She was gone. My friend was gone. Penta's soul floated lifelessly inside me, just like many others before and after her. She had died within my body, and I didn't even need to collect her. Her body slid down my spine, her tiny soul - tendrils hanging limply. She was lifeless and motionless, waiting for her final destination after death. Part of me wished that destination was to be devoured by me, a thought that almost made me vomit.
"Vita?" Penelope asked slowly. "Are you okay?"
"Of course I'm not! You killed her," I glared at her, accusingly.
"I'm sorry," she replied. When she sounded truly remorseful, the anger in my heart subsided a little. "It was the only way to save you. When I saw Penta still controlling your body during the toast, I knew this might happen. You should have drunk the poison, Vita!"
"They all should have been poisoned to death!"
"The poison works quickly, but not instantaneously. Those powerful slimes definitely had time to try to escape! If everyone had taken the poison correctly, they wouldn't have had a chance!"
Damn it. Damn it, she was right! I had messed up! Everything had been going smoothly, but I had screwed everything up at the last moment!
Penelope sighed, stepped onto solid ground, and patted my back. I hated her. I also hated myself. I really wanted to reach out and kill her too.
"Vita, it's okay," she comforted me softly, bending down to whisper in my ear. "The souls are still there, right? Have you collected the other souls?"
"I... haven't. I didn't have time."
I felt Penelope's magic probing inside me, grabbing those slimy corpses and slowly pulling them out. I almost told her to stop, but I knew it was foolish.
"Are they still there?"
I closed my eyes, hating the tears that were about to well up. Why did she suddenly care so much?
"They're there. The souls are still there. I think I should collect them before the Mist Watchers take them away."
"Agreed," Penelope said calmly. "If you leave a few undigested ones, soon I might have a place for you to practice with them."
I blinked and looked up at her.
"Are you serious? I thought... the Knights of the Temple wouldn't...?"
"Do you think working for me has no benefits, Vita?" she replied with a smug smile on her face.
At that moment, I felt it. She didn't feel sorry at all. Was this all part of her plan? No, that was too absurd. However, she was definitely satisfied with this result. She had a perfect excuse to kill my friend, the person she hated the most. Her sympathy was the most fake. Her soul was singing with unrestrained joy, and nothing else was possible. However...
There was a place where I could practice necromancy. A place where I could bring Penta back to life. This glimmer of hope temporarily pushed aside my grief, and I rushed back to Taryn's house. Penelope jogged behind me, unable to keep up with my speed. I used my tentacles to wrap around my limbs, trying to use my soul to pull like I would use muscles. It felt strange, and I stumbled several times. But I could feel it. The combined power of muscles and soul. I couldn't do this before emerging from my cocoon. Even now, as I gradually digested the soul of the slime that had possessed Remus, I was becoming stronger. It seemed there might be a law of diminishing returns; at this rate, I would never be as powerful as the slime that had possessed Remus before I destroyed it. However, it was still a huge leap. At least in terms of soul power, I would be stronger than most of my companions.
I burst into the room and saw that the people who had stayed behind after we left were busy taking care of those who had fainted in the battle. Someone had bandaged Theodora's neck, but it was too late and useless. Her soul floated above her blood - soaked body, right next to the soul of the slime that had controlled her. Melik was trying to wake his mother up, but when I walked into the room, he and many villagers pointed their weapons at me. Melik was even holding Remus's damn magic sword! I raised my hands in surrender.
"I'm fine. Penelope just killed the... slime inside me," I said coldly, with a tone full of disgust. "I can drink the poison to prove it."
I had more or less been forced to drink the same poison as the others, and it was wreaking havoc in my bones. But now it didn't matter much; after all, my friend was dead. Afterwards, everyone clearly relaxed their guard. Although some people still glared at me hatefully because I had killed Theodora, everyone here had personally experienced that it wasn't really my own will.
They didn't know it was because I was stupid and didn't drink the poison earlier that this had happened, but I didn't want to explain. I collected the souls in the room, a pile of black slime balls with the cores of human souls inside, and there were also two extra ones belonging to Theodora, with blue and red flashing lights, and one of them even had a bit of slime soul attached.
"Vita, Mom won't wake up...!" Melik said in panic, looking at me.
I sized up Taryn. In my opinion, her soul looked healthy and full of vitality.
"She's fine," I said indifferently. "Penelope will be here soon, and she'll wake everyone up."
"Wait... wait!" he protested as I turned to leave. "Where are you going?"
"I have to finish my part of the work."
The number of souls inside me was less than the number of Navarans at the banquet. Surely some had escaped. But I had killed the slime that had possessed Remus and obtained the souls of the slime and the human Theodora, so now I was just tidying up. I stretched my perception as much as possible, searching around the island, knocking on doors or breaking them down, and reaching out with my tentacles to those possessed by Navarans. One by one, I found those who were missing or stragglers, and told the hosts to go to Taryn's house so that Penelope could take out the dead slime from their necks. Afterwards, the remaining task was to search the vast fields one last time to see if I could still sense the souls of other Navarans.
