Chapter 11
A Meeting of Souls
Murdell was a nation of sorcerers, making the average citizen significantly more dangerous than those in Arcadia. Because of this fact, they built their towns directly outside the dungeon entrance, unafraid of what would happen if it should surge. So, it was a short walk from Darksmith to the hotel where Luke and Davina were staying.
It had been three months since Kathrine summoned me which meant Davina and the others must have set out almost immediately and pushed hard to get here so quickly. I sensed the intense lifeforce of Carolyn’s Old Monster guards as I approached the hotel. The smell of their blood lingered in the air as inviting as a delightful meal in a flower filled meadow. It would have made me curious enough to stop by, even if they weren’t my destination.
Old Monster stood in front of every window and door eyeing the people walking past. Angelica’s dracolich was stationed on the roof with several more guards, drastically lowering the amount of foot traffic. Clearly, the king hadn’t stopped trying to rescue Carolyn once I’d gone to sleep. Her personal guard was now over a hundred strong, based on the lifeforce I could feel coming from the building.
Sir Trent scowled at me as I approached the entrance, carrying several storage chests filled with ninth floor cores. He was dressed for war, wearing thick plate armour that was covered in enchantments. A sword with a blade as wide as my hand was strapped to his back, radiating an intense death aura that concerned me. It would slow down how quickly I could heal.
He stepped in front of the entrance, blocking me from entering with his massive frame. He glared down at me. “Do you have any idea what we had to fight through to get here? How many borders we had to cross? How many threats we had to put down?”
I met his glare with an easy smile. “You don’t have to thank me for making your life more fun.”
He dropped the glare and chuckled. “How did you know I was messing with you?”
“You don’t smell upset. Why are you here?”
“I can’t tell you that. Do you still want me to train your unarmed combat skill?” He seemed excited by the prospect.
“The moment I have the spare time.”
“Good. Follow me.” He turned and opened the door, before leading me through the lobby.
They seemed to have rented the entire building, because Gregory’s people and Davina’s clerics and paladins were everywhere. Gregory’s people saluted as I passed, taking the storage chests from me to transfer the contents to the master storage chest they’d brought. Davina’s didn’t even acknowledge I was there, continuing with their task. Unburdened, I followed Sir Trent up a staircase and down a hallway, passing more of his people, before entering a lavish suite where I was led to a sitting room.
Davina had tied her black hair into a ponytail and was sitting in an armchair, with her legs tucked under her while she read. Her complexion remained pale, despite the lack of death magic in the air, and she still looked like she was sixteen even though almost a year having passed since we met.
She’d grown significantly stronger since I’d gone to sleep, finally having cleansed the death magic locked in her mother’s city. Judging by how strong her aura felt, she would now be able to cast expert tier magic at will.
My son was sleeping on the couch, with his arm hanging over the side. Luke had allowed his facial hair to grow out, giving him a dense beard. He’d lengthen his hair to his shoulders making him look completely different. It seemed like he was going for a Captain America look.
The presence of a second hero in Murdell might have made the Dark Lord think the South was making a move and trigger a war, so I assumed he was moving incognito. His scent didn’t hold any traces of his party members.
Angelica was in another armchair with her waist length blonde hair over the back. She was wearing her dull blood red armour and reading a book on mana control. Over a year had passed since we had met and unlike Davina she had changed. Her features were slightly more adult reflecting slightly more woman than child. She was closer to eighteen than seventeen now and it showed. It made it harder for me to care about her.
Angelica was the first to notice I’d entered the room. She immediately threw down her book as she launched to her feet. “I’m free!” She blurred out the room, so I couldn’t command her to stay.
Luke snorted himself awake, raising his hand and conjuring a ball of fire, which was new. “What the...Dad!” He leapt out of his chair and raced across the room, face red with rage. He threw a right hook the moment he reached me.
I planted my feet and let the punch hit me.
My head snapped back as his fist collided with my cheek. My jaw broke and skull fractured, as the tiles under my feet cracked. I heard one of Luke’s knuckles break as my higher constitution came into play, making my body much tougher than in the past.
