Devil’s Doll Reincarnation | Chapter 9 | Demonic Intervention

It had been about four hours since the search began, and in that time, we found the retired woodcutter’s cabin the mayor told us to look for. Unfortunately, what we found was far worse than anticipated. Not only was the woodcutter nowhere to be found; the daughter of the mayor had been killed, with her lifeless body limp on the floor of the cabin. And yet she was devoid of any serious physical injuries. We concluded that the cause was either poison, or magic. We would know for sure soon, as we brought along somebody who could investigate exactly that.

The local healer, who had volunteered for the search was holding back her tears. Seeing that the innocent, bubbly girl she spoke to on a weekly basis was now dead. “Who would do such a thing,” she muttered, her eyes darting all over the room. We gave her a breif moment to regain herself, and soon enough the healer swore to figure out how Anna died to assist in finding the killer.

Moving on with further investigation, the crime scene revealed that some sort of conflict had happened. Someone’s blood was tipped on the splinters of a broken cupboard, and drops of it were leading towards the exit of the building. The various tools inside the cabin were for pottery and woodcutting. This definitely added up with what the mayor had explained. The woodcutter had a pastime of making dolls for some big project.

Anna had been coming to this cabin to learn how to sculpt figurines and dolls as a hobby. Although the man teaching her was a little odd, he was no doubt a good person, and had lived in the village for the majority of his life. The woodcutter, known simply as Geralt, knew nothing of poisons and magic that could harm someone. In fact, he was far too busy working on his life’s work, of which Anna had grown incredibly fond of. A porcelain doll of absurd detail, was how the mayor had put it. Surely worth sixty to seventy gold coins by itself, or enough to feed a farmer for several years.

Though I didn’t know the man personally, there was some clear evidence making out that he could not be the culprit. The arm of a little girl was lying on the floor, just metres away from the body of Anna. Who often spoke fondly about the extremely lifelike doll, and that Geralt had been working on for years without an end in sight. This arm was so realistic that the others believed it was of flesh and blood, their thoughts only changed after they noticed the shattered porcelain shards just above the elbow. This arm had been broken off by something, or someone.

Coming to the conclusion that, whatever events had transpired here were no doubt related to the disappearance of our missing manager, I ordered some suitable volunteers to continue investigating the cabin. Soon after, I left with six other people to continue combing the forest, as that trail of blood would assist in leading us to more answers.

Hopefully this wretched forest hadn’t already swallowed what was left. We can only go so far into the Eternal Forest before… they intervene. We don’t need anymore people being taken by those freaks.

…

“My god, I can’t believe I did it,” I cheered, celebrating over my success. Looking down at Anna, I awaited her response.

“...I’m kind of at a loss for words, Fumi, I can’t thank you enough. Saving me twice now and all…”

I was surprised it worked at all honestly. She really knows how to make me worry, I had to call out her name dozens of times before she responded to me last time, and even then, she sounded very exhausted. However, along with her previous guidance, I worked away through the night, creating a new body that may help her condition. Occasionally, I thought I was wasting my time making a badly shaped homunculus for her soul. I didn’t really have anything to go off, but by angling my head just right, I could see inside my own arm and down into my mostly hollow body. Yes, it most likely traumatised me in some way or another, but I quite literally had Anna’s life in my very hands…

I know I only have one hand, don’t judge me.

Anyway, what I was so proud of was an extremely simple looking blob of clay. It was kinda humanoid in shape and sparkled in a weird way, but nonetheless, it was quite good considering I only had the one arm to work with. The first time I found this odd clay, Anna explained to me how the forest had infused it with ambient mana over thousands of years, which made it quite valuable and very susceptible to certain kinds of magical manipulation. Geralt used this clay specifically because it would help in his experiments to create a sentient golem. The mysterious black ooze within my body is the main reason behind my continued existence. Geralt never told Anna how exactly the ooze worked, just that it kept souls alive as long as they were covered with it, allowing them to be stored within the confines of their artificial bodies that usually lacked any kind of system to keep them alive.

After telling me that, I thought of something that could prevent Anna’s soul from dispersing. So, going off on a limb… shut up. I figured out a possible solution, on the spot, that might actually prevent her from disappearing. If the black liquid keeps my soul stable, why wouldn’t it work for Anna’s?

I may not be a master of whatever art this is, but what matters is that it worked. Gathering whatever knowledge I could from cliché stories of magic and myth, plus some basic science class skills I learned around two years ago. I siphoned some excess ooze from my broken arm, using it to fill Anna's hollow clay body. I waited in silence for anything of notice to happen, idly hugging my legs up to my chest.

Sitting patiently, and completely still, I watched until the sunlight began to fade. I spotted the slightest of movement, following shortly after that, hope welled up in me once again. A few hours later the arms of the little golem jostled about, shaking violently to the point of knocking itself over. Catching it with ease, I placed it back on its feet. Its legs shook like a newborn dear, but once it stabilised itself, the small figure looked up at me in a confused manner.

“When did you become taller than me?” It asked in Anna’s voice.

Feeling all my worries wash away, I didn’t even question how it spoke, or how it sounded like Anna. I just laid down beside it and hugged it close.

“I thought you would be gone forever,” I said “I didn’t know whether anything I tried was going to work.” By this point, tears of relief were flowing freely. Ironically, I’ve probably cried more in this body than my previous one. Anna, seemingly growing aware of the situation, just silently hugged me back.

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Heaving out a long sigh, Anna whined at me. Even so, I was just glad she was still alive.

“Couldn’t you have at least made me a better body? I mean, I definitely feel my strength coming back, but I’d never expected it to feel quite so weird,” patting down her body, she rubbed my cheek while observing her new surroundings “Of course, it's infintely better than that glass prison,” she added with a scowl.

“It’s certainly not ideal, but I think I can get the hang of this pretty quickly, if I really try,” following those words, she pinched my cheek and uttered some reassuring words: “No need to worry about me anymore.”

Suddenly flexing her mana, she jumped out of my arms just few feet away. Anna’s new body heated up rapidly, solidifying the magical clay into a brown, ceramic finish. She didn’t stop there though, and continued to move mana around her insides to probe it for new information. Finishing her bodily inspection, Anna found that she could manipulate her body to some degree, changing the design to look identical to her original appearance. While Anna could do that, she also had the ability to stretch and solidify her limbs into possible weapons.

Noticing that she looked naked in her default human form, she formed some skintight clothes that made her feel slightly better.

Normally, solidifed clay wouldn't be able to move around and change shape. In this case though, the special clay making up the majority of Anna's body could still be moulded, as long as a constant stream of mana was supplied. Which just so happens to be, exactly what her soul does. 

“Why are you so much better than me at magic?” I asked, trying to hide the jealousy in my voice. Unfortunately she noticed it easily, not hesitating to throw me a smug grin in response, before slumping her shoulders down just as quick.

“As much as I’d like to say that I'm far better than you in magic, that just isn’t the case,” she grumbled. “Because this body is so small, it is way more malleable than my previous one. All the mana meant for a human body has been packed into a softer, much smaller one, letting me do a bunch of new tricks a human body couldn’t hope to achieve. What with all the bones and organs preventing any decent shapeshifting.”

Thinking it over, her explanation definitely made sense. Not only was Anna years ahead of me in magical experience, she understood the theory behind the process much better as well. Although Anna was certainly no expert, everyone in this world would have more experience than me either way, considering I only arrived in this world a few days ago. Switching my attention back towards Anna showed she was messing around with the various shapes her body could take. A ball, a two headed little duck, one very fluffy looking kitten, and a vase. By the time she finished playing around and reverted into her base form, the happy grin on her face only become oh so more obvious.

“Enjoying yourself?” I mused while using my one arm to upright myself.

“… Yes, actually. This is much less mortifying than I expected. In a way, it’s kind of… fun?” she answered as her grin swapped out for a mystified look. “Don’t get me wrong, though. This is a terrible situation to be in. We need to act more seriously from now on,” she hastily replied, waving her little hands about.

