Bone Tempering

Nothing else happened on the way home. Iono arrived at Ballu's cave and let the panther know that he was back.

He was surprised to learn that he was gone only for half a day. He took a couple of hours to go and come back from Argento, plus the time he waited for Troban's gang to leave the establishment. Which would mean that the time he spent in the cave would be less than half an hour.

But the truth was that the time he spend in the cave was more than a day. Between moving through all the traps, and studying all the rings, it took a long time to meet Ophiucus.

That would mean that the time flow inside the cave, had a difference of over 49 times than the time outside. That left Iono inwardly impressed, and filled him with joy, seeing as he now possessed that small time changing cave.

One more surprise was that his parents came looking for him, and Ballu covered for him. Nonetheless, his parents did give the poor panther a small beating for sending their precious, little boy away, alone.

"Many thanks my dear friend, here's a token of my appreciation.", he pulled out Troban's equipment and gifted it to the panther.

"Hmph, weren't you calling me your slave a couple of days ago? Hypo- Ouuu, goodies, yay!". And so the whole matter was settled.

After returning home Iono had a lot to answer for, given that he was missing for almost an entire day.

"And what do you have to say for yourself, mister?", Anna was pretty pissed off, but she was too relieved that he was okay to be mad at him. On the other hand, she was still his mother, and she had to be stern.

"I'm sorry mom. I promise I won't do it again.", and by using his ultimate secret move, Anna was lost in cuteness, and hugged Iono tightly.

His father was the one training him, so he knew Iono's strength the best. Even if he didn't know his actual limits, he understood that he was no pushover.

After a small lecture of how important is his own safety, Iono enjoyed a joyful dinner with his family.

Anna went all-out, filling the table with numerous delicacies. It was the first time in a long time Iono was so full he couldn't walk.

Father and son rested in the living room, holding their inflated bellies, trying to breath normally.

Anna could only laugh at the sight.

After a few hours of casual conversation and a goodnight kiss, both of Iono's parents went to bed, and let him sleep in his now double sized bed that had replaced the small crib.

Iono was only 8 years old, but his constitution made him look almost like a teenager. He was now almost as tall as Anna, if not a bit taller and was slowly catching up to his dad.

Yusef was glad to see his son getting stronger, and more handsome, while Anna, although happy with her son growing to be a healthy young man, was afraid that by the time he was eleven, he would look like a young adult. If having green skin wasn't enough to induce mocking by the other children in the academy, an eleven year old looking like an old man would do the job.

"What if they call him "Old man", and they make fun of him? Yusef what should we do!?"

Anna was worried as his mother, and Yusef was heartily laughing at his wife's needless worries. Only he regretted it every time, since his laughter would only be responded by a mean glare.

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Midnight, Iono's House.

After his parents fell asleep, Iono made sure to be silent while leaving the house.

He arrived at the fields that he used as a training ground with his father.

He approached the mountain that hid the morning sun from the field and using his bare hands, dug a hole deep enough for the tungsten cave to exist in.

He opened the pouch and the tungsten cave was placed in the ground.

"Maybe I can use this cave as a moving base. It's still too early for my ego space to work as one, so I can use this cave until that time. And if you also consider the time advantage, I'd be pretty much unstoppable in the Academy in three years.

Not just in the Academy, but in this continent, maybe in the rest as well. After all a 49 multiplier, would mean that... If I deduce the year with my godfather...I would spend 98 years training in the cave, while only 2 years would have passed outside... Holy sh*t! I will be an actual old man! Maybe my mom's worries will come true!"

Only his plans fell apart, when he realized that the moment the skeleton was removed, the energy rings bending the fabric of space-time of this place would collapse on themselves, reducing the cave to nothingness.

*Sigh*, "And here I though I would have a mobile home. Damn it, Ophiucus, I thought we were buddies! Anyway, the plan would fall apart either way. I can't magically turn older than my grandfather, and expect my parents to not have any questions, or more importantly, reservations."

After realising he got worked up, and disappointed for nothing, he dove back into the spinal fluid, and then ended up at the skeleton.

Iono started running across the spine of the creature, until it reached its tail. It took him almost a half hour to cross that distance, and he was moving while using his dagger arts.

The skeleton was just that big.

After reaching the point where the tail connected to the spine, the sides also connected to the legs, and in the middle was the pelvic girdle.

