Bab 195: 193: A Company of Fools: Royal Revelations I
"Chase…Chase…Chase are you in there?" Iris called out as she knocked on the door to my room.
I was sitting on one of the many couches in the oversized room with my eyes closed, trying my best to heal the damage that Viola caused to Jingles with her magic. A task that was all harder than I originally thought possible. At first, it was as if Jingles genetic structure was damaged and rejecting mana, and then suddenly, it was as if his body was soaking up my mana like a sponge. I couldn't understand it, and it was taking everything I had just to keep him alive at this point.
"Chase?" Iris called out one last time.
"You going to answer her?" Bo asked.
I opened one eyelid and looked at the young boy who was watching me from the couch across from me. After the duel Turak'Kahn told everyone to rest before dinner and had staff show us all to rooms. I made sure that Bo was placed with me so I could keep an eye on him and hopefully keep him from wandering somewhere.
"Cone on in Iris!" I called out to the door and then closed my eyes again. I heard the door to the room open and Iris footsteps into the room. She paused slightly when she saw me sitting with my eyes closed.
"Something is wrong with Jingles." Bo said to Iris.
"What's wrong with Jingles?!" Iris exclaimed.
"I can't heal his wounds…" I said without opening my eyes. The lack of reaction from Iris caught my attention. I opened an eye to look at her and frowned. "…what do you know?"
Iris looked conflicted about whether she should tell me whatever she knew, but a well placed glare from me quickly loosened her tongue.
"Jingles…isn't a natural evo…." Iris said. I frowned and looked over at Bo, hoping he knew what she meant, but he simply shrugged his shoulders and then looked back at Iris.
"Explain…" I said. Iris sighed and shook her head.
"Jane didn't start splicing evos until she was sixteen. Which for Splicers born in any country outside of the States is late. She couldn't get the splicing circle to activate until then no matter how hard she tried…" Iris rubbed the back of her neck and shook her head. "…She doesn't really have much talent for splicing. She's much better with spells. When she finally did manage to activate a splicing circle, her first attempts…ended up like Grimm-Guard."
"Misshapen, malformed, and barely clinging to life?" I offered. Iris nodded.
"Those were the lucky ones. After many failures, King Turak'Kahn and Queen Viola tried to convince Jane that maybe her talent didn't align with splicing, but she refused to hear of it…" Iris said.
"Her pride?" Bo asked.
"Partly. Part of it was her pride as a splicer, but the other part was Her grandmother. The former Queen." Iris replied.
"The Pharaoh talked about her up on the space station…sounds like he wasn't too fond of his own mother…I can relate." I said.
"She was the typical blue blood that you are used to dealing with, only controlling to an extreme. Most of my early memories with Jane involve her. The horrible things she'd say about Queen Viola to Jane, the things she said about Jane when she didn't meet her expectations…" Iris paused and took a deep breath before continuing. "…she wanted to turn Jane into a mini version of her and would have succeeded were it not for The Pharaoh and Queen. The only reason she's as kind as she is now is because of them, especially her mom. Even if she doesn't want to admit it. When that…woman…finally died…it was the start of Jane's healing and turning into the person she was when you first met us."
"So how does this result in Jingles being an unnatural evo?" I asked. Iris started to look uncomfortable and then glanced towards Bo.
"Please know that I in no way condone what Jane did…she did it behind everyone's back, and the Pharaoh and Queen were furious when they found out." Iris said, mostly for Bo's benefit. "When Jane didn't have any results in splicing with blood samples or animal parts…she…she…she spliced Jingles using a live lion cub and eagle chick."
I opened both eyes and looked flabbergasted at Iris. Bo looked absolutely disgusted and covered his mouth like he was about to hurl.
"She spliced live animals! Even I know not to do that!" Bo yelled. I scratched my chin and scowled.
"I can obviously understand why Jane's mom and dad were mad at her for doing that. Jane's…style of splicing is far from harmless. That poor cub and chick were probably in agony before the splicing spells ended. But how did it affect Jingles?" I asked Iris.
"Jingles has something called mana flux syndrome. It's something that only happens with evos that are spliced using live animals. Those afflicted by this sickness have special nodes on their cells that restrict how much mana an evo can absorb from splicers." Iris explained.
"It also makes controlling evos a challenge. Since most of the time, mana doesn't work on them." Bo added. He growed and crossed his arms. "Poor guy…if he can't accept mana, then how are you going to heal him?"
"With difficulty…" I muttered and scratched my chin. "I'll need a lot of mana to do it. I've been banking on the mana provided to me from Bone-lasher and Alpa'nagia to help keep it alive, but their reserves aren't infinite. I could probably call Empress and Jiggles here and hope their mana us enough, but I'm not sure I can last till then…"
"Could you do it with our mana?" A familiar voice suddenly said from the door.
Bo, Iris, and I all jumped and looked to the door to see Turak'Kahn and Viola standing in the doorway to Bo and mine's room. Jurirai and Ultia stood just behind the royals with pensive looks on their faces.
"Probably…I'm not going to guarantee that…I have experience with modifying evo DNA but not with an evo that was suffering from mana flux syndrome. Who knows what I'll have to do in order to save it." I replied carefully. I motioned for the Pharaoh and Queen to come inside, and they both did while Jurirai and Ultia waited outside.
"Then I would like to ask that you do everything that you can in order to help him." Turak'Kahn said. He looked mournfully as he spoke. "I know it might be out of character for a ruler to care for a single evo but it's my shortcomings as a father that resulted in Jane feeling she had to rely on such…barbaric methods to splice."
"Such practices are illegal in Egypt, that law was created by Turry's great grandfather…we kept the circumstances following Jingles creation a secret. Jingles current situation, however, is totally my fault. I should have backed off in my lesson when I noticed how single-minded she had become. She gets that from me…so if I can. I want to help heal him!" Viola exclaimed.
"Thank you. I have an idea, but it's going to require a lot of patience and all of you following my instructions." I said. Everyone nodded and looked eager to follow my instructions. I stood up off the couch and walked out the center of the floor, and sat cross-legged. "Bo and Iris, both of you sit behind me and grab a shoulder, Your majesties, each of you sit behind one of them and grab one of their shoulders."
The group quickly stood up and did as they were told. Iris sat on my right side and grabbed my right shoulder with the queen sitting behind her and doing the same. Bo sat on my left side and grabbed that shoulder with the Pharaoh copying the queen and grabbing his shoulder.
[Bone, Alpa, can you two keep Jingles alive long enough for me to link everyone else?] I asked.
[For a few moments at least Star Shaper…] Bone-lasher replied
[I won't let him die!] Bone-lasher snarled. The will and conviction in his voice made me feel a little confident.
"Okay. You guys are going to feel a little pressure for a moment." I announced to every.
[Okay, you two cutting off my mana…now!]
I quickly switched from channeling mana into Jingles to taking my mana and sending it through my shoulders and into Iris and Bo, sensing their mana out with my snagging it. From there, I sent my mana into Turak'Kahn and Viola and quickly found their mana and snagged it as well, then recalled my mana back to my body. Like a tidal wave receding from the shore, I drew the others mana into my body in a strong and steady stream.
"By the gods…" Turak'Kahn muttered, then winced.
"You okay?" I asked.
"Yes…I wasn't expecting you to have so much mana. As a royal, I have more mana than average but…this is on another level entirely." Turak'Kahn explained.
"I get that a lot." I said as I focused all the mana I was drawing in from everyone and funneling it into Jingles.
Jingles was in middle of his stage where his body was rejecting mana however my way around this was to simply surround his body with mana so the second he stopped rejecting it his body would just soak in as much as it needed. The problem with this tactic was that it was only keeping him alive. It wasn't healing his wounds.
I closed my eyes and focused my consciousness into my farm crystal and the biome I was currently residing in. I felt everything go black as I was sucked inside.
***
I opened my eyes and found myself inside a massive Egyptian temple of some sorts in great need or repair. Most of the structures were other crumbling or toppled over, a physical representation of Jingles' current state.
In the center of the temple laid a very injured Jingles barely breathing and fighting on for dear life. He was laying on a slightly raised stone platform that was surrounded by a moat. Bone-lasher and Alpa'nagia stood on the other side of the moat, sending mana to him in a steady stream.
A rainbow cloud surrounded Jingles, and it realized it was the mana that j was funneling into the biome to keep him alive. Before I even took a step, Bone-lasher noticed I was there and turned his head.
"BOSS!" He exclaimed, sounding relieved. Alpa'nagia turned and smiled when he saw me, then frowned suddenly.
"You brought others?" Alpa'nagia asked. I arched a brow at that comment.
"Others?" I queried.
"Ummm…Chase, where are we?" I heard Iris voice ask from behind me.
I turned around and saw Iris, Bo, Turak'Kahn, and Viola all standing behind me. Or at least mental projections of their consciousness's standing behind me.
"Fuck! When I pulled your mana into my crystal it must have created a mental link that allowed all of you in here with me!" I groaned and slammed my forehead.
"Oh my gods! Are we inside your farm crystal?" Viola exclaimed. I nodded and she squealed as she looked around. "The biome of a evo! Only people who are exceptionally gifted at controlling evos or at least trusting them can come inside one of these! I've only read ancient texts about how one would look but this is better than my greatest imagination."
"This place is falling apart. Gadget, Gargesh, and Midnight's biomes look a lot better than this." Bo commented as he walked over to a crumbling pillar.
