Gwin was currently sitting by a fire lost in his soul sea. He had been checking to see if anything had changed with the strange thing he had seen in his soul sea.. What he saw answered his question. The unfinished "sculpture" had developed. It was still vague and unfinished but it had grown in size. Gwin was even able to make out what appeared to be scales on the bottom. Gwin finally realized what it was making.
'It's the disciple…'
The scale had given it away. He took in the similarities of both situations and realized two things remained the same. What he killed and what he killed it with. He could rule out it being the feeder once he saw the scales and that's when it clicked. For whatever reason every time he killed a nightmare creature with his aspect it added to a sculpture of blood in his soul sea. This was incredibly bizarre yet exciting.
'What happens when I finish it?'
He took another bite of meat. It felt like chewing leather with his sleeper teeth but it was undeniably the tastiest thing he had ever eaten, there were hints of fishyness with an underlying taste of…he actually didn't have a word to describe it, it was just good. They had made up camp immediately using broken pieces of wood and dried seaweed they found throughout the labyrinth as kindling to roast it. Gwin's intuition was telling him that completing the sculpture would be important to growing.
Gwin had been given the soul shard again to make up for the difference in power between them, even then it was still quite big. They were splitting the rewards 2:1 with Gwin getting two shards for every one that Elena gets. After filling his stomach he focused on his left hand.
He was going to test out [Chimera] on the feeder again. Sitting by the fire he focused on the traits he wanted. So far he had only copied attributes of the creature like skin and muscles but now he wanted to see if actually transforming himself was possible.
The night before his fingers had grown into semi-tentacles so tonight he wanted to go all the way. He focused and thought of the anatomy of his hand and that of a tentacle like he had learned about at the academy.
There in the warm light of the fire the fingers of Gwin's merged and reddened, his limb grew and grew becoming a singular long red tentacle adorned with a chitinous blade at the end. It wasn't as big or mighty as the original though but was still nearly two meters long. Gwin struggled to control it, it was simply too different to what he had known. Remembering the anatomy and functions of a tentacle the best he could, he tried to pick up a nearby rock. He could feel his essence rushing out of him as he fumbled around with the rock. Shakily he managed to pick it up and bring it to him before being forced to dismiss the transformation.
With shaky breath Gwin felt newfound confidence. He was busy imaging all the things he would be able to do once his pool of essence grew. Just then he noticed the look on Elena's face.
Pure, absolute, unadulterated disgust.
Her face was contorted into a grimace and she even seemed paler than usual.
"That was the most disgusting thing I think I have ever seen…"
He couldn't blame her so instead he just smiled. He would have responded with something witty and funny but he could care less about trying to impress her right now.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They had just slain their eighth feeder of the day. Gwin's method of hunting them had proved to be more efficient than he had initially thought. It had been three days since their first hunt and they had been steadily improving their effectiveness and hunting more and more each day. Every night the dire pressure from the dark sea blasted away the corpses leaving nothing in their way. At this point they had a network of different suitable caverns to hunt them in so they could use their tactic of hunting in favorable locations numerous times a day. They had already amassed quite a few soul shards from these hunts. In this time Gwin had received an armour memory of his own.
It consisted of thick brown leather and a ring of blue cloth around his neck to protect from the wind. It's runes read:
*****
Memory Name: [Mantle of The Drowned]
Memory Rank: awakened
Memory Class: I
Memory Description: [When the black sea rose many were subjected to the cruel embrace of water. The most resilient of them succumbed to another cruel fate entirely. Their grudges searched the depths for other poor souls to join their ranks.]
*****
He was happy to have received a new memory yet he still lacked a proper weapon. He was getting tired of being covered in viscera up to his elbow every hunt. Elena hadn't had much luck either, or at least he didn't think so. She wasn't very keen on sharing so he was kind of in the dark as to what she had gained. During this time he had been practicing using a singular tentacle as a weapon. He had not actually used it to fight yet but he was becoming confident in his ability to use it. Its unique anatomy was becoming easier and easier for him to control comfortably. Soon he would be able to use it just like if it were a natural part of him. He had found that if he coiled the tentacle and then released it he could launch the blade forward like a spear. There was a wall full of small chips from his testing.
Along with that they had been making a mental map of the surrounding area. Gwin had a gnawing feeling in his stomach telling him to leave. Lately it had been growing. He still hadn't shared his feelings with Elena but she seemed to be thinking the same thing. They couldn't stay here forever. Gwin felt a little melancholic at the thought. He had explored almost the entirety of the obelisk except for the top so it almost felt safe to just stay here. His instincts screamed not to go up to the top however and he would be a fool not to listen to them. Until they were confident however they didn't plan on moving since the labyrinth below was a veritable death trap for two sleepers.