Ch.37 Objective Vs Subjective

Malpetios ran to Muscles' bubble prison as fast as he could, while an unknown pressure was slowly pushing down on his body as he got closer.

The pressure got to a point his Lily's body would not move any further, shivering uncontrollably. Malpetios hesitated to leave his only means of defense, to whatever those intruders were doing to his mind, but had little choice.

Taking a deep breath, he canceled (Boss Fusion) and waited, to his great joy the feeling was suppressed to a point he could control. Floating closer to Muscles he could feel it getting weaker till it was verily noticeable.

At this point he was only a few feet away from Muscles before he started shivering, noticing that his body was shrinking, he stopped getting any closer.

The pressure he was under was also starting to become unbearable, like if he was lifting weights way over his limit, so he took a look at his shrinking body of light.

Checking himself out he only noticed that he was slightly gray, most likely from the pressure. Before I asked the System I ordered the Lily to back away to the entrance and hide from the intruders. The lily seemingly happy to be anywhere other than here hid behind some rocks near the entrance.

Spreading my consciousness to envelop my Mindscape I was able to see that the invaders did not dare to come close to Muscles' cave. I was confused at first but understood the situation from their arguments.

Apparently, Muscles kept his high rank, and they are unable to defeat him without casualties, this made them unwilling to rush inside. What they said after made me worried, "the system wouldn't allow a Dungeon to open without a one-hundred percent synchronization?"

Malpetios ponder if he was so different by virtue of being a prismatic variant core, or the mess up circumstances of his birth. Thinking about his birth reminded him that his own System was also a variant in its own way, taking a look at his interface he found his target.

Prismatic Dungeon Core: Malpetios

Mana: 500/500

Elemental mana: 39,030/421,474

Pure mana: 0

Mana stone(full): 10/23

Special skills: ( Protocol#30 System: Host )

Description: The system, a piece of the world's will, its goal? Pure mana, in exchange for this symbiotic relationship, the host can tap into the nearly endless calculating prowess of the world, as well as ask for small favors with a large price tag.

"Protocol number thirty..." he could still remember that this protocol was activated thanks to Q'ill, the system using the bootleg boss fusion as a channel, supplying life energy. Taking one more look at the invaders, and hearing their arguments, Malpetios was reassured that they would not move for a while. Turning his attention to the system he asks for another search of his soul.

[Searching Host soul... complete. An anomaly was detected on the 396,186 fragmented wills previously neutralized by the Main System. Scanning fragments...complete. No danger detected.]

"Wait, what?!" Dumbfounded, Malpetios keep explaining to the system that something in his mind was under the control of the invaders outside. After fighting with the system, and getting no results, Malpetios thought about asking more specific questions.

Ok System, you say there's no danger on my soul, however, what is this 'anomaly' you detected? I would like you to explain it to me.

[The Main System has left memories for the Host's use, inside the neutralized wills. These memories are activated, even though the Host has not approved this action. Further search has Identified these memories as useful for the Host's survival.]

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My survival? Malpetios thought about it, and remember what Q'ill said before, most cores that have survived to any length past their birth, are all basically clones of each other. That means there's an original where these copies came from, looking outside at the giant transparent diamond he can guess who it was.

"The Jewels?" Malpetios could not understand why they wanted to control him, is it something like they don't want someone to grow stronger than them? But why would the System allow this, so far the System has done nothing against my benefits, this and all the previous scans coming up as 'not harmful for the Host' can only mean the Jewels found some way to 'cheat the System'.

Coming to that conclusion Malpetios kept asking specific questions, like what are the memories about, why are they for my survival, and so on. After seemingly running in circles, Malpetios finally got something.

[Original source of these memories are 'The Jewels' and are implanted on any newborn cores, as of the 5th generation. They function as support for the growth of the newborn cores, by injecting will fragments donated by The Jewels.]

At that moment Malpetios understood! The Jewels said something about an 'Imprint' those bastards use the fact that The System or should I say, the Planet's will, mergest with all the cores it created. They underhandedly use that connection to leave memories of attachments and their own wills, controlling them just enough to not be seen as an attack.

The reason I can still remain myself is due to that six percent missing from the synchronization rate. I then remember something, my current body is made out of 721,974 will fragments, yet there's a problem with only a little more than fifty percent, shouldn't it be ninety-four?

After repeating the same procedure of talking in circles till I asked for the right keywords, I finally got my answer.

[The Host is currently an artificially created Dungeon Core put together out of many other Core fragments. Each fragment represents one Elemental Mana point. Host total fragment count is 771,474]

I remember it being lower? Oh wait, the System back then said 'undigested' will fragments. Even so, that still doesn't explain why my Elemental Mana capacity is only... wait! I remember that the System said that Muscles had 350,000 Elemental Mana on him, holy fuck! Putting that together is 771,474.

With that in mind, Malpetios did some calculations and found that six percent of his current Elemental Mana pool was indeed missing from the fragments with anomalies, coming out to 25,288 fragments. Malpetios gritted his teeth and mentally said, System I wish for the fragments with anomalies removed from my Core!

[Warning!! Warning!! This action would Break connection with the Main system, Heavily damage the Host, and Weakin your overall capabilities. It is highly advised for the Host to reconsider.]

I don't have any other options! I got enemies attacking my boss, a super-strong Knight coming soon, and on top of all that I have my literal backyard on fire with these intruders in my mind. I wish to have the fragments removed, now!

[Scanning The Host soul... Complete. Can not find cause for Host behavior. The Host request has no beneficial effect. The search of Host memories conflicts with the current situation. No harm can be found towards the Host. Requesting emergency connection with Main System... Failed. Can not resolve the problem. Searching for solutions... searching...]

Malpetios yelled at the system to do what he was asking but got ignored by it, frustrated, he could do nothing but wait. At this moment a cutesy yelp was heard near the entrance, turning around he saw his Lily had half its Corona destroyed yelping in pain. Quickly gathering his mind into it, he found to his horror that the connection to its physical body was being assaulted and nearly killed.

Although he could feel that his Lily was getting a beating from that mage, it was still able to hold him down with my Elemental mana repairing any damage alongside the perverse speed of healing Ivys have while absorbing Elemental Mana, the mage helping it by supplying it with more after each attack.

I had also equipped Q'ill with some of the weapons and tools I made in my free time. That along with a secret passage out of my core room, she can help my Lily when needed. However, she would not act unless King Lily can't hold on anymore.

It could do nothing but be a meat... haaa... plant shield, and couldn't kill the Mage or stop it from escaping. However this time my Lily can't hold on, it was the attack by something way stronger dam it! It has to be that Knight, without caring anymore he brought up his interface and selected (Log Out), as his body started to expand the gray colors quickly turn into a cocktail of red, grayish-green, brown, and blue.

A feeling of constriction ran over me, as the log out option grayed out and stop working, I was dumbfounded yet again and can only say, "mister Jewels I know you want to take over me, but there has to be a 'me' left to take control off GODDAMIT!!! Can't you see I am about to die here!?"