"It's like this because Jingles is so weak and close to death. Fix him up and everything will change." I said. Iris walked up to the edge of the moat and peered up at Jingles.
"How? I can sense a lot of mana around him but he's not healing…" Iris observed. I walked over to the edge and stood beside her.
"Body modification. If I can remove the protein that gets messed up when you use live animals i can heal him the normal way.." I said.
"Easier said than done Chase…" Turak'Kahn said as he approached us. He stopped at the edge of the moat on my other side and crossed his arms. "…that protein is in every cell, corrupting every gene in his body. Finding it will be easy however removing it next to impossible. It self-propagates like a virus, no matter how much you get rid of more with grow back in its place."
"…Fuck..." I muttered.
"Then why not just overhaul Jingles genetic structure from the ground up?" Bo asked. Iris, Turak'Kahn, and I all looked back to Bo, who was sitting on top of a barely stable arch.
"Wait what?" I asked. He twirled his finger in the air like he was trying to remember something.
"You know, ummm….what was it called….biometric Sequencing…." Bo started.
"Biometric revitalization sequencing!" I exclaimed and slapped my head. "Of course! Replace all the lion and eagle DNA with different close related animal DNA!"
"Is that even possible?!" Iris exclaimed. I shrugged my shoulders.
"Not really sure. It's a conceptualized idea in techno-splicing but with magic I might be able to pull it off…hopefully…" I said.
"What is this concept?" Turak'Kahn asked.
"Basically using the DNA of another animal that is closely related to the original in order to fix errors in a evos genetic sequences." I explained.
"So like swapping hyena with wild dog DNA?" Turak'Kahn asked.
"Exactly. However that concept only talks about swapping small sequences in the structure, not remaking it entirely like with what I'd have to do for Jingles." I said.
"Would he even be Jingles at that point?" Iris asked.
"Yes? Maybe? He'd be alive at least of it succeeded." I said.
"We have to try something…as it stands he'll die." Viola called put from her spot near a crumbling waterfall. I groaned and pinched the bridge of my nose then looked up at Jingles.
"I'll try it. It's probably going to take a lot of mana you guys, Bone, Alpa, and I have already burned through a lot trying to keep him alive this long so don't be surprised if I start draining yours." I announced.
"Got it!" Bo exclaimed.
"I'm not so weak that I can't handle this." Viola said. Iris and Turak'Kahn both gave me nods. I jumped up onto the platform that Jingles was resting on the walked over slowly to the injured evo. He stirred only barely when he heard me approached, his eyes following me as I got closer.
[Savior…] Jingles called out, his voice weak.
"Hush now. Conserve your strength." I said placing a hand on his head.
I made sure to touch one of the places that didn't have burns so not to cause him anymore pain. The simple caress seemed to calm him and he even tried to purr, however the damage to his throat and chest made the sound come out wet and gurgling.
I noticed the mana cloud that surrounded him started to get sucked into his body. His body was back to accepting mana. I took the chance and forced a surge of mana into his body and quickly changed it to flesh attribute in order to scan his genetic sequence.
"I'm going to fix you…this might hurt a bit." I said as my mind changed all the data I was getting into a lysdale script.
The data I was getting was confusing me however. Jane had messed up Jingles sequences when she used that live cub and chick. There were so many redundancies and gaps in them it was a wonder Jingles was able to survive at all. Thankfully it seemed each gap and error seemed to play off of each other and give off the appearance of a fully functioning evo. In reality however he had to be in constant pain.
Looking over the lysdale script in its entirety it was easy to spot where the proteins that were blocking mana absorption were. The Pharaoh was right, they were in ever cell and unless I changed the cells entirely they'd keep coming back.
Taking my hand off Jingles I stepped back and looked over my shoulder. I found that everyone was huddled near the edge of the moat looking eagerly at me, even Bone-lasher and Alpa'nagia.
"He has a lot of gaps in his sequences. Apart from changing DNA I might have to add more animals to his sequences." I announced.
"Like you did with Empress?" Alpa'nagia asked. I nodded then turned back to Jingles.
"If what I plan to do succeeds Jingles you will look vastly different. There is also a chance you might lose your memories." I said. Jingles turned his head to look at me and sighed ruggedly.
[You saved me…when even my…my creator gave up on me. My life…is yours…save me or end me…the choice is yours.] Jingles said. I petted him lightly and smiled as sweetly as I could manage.
"I choose save." I said then flooded hos genetic sequences with mana.
PERTIMBANGAN PENCIPTA 
Hutexa_The_Djinn
Hutexa_The_Djinn [HUYEXA_THE_DJINN Here! This is the first of two chapters you'll get today. My migraines are acting up so I haven't written much. SORRY!!! They're common in my family so I know they'll stop after a few more days. Hope you enjoy the chapters!]
Status Power Mingguan
-- Peringkat
Power 
-- Power
stone