I started with the information on how to create the body of the vessel since the ‘Mind’ aspect is something I can probably do without too much supplementary information.

The main parts needed for the vessel are:

 Skin: protects the interior of the vessel. Magic resistances will be added to the skin. A list of materials was listed to create different types of skin with slightly different properties. Hair and nails are considered to be part of the skin.

 Muscles: the spirit vessel needs to move and while not as complicated as real muscles it is needed for most of the volume of the vessel. It will also be responsible for the generation of heat so the vessel feels ‘Human’. It will also be the part that gets augmented when spirit energy or magic is applied. There are white and red versions. The red are responsible for long sustained movements, the type suited for endurance while the white are more for explosive bursts. The ingredients for these were also listed and their locations.

 Bones: the main skeleton needed for support, it will also be in charge of producing Ichor Pneuma, the most important component of the spirit vessel. The ingredients for this seemed to be problematic. How annoying.

 Ichor Pneuma or ‘Spirit Blood’: The life force of the vessel. It will be acting like blood but it doesn’t share similarities with real blood. It is a self-sufficient sort of fuel. It is also what makes the entire vessel more receptive to receiving a spirit. While every part of the vessel can be mass-produced in theory, Ichor Pneuma needs to be tuned after the specific spirit that enters the vessel. A mismatch will create a rejection reaction. The precise ingredients for this are also unknown since it’s highly specific to the spirit and will need a lot of testing. The bones will be able to produce the Ichor Pneuma after they get tuned to each other.

I sighed. I guess that this is the reason why the bones have no set ingredients. There are many chapters about Ichor Pneuma. It seems to be the single most important component of the spirit vessel and it will decide whether the whole vessel fails. Because this needs to be tailor-made. A mismatch in Ichor Pneuma will make the whole vessel useless to other spirits. It can be drained and the bones removed but it is not worth it because the process of foxfire smelting is too complicated and troublesome.

I guess that part won't apply to me since I will be using alchemy but it does sound like a pain. It would be ideal to get this down correctly.

‘To make an effective Ichor Pneuma, one must understand spirits.’

Fuck! So, I also have to understand spirits. Well, this isn’t surprising actually but this seems to be way more complicated than I thought. So, it seems that it is important to know which spirit receives the vessel before making it. I guess I will have to do some check-ups on the guardian spirit after reading this. Anyway, there is more to the list.

There are 4 more components:

 Fat: used as filler and damage reduction. 3 types are listed but Rignef only used the easiest one because it was all he could muster since at some point he got pursued by a stupid bitch goddess. The type of fat determines the amount of physical damage reduction. I think I will go for the best version. I don’t want any half-assed work with my name on it. This seems easy to make.

 Nervous System: While pain isn’t necessary, it is important that the spirit in the vessel notices when parts of the vessel are damaged and needs care. The Immune system which will be in charge of repair will take care of this but it will alert the spirit that it needs to be careful with certain damaged parts. This also seems easy.

 Digestive system: This is completely optional. It is not needed to keep the vessel functioning. Ichor Pneuma is the driving force behind the spirit vessel and produces no waste. However, Spirits are obsessed with bread so they would prefer to eat. This is why Rignef had developed the digestive system but he hasn’t used it. How considerate of him. This is also easy but it uses some rare materials.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

 Immune system: which is the self-repair. A spirit vessel is immune to diseases but it can still take damage. This is the only part that is tied to the magic circuits which will be the ‘Mind’ part and possibly where the ‘Mind’ connects to the ‘Body’. Rignef had half-assed this and that’s why Isi asked me to check if there were defects in her vessel. But if it needed the magic circuits to function, then he did a great job even though it was half-assed. I assume he didn’t know what he was doing but it worked somehow.

The sensory organs were redundant. Only the skin was functional in its ability to touch and feel temperature. The ears, nose and eyes didn’t need to be functional because a spirit will be able to do these perfectly without functional organs. The digestive system was needed for taste but only the tongue could be made without the digestive system to get the sensation of taste. It would also aid in speech so the creation of the tongue, which is a muscle, was highly recommended.

Most of this makes sense. So, the only things that would be a pain to create are the bones and Ichor Pneuma. The book then went into the complicated processes needed to bring them together. I skipped those. It seems the bulk of this book was on how to bring these components together. It would create something similar to a rock-like substance and the desired shape had to be carved out. An artisan was required or a 9t who could use the precision of their eyes to sculpt a realistic body.

I guess being a 9t and a blacksmith makes me perfect for this.

I found a note. I had just copied the information on it but Rignef must have slipped the note in when he handed me the book to read. It told me about a filter I could use to create an illusion of clothing and an appearance, place it on the vessel, and use foxfire to bake the appearance into the vessel. It required that I would add some extra ingredients to the skin.

I had to create the solution of the skin by boiling it with my foxfire instead of regular fire and I would also need the extract from a memory slime. It is a creature that can mimic the form of the person it encounters. That sounds easier. Oh, it also said that those slimes were nearing extinction.

Can species stop going extinct? And that seemed to be it. It did mention that space should be left over for the magic system.

I went through the book about the ‘Mind’. There were 6 components:

 Mana conduits: It is like a blood vessel system but instead of blood it has mana running through it.

 Mana Generator and convertor: This does exactly what its name suggests, generate mana and convert incoming ambient mana to become more suitable for the vessel to use. This works similar to how the bodies of living beings produce and collect mana.

 Mana extractor: extracts ambient mana, pulls it into the body and stores it before it gets sent to the mana converter.

 Mana nodes: nodes that store small amounts of mana for spontaneous or quick use of mana.

 Mana ward: basic protection against foreign mana that isn’t ambient mana.

 Mana repair: repairs all the other systems when they get damaged, this part is tightly linked to the immune system of the ‘Body’.

Rignef had written down the theories and magic circles but I could see they were all wrong. It was a good attempt though. I could see where he was going.

I sunk deeper in the couch. My head hurt. That was a lot of information. It seems simple at a glance but that’s because I didn’t need to come up with how to make those individual components and find out which ingredients make for the best components. I am assuming that most of the ‘Body’ is correct. I will have to rewrite the ‘Mind’ book for him.

The book on the ‘Spirit’ wasn’t long but at this point, I needed a break. I looked over at the elven elders. They were talking at the table and eating all my bananas. Bunch of assholes.