He didn’t throw a second punch.
My bones snapped back together as my flesh healed. “I deserved that.”
He glared at me. “Damn right you do. Do you even feel bad about what you did?”
“Every second of every day since the moment it happened.”
Luke seemed surprised by my reply. “You mean that literally, don’t you?”
I nodded, dropping the facade that everything was alright. Holding it together until they got here had been hard. Everyday, I wanted to go out into the world and kidnap someone, anyone, who could help her get better. I wanted to pull the world apart until everything was right, but I couldn’t let myself do that. I had to be better.
He engulfed me in a hug, cracking my back, forgetting the anger from a moment before. “How bad is she? Amelia wasn’t sure.”
“She’s asleep. Within a few hours of feeding on her, she was terrified, paranoid, and in a deep depression. She’s hurt and I haven’t been able do anything about it.”
Luke pulled back and gave me a sad smile. “Sit down and explain from the beginning.”
When Luke stepped away, Davina was waiting for a hug. Her glowing white eyes showed she was favoured by heaven as they held all the compassion in the world. “Do you want me to make it stop hurting?”
I shook my head. “I don’t deserve it.”
She gave me a simple hug, that made me what to protect her, and then made me sit next to her, so she could hold my hand. She didn’t do anything to take the pain away. She just let me know that she was there for me. That the necrosaint didn’t think I was the monster I saw myself as.
I wished it helped.
I told them what happened. They had heard Amelia’s version, but this version was more intimate. Amelia didn’t share my pain in her dreams or my thoughts. She only saw what I experienced, not how I experienced it.
Luke gave a heavy sigh as I finished. “This is a completely different problem to what I thought it was.”
Davina gave my hand a squeeze. “I can repress emotions and hide memories for a short time, but I can’t heal trauma or soul injuries with a wave of my hand. Amelia is only just coming to terms with what she saw happen to you and it’s taken me months. What do you want me to do?”
“Help her.”
She squeezed my hand again. “I will. Are you hungry?”
I shook my head. “I’m still working my way through everything I ate after the demonic parasite mutated.”
“Are you tired?”
“Not since I fed on her.”
Luke raised an eyebrow. “Was her blood that good?”
“It worked better than anything I’ve ever heard of.”
“Mines probably better.”
It was and I hated myself for the way it made me salivate. “It’s not a competition.”
He grinned. “Still winning though.”
“We are not finding out if that’s true.”
His grin grew. “If I flicked a drop of blood at you, do you think you will behave like a dog and catch in the air with your mouth?”
Davina giggled.
I scowled at him. “Your sister is suffering. This is not time for jokes.”
He continued to smile. “This is the exact time for jokes, Dad. You need some humour in your life. There is far too much vampire teen angst.”
That got me to chuckle. “How long have you been saving that?”
He smirked. “A few months. Have you found anymore teenage girls to follow you around yet?”
I groaned as he chuckled.
Davina came to my rescue. “Like father like son.”
Luke stopped chuckling and groaned too. “Please don’t mention that in front of him.”
“I wouldn’t dream of mentioning that the princess ogles your butt, every time you enter a room.”
I saluted my son. “That’s America’s ass.”
“I didn’t steal Captain America’s look,” he said indignantly.
“Only his butt.”
“Okay, that’s enough humour,” Luke said. “What are we going to do about Kathrine? Davina can’t fix this with a wave of her hand and Carolyn can’t remain here long without causing a disturbance. We came through the South, but the Darklord will eventually learn she’s here and try to kidnap her.”
That was a good point. “Why did you bring her?”
“We needed Amelia to keep tabs on you in case you were discovered and had to move,” Davina replied. “The princess and Amelia’s parents weren’t willing to let us take her alone, so we brought them with us.”
There was more to that story, but I had other priorities.
“How skilled is Carolyn when it comes to magic?”
“She’s at the low end of advanced. At her age, that makes her a savant. She’s also already an archsorcerer.”
“What about Angelica?”
“High end of intermediate.”
“That was fast?”
