Together, Felix and Nova managed to walk up to just a couple dozen meters away from the creature which allowed them to see further into the town and see many more Devoured. Felix was wary of getting too close to them, especially once he saw that there were dozens of them spread throughout the buildings, some inside, most just on the roads. As they approached though, the Devoured continued to just loiter about in a creepy way. They definitely reminded Felix of zombies, though those were much easier to understand, they were simply walking corpses. Their skin fell off and their bodies rotted but they were evidently alive at some point, with these creatures, Felix wasn't sure they weren't created.

Felix placed his hand gently on Nova's back and closed his eyes to focus on his soul sight. He extended it out as far as he could. First, he saw his own soul and pushed outwards from there. Next he saw Nova, filled with excitement and wonder, like a child searching for anything new and shiny. Their soul was also tinted with an insatiable hunger but Felix could tell it hadn't grown too much yet. He could also feel his own soul seed within them, it had integrated itself perfectly and he could only tell it was there because he knew about it before hand. It left his own convictions within them, not as strong as if they were their own, but strong enough to feel.

Felix continued pushing his soul sight through the darkness until he managed to find the Devoured. As soon as he sensed the creature, he knew more or less what had happened. The creature's soul was less than the flicker of a candle, it was a tiny smidge of a soul, just enough to be alive, to move. He continued searching with his soul sight and spotted a few of the other Devoured nearby and saw their souls were exactly the same.

I take it someone devoured their souls?

Their souls and energy it looks like. I've seen both separately, never together. They were… awful people, one that consumed the souls of their victims to gain strength, while they were still alive. The other, consumed the blood, energy and other essential materials from a person's body, leaving them with tight black skin and no fat, much like these abominations.

You mentioned that I could have done that, harvested souls while the creature was still alive.

Yeah and I'm glad you didn't. It's likely the worst kind of torture ever. Essentially your soul is ripped apart right in front of you. Your memories and experiences are stolen. Your abilities are ripped out of you starting with your ability to fight and ending with your ability to think. The entire time your soul is inflicting as much pain as it can to your body so you try and fight back, so you try and stop what's happening.

Why didn't you mention that before?

If that was what you decided, that was what needed to be done, then so be it.

Really? Do you have a moral compass at all? A sense of ethics, what's right and wrong?

No. At least I didn't. I was constructed with artificial convictions that forced me to think of some things as right and wrong but none of that was my own thoughts.

What about now?

Now I think your soul seed has started to affect me. It's not overwhelming yet, I wouldn't fight you if you decided to harvest live souls, but it's there. The little thought in the back of your pages that says, this probably isn't right, I have that now.

Wait, so my soul changed your personality? Your sense of right and wrong? It gave you a conscience?

Felix, you've seen your soul. It's an infection, a disease. It's probably worse or just as bad as the worst curses. It's a virus that spreads though anyone it infects, through a soul seed or otherwise. It overwrites parts of the infected individual's personality, who they are. It also gives them super powers, so there is that. Worth it if you ask me.

Felix looked towards Nova with a sinking pit in his stomach.

How can you be ok with that? How can you know you would have been ok with that? How can I be ok with that?

I don't know that I would have been okay with it. I am now but there isn't any way to know how I would have felt had I known. There's no point in worrying about it now. I currently don't care and the me-from-before-I-was-infected doesn't exist anymore so there's no point in worrying about him. As for you, I'm ok with it so why shouldn't you be? All I can do is guess at whether or not I would have wanted to bond if I had known, but that's not worth either of our time.

What about Nova? I feel like I tricked them, didn't give them all the information before they agreed.

Grim chuckled in Felix's head, I know I haven't been in many people's heads, but you are definitely the only one who would worry about that, or even think of it. Nova was a Matter Sprite, they didn't have emotions or coherent thought before D grade. Even if you did tell it everything, it would have agreed just for the prospect of new and shiny. It's like taming or adopting a wild animal. Do you tell the animal that you're going to leave it alone for 8 hours at a time. Do you tell it it's going to have to be neutered or wear a collar?

I guess you're right about Nova, wouldn't have mattered anyway. It's just hard to think of them like that now that I occasionally tune into their constant stream of emotions and sometimes even complex thoughts.

I hear you. All you can do is be better. If someone asks you to soul bond in future, tell them or refuse. You can't change what's already happened.

I know, it still makes me feel a little bad that I'll never get to know who you would have been without me.

I'm not. You kidding, this me sounds way more interesting than that sad sack. Are you sad that your parents got married? That you never would have known who they would have been without each-other?

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

No, definitely not. I guess… are you happy?

I'm a book.

Sure. You also have a soul and seem to have feelings, you enjoy puns and despise my language, which is completely understandable.

Those are mostly pragmatic, maybe not the puns. I think so. I mean, all I can reference is your memories and I'm definitely not sad or depressed. I feel rather… neutral.

Yeah, I get that. Honestly, I always hated that question, "How are you?". I say "fine" and people think something is wrong. In reality, I'm just neutral, totally fine. Aren't most people like that the vast majority of the time?

I think most people see it as binary, if they aren't bad, they are good.

That's idiotic.

Most people are.

Sorry… about the whole corrupting you thing.

Uh… I forgive you? I really don't give a shit so don't worry about it. Plus I'm really looking forward to having super powers, seeing what it's like to be you, even just a little bit.

