From what he understood he should be able to use these stones, the weird engravings on the inside of his body should allow him to absorb the powers, whether active or constant, he should be able to absorb them.
This almost made him smile, but not quite yet, Cades had to first know how it worked, maybe they got one each time they ranked up by an order or something of the likes.
After thinking and finally, subconsciously blinking once, causing the archer to finally stop staring at him as well and intently listening as Cades posed what he hoped to be his final question before he could ask about where they were, a matter that had completely evaded his attention until now.
"How do you get these stones?"
The archer, seemingly already expecting this smiled slightly, his perfect face seemingly growing even more entrancing, perhaps his emotions affected his power, Cades assumed.
And then the archer began talking once more, answering his questions, by now barely tense, feeling that Cades would most likely not kill him.
"Most of the time they just appear when we kill monsters, I'm fairly certain, however, that you aren't able to gain them if you didn't know that already.."
This was definitely not a good answer, Cades was disappointed by that, but now he could understand why the archer was this relaxed, maybe the archer knew this, he was helping that Cades would use him to gain more power, to kill others, to have him in his team.
But before that Cades had to ask something, he had to make sure and perhaps the archer had one of these stones with him right now, one that he could part with, no.. one that he would be forced to part ways with, whether he wanted to or not.
So he asked a question that the archer had seemingly already expected.
"Do you have one of these stones ?"
The archer nodded, and already knowing what would happen and realizing that this was truly a fair price for his life, a great exchange rate actually, a stone, a dupe that he had already used once, a stone that would've just made a weak ability ever so slightly stronger for his life.
Out of seemingly nowhere he suddenly had a glinting, dark onyx stone in his hand, about as small as half a fist with a glassy exterior and a glowing pale light in the middle, handing it over to Cades without resisting, though a bit saddened by the aspect of losing the stone, however useless it might eb to the current him.
As the archer stepped up, walking closer to Cades and giving it to him, laying it in the stretched out left hand that Cades was holding out, the right hand resting on his sword if the archer decided to do something foolish and tensing up he dropped the surprisingly light stone into his hands and swiftly walked away, out of the dangerous situation where a sword could pierce him at any moment.
The onyx stone was unnaturally smooth and radiating a pulse, as if still breathing, maybe it was, having been ripped out of a monsters body as far as Cades understood, as if it had a heartbeat and maybe it truly did, he wasn't certain about that, not at all.
But Cades could feel it, there was indeed something there, something he had felt before.
Intent.
The same as with the demon of the forsaken, he slowly balled up his fists and the stone slowly began bursting, shattering from the inside.
Manug, the archer, watched and panicked more and more, he was seemingly disturbed, this was probably not how he absorbed these stones, but well, Cades had to do it this way, at least as far as he knew, just like with the demon of the forsaken after he finally destroyed that sentient artifact.
And finally, after resisting the pressure for a few seconds it shattered completely, shrapnel shooting out in all directions but seemingly vanishing into thin air as soon as it touched anything, though the archer did have a reaction, Cades as well though, the purple dissipated as if it was only an illusion and then, finally, something began happening.
Out of his completely enclosed fist there slithered a thick mass of golden light, slithering along his arm and towards the middle of his chest, towards his heart but not into his heart.
The process was surprisingly fast, so much so that Cades had barely any time to really react and only really did so after it happened, his arm twitching in an attempt to instinctually get rid of the small, golden snake of light, but it was too late, he could already feel the golden snake expanding inside his body and empowering it, his mana growing ever so slightly more powerful and the golden light settling into the runic sequences carved into his body, into a single open space, among countless others like that, and finally, though Cades himself didn't know that, a rune resembling a circle with a dot in the middle appeared, weaved out of golden light but soon beginning to change into the same silvery-purplish glow as the rest of the sequences.
And finally Cades had something, he could feel it, he could feel the "active" as the archer had called it.
Cades couldn't explain it, it was as if something that he was already able to do had now become possible, as if it had become so easy that he didn't have to think about it at all, and he already knew the spell that this active seemed to contain, the easiest attack spell he could think of.
And as he finally decided to test it, his inner runic sequences burning and causing slight pain as he the rune symbolising the active burned in a violet glow, great amounts of mana were forced into his hands, finally shooting out of his hands in the from of a violent, violet lighting storm with a slight metallic colour.
The archer on the other hand was still in quite a shock at the seemingly unorthodox way of absorbing the stone that Cades had just shown to him, all the while still sitting down, and in the end shooting through his left hand, away from him, but still so close that his hair was moving, at least the smaller ones.
But Cades, regardless of his current ecstasy had another question.
"Where... are we?"