After a little bit of show and tell featuring all the forms Anna could confidently take, she turned into an arm, with her tiny face compressed into the side. Creepy? Yes. Ingenious? Perhaps. I froze in place, simply staring at Anna’s face chaped like a Cheshire cat. I questioned whether she would let me attach her to the base of my missing limb, but before I could finish, she jumped onto my stump and morphed into an arm. The disturbing wriggling and slithering to get a good fit made me feel uncomfortable, but the end result was an identical looking limb to my still intact right arm. Sadly, the colour was off, and it looked like I had stuck my arm, shoulder deep, into a muddy puddle.

As soon as she attached herself to me, I could hear her thoughts once again. She was incessantly giggling to herself as she continued to morph into new shapes, allowing me to think over our new circumstances. Combined with my growing skill in moving around, we might actually stand a chance against whatever threats we may encounter. Watching Anna morph into sharp blades and spiky flails gave me some new confidence in surviving this strange ordeal.

For the next few hours we practiced using synchronised movements and attacks. I told Anna that while we were in public she’d have to get used to being an inconspicuous limb, which wasn’t much of a problem surprisingly. Anna could give control of herself to me, and take it back just as easily. This pretty much turned her into an ordinary arm, effectively removing any chances of somebody random learning one my limbs having a mind of its own.

Unfortunately, Anna didn’t know of any offensive magic, rendering my hopes and dreams of throwing fireballs at monsters spiralling down the drain. We tried cutting a log at Anna’s request, but I wasn’t able to swing my arm fast enough to deal much damage. Her spiked flail form worked much better, as I could use the momentum of swinging it around before slamming it onto the log, that took out a small chunk of wood. Anna could use reinforcement magic on herself as well. With all her mana being focused into such a small body, the strengthening effect was much greater. I tried to swing her harder and harder, but a piece of my shoulder chipped off, resulting in a ten minute long lecture about not taking care of myself better. It’s a nice feeling, being worried over something so little.

I decided to head back to the clay deposit to experiment on making new things. The thought of having legions of clay or stone soldiers motivated me to push onward, and by the time that night fell, I successfully made a hand sized, spider looking... thing. My continued experiments and guidance from Anna resulted in a rather useful little toy if used properly. Hopefully I could make it climb around and use it as a scout after finding a mana stone.

Pouring mana into the clay spider let me manipulate it. This helped to shape it at first, but I later realised I could also control the spider manually. I could walk it around for a bit, do a cute little hop, and roll it over with a single thought. Anna thought it was quite funny, but inevitably useless in its current state. As did I.

Unfortunately, someone else thought otherwise.

With an unholy screech coming from above me, a large black bird gently touched down unannounced, simultaneously sending a gut wrenching feeling to flow through me. Slowly rising from my spot, I saw a grey skinned man sitting upon the feathered fiend. With long pointy ears and eerie black eyes, he stared at me, sending a shiver running down my spine as his lips upturned into an all-knowing smirk. He had red fur over his shoulders, thick leather pants adorned with metal shin guards, and two war-axes placed firmly on his large, but fitting belt.

Ruffling his metal studded jacket, he casually stepped down from his obedient nightmare inducing bird. Taking a glance at the clay spider in my hands, he nodded his head in approval, then spoke up in a deep voice.

“A potential golem maker, huh? Quite the nice find I’ve found this time. Golem makers are rare enough, especially outside of human origin. Surely my master will be pleased with this,” he complained before continuing “Well… you’re coming with me then. Hop on and shut up, before I snap the rest of your limbs off and drag you back with me.”

Before I could manage to form a single sentence, I felt myself catapulting away at breakneck speed. Looking at Anna, she had morphed into a long, snake like arm. It astonished me. How could something so small stretch to such a degree? Anna spindled around a tree root, flinging us away from the mysterious man with increased fervor. Turning back, he was simply watching our escape with a casual expression. He went to speak, and reading his lips, I took a wild guess at what he said.

“And so, the chase begins.”