[Dr. Kerenski / Kopusha / Leemy]

I considered the [Modify] skill that was offered to me. It seemed far to good to be true. Where was it getting the information to Modify "absolutely" anything from? The Astral? Some local god? Poking around the Astral willy-nilly and interacting with the local divinities was just asking for trouble. I worried greatly about the Astral and its denizens... such as the Hollow Mother.

I shuddered as I thought again about the monstrous creature that haunted my dreams. She was something that truly frightened me.

I decided to gamble on the fact that my soul was already pretty deep in the minus and I wasn't in too much pain, which mean that I had an excess of soul to carve apart.

According to Kopusha... a soul needed a container to protect it. I had just the right skill to make one!

I set Life-Forge to work on an organic spore that would house my soul-cell construct. While it worked on building one, I started to memorise the Sky-god word for [Tether] with Identify, turning the Soul-Song skill on and off. Then I attempted to add the word [Mana] to [Identify-Soul] to visualize mana colors better.

[451/450 Experience optimum reached! Initiate level up?]

The Soul-Song resonated.

Hrm. Would Chrysalis work while I levelled up?

[It would,] the inner voice whispered in reply.

"Great," I replied and activated [Chrysalis] skill so that it would begin to change me from an Astral tree to a human-tree within the body of the girl I was inhabiting.

I decided that to start off, I would blend into the organic human body, become completely invisible, my branches fusing with her nervous system. As an Astral tree I was far too exposed and could potentially be caught quite easily by an Identify scan.

"Initiate level up," I ordered as my thoughts began to slow down and wobble when Chrysalis kicked in.

[Congratulations on reaching : Level 3] New skill channel forged!

I blinked the congratulatory message away, paused Chrysalis and focused the evolved [Identify-Mana-Soul LV 6] at my soul, hoping that it would let me define more things. It worked!

Base name:

Definition:

Definition:

Number of shards: Approximate color:

Vladislav Alexandrovich Kerenski

Primary soul

Astral Tree

46 Basil Invested points New shards formed 0 Kopusha Megara Tricameron Absorbed shards + 22 [approximation] Violet Leemy the Dryad Absorbed shards + 43 [approximation] Brown __________ Alana Skyisle Absorbed shard + 1 Azure Battie [Carved shard]

[Battery]

[OFF]

[ 10/10 m]

[Untethered]

- 1 Obsie [Carved shard]

[Obscurer]

[OFF]

[Untethered]

- 1 Soul decay: - 22

- 43

-1 Total: 44

Here we go! I felt that I could almost see the silver-blue, azure color of the soul of Alana Skyisle. I just had to keep working on Identify-Soul and I'd get there!

I checked how much time had passed while I levelled up. I was unconscious for 4 days this time. Not bad.

I felt myself and noticed that my eye-stalks had already fused into the eyes of the girl and my branches had fused to her veins and nervous system. I was truly converging with her. Soon, I would be completely undetectable.

"Stats," I said.

Name:

_______ Alana Skyisle

Age:

27 weeks

Species & Subtype:

female - human - foetus

Affinity:

Astral Phantom [Various stat bonuses from subsumed soul-shards and affiliated affliction]

Spark of the Morningstar [+ 3 skill channels]

Blessing of Lunaria [+ Soul-Song skill]

Agromancer [+ Life-Forge skill]

Dryad [+Chrysalis skill] [Base form: Flesh Tree]

Level:

3

Experience:

1/800

Health:

3/3

Stamina:

3/3

Mana:

3/3

Mana regen:

3 m/hr

Strength:

0

Agility:

0

Dexterity:

0

Vitality:

0 [+3]

Charisma:

0

Magic:

0 [+3]

Luck:

15

Intelligence:

0

Wisdom:

0

Soul:

44

Skills:

[Soul-Song LV 1] [ON]

[Raising Spell efficiency by 0.1%]

[Providing detailed Soul-Stats]

[Translating the Soul-Song's Language]

Known Song-Spells:

[Tamus-Anima] [Sectus-Anima] [Conjugo-Anima] [Identify] [Obcultatio-Anima]

[Life-Forge LV 2] [PAUSED]

[Forging: Organic "container" spore]

[Chrysalis LV 1] [ON]

[Identify-Mana-Soul LV 6]

[_____________]

Affliction:

[Soul decay: - 66]

Investiture points:

15

Level 3 had granted me 15 Investiture points. I pondered about where to put them. Soul or Intelligence? Eh, I'll do both. I put 7 points into Intelligence and 7 into soul.