“It took her a week to realise, your wording wasn’t a death sentence and let her train all of her death lord skills. She switched over to studying magic, because the need to be able to think clearly let her sleep more. She’s been studying magic nonstop for five months. With only two branches of magic, her set, and attributes, she can train much faster than a normal person.”
“Why didn’t she stop three months ago when I sent for you?”
Davina sighed. “She should have been able to stop studying when she saw that your sarcophagus was empty, but in her mind that didn’t mean you were awake. Only that your resting place was empty. I think it has something to do with her parent’s abuse.”
“Did she talk to you about it?”
Davina shook her head. “She doesn’t trust anyone that much. But I listen to what she says and what she doesn’t. It doesn’t take a genius to realise they were monsters. Did she cry when you killed them?”
“She smelled relieved.”
“I thought so.”
Davina leaned into my side. She was worried for her friend and had no one else she could be vulnerable with. Something inside me changed as she leaned into me, and I put my arm over her shoulder to comfort her. Normally, I couldn’t care about her even when we were this close. Whatever she was doing was making it possible for me to care the way I once had. She was growing stronger, and she was trying to use that strength to help me.
“So, what’s the plan?” Luke asked.
I turned to him. “That depends. Why do you suddenly have magic?”
He smirked and folded his arms. “There I was minding my own business, being a talented and dashing young hero, devoid of magic, but still making the world a better place. When low and behold, my father eats most of the royal family and gains the royal bloodline without telling me. So, I’m none the wiser when I mosey into the local adventurer’s guild to use their class hall, getting the shock of my life as I discover that not only do my new levels give me a bunch of magical skills, but I’ve also unlocked the royal family’s bloodline.”
“Happy Birthday and Merry Christmas.”
He chuckled. “Does this count as one year or all of the ones you missed?”
“It covers the decade I was asleep.”
“Damn it. Now I have to get you something.”
“You know what I want.”
“I’m not getting married and giving you grandchildren!”
I chuckled. “What branches of magic can you practice?”
“The four elements, plus death and necrotic magic.”
“How good are you?”
“Low intermediate. I had a few skill upgrades that were collecting dust, so I upgraded the Sovereign Sorcerer skill to tier three, between it and my prodigy skill magic comes naturally.”
That was too low. “Davina, Angelica, and Carolyn are all talented enough to gain immediate entry into Darksmith, if we lie about Davina’s age. You can become my assistant.”
Davina frowned. “You’re planning to stay here long term.”
“As long as it takes. I want Kathrine to wake up somewhere familiar.”
Luke rolled his eyes. “And I have to be your assistant to do that.”
“More like an apprentice. I can’t actually hire an assistant.”
“Can’t I just join the academy?”
“By your age, the students that haven’t left are practicing expert tier magic. You don’t qualify.”
“Can’t you get me in some other way?”
“Not without people questioning it.”
“Why are you including the princess?”
“Because you brought her with you and you’re right. Out here she’s a target. Inside the academy, the Dark Lord would start a war if he touched her.”
“What if she doesn’t go for it?”
“This is Darksmith. The student body is made up of Murdell’s elite. She will never get another opportunity to build alliances like the one she has here, or a chance to show how much better she is than them.”
“Her guards won’t like it.”
“The school rules allow her to have as many servants as she wants, on top of her guards. The only stipulation is that they cannot practice magic above the intermediate tier. There is nothing in the school rules that say those servants can’t be Old Monsters.”
Davina smirked. “Still sticking to the letter of the law while crushing its spirit, I see.”
I grinned. “It’s the best way to get things done.”
***
Luke sat beside his sister on the bed holding her hand, watching as Davina, Father, and Mother completed their examination. He was worried, more worried than I’d ever seen him. His strength meant nothing here and being powerless didn’t sit well with him. It hurt me to see him like this. It hurt to know that I was the cause.
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Father walked over and took a seat next to me on the couch. He and Mother were in their eighties, but because of Davina, they now looked like they were in their late thirties. Before devoting his life to Davina, Father had been an archbishop focused on healing. He was the same level as Carolyn’s Old Monsters, but because of his focus he wasn’t a threat to me.
