He watched, stunned, as a tendril of this prismatic smoke drifted away from his arm. It didn’t dissipate. It extended outward, moving with a purpose, stretching across the furs touching the sleeping woman.
Sol held his breath. "Don’t kill her, don’t kill her..."
The energy didn’t hurt her. It was sunk into her skin.
He watched with a mix of horror and fascination as the prismatic strand seeped into her pores, diving deep into her flesh. And as he continued staring, he found that most of the energy radiating from her began to recede, evaporating into the air, but that specific strand... it stayed.
He looked carefully, squinting in the gloom. The energy wasn’t just touching her; it was merging with her. It twisted and curled, knitting itself into her aura, becoming a permanent part of her existence.
It looked like a root taking hold in soil. Or a brand searing into hide.
He sat back, his heart pounding against his ribs. He didn’t know the mechanics. He didn’t have a manual. But as a veteran "cultured man" of the modern world who had spent way too much time reading web novels, his instincts screamed the answer at him.
Connection.
"It’s related," he whispered, his voice trembling with excitement. "It has to be. The sex, the earlier power, the glow... all of this has to be connected."
Maybe, this energy...this Prismatic Chaos....was the source of the power he had used earlier. It was the fuel for his ability to rewrite Common Sense. And that strand? That was like the tether, like he had literally plugged himself into her.
A shockwave of pure, unadulterated dopamine hit his brain.
If this was true... if he really carried the primordial chaos of the universe in his chest...
"I’m invincible," he murmured, the grin stretching his lips until it hurt. "I’m literally the protagonist."
He could almost imagine his future. He wasn’t just a guy with a bit of modern knowledge. He was a king in waiting. He could walk into the Chieftain’s hut and rewrite the laws of the tribe. He could turn Vurok into his loyal dog. He could have the finest women of the Osari lining up to warm his bed, believing it was their divine purpose.
He looked at the hunter’s wife, his first conquest, his first subject. She was proof.
"World domination," he chuckled, the sound wet and giddy. "A harem. An empire. It’s all right here. I’m going to be a god."
He shuddered, gulping down the saliva pooling in his mouth. The possibilities were endless. He could already imagine himself on a throne of skulls and furs, surrounded by beauties feeding him grapes (did they have grapes here?).
That’s when reality slapped him right in the face.
He suddenly noticed that, the prismatic glow was fading.
He hurriedly looked down at his chest.
"Wait," Sol said, blinking. "Hold on."
The shimmering aura that enveloped his skin was dimming rapidly, retracting back into his pores. He hurriedly closed his eyes, diving back into his internal vision, ignoring the lingering pain in his head.
He looked for the hollow cavity.
The Prismatic Chaos... really was vanishing.
It wasn’t just fading; it was seeping away. The swirling storm of colors was draining out of the cavity, soaking into the surrounding flesh and bone of his body like water into a dry sponge. The reservoir was emptying.
"No," Sol whispered, panic clawing at his throat. "No, no, no!"
He tried to mentally grab it, to hold the chaos in place, but it slipped through his grasp like smoke. It was dissolving. Being absorbed.
"Don’t go!" he hissed, his eyes flying open, clutching his chest frantically. "I just got you! Come back! My power! My invincibility! My harem!"
He felt the last of the vibration fade. The hum in his chest died. The hollow cavity was just... hollow.
The energy was gone. Absorbed by his starving cells, used up to repair his weak body and merge with his body.
For a long second, he just sat there in the darkness, clutching his silent chest, the dreams of empire crumbling into dust around him. He was back to being just Sol. A boy in a mud hut with a stolen wife and no gas in the tank.
"Agghhh!" he groaned, laying there like a corpse, the frustration burning hotter than the lust ever had.
For a long, agonizing minute, Sol lay there slack-jawed, staring at the thatched roof like a fish thrown onto a riverbank. The silence in his chest was deafening.
"Great," he thought bitterly. "Just great. I finally get the cheat code, the golden finger, the ultimate power... and it’s a one-shot disposable item? What kind of crappy game design is this?"
He was ready to mourn the death of his empire before it even began. He was ready to accept his fate as a permanent side character.
But then, a tiny flicker caught his attention.
It was a subtle sensation, like a phantom itch deep inside his ribcage, right where the hollow cavity sat. He froze and hurriedly closed his eyes, focusing with the intensity of a man trying to hear a pin drop in a thunderstorm.
But It was empty.
"Hello?" he projected his thought inward.
But believing his intuition, he focused deeply and slowly, he really sensed it. It really was there, further found that the energy was slowly recovering.
A wave of relief so potent it nearly made him dizzy washed over him. He let out a long, shaky breath, his entire body relaxing into the furs.
"Oh, thank god," he whispered, a giddy grin returning to his face. "I’m not a one-pump chump after all. So, It regenerates."
But as he scrutinized the recovering energy with his inner eye, he realized something was different. It wasn’t the violent, eye-searing Prismatic Chaos from before. That storm of clashing neon colors and cosmic screaming was gone.
In its place, rising slowly from the bottom of the cavity like smoke, was a single, stable strand of Ash Gray energy.