getting quite worried again. There was a lot to be happy about, including the fact that his life was no longer in danger, that it didn’t matter as much if he got interrupted this late into the ritual, and that the bath had clearly enhanced his body a lot. However, it was looking increasingly unlikely that he would reach Kassorith’s level. It had taken him most of the first day just to attain a body on par with the average Thess’kalan, and the second day hadn’t imparted him with nearly as many benefits.

‘Good thing I managed to bring an extra set of ingredients back…’

As the sun approached the horizon for the third time, Percy’s Status finally spoke.

[Congratulations! You have acquired a new mutation: Lesser Thess’kalan Physique!]

Reading the notification, Percy couldn’t help but frown, feeling relieved and confused in equal parts. It wasn’t that strange that he’d only inherited an inferior version of Kassorith’s mutation, considering how much less effective the ritual had been on him so far.

However, he was somewhat surprised to see his Status notify him about the new mutation. Phoebe’s Decree had admittedly been more active since its latest evolution, having announced the upgrade of his Sorcerer’s Eye and the acquisition of the Scribing trait, but that didn’t explain why it had remained silent when Kassorith had earned his version of the mutation on Thess’kala.

‘Does it only care about things I can bring back to my main body?’ Percy wondered, harbouring a random guess that he felt was close to the truth.

Granted, the clones’ Status had registered spells that he couldn’t use with his own body in the past – such as his recently acquired Instantaneous Formation – but that was different. The spells themselves had always followed him back to Remior, waiting for some breakthrough that would allow him to use them. Foreign mutations and bloodlines, on the other hand, were typically useless for him, and it appeared that Phoebe’s Decree was smart enough to recognize that.

Regardless, the Status’s whims weren’t important right now. Not even waiting for the sun to fully set, Percy pulled up his page, reading the new entry.

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Mutations:

* [Sovereign’s Eye] – Draws from the cumulative knowledge listed in the Status to enhance one’s vision, allowing them to discern details previously unseen.

* [Lesser Thess’kalan Physique] – Enhances one’s physical strength and the toughness of their body. Enhances one’s resistance to high or low temperatures and sharpens their thermal sense. Enhances one’s resistance to toxins.

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