I try to calm myself. I have at least a day. Maybe a bit less. I have done many experiments, and I know Axi’s soul can survive maybe twenty hours on its own and a full day while I’m holding it with my magic. Therefore, I need to be calm and create a good plan. I can spare a few minutes. First, how do you resurrect someone?

My main problem is that I cannot move either vitality or soul stuff. I need a way to attach vitality to a dead soul. Beyond that, I also need to attach vitality to a body. That’s another problem. Axi’s body is still filled with venom. It may degrade over time, but can I count on it?

As a result, my top priority is to find a way to control vitality. There could be a solution. A mad method, from which I might not survive. I’m not going to give up on Axi, though. She is my friend, my lover, and the only person I can have a meaningful conversation with. Anastasia doesn’t count. She is going to leave anytime soon. Well… I may be able to use her before that. Actually, I may not have a choice.

“What’s going on? Is she fine?” Anastasia asks me.

“She’s dead, but I have an idea how to bring her back.”

“That’s… I heard high-tier priests can resurrect, but…"

So that’s possible! Now I’m even more motivated!

“I need your help. Axi is your friend, right? Can you do that for her?”

She sighs. “What do you need?”

“Sacrifices. A lot of them. Take as many goblins as you need. I don’t care about losses. Bring as many living monsters as possible. You need to do so in less than twelve hours. The faster, the better.”

“Ok. I can do that, but would goblins listen to me?”

I want to say 'sure', but I notice another hobgoblin. Two hobgoblins evolved in the last two months.

“Chieftain dead. Me chieftain!”

“Chieftain is still alive, just heavily wounded. You need to help her.”

“Chieftain dead. Stupid goblin.” The second hob is planning to challenge the previous one for the position; I can see it. Damn it! I don’t have time for it.

“Idiots. I challenge you both! Come!”

I rush at the first hob. He is surprised but adapts quickly. He tried to stab me with his sword, but I just hit his head with the Mana Orb. I use his stunned state to hit him in the head with the blunt end of my spear. He falls down.

“You next.”

The second hob is now scared but tries to fight. I just repeat my previous tactic.

“Anastasia, take as many goblins as you need. If these two idiots try something, kill them. I don’t have time for it now.”

“Fine.” She starts organizing the tribe for a massive hunt. Meanwhile, I have work to do. I will need to evolve now. I need more stats, but there are a bunch of things I need to do first.

I find a stump of a fallen tree and start polishing it. I will need a smooth surface for rune carving. This rune will be my creation, so I need to make sure it will work.

Runes can do everything in theory, so they can control vitality as well. I even have such runes; they are in Transfer Vitality skill runes. The problem was that I wasn’t able to reverse-engineer those runes until recently. I got an Earth Mana perk for the Rune Basics skill, which gives me similar runes for earth mana. By cross-referencing both sets of runes, I noticed similarities and figured out what the various parts do. I already tested it, and I know it works. The main problem is that I know only some runes for vitality, and such control is absolutely atrocious.

So, I’m changing my plan. I carve in the next four hours a sacrificial site. It’s not enough, but the next set of runes must be created in my body as a mark. I look around. Anastasia does good work. There are ants with cut-off legs and small animals with broken ones laying around. It’s not good for their vitality, but I would rather have a small amount than none.

I need to wait for more sacrifices, so I should prepare for evolution. First, upgrade Tactics. I know it has nothing to do with vitality, but I need the best evolution possible. According to Anastasia, the best evolution shouldn’t care about skills level but about their rarity.

There should be a few ways to upgrade Tactics. I want a straightforward upgrade to Strategy. Strategy is about a more broad way of thinking and caring not only about current engagement but also future situations and long-term plans. I know all these things already. So, I concentrate on the skill and try to force evolution.

Your Tactics (Unommon) skill has evolved into Strategy (Rare) skill.

You have retained skill levels.

I check.

Strategy 16 (Rare) – (Perk Available!)

Good enough. I take a look at perks, but none of them can help me immediately, so I just pick Will for now. It gives +10 due to the skill being Rare, and I will need it for what’s to come.

Should I help with hunting? No. I will need my mind in its best shape. I place Axi’s soul in a soul trap I created some time ago. It works the same as my hold, but I don’t need to actively use magic. After that, I take a nap by striking my head with isolating mana.

I stir as someone hits me.

“Are you really sleeping?! What about resurrecting Axi?” Anastasia shouts at me.

“I need to be in my best shape. Do you have sacrificed?”

“Quite a lot, but many goblins died.”

“Whatever. How long have I slept?”

“I don’t know. It was maybe eight hours from the start.”

“Good enough. It will take me maybe another hour for final preparations. After that, I will need all possible sacrifices. Try to catch more, if you can.”

