Pushed Too Far

"Actually," I said, finally remembering about the mask, "there was one other thing we should probably mention. When we helped defeat the Priestess of the Mortal Cat Temple, she surrendered this to us…"

The statue's eyes flickered, I guessed an expression of surprise, when I brought out the Zodiac Mantle. "So they truly did place the Zodiac Mantles in the keeping of that place. It will be difficult to recover the others, but it sounds like at least a few are no longer in Cat's grasp. That is good."

"So, I was wondering…"

"Yes?"

"Is there any way you could, like, partially seal or limit their powers, so that I could use a weakened version of Snake's Mantle now?"

"Hmm…sorry, not as things stand," said the statue after some contemplation, "I'm not opposed to the idea as a reward for your recovering it, but even if I sealed a portion of its power, I'm afraid I could only do so enough to make it usable at Divine Rank. And even that isn't the main problem.