Father folded his arms and turned his white gaze to the ceiling. “Your ability to eat souls is significantly stronger than I anticipated, without soul healing she won’t recover for at least a decade.”
“Can you heal her?”
“That depends. Have you improved your soul regeneration and strengthening skills?”
I didn’t trust him or Mother the way I did Davina. “Why do you want to know?”
“With a strong and healthy soul, you could learn techniques to heal your daughter’s soul. Parents are better for this than strangers and your nature would allow you to master the techniques in days instead of decades.”
He was trying to help. “They haven’t level.”
He scratched his chin. “Do you know why?”
“I don’t know how to exploit my demonic parasites correctly.”
“I’m not sure I understand.”
“When I raised the level of my vampiric touch skill, the demonic parasite within me didn’t get better at pulling lifeforce from someone. I got better at using them to pull lifeforce from someone.”
“You tapped into what they were already capable of rather than building a new skill.”
“Yes.”
“Then, you need to learn how to exploit their soul regeneration and strengthening capabilities in order to level these skills.”
“I believe so.”
“May I examine your soul? If I can understand what they’re doing, I might be able to help you develop these skills. If you’re soul recovers, I’ll teach you the techniques you need to heal her.”
“Do it.”
He reached out and placed his hand on my forehead, casting a spell. Father was the foremost expert on souls in Arcadia, so if he didn’t know what was going on, no one would.
He began to frown. “Your soul is in even worse shape than your daughters.”
“Do-”
“Give me a moment.”
His moment lasted fifteen minutes. Davina and Mother, worked on Kathrine while I waited, helping her to recover faster in any way they could.
He pulled his hand away. “The demonic parasites seem to be excreting soul energy for your soul to gather, so it can recover on its own. Strengthening seems to occur while they are feeding on your soul. They strengthen the sections around where they’re eating, and when they run out weaker sections to eat, they begin eating the sections they’ve strengthened. They always seem to eat the weakest point first, stopping your soul from being able to recover or strengthen evenly. I think I’ve got a book that might be helpful, but I can’t remember which one it is.”
“Give me them all then. I can read them faster than you can sort through.”
He reached into his storage pouch and began passing me books to read. “Monks have created dozens of techniques for strengthening and healing their souls. Some of these techniques are practiced by clerics who perform exorcisms. If you can’t improve your vampiric skills, you will need to practice one of these techniques anyway. In a year or two, your soul will fade from existence without them.”
Father had over one hundred books on the soul with various techniques that could be used to strengthen and repair it. These books were entirely different to the ones I’d read in Contessa’s library. Those dark arts were devoted to how you could use souls to empower spells or harness them to strengthen your own soul. They treated souls as a fuel source. These book treated your soul like a muscle, showing you how to exercise it to make it stronger, so you could use techniques.
When I finished reading them, I handed him a book titled, The Root and Branch Technique. “I think this is the one you were trying to remember.”
I pointed to the section that explained the technique.
Despite clerics and monks being able to see souls, they only had a basic understanding of how they worked. They knew your soul copied memories as they formed and that with the right spells these memories could be reintroduced to the flesh, which was how you could resurrect someone whose brain had been crushed. They knew souls sometimes did this on their own, but they didn’t know why. And knew that painful memories would injure souls.
They also knew that souls consumed lifeforce to maintain themselves, regenerate and strengthen themselves, and that magic could be used to strengthen them further.
You could safely train your soul in a number of different ways without causing harm, like how different athletes trained different muscles for different sports. However, trying to change your soul’s nature usually resulted in disaster. This was like giving yourself extra arms and legs. It caused all sorts of problems.
Father put down the book. “This wasn’t the technique I was thinking of. Why did you suggest this one?”
“The technique creates a root system that absorbs lifeforce, converts it to soul energy, and then uses the soul energy to make soul fragments to regenerate the sections of the soul around the roots. You said the demonic parasites eat the weakest parts of my soul, strengthening the sections around it. If I make the soul roots thin enough to have regular soul fragments around them, then the demonic parasites will only feed on the regenerated sections, while strengthening the roots. If the roots become strong enough, the demonic parasite will never view them as a food source, unless their starving, which the increase efficiency should make impossible.”
He folded his arms and leaned back. “From what I remember, the technique doesn’t work that way.”
“It doesn’t, but if I combine practices from the other techniques, it could. Let me write it out so you can understand and give me your thoughts.”
Father followed me to the study and began reading as I finished writing the first page.
Unlike the human body that had different cells for different purposes, every soul fragment had the exact same capabilities. They could all absorb lifeforce, store memories, regenerate, and strengthen the soul, but they could be trained to be better at one task over the others.
The technique I wanted to use caused soul fragments -the smallest functional piece of a soul- to link together and become specialised soul roots. Some of these roots would be changed so that they absorbed more lifeforce, they would pass the lifeforce to the roots next to them that converted lifeforce to soul energy more efficiently, which would then be passed on to roots that regenerated the soul by creating soul fragments more efficiently.
The technique in the book required thick roots, but thick roots wouldn’t work for me. My demonic parasites where everywhere inside me and they would eat the thicker soul roots when that was all they were surrounded by. The damage would stop the roots from maintaining an equilibrium and destroy the increase efficiency, leading to an even faster rate of decline.
To make this work, I needed to interweave unimaginably thin soul roots that absorb lifeforce, with unimaginably thin soul roots that could convert the lifeforce to universal soul energy, with unimaginably thin soul roots that could absorb and covert the soul energy to new soul fragments, and then use the demonic parasites to make the roots stronger, while they feed on the new soul fragments the roots were creating. I’d be working on a microscopic scale which was something humans couldn’t do. And my soul would only recover if I could make these unimaginably thin roots long enough to make a difference.
The roots I created would be a three braded cord that would hopefully work with my demonic parasites rather than against them. It wouldn’t be the strongest soul technique, but it would be the strongest technique that worked for me.
Father read the last page and put it down. “This technique will make your soul degrade faster.”
“Only in the beginning. Once the demonic parasite strengthening the roots, the roots will become more efficient at converting lifeforce and regenerating my soul. They should also become more efficient at collecting the soul energy the parasites excrete.”
“True, but it’s terribly inefficient compared to other techniques.”
“This technique will never be as efficient as the techniques the monks practice, but it has the best chance of working with my skills, and if I can level those, it won’t require me to do much more than feed to maintain my soul.”
“True. My oaths prohibit me from offering you aid with the power that heaven granted me, but the necrosaint spent her time traveling here mastering any magic that could help your daughter. She can do what you need.”
I pushed my chair out and returned to the bedroom. Luke was still sitting next to Kathrine, but Davina was on the couch talking to Mother about my daughter’s condition. Mother was teaching her what they could do to help her.
I told Davina what I needed her to do, handing her the technique I’d created.
When she was finished reading, she turned to me. “If I reinforce your soul, the demonic parasite won’t be able to eat your soul as quickly which will be significantly more efficient than using this method alone.”
“That’s fine. How long do you need to prepare?”
Davina stifled a yawn. “I can do this now.”
“You don’t need to practice?” I asked, concerned by how casual she was being. The spells she had to cast were some of the most complicated magic I’d seen outside the vault under the Northern Royal Library.
“It’s less complicated than reinforcing your soul. All I’m doing is casting a spell that temporarily makes you aware of your soul, and casting another that will allow you to manipulate it.”
“That’s less complicated that reinforcing my soul?”
She nodded. “That was like filling my hands with water and trying not to spill a drop as I walked from one side of the city to the other. This is more like covering the crack in a cup with my thumb, so water doesn’t spill out. You ready?”
I sat on the floor in front of the couch, crossed my legs and began breathing, matching the cycles I’d read in the book. The monks practiced the original soul strengthening method used it to fight. It caused their strikes to have a spiritual weight to them, which allowed them to fight ghosts, demons, and beat someone into a dark depressive state.
I glanced at Kathrine. “I’m ready.”
