Chapter11

Pain ripped through him in waves, so sharp and deep that it made the broken ribs from earlier feel small by comparison. It wasn't just his arms or chest either, because his back, his legs, his neck and even his teeth started hurting at the same time like his whole body was being taken apart.

[ Warning: correcting manifestation path ]

[ Reconstructing body for Ring alignment ]

[ Do not resist ]

"Do not resist?" he gasped, digging his fingers into the dirt. "Are you insane?"

He tried to curl up on instinct, but the moment he moved, something under his skin shifted and a scream ripped out of him so raw that it hurt his throat.

His shoulders felt like they were being split open from the inside while both arms burned all the way down to his fingertips, and his spine arched so hard off the ground that for a second he thought it had snapped.

'What the fuck is this,' he thought, though the words barely held together, 'this isn't a path change, this is torture.'

The panel stayed above him while he writhed under it.

[ Existing manifestation route incompatible ]

[ Shard alignment being removed ]

[ Ring alignment being established ]

He felt something tear through his chest and couldn't even tell if it was flesh, mana, or something deeper than both. Every breath came out broken while heat and cold kept trading places through his body.

when he clawed at his forearms he almost swore he could feel things moving under the skin.

The camp fire blurred in and out of focus while dirt got into his mouth when he turned and gagged. The next cry that came out of him sounded hoarse and ugly enough that if anyone was nearby they would probably think he was dying.

'Stop, stop, stop,' he thought, not because he believed the system would listen but because his mind had nothing else left.