Here, slowly walking in the fields, I could only keep myself company with my own thoughts. I had quickly gotten used to having Penta to chat with. Many times, I unconsciously wanted to share my thoughts with her, only to suddenly remember that she could never hear me again. She was gone.
But how important was this really? I was a necromancer. Using death for my own benefit was my skill. If I really wanted to, I could kill a nearby animal and talk to her right now. But first, I would have to put a part of myself into her body. First, I would have to force her to obey me. In some ways, hadn't I already done that before? I had forced her to obey through violence rather than my talent. Why not the other way around? It was almost like a stupid question - there should be many reasons why this wasn't a good idea. However, I seriously considered it.
Just... it's nice to have someone who understands me. Someone who truly understands me, perhaps even more than I understand myself. Maybe she wasn't the best friend ever, maybe she didn't even consider me her friend. But I still liked her. I hoped she would come back. The question wasn't whether I should do it, but how. Should I turn her into an undead, or keep her inside me until I figured out how to create life itself?
Ha. I didn't even dare to imagine how long that would take. Maybe trying to learn to create undead that were less pathetically loyal to me would be faster. But, I thought I actually didn't mind this...
Should I mind this? It felt like I should. But what's wrong with people liking me? Why would that be bad?
Damn it. I really wished Penta were here. Well... I mean she was here, but I wished she were alive. I had to get home as soon as possible and talk to Rowan and Lin about this. I... really looked forward to going home. This trip had been a bit of a disaster. I wanted to hug Lin's soul.
... Of course, I also wanted to hug her in person.
Sure enough, there was someone possessed by a slime in the fields. They must have fled their original bodies as soon as they realized the situation, rushed out of the room, and tried to find an un - poisoned host instead of waiting for death. If I hadn't been choked and possessed at that time, this strategy wouldn't have been so effective, but now we had reached this point. They huddled in a large wheat field, completely surrounded by the tall wheat stalks. It would have been very difficult for others to find them, but for me, it was almost a piece of cake. I walked over to them, feeling the slime trembling with fear inside. I just felt tired. So I sat down on the farmer who was trembling and possessed by the slime, knowing that death was approaching.
"Hey. Uh... Mr. Slime. If you're willing, I can kill you quickly," I offered, not even knowing why I said that. "I don't know if it will hurt or how much it will hurt, but it will be fast."
The face full of fear looked up at me, with an expression full of submission.
"I... I mean, we don't feel pain," he replied. "At least our real bodies don't. Unless you're hurting our host."
I nodded. Ha. I hadn't known that before.
"What I'm about to do might still hurt," I admitted. "But, uh... if you're willing, you can crawl into my body."
What was I saying?
"You... you'll still die," I explained. "My body is full of poison. But... you know. If you want to talk for a while without scaring your host. We can do this. If your sensations are limited to my pain, then... this poison isn't that bad after all."
I put my hand on the farmer's neck and waited for his decision.
"Why did you make this offer?" the slime asked, giving a dry laugh.
I shrugged.
"I really don't know why. But maybe if you crawl into my head, you'll find out."
After hesitating for a moment, I felt that familiar and disgusting feeling again. A Navaran crawled up my arm and into my neck. I stood up from the farmer and told him to run a short distance away from me quickly, then I sat down on the ground again, and my body was once again out of my control.
This wasn't the kind of familiar feeling I had expected. This slime couldn't control the body technically while still allowing me to move freely like Penta could. Instead, the panic I had felt when Remus controlled me came back again, and I almost instinctively killed the slime. But there was no need for that this time. As soon as it crawled into my arm, it began to head towards death.
"What exactly are you?" the slime panted, feeling my tentacles dangerously coiled around it. Its voice was much deeper than when Penta and I spoke through my body, and it sounded strange to me.
I didn't know. At this point, I didn't care anymore. I was just me. The rest could be figured out later.
"But it feels good to know that someone cares about us," the slime said softly, looking up at the sky. "Maybe what your friend said wasn't so crazy after all."
Maybe. But who could be sure now? We weren't fast enough. Both you and the humans should have survived, but it was you who were inflicting torture. If we had to make a choice...
"Then the choice is obvious," the slime agreed. "The responsibility of seeking a solution has always been on our side. Maybe if we had started looking earlier..."
Maybe. But you never had enough time. You've only been around for a few weeks.
"Ha. I guess that's true. But it feels like we're much older than that..."
Yeah, but I guess Penta was like a baby, right?
"What gives you the right to say that? You're just a kid yourself."
What - hey! Do you know I'm sixteen years old!
"So what. My original host would insist that sixteen is still a kid. You know, your life is a complete mess. That's why I understand why your friend is worried about you."
Yeah.