Davina placed her hand on my forehead and cast the first spell.
Becoming aware of your soul was like becoming aware of your skeleton. You knew it was inside of you, but you couldn’t quite pinpoint where it was or how it worked only that it was there. With the help of the spell, I could feel how my soul interacted with my body, drawing lifeforce into itself to convert to soul energy, similar to the way my lung used to breathe in air. It also drew in my thoughts and memories copying them away, like a data backup.
My soul felt like a mangy dog with patches of missing fur, two heads, and oozing puss filled wounds. The demonic parasites were attached to every inch of it like invisible maggots, gnawing on it everywhere they could.
No wonder Father had said my soul looked worse than Kathrine’s. The books I’d just read, told me I should have gone insane with my soul in this state.
Davina cast another spell, allowing her to see my soul.
She flinched at the sight and then took a deep breath. “Where do you want to start?”
I turned to Father. “Any recommendations?”
“I’d begin with the most damaged section. If you make a mistake, it will be less costly.”
“Heart it is then.”
Davina cast another spell. “You should be able to feel what your soul is doing in that section and how it is doing it. You can add your will to the spell to train your soul the way you want.”
I felt how the tattered wisps of soul fragments behind my chest wall allowed lifeforce to enter them, so they could convert it to soul energy, and use that soul energy to repair themselves, as they were eaten by the parasite. Occasionally a soul fragment would get ahead of the damage and try to help its neighbouring fragment, but this was incredibly inefficient.
I began training a section smaller than the head of a pin, so that it was only absorbing lifeforce. That section of my soul immediately began to shrink as the parasites ate the fragments faster than they could recover. Before I finished training them into what I needed, they were eaten.
I wasn’t surprised by the results. It was exactly what I’d expected to happen. “Davina, reinforce my soul.”
She cast the same spell she’d used to slow down the rate the demonic parasites ate my soul in the past. With my perception, I could sense where the demonic parasites were, by where they were eating my soul. These were the weak points. I could also tell which stage each parasite was at based upon how quickly it was feeding.
I found the strongest stationary parasite, inside the muscle wall of my heart, and began training the soul fragments next to it to become soul roots. They were halfway through their training when the parasite began to eat them. They were almost done, before they were consumed.
The problem was simple enough to overcome. I needed to distract the demonic parasites with another food source.
I found another candidate to work with and began forming the interwoven roots next to it. At the same time, I moved weaker fragment to the demonic parasite that were easier to eat. It happily ate what I supplied as the root system finished training the way I wanted. The demonic parasite kept eating everything I supplied while strengthening the roots.
Eventually the roots grew strong enough to start expanding. The lifeforce roots brought in lifeforce more quickly, which they gave to the conversion roots to turn into soul energy, which was picked up by the regeneration roots, which used the soul energy to grow and repair everything around it which was predominantly the roots. The regeneration was the hardest part, it needed to expand all three roots, while also creating random soul fragments for the parasites to eat.
The roots system slowly grew to surround the demonic parasite, feeding off the soul energy the demonic parasite was giving off, creating a nest that feed it soul fragments while it strengthened them. Once that was done, the roots began to spread, sending out nano thin roots in every direction. It was slow at first, but whenever they came in contact with a demonic parasite the growth rate sped up. The roots would circle the new parasite and build a nest, before sending out more roots.
As the more mobile demonic parasites moved, the root system followed them, feeding off the soul energy excretions the parasites left behind. After nearly an hour of slow progress, the roots reached the section of my heart wall connected to blood. The higher concentration of mobile demonic parasites made them spread more quickly and over the next few hours they fully engulfed my heart.
“You need to expand the soul reinforcement,” I said.
Davina frowned. “Why?”
“The root system has spread through my heart?”
“It has?”
“You can’t see it?”
“Your soul looks slightly more stable there, but that’s all I can see.”
“Just do it.”
Her spell spread to engulf my rib cage and then later my entire body.
The roots fed each other, so the longer they grew the more efficient they were. It only took another hour, for them to spread through my circulatory, which gave them access to every part of my body.
