Enigma of Sin

The last of the mana stored within Kayn's arms slipped away. His eyes widened as the sudden event jolted his mind awake.

'Well, this was why I included the 2% failure rate.' Kayn sighed in his mind. This was the only part that Kayn couldn't say wasn't a gamble, because it would all depend on his new core.

Kayn's only hope in the case this happened was that his core would have accumulated even the tiniest amount of mana within it after being set into its new home. So, without wasting any time, he concentrated all of his will, focusing in on his core to find even the most minute amount of mana stored inside his new core.

Kayn could feel himself starting to fade into unconsciousness again, but then he felt it. His core had such a small amount of mana that Kayn wasn't actually sure he could do anything with it. His mana pathways weren't connected to his core yet, but luckily the mana was right where he needed it.

Just as he was about to pass out again, he exploded that tiny amount of mana by converting it into the lightning element.

*Ba-thump*

The sound of Kayn's heart beating echoed in his head as he was once again jolted awake, taking in a massive breath. Each breath Kayn took helped him to settle down more and more as time went by and he lay there, relief visible on his face.

He placed the removed piece of his chest wall back in place, but couldn't heal it back together yet as he still couldn't utilize mana as his mana core and pathways weren't connected.

Now that the dangerous part was over, Kayn finally relaxed a little, but not fully. Until his pathways were once again connected to his core, he had to stay focused. Only after 10 minutes passed did Kayn think he could expand the mana from his core outward to connect the main pathway.

As the pathway reached outside his heart and connected with the aorta, the main artery, Kayn felt a massive influx of energy. Every beat of his heart was spreading a warmth that he had never felt throughout his body.

'This is incredible! With this maybe I can-' Kayn's thoughts were cut off at that point as he screamed in extreme pain.

"Ahhhh!!" His hands immediately went to squeeze his head that exploded with a pain worse than anything he had ever felt before.

The pain was the final straw as Kayn's mind just couldn't take everything it had been through. He fell unconscious even as blood began to flow from the open wound on his chest.

…

Exactly 10 days, or one week, had passed since Kayn entered his room. Est and Horace were standing outside of the door to his room with sorrowful expressions on their faces.

Kayn said that if he didn't come out within a week, he most likely died. If they were being honest with themselves, they felt like they knew the answer too as a repulsive smell had started to come from his room during the last few days.

Both of them wrapped a cloth around their faces to help block the smell and picked up the water bucket and other cleansing materials they had brought with them in order to clean the room of the smell after they removed Kayn's body for burial.

Opening the door, a putrid odor immediately assaulted their noses even with the coverings. Fortunately, both of them had been around nasty odors several times before while working on the farm, but that still couldn't stop the nauseous feeling from arising within their stomachs and throats.

Kayn's body was surrounded with a reddish-black substance that looked like a mixture between dried blood and tar. He didn't have a shirt on and there on his chest was a partially healed wound in the shape of a massive rectangle where his heart should be. Dried blood and more of the gunk were all over his chest.

Kayn hadn't explained the entire process in detail to them and had only said that he was going to perform a dangerous experiment on his own body. However, it didn't look like whatever he was trying to do healed properly and it led to his death.

The only oddity they were able to observe though was that through the gunk, his skin didn't look pale as a normal person would after death. However, his chest wasn't rising and falling, so it didn't look like he was breathing.

Kayn's arms were lying spread out to the side of his head like he had been clenching his head and his facial muscles were seemingly frozen is a pained expression.

Est and Horace both sighed at this sight. They weren't exactly sure what he was trying to achieve, but surely it wasn't as important as being there for his sister as she grew up.

Horace placed down what he had brought in and approached the window to open the curtain, letting more light into the room. The ground was still hard and covered with snow, so they would have to wait for a while longer before they could actually bury him.

The two were planning on storing his body outside in the snow, wrapped in cloth. They wanted to at least keep the smell down until they could bury him properly.

Horace had just finished pulling the curtains back to let in the morning light when he heard a crashing sound and a scream come from his wife.

Quickly turning around, Horace had started moving before he fully looked at his wife's face. Upon checking on her as he continued moving to the other side of the bed, he saw that she dropped everything in her hands. Her eyes were wide open like she had just received the biggest scare of her life.

Following Est's line of sight, Horace's eyes also widened as he saw what had caused such a reaction.

…

Kinzie and Rowen settled down quite easily within the last few days of being in Palatine. Even if Rowen's core wasn't up to par with the best enchanters out there, he was specialized in a field most were not, slave collars.

The Palatine officials were quick to accept his request to open a shop when he also said that he would be willing to becoming a contracted slave collar remover.

The Mancean Empire was extremely strict about slaves. Anyone caught anywhere near capturing, trading, or owning of slaves would be sentenced to death regardless of the level of involvement. Palatine even had their own special forces group that was only dispatched for matters involving slaves.

Compared to the officials in Carnet, who had a zero slave policy on the surface, but would look the other way if they were paid enough, Mancea did not have any tolerance for those in the slave industry.

Why? Because the Mancean Empire was founded by slaves who had escaped or killed their masters. Mancea had a much more diverse population compared to Carnet, strictly because of their zero tolerance rules on slaves.

The majority of the population was composed of different beastkin races, but they also had elves, dwarves, demon races, and even the odd speckle of the rare races on Lavanth, such as gnomes.

The demon races that chose to live here were those who were nervous about living in places where being captured was a risk because they were the more sought after races for slaves, such as succubi.

That didn't mean there weren't humans within the Mancean Empire, but there weren't many. Most of them were either half or married to a different race. After all, humans were the main culprit behind the slave trade in the past and even in Carnet, not to mention the corrupted humans of Inmortuea.

For the first few days, Kinzie helped Rowen set up his new shop that he had leased, but that wasn't all she did. She also went to find a shop that had a bowyer, a bow craftsman. While blacksmiths weren't a rare sight, a specialist in bow making wasn't often seen outside of the Great Forest.

Sure, there were people who crafted bows and arrows, and some that were quite good, but none of the ones Kinzie found could make heads or tails of the design she described. She didn't want to give any specific details as she didn't want someone to copy the design before she could obtain one herself.

The day was closing out and Kinzie had given up all hope for today of finding a shop that could meet her needs. Fortunately, Palatine was massive and the crafting district in the middle ring would take over a week to comb through, so she was still hopeful.

"Get out of my shop if you think so low of my wares!" Kinzie heard the scream of a disgruntled woman before watching as fox beastkin walked out of shop while mumbling about ridiculous bows that definitely wouldn't work.

Intrigued by this, Kinzie decided to step into the shop. Inside she saw an absolutely tiny woman with pink hair pulled up into a bun placing a bow that was at least three times her height back onto the wall.

The pink haired woman, or maybe child, turned around before noticing Kinzie's dumbfounded stare before snorting and speaking to the dazed elf looking woman in her shop. "What are you looking at? If you've come to gawk at the gnome, I'll kindly ask you to leave before you get hurt."

Kinzie quickly came out of her daze after she was threatened and started to look around shop. The walls were covered with bows of all different shapes and sizes ranging from long bows to bows that she had no clue what to call them. If Kayn was there, he would recognize them though since they had the same appearance as a compound bow from Earth.

Kinzie's mouth unknowingly opened as she was still busy marveling at all the different types of bows she had never seen before. "Did you make all of these?"

"Of course I did! This is my shop! Why would I display other peoples' craft in my own shop? Tina's Bows. The name of the shop is straight forward, so why ask that dumb of a question?" The tiny pink haired woman was annoyed.

First that fox had come into her shop and done nothing but complain, and now she had a naïve looking elf that gawked at her appearance for a short amount of time before averting her eyes and trying to distract her by asking obvious questions.

"Um, my apologies Miss Tina, if that is what you would prefer to be called, otherwise please tell me. However, I was wondering if you take custom requests, or do you only make your own designs?" Kinzie asked after a bit of hesitation and embarrassment as she felt bad for staring at her in a daze since this was her first time seeing a gnome.

"It's Tina Bowyer, we gnomes take our surnames based upon our specialty, but you can just call me Tina, if you're a customer that is. Also, I do take custom orders, but you must provide a design that is even somewhat workable as a bow and I retain my right to make changes as I see fit as the craftsman."

Hearing this, Kinzie's eyes brightened up a bit. With the complexity and detailed work put into some of the bows on the wall, surely this gnome could make Kayn's design a reality. Kinzie quickly started to list off the details she had given all of the other craftsman throughout the day rather than hand over the design.

Tina's eyebrow raised as she listened. This bow sounded like it would be a challenge to make, and even the materials required sounded quite unique. However, she wouldn't know if it was doable until she saw a mostly put together design.

"Do you have a design drawn out that I can take a look at? It sounds possible, but I won't know until I actually lay my eyes on the design. Unless you'd like for me to draw one up based upon your specifications that is."

Kinzie hesitated for a little while before finally reaching into the satchel that was hanged by her side and pulling out a piece of paper before handing it over to Tina.

Tina's eyes opened wide before a grimace started to form on her face the more she looked over the design. While it looked doable at a glance, the requirements for the materials and the smaller details would make this bow quite challenging to finish to specifications.

In the end, Tina sighed before looking back up to the elf who had given her the design and noticed she had a sad look on her face like she was about to be disappointed again, "I can do it."

Kinzie's voice immediately contained a great amount of excitement, "Then!" she started to speak before being interrupted.

"However," Tina paused, "the materials this will require are going to be quite expensive and it may take a while. Several experiments are going to be needed to find materials that meet the requirements of this design. I need to know you'll be able to pay for all of that before I even consider this."

Tina said that, but inside she was hoping that this elf was loaded. She really wanted to make this bow, even if not for this elf, for herself as a craftsman. But the thought of spending her own money on a bow that probably wouldn't end up selling, even if it brought her a great mount of pride, it just wasn't possible for her current situation.

Kinzie's face dropped for a second before brightening up again, "I can afford it, how much do you need to start? I'll bring it tomorrow!"

Little did Rowen know, Kinzie was going to extort him for all he could afford over the next few months.

And that was exactly what she did. Rowen couldn't fathom the amount of gold coins she was spending from his profits, but he couldn't help but continue to spoil her. She had even gotten accepted into the academy during these months, even with it being mid semester.

She was working especially hard to get good grades on her studies as that was his only requirement for providing her with so much money. Even when she wasn't in class or given any assignments, she remained vigilant in her studies in order to catch up to her classmates on non-combat subjects, of which she was severely lacking knowledge in.