In the depths of its mind the spirit 'sat.' It had no desire in particular to move anytime soon. Though it was still paying attention to the outside.
The sun had stopped running sometime and was currently laying down. Resting. It was of course going to help the sun. Just because the world was stupid and should die wasn't any reason to not help its friends...friend? It had nothing else to do or look forward to anyway.
The sky had no stars like always, and for the first time the spirit hated that. Its friends would have liked stars, but they were dead. This sky had never given them the chance to see stars.
The sun was making sounds in its sleep. Was the sun thinking about everything like it was? Probably. Its friends were the sun's friends too. It must be hurt too.
One thing was for sure. It wouldn't make friends again. Friends just died. Not like it. It was always alone. Always different. They couldn't talk to it. Not really. Maybe they weren't even friends. It hadn't went and fighted with them. Even the imps did that.
The sun up was there now. The sun was still resting. It could explore. Maybe kill something. Level up. Do something. Bones would probably be best. The sun would be alone then.
It would wait. It would never run out of time anyway.
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The sun was up. He was looking at it. He was talking.
"I don't like you. But, my parents said to. So. Which way?"
The "way?" It did not know the way. It could find a way though. So it floated that way; and the sun followed.
"Hey. I know you can't talk. But I think you understand. So listen ok?"
"I don't like you, but I know it's not your fault. I just need something to hate. I can't keep going without it. I was never a good demon. I couldn't not care when another imp died. Especially when I knew him. Or her. I couldn't just listen to what the stronger imps said. They always seemed dumber to me; they died fighting. I'm still alive, and I don't know why."
It was talking a lot. Couldn't it just learn from it and not talk?
"Do you think my talking is going to attract a monster? Is that why you're glowing more? Are you mad? Well, I think I would rather a monster came. It's hardly like I have much left now. Maybe I want a monster to show up."
Well. If that was what he wanted.
"If I was a little better back then. If I was half as strong as Azaraath from father's stories, everyone wouldn't have-"
Chuff
"That's...not good."
No, really? Was he sure?
The bear. A monster with big arms and legs. It was also not capable of hurting it. It could still eat it though. Also the sun needed to eat. That was part of the needs of imps. That much it had learned. The bear was big, which meant it was lots of food. He wouldn't be able to help much. That it knew. It was fine so long as it didn't die though.
It opened its mouth to roar...and choked as he threw rocks in it. Now, why had it done that?
"Go. I know how you kill things."
Ah. That would explain it. Yes. Also it felt smarter recently. Strange.
Into the bear and down the food way. Then, eat. Much eating. The rocks were in there, and upwards it could see a weird thing. It looked like the head's inside. Would that be better? It felt like it was important. Things without heads usually died.
The bear wheezed in pain. Slammed its head in the ground. Trying to dislodge the rocks and the horrible itch. Bucking and roaring seemed to accomplish nothing. Other than making it hurt more.
The spirit didn't know what the bear was doing, except changing color. The insides were turning black. Especially the weird thing in its head. It turned black fast. Soon, the bear stopped moving.
Level Up +2
Max Level Reached. Evolve?
Yes/No
Evolve? It didn't seem as...'exciting' as before. Not to mention if it was evolving it would be resting and if it was resting it wasn't "taking care of."
Right. The sun. Was that useless thing still not dead? Good.
"Ugh. That's still creepy no matter how many times I see it. And I was there for the wolves."
So? What was a "creepy" anyway? Could he eat it? No? Then maybe he should be happy for food. Useless thing.
"Still thanks. For the free food I mean."
Well. "Thanks?" Maybe it wasn't completely useless. It was the friends' sun.
"I mean those are supposed to be pretty strong. I'm impressed you killed a Grotesque Bear. Even if it took a while."
Shouldn't it eat? Yes it should.
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It was just touching the ground. What idiot things was it doing now?
"Ah, finally. There we go."
There we go?
"The one good thing about this place. Lots of fire starter rocks."
What was a fire starter rock? How was it different from a rock?
"The growths on these things are disgusting, but they catch fire easily. They burn out fast, but the insides at least taste slightly better that way."
Oh. Just one question. What was "fire?"
"See?"
The sun hit the rocks and then something happened, and then...a sun! A weird form sun! That was also not like food! How strange. What was "taste" anyway? Was that important? Food was food.
"Can you warn me if something is coming?"
Was the sun's intelligence too low? How was it supposed to do that?
"Uh, just come in front of my eyes and start moving if something's coming to close."
Ok.
Nomnomnom crunchnomnomcrunch nomnomnom
How close was too close?
Crunchnomnom chewchewchew
That one thing seemed to be getting close. Of course, it wasn't sure if that counted. It would have to find food again if the sun didn't manage to eat enough this time.
Nomnomnom
If it was too close though, then the sun would die. Probably. What to do.
"Alright, can't stay too long. Let's go."
Well that helped.
If they stopped would it have time to evolve?
"Is that a scout!? Run!"