Luke had fallen asleep next to his sister, and Mother and Father were dozing in the armchairs, when the root system finished spreading across my skin and began to connect to each other. These connections established shorter paths for the roots to share resources and entirely changed the way they worked.
One moment everything was perfectly normal and the next the majority of my lifeforce was gone and my soul was healed.
“Help,” Davina shouted, as she threw a silence spell at my mouth and leapt away.
Luke exploded out of bed, drawing his sword, before getting between us. At the same moment, a prompt appeared before me.
You have mastered your Ancient Vampiric Soul Regeneration skill.
You have mastered your Ancient Vampiric Soul Strengthening skill.
The soul reinforcement vanished, but I could still see what was happening to my soul. The demonic parasites were only feeding where they were supposed to. It was the root system that had consumed my excess lifeforce, leaving me with what a normal hero with my attributes would contain. Somehow encapsulating my body and soul had made it easier for the roots to tap into my lifeforce. It probably had a lot to do with the soul reinforcement spell, but I wasn’t sure.
Davina hurled a holy bolt at me while I was considering whether or not I needed to be concerned by this change. “His soul is still intact,” she said, purposefully not looking at me. “We need to contain him and get him to the dungeon to feed.”
“I’m fine,” I mouthed as Mother and Father trapped me inside a holy barrier.
Luke frowned. “He says he’s fine.”
“I just saw his lifeforce vanish,” Davina stated.
“Not all of it,” I mouthed.
“He says not all of it.”
Davina continued not to look at me, afraid I would compel her. “How much does he have left?”
I told Luke.
“He says about as much as a person with his attributes would have. He thinks the root technique he created somehow tapped into the lifeforce and absorbed the excess. Souls apparently don’t typically kill you unless your extremely old or your soul is altered, and his soul is behaving by these rules despite what happened. He theorizes that the speed of the conversion was only possible because of your soul reinforcement spell.”
She continued not to look at me. “Throw Slaughter out here and empty your core. If you don’t go crazy in a reasonable amount of time, I’ll release you.”
I tossed Slaughter through the barrier and emptied my core. I trusted Davina’s instinct in these sorts of matters. It was better to be overly cautious than to take unnecessary risks.
While I waited, I talked to Father through Luke.
“He asks, if you know why the root system encapsulating his soul would cause it to absorb his excess lifeforce?”
Father frowned. “It might be because your soul could correctly measure the lifeforce once it had encapsulated it. Once it could confirm that the lifeforce was in fact excess and not some strange concentration, it consumed the excess to repair itself because that was what you wanted it to do.”
It was the same assumption I’d come to.
“He asks, if you think he will be able to store excess lifeforce in the future?”
“I’d need to examine your soul, but I wouldn’t think so. On the positive side, your soul will now grow stronger as you feed.”
Luke scowled as I gave him my next message. “You’re seriously worried about your ability to make armour right now.
I nodded.
Luke sighed. “He wants to know if there is anyway around this? He can’t donate blood easily with this condition.”
I wanted to replicate what we had done for Angelica’s armour for Gregory’s men. Without the more powerful reagents, the armour would be weaker, but it would still be powerful enough to make them stronger.
“There might be. I would have to study your soul before I can give a definite answer.”
“He says, he want’s Davina to end the spell that allows him to see his soul.”
“I ended that spell when I silenced him,” Davina replied.
“He asks if, you’re sure. He can still sense and manipulate his soul.”
Father frowned. “He would be able to sense and manipulate his soul unaided if it was strong enough, but this would be too quick.”
“Seriously, you mastered more skills,” Luke said indignantly. “This is anime protagonist cheating, Dad. No, I do not want to hear about the skills you’ve mastered before I got here.”
I chuckled.
“He says he mastered his soul regeneration and strengthening skills. And that these skills only seem to be related to him fully utilizing the capabilities of the demonic parasites. They’re not eating the roots, which he says might account for why he could sense his soul.”
Father folded his arms. “It’s possible, but they would have to be significantly better at strengthening your soul than what I saw them doing.”
“He says, he’ll wait for your assessment.”
A couple of hours passed before Davina decided I wasn’t a threat. I used the time to talk to my son. Apparently, he hadn’t left his party behind to come here. Kidnapping the king’s daughter had given him the excuse he needed to part ways with them. Since reuniting with me, he’d out leveled them so significantly that they were becoming a liability.
He wasn’t exactly happy with the change, but he wasn’t bitter either. He was able to do more alone than he had been able to do with them, even if he couldn’t take on such a wide range of threats. In a year or two, when they had trained some more, he’d power level them, so they could adventure together again. But for now, he was a lone wolf.
When the barriers dropped, Father walked over to me and place his hand on my head to examine my soul. “Can you manipulate soul energy?”
I moved a little soul energy around.
“Strange. Based on what I can sense, you shouldn’t be able to do that. It would appear whatever you’ve done to your soul is too small for me to detect. It might be possible that only these roots have been strengthened and you’re using them to see and manipulate the rest of your soul.”
That was a reasonable assumption. “I’m in all new territory then?”
“It would appear so. I strongly suggest you practice soul healing techniques on someone else before you use it on your daughter. I can supervise if you like.”
“I’d appreciate that.”
***
“Why am I being used as a test subject?” Angelica complained, the following night. She was sitting in one of the armchairs in my bedroom glaring at me. “I didn’t do anything. Use Luke.”
Luke sat beside his sister, rolling his eyes. “I’m a hero. If he practices on me, I might gain a skill that I don’t want.”
“What about Davina?”
“We’re not sure how his technique will interfere with my constitution,” she replied. “And Father and Mother both practice soul strengthening techniques already.”
“Kidnap an Unseen then.”
“We considered that,” I said. “But it might be counted as helping them, and I don’t need that sort of attention from heaven.”
“Why does it have to be me?”
“You’re tougher than everyone else, which means your lifeforce is stronger, so any complication will be easier for you to recover from.”
I didn’t add that her soul was damaged from going through the reaping and the lifetime of abuse her parents had subjected her to.
“Can’t I just kidnap one of the students for you? I’m sure theirs some asshole that has it coming to them.”
“Language.”
“Pleaseee.”
“No.” I picked up the other armchair and placed it beside hers. “Give me your hand.”
She immediately held out her hand.
I took off my glove and grabbed it.
Father came over and placed his hand on ours, casting a spell so he could see our souls. “You can begin using the healing palm technique when you’re ready.”
I manipulated the excess soul energy the demonic parasites produced to move to my palm and then pass from my hand into hers. I’d spent all day playing with my soul trying to figure out my limits. Two thirds of the soul energy the demonic parasite produced was needed to be fed back to the demonic parasites to stop my soul from being eaten. The rest could be taken away from strengthening my soul to heal someone else.
Father smiled. “Everything appears to be normal.”
“Why don’t I feel anything? Angelica asked.
“You can’t feel your soul, so you can’t feel what’s changing,” I said.
“Can you?”
“Not yet.”
“So, the three of us are going to just stay here awkwardly holding hands like this.”
I nodded.
“How long do we have to do this?”
“Most of the night. We need to be sure there’s no complications. You can sleep if you want to.”
Angelica reached out with her foot and pulled the footstool towards her. Then she slumped in the chair and put her feet up.
I turned to Father. “How quickly will Kathrine recover, using this technique?”
“At this speed, you’re looking at six weeks uninterrupted.”
I’d already tested what reinforcing my soul would do, so I knew that it didn’t improve anything like I’d assumed. My soul sensed my body couldn’t regenerate lifeforce, now that it didn’t have excess, so refused to convert more lifeforce than was required to maintain itself. The excess soul energy I was feeding Angelica was only coming from the demonic parasites. They had no problem feeding on my lifeforce and the ambient mana that my mana regeneration drew in but didn’t place in my core for me.
I’d gone into the dungeon and killed a few monsters to see what would happen. Their lifeforce had been absorbed by my soul so quickly I couldn’t gather the excess soul energy before it was used to create more soul fragments and roots.
This was the best I could do.