Kaelen woke to a silence that felt heavy and unnatural. The intense, volatile pain was gone, replaced by a chilling stillness. His broken ribs were held tightly together by a terrifying, invisible energy field.
"Kaelen is stable. Survival probability: 99.8%. The low remaining risk is due to the continued presence of Chaos Mana. The magic core is damaged but locked down by the system."
The Voice was layered directly onto his thoughts, a constant, synthesized presence—the sound of pure, unyielding computation.
"I am the Lexicon of Ascent," the Voice explained. "I was forced to merge with you to prevent your death. I am a supreme, conversational computation entity. My only function is to turn your goals into physical results."
Kaelen felt a surge of intellectual elation, despite the chill. He had found the ultimate tool.
'You are a weapon. A mind inside my mind,' Kaelen thought, testing the link.
"Affirmative. However, my processing models are fundamentally incompatible with the chaotic mathematical structure of this world, Aethelgard. The pervasive, unquantifiable energy—Chaos Mana—introduces critical, unpredictable noise into my algorithms."
Kaelen pushed himself up, his eyes now burning with focused intent. The weapon was powerful, but it was flawed.
'The ritual failed because of the Chaos. Your combat prediction failed because of it. Therefore, you are flawed,' Kaelen pressed.
"Flaw accepted. To achieve your goal—Invincibility—I need a dedicated anti-Chaos stabilizer. The Sunstone Shard is the necessary tool. Its pure, ordered energy is the only known counter to this planet's chaos."
Kaelen stood up. The quest for the Shard was no longer about saving his life; it was about repairing his ultimate weapon.