The Intelligence value suddenly expanded, revealing something new to my eyes:

Primary soul: 89 Computational Circuits added: 7 Soul shard [Battie]: -1 Soul shard [Obsy]: -1 Total: 94

So... carving new soul shards subtracted intelligence from me, granting it to my soul shards.

I see. The more I carved myself... the stupider I would become?

[Not stupider. Intelligence, as defined by the Soul-Song, has no relation to your total knowledge. It defines your ability to tally numbers and do complex mathematics... which is very necessary for forging new, beautiful, stable Song-Spells,] the inner voice commented. [Having a million points in Intelligence would not make you smarter, would not grant you extra knowledge about the universe. It would simply allow you to add or multiply large numbers a lot faster].

"Ah, right. Thanks for the clarification," I said with a nod. "Computational Circuits? That's not an Alanian word is it?"

[It is not. I do not know this term. The Soul-Song is using your idioms and words for its translations.]

"What is the Soul-Song, really? It's not a god... right?"

No answer came to this query. The knowledge either wasn't there or had decayed away.

I continued to meddle with the word [Tether] until the fractal that I was mentally constructing looked like it had approximately three branches going away from it, akin to a vein splitting in three.

I slotted it into the empty skill slot. The spell appeared there as [Tether LV 3].

Tether skill unlocked.

I stilled my soul and carved a shard out of it and fused the fractal for Tether to it. I called the new soul-shard Tethy.

-1 in Intelligence

-1 in Soul

[Identify-Mana-Soul] labelled my new shard as:

[Tethy] [Circuit LV 3] [3 connections]

Fantastic. I had my magic circuit! I tethered myself to [Tethy] and then connected her to Obsy and Battie. Instantly I felt all of my shards as part of myself as the magical circuit activated. I could now draw power through Battie and turn my obfuscation on and off.

I turned Obsy [ON] and hummed the Identify song at myself.

[_______Alana Skyisle LV 0]

Perfect! Ha ha ha. I did it! I'm invisible! Great success!

[Tethy] shimmered, dimming. I saw that her life was being consumed, drawn in by my own soul. Argh!

Guess I really need that container to keep her from falling apart. I turned her [OFF].

I checked on the progress of the organic container.

12% complete

It was still growing. I sighed mentally. This was a lot of work. I didn't want to keep carving up my soul without containers to encase the shards in. If I kept them activated on myself they simply started to melt into me, which was annoying. While they were OFF they were static, immobile, but they were still dissolving into me very incrementally.

Alana Skyisle was slowly dissolving into me too. I decided that it was operation time.

I stilled my soul with [Tamus-Anima] and slowly, cautiously began to carve the newly added soul out of me with [Sectus-Anima]. It wasn't perfect, I was definitely giving a bit of myself and Leemy and Kopusha to Miss Alana, but whatever. She was so young and so small that it was incredibly difficult to determine where we ended and she began. The only difference between her and our trio was her lack of memories and her azure-tinted color that [Identify-Mana-Soul] revealed to me.

It was a good thing that I didn't need to eat or sleep as an Astral Phantom because the separation operation took me nearly a week.

Once her soul was fully separated from me, I held onto it with my Astral branches and kept it stable with [Tamus-Anima].

The spore was done! Just in time too! I attached the soul of Miss Alana Skyisle to it, creating a phylactery for her soul, preserving and separating her from myself.

Now that she was separated from me and safe, I really had to make a decision.

I could remain as an Astral tree inside her, or take over this entire body and modify it with my Chrysalis. The problem here was that if this pregnancy lasted 40 weeks, I had 11 weeks left.

I spent another week memorizing and computing the Chrysalis skill, managing to bring up its level to 5.

. . .

There were 10 weeks left now...

Was it enough time to create another child or even to make more bodies to house Kopusha/Leemy?

Was my Chrysalis strong enough to do it in time?

I wasn't sure...

[Remain as a symbiote]

[Identical Twins]

[Brother and Sister]

[Triplets]

[Quadruplets]