Chapter 92: Chapter 91: The Power Devotion Brings
"How are you controlling my divinity mortal!" Dracula’s world were spoken from the a charred husk similar to the one the wyvern had made Carl, the only difference was that he was regenerating.
"Your divinity? Mortal? You’re nothing more than a cowardly little parasite, feeding on humans because you’re too scared to die yourself. Don’t act like you’re superior." Carl stepped forward and used raw divinity to rip out a piece of his soul.
Dracula screamed, his cries echoing across the molten rock that only solidified beneath Carl’s feet. The new magma lake was immense, spanning a kilometer in every direction and even the volcano that their home once backed onto had been melted into the puddle.
"Sorry Gaia, I have ruined this world... " Carl looked down, magma itself no challenge for Dracula’s unnatural regeneration, the charred husk was now a fully formed torso, left arm and bald head. "...You took my mother’s arm. Did you expect me to hold back after that?"
Carl picked him up in the same way he had held Leanna, then ripped his arm off, adding more screams to the air, then pulled out his black desiccated heart and threw it into the lava, then ripped off his head and dropped both bits.
"Come on, I only blocked your ability to open portals. I’m a mortal, aren’t I? Just food or a plaything. Heal yourself, or I’ll cast you into the void and take out my anger on everything you treasure... Maybe I’ll just kill every human and watch you starve?"
Dracula forced his regeneration to increase from his head grew a neck, then a torso and arms and legs.
"If you’re the hero, then this is one twisted game Margo ma-" Carl suddenly transmuted the divinity in Dracula’s body in sunlight, burning him from the inside out, burning away everything below his waist and leaving his torso to drop into the lake of fire that rivalled purgatory.
"Shut up already, morality, reality, possibility, hero and villain; it’s all just matters of perspective. Any other time, I’d feel evil right now, but you’re a monster and you hurt my mum first."
"So what? I smelt the blood of the mother of demons in her, she’s a far greater monster than me. I assure you. I don’t know what law you have exactly, but I recognise the signs of a devoted conduit and this won’t last much longer and you’re just stalling because you don’t have it in you to kill."
Carl sighed and threw up his hands. "Oh no, you caught me... Shame but not terrible."
Carl then did something completely bizarre and created a barrel, then filled it with his golden blood. What wasn’t obvious, is that he had made it a delayed but incredibly toxic poison.
He then used his temporary control over divinity to map where Dracula had come from and opened a portal before throwing it through and changing his voice. "Enjoy everyone! This human’s blood was simply too incredible to enjoy alone. Enjoy the dregs whilst I savour the source!"
Carl then closed the portal. "You’re also right about the time limit, but that won’t really be a problem. I’m going to rob you of your stars, leave you with just enough to survive the trip, then cast you into your soon to be empty castle and let the other vampires discover you’re no longer the terrifying king of your kind."
For the first time, Dracula’s unflinching smugness and self-assured superiority faltered. "Just kill me and be done with it!"
"No. I don’t have time to hurt you as much as I want to, so I’ll leave you with just enough to maybe stay alive long enough for us to meet again. For me to shame and take from you again... Speaking of which, I’m also purging your ability to turn humans and your laws, can’t have you building an army."
"You can’t take laws fool!" Carl let him finish the remark, before grinning with malicious delight.
"My law is the origin of all others, they are all a part of me, so you’re right I can’t take them since it’s more like retrieval." Carl then made good on his promise and robbed him of everything he had used to maintain his brutal reign of tyranny, before casting him back into his own realm.
He barely had enough time to fix the ground and give everyone in the faction back their abilities before he collapsed and rolled in pain.
The power of a devoted conduit wasn’t free, it was a reward for understanding.This means that if you tried to take more than you earned, you were just stealing. A master of their law could tap into that state once for every passage they learned.
Each time one ceases to be a devoted conduit, the words of the next passage are seared into their body and Carl like everyone, had no idea how many passages the law of Divinity held.
I am one,
I am the few,
i am the many.
I am all things and I am nothing,
I am great and I am small.
I am the root of all things.
For all things came from me.
Each letter was agony, burned into his mind, body and soul.
The others arrived as he was writhing around the ground, Lillim, Kyubi and Faylorna each treating the moment with unusual reverence. It was clear the occasion was significant to them, the manifestation of an even higher power.
To Klaire however, it was the man she loved in pain once again, the hatred of everything that he had been placed at the mercy of bubbled inside of her. She knelt beside him, ready to vent her frustrations, but in the end it all just reached an anti-climax of inferiority.
"Carl, I’m sorry I’m so weak... No matter how hard I try, I just can’t catch up. I want to fight this battle with you, but every time it comes down to it you need to send me away so I don’t get killed."
"Klaire, you can’t call yourself weak simply because you aren’t the strongest." Faylorna spoke with unusual softness.
"No? I’m so weak that simply being next to him could kill me. Is that why he was so stunted for eight years? Because he wanted to keep me alive. Did he have to avoid getting stronger because I wouldn’t leave him alone?"
"Klaire, he is far from the strongest, don’t mistake the powers he borrows for his own. If anything you should see him as an example."
"What do you mean "an example"? How can I learn from him if I don’t have the powers he "borrows"?"
"Simple, by leaning on the powers you do have and borrowing them. Stop estimating your strength by the damn screen in your head and look around, find sources of strength beyond yourself that you can take for yourself.
Carl didn’t just stumble onto becoming a devoted conduit, he knew the law had more power than him, so he promised it he would suffer any price in exchange for enough power to keep us alive."
"Okay, but I don’t have a law to beg for help."
"Klaire, cease your stupidity at once, powers like the laws surround everyone at all times. The problem you have is that your too proud to accept your weakness. Honestly girl sometimes you seem part dragon your so self-absorbed."
Carl’s hand slowly reached for her. "So glad, you’re all safe, how’s Mum?"
"She’s going to be alright Idiot, now get some rest and try not to kill yourself doing it." Klaire barely managed to finish talking before she started sobbing.
"No... Have to, keep going. Dracula just became my example. Have to prepare..." Carl tried to push himself up, but only collapsed under his own weight.
"Carl, even you can’t push through this. If you don’t rest, I’ll be a widow by the end of the day."
"I’ll be fine... Just keep pushing forward... If I don’t stop, then I’ll get there eventually..." The words hit Klaire hard, not because they were his usual brand of dogged stubbornness, but because they were what she used to say to him in their first year.
Klaire pulled him to rest on her as she reminisced about the time she was having to console her cry-baby cousin as she thought of him back then.
He had already fallen five levels behind everyone else in their year and nine levels behind Klaire and seven behind the jerk that was picking on him all the time.
"Just keep pushing forward Carl! It may take some time, but if you don’t stop, you’ll get there eventually!"
The idea that those meaningless words had stuck with him through everything, that she in some small way was the reason he had attained such power now, held the absolution for her self-loathing.
"Dummy, you’re an adult now, you shouldn’t be so invested in the words of a kid."
"Almost forgot... Brought you breakfast if you want it." Carl retrieved the slither of soul he had ripped from Dracula. "You said you were curious, I wanted to be a supportive husband."
As she took the slither of soul, Carl passed out.
"Klaire, is that what I think it is?" Faylorna chuckled. "Did he really treat a fight with that monster like he was making you breakfast? Well, you had best move away from him before you eat it, the first time usually makes you vomit."
"Then I’ll eat it later."
"I wouldn’t wait, if he has an ally with the law of Soul it might be pulled back to him. Alisha, go take the boy of her hands."