Iono pulled out his scythe, and used "One with the Scythe", similar to "One with the sword" his father used, to split the tail and the rest of the skeleton. Invisible prana gathered around Iono's body, and he pushed his energy to it's limits. Suddenly his eyes turned white, and Iono's body merged with the scythe, which in turn grew in size.

It was a colourless gigantic scythe, that emitted an energy so full of bloodlust, the space around it started freezing. It tore down to the sacrum*, and split the skeleton in two, in a majestic tremor. The whole cave quivered for a few moments, before settling down.

"Phew, that's tiring work. I went all-out, and this is all I can master with "One with the scythe". I should quickly complete the refinement and successfully enter bone tempering.

I don't have a tail, so I will let the egg eat it when it's born. Let's start with the legs, that should be something I can handle."

And so Iono placed his scythe in his ego space, and sat in a lotus position, next to the legs. At this point the spinal fluid lake couldn't reach. There's only a certain amount of spinal fluid a skeleton has, and it should have been long gone, only this creature was very special.

While meditating, Iono had a thought.

"Come to think of it, I still don't know what species this guy was. Let's hope it's something with Bloodline Inheritance. I don't know if the skeleton is enough to inherit it, but he did say that they have special powers. I really can't wait!"

While in lotus position, Iono let his prana loose, which covered both legs of the skeleton. The legs where huge and the Prana Iono possessed was not enough so he had to constantly create Prana in his core to make up for the difference in size.

Constantly creating prana was one hell of tiring thing to do, but he could only grit his teeth and curse himself for not further refining his core.

The Prana left his body, coating the skeleton legs, and started chipping on the bones from the inside. While burrowing through the marrow, the Prana started grinding the bones of the skeleton into powder.

Just like a stone mill grinding seeds, the Prana inside and outside the bones moved in circular motions, turning the bones into fine dust.

It took an enormous amount of time for those humongous bones to be grinded into powder. The pelvis*, the femur*, the tibia* and the fibula*, where all made into powder after almost four days of constant grinding. Thanks to the time energy rings though, only two hours had gone by outside.

After four days of constantly releasing his Prana and controlling it to apply pressure to the bones, Iono was utterly exhausted.

"If I start the refinement now, I'll die before actually starting. I need a breather." he pondered.

Therefore he rested for half a day before starting the refinement.

After reaching his optimal state, he started placing numerous energy rings around him.

Pain numbing, regeneration and even electrical to shock him in case he passed out from the pain.

After many preparations, he finally laid down with his arms and legs spread out.

"This is going to hurt."

With that thought he took a deep breath and started once again to release his Prana. The Prana entered his body, and this time started grinding his own bones.

This was the hurtful part.

The idea behind refinement was to turn one's own bones into dust, and replace them with a different bone dust, which would at some point heal and become his skeleton.

Basically, they literally change their skeleton, like changing a shirt. Only this hurts enough for someone to wish for death, and if you're not careful, a single mistake could cripple you for life.

One had to not only be extremely careful while handling every spec of dust, one had to rearrange the powder so as to create a skeleton that matches their body. Because you can't wear pants like wearing a shirt. It won't fit.

The pain of grinding your own bones can only be described as terrifying. Iono had to constantly shock himself so he wouldn't pass out from the pain.

His eyes had turned red, and his veins where popping out. His hair had become disheveled, as he was constantly making his legs into dust.

After a few minutes, his legs looked like two gooey substances, it seemed as if though they were made of rubber. There were no bones in his legs or pelvic area. He couldn't feel the bottom part of his body anymore.

He then used every shred of willpower he had, to guide Ophiucus's bone dust in his legs.

The dust seeped inside the flesh, by digging through it, causing even more pain. While in this kind of pain, he had to constantly rearrange the bone molecules to look like his previous skeleton. One mistake and he would be looking like a humanoid monstrosity, with bones protruding out his skin.

The dust took the shape of the pelvis, the femur, the tibia and the fibula. Although it was still dust, it looked like a proper bone structure. Then all of Iono's blood vessels and nerves wrapped around the dusty bones, to complete the transmutation.

Iono was constantly shocking himself, trying to stay awake, and he was gridding his teeth so hard, they cracked.

After a few moments to catch his breath he realized that the painful part is over. Now he only needed enough nutrients and energy for the dust to assimilate into a proper bone.

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*Parts of a skeleton