I felt the slime gradually dissipating inside my neck, its soul struggling to stay intact.
"But you've done not too badly for yourself," the slime continued slowly, its voice gradually fading. "You're not perfect, but you've been trying. Maybe you don't care about everyone, but I really don't think you're a..."
Its last few words disappeared as its dying soul floated into my tentacles. I gently pinched it, properly stored the soul, and then stood up. When I turned to the farmer, he was staring at me with a look of both fear and confusion.
"I'm sorry about this," I said. "That slime is now dead. I think this was the last one."
"What did you just...?"
I shrugged.
"Come on. We'll take you to get checked out and give you an immunity injection. Do you know where Taryn's house is?"
Soon I was alone again, and I conducted a second search, which took longer than actually needed. I returned to a rather gloomy scene: silent people were queuing up, waiting for Penelope to check them, while a group of villagers were either crying with relief, regretting, or mourning. Someone had covered Theodora's tattooed body with a cloth. Presumably, a safe burning site was still being prepared on this grassy island. Many people were hugging their families, for the first time in a long while, relying on their own strength to embrace each other.
"Vita, you're back," Penelope greeted me blandly, still focused on a spell. "Are there more?"
"Yes," I sighed. "There are a few. I've taken care of them. I think it's all done."
She nodded, still busy casting spells on the villagers.
"Just in case, I'm going to launch a large - scale plague against the Navarans here. If our work is done well, it should last for a few days and then disappear on its own without causing any harm. It's just a precautionary measure."
"That sounds good," I replied, shrugging indifferently. "One wants to crawl into my body. I need you to take out another corpse."
"Then get in line," Penelope replied.
Oh right. I walked to the back of the room to queue up. At this time, Song, who had regained consciousness, came over to me, holding his ribs.
"Are you okay, kid?" the poisoner asked in a low voice. "I heard you're fine now?"
"Yeah," I replied. "Sorry, Song. I messed up at the last moment."
"Well, you did," they snapped. "Theodora's death is all your fault. She was a good person."
"Yeah," I admitted. "I'm sorry."
Song let out a gruff sigh.
"What's done is done. And you saved the rest of us. It still means something."
"Strictly speaking, I just saved you, and then you saved the others."
They let out a hoarse, raspy laugh.
"Pretty much. And if I had been stronger or faster, that guy might not have caught you. He's dead now, right?"
I nodded, glaring at the thought.
"Dead as a doornail."
"That's good," they said softly, patting me on the back. "Hey, Remus! You old fart, come here and apologize to your apprentice."
The old man who was called over walked towards me, his soul as powerful and alluring as ever. The half of Remus's face that could still make expressions had an embarrassed look on it, and from the way the people around him looked at him, it was clear that there was still a lot of resentment towards him for initially causing this crisis.
"Vita," he greeted me hesitantly.
"Hey, old man," I replied with a smile, which made him shrink back.
"Please don't call me that anymore."
I chuckled softly. It wasn't that funny, but I still laughed.
"Yeah. Sorry it took me so long to figure things out."
"You're apologizing?" he protested. "Vita, this... all of this was my fault. If I had known what those slimes were earlier, none of this would have happened. I should have known. As a teacher and a senior hunter, it was my responsibility."
I shrugged, feeling the souls inside me and glancing at Theodora's body.
"We all make mistakes, boss. I don't think you need to apologize to me."
"Then at least let me thank you. You and Penelope saved all of us from my mistakes. I'm proud to call you both hunters."
Oh right. To be honest, the idea of "becoming a hunter" already felt so far away.
"Thank you, Remus," I replied, but my heart was rather indifferent.
Then Taryn came over to us, with one arm tightly hugging Melik, who was snuggled up close to her. This sturdy, muscular woman nodded at us.
"Vita. Thank you. Remus... can I ask you a favor?"
"Of course, Taryn."
"Can you take Theodora's body to Sky Hope City? I think you'll need another transmutation mage to safely cremate her."
"Oh," Remus said, looking over in that direction. "Of course. Is it because of the metal ink?"
Taryn nodded.
"Yes, that's right. She and Melik often... well. The point is, there's no doubt that her body is still full of magic power. It's kind of poetic... she's gone, and there's no one here who can give her a proper resting place. I know it will be expensive, but I want to cremate her like this. Peeling off her skin and selling her tattoos as materials is just wrong. Even if it's a waste, I - "
"I'll handle it," Penelope interrupted, having heard our conversation since she was almost at the front of the queue. "I've already paid for the Knights of the Temple who sacrificed their lives on the way here, so this will be included too."
This remark made some people raise their eyebrows.
"The Knights of the Temple?" Remus asked.
"The dead Knights of the Temple?" Song whispered.
"I guess that's a story we'll tell on the way back," Penelope replied with a smile. "Let's just say Remus will meet an old friend of his, a disastrous old friend."
The gray - haired man's face turned pale.
"Oh,