Lowly Ascent

Cain sat down in the center of the poorly lit room, he pulled out the materials required for the ritual.

Even if Cain had created a different way to augment the body, creating a way to truly affect himself down to his very DNA. Such a process still requires a ritual, usually.

These rituals are also tailored to the serum to create an equilibrium to boost survival.

The purpose of rituals is to hasten the process while keeping the augmenter alive. When Cain implanted himself with Zimo, the plants bore the brunt and acted as a medium to safely transfer the disease into Cain's body in a healthy way.

Interestingly, these rituals are also connected to the mind. Research suggests that having a ritual that 'suits' the mind will better enhance the ritual's original effects and can improve the overall process.

Cain was intrigued by this piece of information when going through research on rituals contained in his mind. He then spent time understanding his own psyche and creating a ritual based on it. He surprised even himself when he learned how volatile his personality had become.

'I am already so different from myself so long ago. Every day I feel more and more distant from my past self...'

He already knew that he struggled with fully committing to his ideals, often torn between conflicting emotions and thoughts.

But he didn't know that this internal struggle added an element of unpredictability to his behavior, as he oscillates between moments of clarity and inner turmoil, this can be interpreted from doing something rash in his daily schedule.

Searching through his memories, Cain was reminded of an event he had to cover up where a worker asked him a question, Cain was deep in thought and the worker had to even tap on Cain.

This broke his line of thought and anger ensued, he beat the worker to the brink of death and when he returned to clarity, he killed him humanely and covered it up.

The deed had already been done with the first punch, there was no going back.

Similar events have happened but they weren't as bad, but realizing this Cain knew he was walking a thin line for his mental state and spent the rest of the day in a meditative state and relaxing to release tension.

He also secretly gave the worker's family money to ease his conscious. He felt even better when the family broke apart trying to fight over the money and it reinforced his more negative views of humanity,

Cain was truly a mess.

He also learned he would often contemplate dark and existential questions, delving into the realms of morality and the meaning of life, only to stomp on morality and life afterward.

Slowly, he witnessed his personality adversely affected by forming lasting connections with people challenging him due to the inherent instability of his emotions and thoughts.

If it weren't for things like being things like faking a leader, a master, a fiancé, and a business partner, Cain figured that none of these connections would last if they were to meet as just people.

But was he truly faking it? Was it his real self? 

Everything was confusing and conflicting. A mess, truly a mess.

Cain thought even deeper on the subject and hypothesized that no relationship could work without things like titles to act as glue, true relationships would be rare but they would also be stronger than these fake relationships only tied by status.

People lie, they hide behind a mask to appear presentable, and people want to be liked by the majority and to fit in.

Cain too was lying to everyone, hiding behind a mask. It's just his mask was the darkest mask somebody could wear, hiding something that others would call a monster underneath.

Through his memory search, Cain began to feel even farther from a human. 

During one of his mornings, he had looked into his bathroom mirror.

He saw his blood-red eyes, he saw the inner chaos that lurked within those eyes, a constant reminder of his struggle with his sanity, he saw himself walking away. Distancing himself from being a human.

Breaking down in fear right there and then, he destroyed the bathroom in a rage, he eventually just crumbled to the ground and sobbed while laughing to himself.

Cain was slowly losing his sanity, the cause of his fears was himself. When he realized this, he felt peace from understanding. When he should have turned back he kept walking forward thinking it would become better.

'What a pitiful life.....'

All of these emotions funneled and led him to create his own ritual, a ritual that used himself as the catalyst, as the bearer of his own sins.

These memories that have been repressed from Cain's own fears will now be his weapons to gain even more power.

He stopped reminiscing and laid out the serum, a dagger, a needle, an assortment of pain-numbing plants, and potions. He also took out oil with a lighter.

Cain took these materials and ordered them in the process he would use them.

He first took the dagger, and he made deep cuts, puncturing every part of his body and opening up his insides to the outside, his organs and muscles could easily be seen and seeped out.

Then, he barely picked up the needle and dipped it in the serum, he then took the needle and carved runes inside his organs, inside his skin, and outside his heart.

He would eat the plants and pour the potion on himself when he felt like he would lose consciousness, he continued doing this for two days, slowly carving his own flesh and body to be the catalyst for this serum.

Ever so slightly, ever so slowly. 

After he finished with the carvings, he picked up the oil and poured it all over himself and inside his wounds, he then poured the rest of the serum and waited an hour before picking up the lighter.

He then stuffed the rest of the plants in his mouth and swallowed......then he lighted the oil.

Hell.

That's all he felt. His entire body was being eaten away by the flames, yet he didn't make a sound.

He sat in silence as he felt his body burned, however, his flesh was still there, his organs still safe. Through the pain, Cain felt like he was burning away his conflictions, his contradictive thoughts, and his fears, they were all swept away by the flames.

The fire stopped after an hour, the room was filled with smoke and he stood up, he was now naked but his body was smooth. He took the dagger he previously used and attempted to stab himself.

The dagger bent under the pressure of his skin and Cain felt satisfied.

He then took the rest of the potions he left in a corner and poured them all over his body, healing the burn scars of his mended flesh from the flames.

'Quite potent indeed. Pity the materials to make them took an entire month of savings....'

Cain then walked out of the room as a black thick smoke with a hint of crimson followed.

The guard was bewildered by Cain and even more so by the smoke, he attempted to say something but Cain quickly walked past him and left.

Getting his clothes from a servant, Cain then visited Rebecca before returning to his merchant group building. He wore a smile while he greeted everyone, he even spent a few more hours than usual to train Anders.

After everything was said and done, Cain sat on his desk in his bedroom. He looked out the window and looked at the dark black dot in the sky as he reviewed the ritual.

'It appears that rituals do have something to do with the user's mental state. I felt a freeing feeling as I burned myself and the effects of the serum were even stronger than I originally thought. I should definitely use this process for future rituals but my mental state has now changed again so I will have to start over next time. Unless I regress back.....'

Cain's ritual made him use himself as the medium, this not only gave him more power but also bore more brunt on the body.

He used all his savings to buy and make high-end concoctions to keep him alive, if not for those he would've died in the first hour.

Yet, it was worth it. Cain felt... different after this process. He had a clear mind, he now knew that the path he walked was crumbling behind him and he could only move forward, if he turned back he would fall into the abyss.

This gave him a new conviction. A conviction to continue and walk forward, to see the path he chose until the end.

There was no going back.

He sat there as he touched his skin, and he could feel the runes underneath. The ritual Cain did was unorthodox, he used the method of inscribing weapons and instead inscribed himself with his own unique symbols.

He infused the serum into the runes to have more control over them and direct them to the needed areas, doing this made sure that none of the serum merged with other parts of the body.

This process worked wonders, the serum was directed to the runes and perfectly merged with his DNA causing no problems, if he opted for a different ritual, the serum could've merged with DNA already altered and it could have had unimaginable adverse effects.

It was a very precise operation Cain had to due under immense pain, mutilating himself to reach the desired effects.

Thankfully he did what he did and he was happy with this development. He now sat there thinking of a name for this new body of his.

'I think I'll call it...the Unbreakable Evil Soul Body. It seems to reach the middle of the mid-tier which is good, with this I should be able to kill Victor even by myself.'

Cain then got in his bed.

'One problem though, if I take over another body, will the scars and runes remain? Likely not.....'

These questions didn't matter, he was exhausted and tired.

Cain fell asleep with a new directive, no longer plagued by his past and his identity. For the time being.