No. It was a wolf. Get the name right. Did it have to remind the sun that he had to follow it? Not the other way around. Suns. They were everywhere now; each worse than the last.
"AWOOOOOOOO!"
Why were far away foods getting closer now? Wolf sounds were used to call other wolves? It never noticed since they never seemed to do anything any other time it had seen them making that sound.
The sun was running, because he couldn't kill the thing trying to kill him and because it couldn't kill the thing trying to kill him either. Not fast enough anyway.
That evolution may have come in useful. If it had the time to do it. Which it didn't. Time was hard to find more of...
Next time, it wanted to be the one things ran away fr-no, that would make finding food harder for the sun. Then! It wanted to be the thing that killed things easily. Like the chieftain did to wolves. Or make the sun able to do that. Actually, could it level up more without evolving? It was pretty sure it couldn't, so if it couldn't evolve yet, maybe the sun could?
At least, the sun would become better if it leveled up. So, should it just help kill something the next time it found a thing? It could try.
Now, though, it just needed to run faster than the sun. And try to lead it to not die.
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Blargh
WHAT WAS HE DOING!? It was wasting food! Perfectly fine food!
"Ugh. I can't. I can't run anymore."
What a lie. It had only falled after the wolves stopped running after it. If it couldn't run it would have been eaten by wolves.
Were all suns like this? It sure hoped not. That would make not dying very hard for the things that had to deal with such suns. Making no sense.
"If I was stronger..."
Obviously. If any of them were stronger they wouldn't be here now would they?
"Hey. You. Next time, could you leave your...prey alive? So I can kill it? Also, I can probably handle a single wolf on my own."
Not a problem. It had probably thinked this before he. Since it had of course it would be fine with it.
The problem was the sun seemed too...not strong. He didn't even have a club. How strong could you be without a club? Clubs were the best attacking thing. It was obvious.
"Karxide. It's a bug. If there's one of those there'll be more! Come on, quietly!"
The small black things were bugs? Could it eat them? There were more in the down cave nearby. If the sun killed all of them would it evolve? Only one way to know. Also, it was pretty sure it couldn't make sounds. That was part of the problem.
It floated over to the bug...and covered it. The bug was smaller than it was at full size, and things it was bigger than were eaten easily. In fact, sometimes they actually seemed to get smaller. Like being eaten the way other things eat.
It only had time to try that with small things that came from big things during fighting.
Now that it was doing that to a bug, it found it wasn't all that different. The bug tried to move away, but it just moved around after it. Eventually, the bug stopped moving. Nothing else happened. The level up didn't happen. Maybe it needed to kill more bugs. Or it was right, and it couldn't level up anymore.
Also, the bugs were hard to tell if they were near dead or not. It would have to be careful and maybe some bugs would not die.
Carefully, it floated onto the ground cave...and then down. Seeing as the first bug tried to run away, the others would too. So, it just had to start from the bottom where the bugs couldn't run away. It had found long ago things couldn't just ignore other things like it could. It bothered it to go through but it wasn't not doable.
There was a big bug at the bottom, one that it was sure would not die. Not too fast anyway. It moved and hit the other bugs but couldn't move away and went still after a while. Then, it went up slowly. It was starting to feel...not able to eat, but the feeling went away when it made itself bigger.
Max Mana +1
Was this good for it too? Maybe. Food went into suns and it was starting to become decently suspicious that food and "mana" were the same thing. Not to mention...things on the status getting bigger were always good right? Since bigger was better. A wolf would become dead by a bear, and a bear would become dead by the chieftain and the chieftain was bigger than an imp. Except the shaman. The shaman was bigger than imps, but smaller than the chieftain. The shaman was always weird. It - was dead.
The fun went away and it ignored the other Max Mana things. It was only another three anyway.
The sun was waiting when it came up. It had realized it was starting to get better at knowing 'how much time.' The bad in the everywhere seemed to change when the sun was up compared to when it was down. There was change with how the sun moved and it was only a little but it had seeed long enough to know. After all, it had plenty of time and not much to do other than become know and eat.
It had been careful to look for other things coming close to the sun too. Maybe the "Age" in its status was also a good thing. It certainly became...just better at everything the more its age was.
"Where were you!? I thought that - I mean not like I need you, but being alone is...well, you know right?"
No. But, it understood "alone." The sun was right there, alone was bad. Or better. It wouldn't feel so bad if it never became friends with the two before right?
Now, how to get the sun to...attack the bugs? It followed so...it floated from the sun to the cave and back. Over and over.
"W-what do you-oh, there's a bug coming up! RU-oh, it looks half-dead."
"Half-dead?" Was that near dead? It liked the sound of that, a nice wolf-like noise.
"Wait, did you leave them alive...? Oh. Well...thanks."
Good that it understood. Not good that it was slow.
Crunch
The sun was eating it.
"What? It's food."
Good. It was learning.
Spoiler: Status
Unnamed Corrupted Spirit Level: 10/10 Species: Corrupt Wisp (E) Affinities: Darkness, Death Age: 663 years Titles: