Nex opened her eyes to a sight that was somehow even more gruesome than what she saw through the mirror. Decapitated heads and limbs littered the ground surrounding the river. Near the mangled torsos and organs, pools of warm blood remained still. Taking in the grotesque display, she was once again convinced that no amount of effort could completely cover this up.

“Did she always have this kind of personality?” Nex mumbled as she stepped towards the apparent sole survivor of this incident.

Alexander was on the brink of death.

Both his arms and legs were brutally torn from his body, leaving only pitiful bleeding stumps left. He was practically catatonic, the stress and pain from becoming a quadriplegic left him barely breathing and glassy eyed.

“Maybe I was always like this but never had the opportunity to let it out?” Mina’s voice seemed to echo inside her own head.

“What a fun revelation. Now I have to hear you inside my head too?” Nex sighed while rubbing her temples.

“No, I won’t be doing that. I won’t bother you that much! I was just going to tell you I’m going to take a nap. All that exercise made me sleepy! I’ll let you know when I wake up, but you’ll probably be done removing this place from the map by the time I wake up, huh?” Echoed Mina’s cheerful but sleepy voice.

“And just whose fault is that? Don’t worry. I’ll properly clean up this mess you have laid at my feet.” She huffed in partial annoyance.

“Sorry, I know I went a tiny bit overboard! But just make sure that redheaded fucker doesn’t kick the bucket. Pretty please?” Her seemingly always cheerful voice took on an icy tone.

“Don’t mind him. My biomass is more than enough to keep him alive and store his broken body.”

As Nex pointed a finger at the still bleeding lump of flesh that was Alexander, one of her tentacles slithered towards him. In a fluid movement, the bulbous tip at the end opened like a gaping maw and swallowed his body whole.

“So uh. Forgive me if I’m being rude, but…didn’t you just eat him?” Mina asked with a tone that sounded equally astonished and irritated.

“No, I didn’t eat him. When I first prepared to come here I set up a hideaway of sorts. It’s linked with my biomass and is only accessible to me. I’ve got some drones who I’ve ordered to take care of him.”

“I don’t know what that is, so you’ll have to show me! I’m having trouble keeping my eyes open. I’ll let you go now. Goodnight Nex.” She sleepily replied.

“Yeah, yeah. What was the human expression…? That’s right. Sweet dreams, you closet lunatic.” Sarcastically, Nex mumbled.

Nex sighed as the presence of Mina seemed to diminish within her. The strange feeling of another didn’t completely leave her, but it was definitely less noticeable than before.

Now she had some time to herself to ponder before ‘visiting’ the village.

She was awestruck by just how accustomed Mina seemed to be at using her biomass in combat. The fact that a regular human girl born in a medieval society was able to move like that seemed inexplicable. Strangely enough, the fighting style was eerily similar to how Nex fought many years earlier. At that time, she was just a youthful maiden, merely 100 years old, and possessed a remarkable lack of maturity for a universe-annihilating being.

“It may be because of the nature of my biomass to corrupt and destroy. But more importantly, I’m almost sure this is due to her peeking through my memories via that damn book.” Nex thought as she absentmindedly willed her body to clean up the bloody mess surrounding her.

In Nex’s mind, there was only one way to get to the root of the mystery: rigorous experimentation and study. To her, it was clear that either her body or the book had ignited Mina's ‘bolder’ nature. However, it could also be attributed to the psychological trauma caused by witnessing her murderers once more. Only through dissecting the issue at hand could she prove her hypothesis.

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But it would be irresponsible for her to conduct such experiments on herself first. Who knew what kinds of problems that could lead to? She would never allow Mina to have complete control over her body, no matter how much like Nex she became.

The solution was an extremely simple one. She just needed to find some unwilling participants. And luckily enough the village seemed to have some enslaved people that no one would mind going missing.

Before that she decided to do a little bit of amateur anatomical study.

Nex gathered all the bodies of those that seemed to last the longest against Mina’s barrage. After inspecting a mangled corpse with the same indifference of someone browsing fruits at a grocery store, Nex got to work.

Using her bare hands, she effortlessly tore the dead man’s chest cavity open and located her prize without much effort. The organ that was called a mana core was a peculiar thing indeed. It was a fleshy sphere-shaped thing, around the size of a balled fist, and seemed to be extremely dense. Holding it in her hand, Nex felt a mysterious sensation emanating from it. With a mellow hum and a low-frequency buzz, it was unlike anything she had encountered before.

“Seems I have another topic to add to my research besides this body after all.” Nex mumbled to herself with a small smile.

She spared no time ripping all the mana cores from the bodies and sending them to her hideaway. The remaining parts of the corpse, blood, and anything standing out were quickly devoured by her eager tentacles.

Making sure to remove any obvious signs of mass slaughter, Nex began to walk in the forest towards the village. After several minutes, she stumbled upon the perfect place to hide her body while exploring the metaphysical. The tree was easily twice the size compared to others and its massive trunk harbored a spacious hollow, perfectly capable of accommodating her entire body.

Sitting in the hollowed out space, Nex realized that the first time she entered her mana core was not something she consciously did, but seemed to be a reaction from Mina. She closed her eyes and began to attempt to replicate the feeling she had at the time. It took several minutes of repeated attempts, but eventually Nex opened her eyes to a mesmerizing world of swirling black and white.

The first thing she noticed was Mina.

She looked quite comfortable, deeply sleeping atop a large black and white teddy bear without stirring on Nex’s arrival. The massive bear appeared large enough to accommodate multiple people, with its black body and white paws. Nex observed the creepy, but delighted, smile on her snoozing face as drool seemed to drip from the corner of her mouth.

“Best..friends…heh…heh..” Murmured the elated Mina in her sleep.

“What a sloppy sleeping face. Just how carefree is this child?” Nex thought to herself.

Turning her attention away from the disheaved Mina, Nex proceeded to copy her conjuring of the sinister black book. She held out her hands and thought how nice it would be if the book just appeared without much effort. It seemed her wish was granted. However, the book she now found herself holding wasn’t an ominous black, but an elegant white one. The book itself was large and featured a blood-red trim that was spread along both sides. Unlike the blank cover of the black book, this one had the image of a mask used in theater, with a distraught expression, shedding a single tear.

Nex skimmed over the first few pages and quickly deduced, from the dates on the pages, that the events seemed to be in reverse. The book seemed to cover the entirety of Mina’s life from the end to the start. Continuing to flip through the pages, Nex located a random page that wasn’t too far from the start. Each aetherial page had the date listed at the top along with the location where it seemed to take place. Below the date and name was a series of strange and unfamiliar symbols that were spread across the page. While she didn’t understand the date format, the location of the memory was named Grandio Village.

The only question now was how did she activate the memory? It seemed, at least according to her explanation, that Mina discovered how to do this by accident.

“If that whacko could do it, I should be able to excel at it.” Nex thought to herself.

While running her finger absentmindedly over one of the symbols, an ethereal purple light mysteriously began to emanate from them. The light continued to grow and grow as Nex thought about throwing the book away from herself just to be safe.

Before she could take any action, Nex found herself in another place.

She was floating above a familiar looking forest beside a simple road. In front of her were several of the recently dead Hounds along with Alexander. They appeared bored and restless, as they stood waiting in the road.

“Everyone, be on your best behavior! Don’t start shit unless this guy has any inkling of wanting to fuck us over! He’s an important business partner after all.” Alexander barked at his subordinates.

Alexander’s gaze snapped from his men to the road as the sounds of distant rattling and hooves were in earshot.

“Right on schedule. Everyone keep on your toes! Keep your eyes peeled for any onlookers from the village. Can’t have them see our little get-together after all.” He chuckled as his men grinned at his words.

The sound of rattling and beating hooves echoed through the forest as the carriage finally came into view at the far end of the road. As far as carriages went, it appeared to be nothing special. An aging coachman guided the horses and either side of the carriage was protected by two armored men on horseback. In no time at all the carriage came to a stop as a portly, but well-dressed man climbed out.

“Alexander my boy! You’re always so punctual! Are you sure you wouldn’t like to join my company’s guard unit? It has some pretty good ‘perks’, I’m sure you would enjoy.” The man remarked with a perverse smile.

“Surely you jest! A rural town guard captain like me could never fit such a position.” Alexander replied with a humble bow.

“You’re too hard on yourself son! Well enough of that. I have a piece of merchandise that was a little too much for me to handle. I figure that you guys could break her in or sell her off to someone else in your network. Either way I’m sick of dealing with it. Bitch has already bitten two of my attendants for god’s sake!” Huffed the man with a reddened face.

“Well I appreciate you coming all this way Mr. Goldspanner. And me and my boys always love the feisty ones, it’s too boring if they break immediately.” Alexander boasted, eliciting a laugh from his men.

“Well I’d hoped you would say that. Let me show you. Pull off the cover!” Said Goldspanner as he moved to the carriage.

One of the guards on horseback quickly dismounted and removed the large cover from the back of the carriage, revealing a large metal cage.

Sitting within the cage, with her arms and legs securely chained to the floor, was a scowling Mina.