The feeling in Felix's stomach had mostly disappeared now that he had rationalized it, leaving behind a dull sensation that should pass as soon as he was distracted. Felix sent a mental nudge to Nova, releasing them from protection duty. Nova mentally meowed then slowly crept forwards and struck out with extended claws knocking the devoured aside. Felix backed up using his boots and watched as the other devoured in the area screamed with awful guttural screechs through their sealed mouths. It created an awful sound as they were simply emptying their lungs through a constricted throat with the whole thing coming through their nose holes.

The devoured that were nearby ran at Nova as they pounced on the one they had already struck. That first Devoured was lying on the ground though Felix couldn't tell if they had been scratched at all as they definitely didn't bleed. It also wasn't dead though so Nova jumped over and clawed and bit it until they were satisfied, likely getting a notification. The other devoured were clawing and smacking their heads against Nova's body but they didn't appear to be doing anything. There were only a half dozen of them and they didn't even slow Nova down as they spun around and knocked them away one by one.

Nova finished them off, though it took much longer than Felix expected, then bounded over to Felix and jumped at his head. He almost jumped aside but Nova shifted back into a tiny kitten and floated themselves back into Felix's hood midair. Nova went back to napping after sending a series of emotions and thoughts that amounted to ‘these things are worthless and disgusting, I'm going back to sleep.' Nova hadn't even eaten a single one of them, even though Felix could feel their hunger slightly coloring every thought and emotion. Felix didn't really feel like he could blame them though, the Devoured were disgusting and seemed to just be annoying to kill.

Felix wanted to explore further but he needed to know just how difficult these things would be to kill for himself so he stalked through the outside of the town until he found one. He made sure to stay at the edge of the town so he had an easy escape route just in case then fired off a simple Mana Bolt to get it's attention. The creature went from slowly moving, like it's joint's needed to be oiled, to bounding across the ground in an instant. It screeched as it ran with it's legs stretching out much further than they should and it's arms flailing about, as though it didn't have full control of it's own body.

Felix fired off a series of spells, starting with his signature Lightning Bolt followed by Fire, Cold and Pure Force. He kept firing off a ridiculous number of spells as he realized he was going to have to run away as he did so. He had initially expected to kill it before it reached him but it showed no signs of slowing down or being affected at all. Felix eventually got sick of the fight and the creature was getting closer than he would like so he charged up a 10 sized lightning bolt and blew 150,000 mana in a single strike. A massive thunderous boom echoed through the chamber and Felix was blinded by the flash of light that illuminated the entire area. It definitely wasn't even close to the lightning strike that had killed the Kraken, but it was the biggest singular strike Felix had ever cast.

As soon as the spell shot out, Felix could feel residual mana spray out, some of it shooting into his arm, the closest medium it could find. It was entirely attuned to electricity and it's energy levels were maxed out. Felix had never thought mana alone would ever really be dangerous for him, but now he knew otherwise. As the mana traveled through the medium of his arm, he felt pain as his cells ripped themselves apart, some burning to a crisp and some simply exploding. Before it could get any further though, Felix forcefully grabbed the mana with his mana control and ripped it out of his arm. He had to do so a few times to get all of it because he had trouble grabbing hold of it when it darted around so quickly. As the mana was removed from his body, so was most of the pain. Felix's vision readjusted and he saw the Devoured, the same damn one, standing above him and clawing at his arm. He would have thought it was a different one if it didn't have a still smoking hole right through it's chest, where it's heart would have been.

Felix kicked the thing off of him, using force spells to create distance then continued to fire off spells at the creature. Entirely Fire Balls at this point because Felix really wanted to incinerate the stupid thing and the force helped slow it down. Eventually, it fell to the ground like a ragdoll and Felix received a kill notification.

Ding You have slain a [D] Devoured (Lvl 286)

Looking down at his arm, the creature had torn right through his armor, it's claws only barely hindered. It had managed to completely tear through his arm though it hadn't quite scratched the bone. Felix immediately sat in a meditation and dulled the pain as much as he could then somewhat recklessly dumped mana and energy into his arm and armor to try and close the wounds. At first he was worried he might have to manually repair things but luckily, even though his arm with in shreds, his body remembered where everything belonged.

Fuck these things. Why are they so damn hard to kill.

Yeah. Unfortunately, I don't think any particular element is going to do you any good either.

I really hope that's not what the entire damn world event is. These stupid things.

I don't think the ones in the city above are going to be nearly as high level, but if I had to bet…

We could just go home?

Treasure though…

Damn.

Over the course of almost a day, Felix confirmed Grim's theory by baiting the creatures away from the others and killing them individually with different elements. He tried everything from Fire to Force even giving sound Sound and Light a shot. No matter what element he tried, they took a stupid amount of time to kill. Fire and lightning were similarly efficient with fire taking less spells overall and lightning slightly less mana. Felix even tried enchanting their bodies to make them less Hard and Elastic but that didn't seem to do anything at all.

After having tested spells on and killed dozens of Devoured, Felix was certain that something was weird with the experience they rewarded. At first he though it was Nova being too close by, but then he left them way back in the mine and it was the same result. If these had been normal creatures in the high 200s, he was certain he'd have gained multiple levels per kill.

Supporting his theory was the fact that they didn't have a rarity at all. In fact, their stats, other than maybe endurance, were far too low for their level by Felix's estimations. It was possible they just focused really hard on endurance at the cost of everything else, but Felix was pretty sure the fact that their souls were devoured was screwing with the experience. It also fit with how Grim assumed leveling, experience and The System interacted with each-other. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .