Although this notification had sounded in Daneel"s mind, he had no way of being aware of it due to the fact that he had fainted the moment his hand had touched Faxul"s, allowing the system to confine the ent.i.ty to his friend"s body.
Although the entire experience had only taken place in the span of a few seconds in the real world, it felt as if Daneel had been tortured for a few years inside his mind due to the unendurable pain that had almost driven him crazy.
Due to the overload of having to manage it while also doing everything he could to find a solution, he had had no choice but to give up and lose consciousness as soon as it faded.
After an unknown amount of time had pa.s.sed, Daneel found himself getting up with an ache in his head.
Finding himself parched, he tried to conjure a globe of water to swallow seeing that there was no cup on the bedside.
Yet, to his horror, it felt as if he had no Mageroot to control the elemental particles in order to cast the spell.
"System, why can"t I feel my Mageroot?!"
The answer made him calm down and crash back onto the bed, feeling relieved that nothing dire had happened as he had feared.
[Mageroot temporarily disabled due to overload. Time to reactivation: three hours].
This was something which had never happened before, making him understand just how perilous of a situation he had been in which had led to the Mageroot actually being disabled and closing down in order to heal due to everything it had been through.
Sending a message to Kellor through the Oathstone, Daneel got up and went to the bathroom before realizing that it was actually the next day.
He had actually been unconscious for an entire day!
Freshening himself up, Daneel changed the rumpled clothes which he had been wearing during the meeting before and wore a different green robe that also had a dragon on its shoulders which had become his unofficial crest.
As Kellor knocked and entered the door on Daneel"s order, the King finally asked the question he had been slightly dreading to ask since waking from his slumber.
"How"s Faxul?"
"His breathing is steady, but he has yet to regain consciousness."
With an expression of relief, Daneel said, "All right. Let"s go to him."
On reaching a room near the King"s Chambers, Daneel was surprised to see that Faxul was actually chained to a bed while being overseen by Robert and Luther.
Seeing him enter the door, Robert only smiled once feeling glad that his son was safe.
Being the King was indeed a perilous job, he mused, before nodding at Daneel and walking out the door to rea.s.sure his wife.
Seeing his father leave, Daneel raised an eyebrow at the shackles before ordering both Luther and Kellor to leave the room.
Sensing their hesitation as they tried to say something, he said, "Don"t worry. The threat has been mitigated. It was because of a technique that the Eldest Prince practiced, but I have managed to subdue it for now."
Hearing the King"s rea.s.surance, the two also nodded before leaving the room and closing the door behind them.
Having the room to himself, Daneel first ripped open the s.h.i.+rt of his friend before sighing on seeing the grotesque sight in front of him.
On Faxul"s chest, a patch of differently colored skin could be seen with veins throbbing all around it as if it were being pushed out by his friend"s body.
Different from Faxul"s ivory colored skin, this patch was darker, reminding him of the exact shade of the face which had been on the Eldest Prince"s chest.
Indeed, this was the physical link which tied the ent.i.ty to Faxul.
On the way over, Daneel had already asked the system about what could be done in this situation because it had already gotten the chance to a.n.a.lyse the ent.i.ty again.
Thankfully, the option was present to directly remove it from his friend"s body to allow him to get back to normal.
Without any hesitation, Daneel ordered the system to carry out this process.
A transparent blade of wind appeared at the edge where the inch wide patch of skin seemed to be grafted onto Faxul"s chest.
Yet, the moment the blade came into contact with him, Faxul"s eyes flew open as he immediately tried to get up and found himself shackled to the bed.
"Stop.", he said, making Daneel tell the system to stop what it was doing wondering just what the reason was behind his friend asking him to do so.
The ent.i.ty was after all like a malignant tumour whose only purpose was definitely to take revenge on Daneel.
This was the reason that he hadn"t hesitated to check everyone for its presence despite knowing that it was a danger to himself, because of the fact that it would definitely mean harm to its host due to all the hate present in it.
"Do you know what it is? I will only simply remove it and you can get back to normal.", he said, looking into Faxul"s eyes.
What he saw next amazed him. An expression of slight panic emerged in Faxul"s face, as he clutched at the patch of skin on his chest before moving back on the bed as much as he could while trying to put some distance between him and Daneel.
Daneel could not make heads or tails out of the situation.
"System, is it possible for the ent.i.ty to infect its host and changes personality in such a short amount of time?"
[Negative. Only a complete switching of personalities is possible.]
This puzzled him even more. He could tell that the person in front of him was still his friend, but the panic didn"t make sense.
Thinking back to its description, he finally got an idea about what could have happened.
Had it enticed him in some way, making him to want to keep it?
As Faxul opened his mouth to speak, Daneel sighed as he realised that this was true.
"This… thing says that it can increase my training speed and battle effectiveness. Is it true?"
Hearing the question, Daneel was tempted to lie as he simply did not want this last-ditch attack of the Eldest Prince"s to effect his friend.
Yet, he knew that Faxul wasn"t someone who was dumb. It was quite clear that both the Eldest Prince and the Vice Sect Master who had used this technique had skyrocketed in power since the last time that they had been seen in the Kingdom.
"Yes. But there is always a risk that you will be consumed by it. It is not worth it, Faxul. You have the lesser development technique which will increase your potential anyway. You do not need this thing which can possibly take over your body even if it means that you can double your training speed. It would just mean an eternal life of pain. Let me remove it."
The mention of doubling training speed made Faxul"s eyes open wide, causing him to lose the focus in his gaze as if he was thinking about something.
After a few moments in which Daneel patiently waited for an answer, Faxul blinked tightly and looked into Daneel"s eyes as if he had made a decision.
Daneel had seen this expression of his friend"s many times. It meant that the decision was taken with the single-minded determination and focus using which Faxul had defied all expectations in the Academy to put in more hard work than anyone else in order to train as fast as possible.
"The lesser development technique is slow comparatively. I want to keep it. I can handle anything it throws at me."
Daneel was simply shocked at this proclamation. He knew that power was important, but was it worth risking one"s own life each and every day and being in so much pain?
As he asked himself this question, Daneel remembered a boy who had gritted his teeth in frustration when he saw his mother going around the neighborhood doing odd jobs and coming back home with wrinkled and callused hands, while his father tried each day to ease their family"s situation in any way he could even if it meant beatings and humiliation.
If he had been posed with the same question at that moment with no system in his mind and the worst potential possible, Daneel knew that he would have accepted without any hesitation.
"Why?"
Although he realized this, he still asked the question because he wanted to find out just what motivation his friend had which had led him to take this decision.
The question made Faxul frown for a bit, as if he were a.s.sembling his own thoughts.
After a few seconds, he answered, "I want to… become powerful enough to be someone who can be compared to my father. By carrying out the tasks you gave me, some… yearning has been born inside me. I cannot explain exactly what it is, but I know that I need power if I want to satisfy it."
Although Faxul"s answer was short, Daneel understood what he meant.
What his friend had felt was definitely something similar to what he himself had experienced when he had first been cheered outside the town library when he had brought the guards to justice: a yearning to save.
Sighing, Daneel conversed with the system a bit before saying, "In that case, I also have a gift for you."