“Fine,” she groans. “Who needs sleep? Right. Only you need.”

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

"Just help me, please,” I beg. I don’t really want to argue now.

“Fine, fine…” She leaves. It’s night already. I sit down and create the final rune. I need it as a mark, so create it using ambient mana. I cheat a bit, though. I start with the receiver mana for the ritual. I place it deep in my body. I have to reinforce it so that my vitality flow won’t destroy it. After that, I start modifying the mark. It takes me several minutes.

Good enough.

“You.” I point at the hobgoblin and a bunch of goblins resting between hunts. “Come over. I need your help.”

“Help?

“Keep giving me sacrifices. I will have to kill them fast.”

I sit down on the stump. It’s now or never. I may die. Even if this is a success, it may not be enough to bring back Axi. I still need to try.

I kill the first monster. Vitality flows into me and gives me a buff. I kill another. Vitality flows into the mark. I kill another. It starts to hurt.

My plan is simple. I need to control vitality. The easiest way is to bond to vitality mana. Normally, I would need a treasure, but treasures are just items with a very high concentration of mana, or at least I think so. I can recreate such a situation right now. My body overflows with vitality.

I kill another. The mark is filled up with vitality. I concentrate ambient mana there as well, creating what I hope will be a seed for the core. The problem is that I may die. Axi had been very sick during core creation. I know that containing such a high amount of vitality in my body can kill me, or maybe even worse. Maybe it would mutate me into some kind of abomination. But maybe it would be enough to condense a core.

I kill another. And another. I start having problems with moving. My vitality becomes a storm, ripping apart my vitality flow. My limbs start to go numb. I’m dying. I use isolating mana to protect my vital points. It’s normally what I do to kill something, but it now protects me more than hurts me.

I kill another. And another. My body wants to burst. I kill another. I suddenly feel it. The amount of vitality is so high that it pressures my mana from the inside. The mark crumbles, but it still works for now. But there’s no explosion. The pressure is just too high. I kill another monster. And another. The pressure starts to rip apart my isolating shields. Now, I’m really dying. There’s no return. I kill another. And another.

The pressure starts to condense vitality. Suddenly, something changes. Vitality starts to flow on its own.

I have done it! But it's too much. I fall into blackness.

“Wake up, you idiot.”

I wake up, and I’m greeted with notifications.

You have killed 29 1st tier monsters. You have earned 860 Experience Points.

You have killed 3 2nd tier monsters. You have earned 1300 Experience Points.

Your Strategy skill has advanced to level 17!

Your Move Soul skill has advanced to level 10!

Your Mana Sense skill has advanced to level 41!

Your Mana Manipulation skill has advanced to level 40!

You have bonded with Vitality Mana!

You have unlocked Mana Pool!

You have learned Vitality Mana Control (Legendary) skill!

You have gained Vitality Mana Affinity (Legendary) trait!

Alas. Two legendaries. It’s just because of rarity of that mana type, though. It seems vitality mana is five-merged mana type. A mana type for archmages. I’m just a monster, though, so I can cheat. I didn’t need to meditate on it; I just needed a lot of vitality to form a core. Enlightened people can’t do that.

Well… The first part of the plan is a success. The next part is more complicated. First, I check my new powers. I can move vitality at will. Great. First, I look inside. The maelstrom wounded me greatly, so I start by repairing the vitality flows in my body.

“How much time?”

“An hour? I don’t know. We are coming close to your twelve hours mark.”

I start by picking two perks. Both skills have the potential to help me greatly. I start with Mana Manipulation.

Rune Casting

Become better at creating runes from pure mana.

Mana Bomb

Violently explode stable mana constructs.

Mana Insulation

Learn to use isolating mana to prevent interference between different mana types.

There is nothing that can directly help me out. Let’s check Move Soul.

Soul Carrier

Move numerous souls easier

Snatcher

Move souls faster.

Preserver

Souls in your grasp will deteriorate slower.

I pick Preserver without hesitation. Moving back to Mana Manipulation. None of these options help me directly. I check previous perks. I can pick Mana Flow II for a general upgrade. From what I understand, the skill is only for ambient mana, which I may not have much use for with the vitality mana core. I pick Affinity I. It will push my Affinity over 20, hopefully helping with evolution. Now it's time for some resurrections.

I kill another small monster and try to resurrect it. Obviously, I am not planning to start with Axi. I kill another monster and transfer vitality to the previous dead one, this time manually. I insert the soul back and try to merge them. There is some success, but as soon as I let it go, it all crumbles down.

Let’s start with something simpler. I kill another small monster, but this time I try to preserve its original vitality flow. I insert its soul back and push vitality into it. It works somehow. I let it go, and the monster still lives. I observe it for a few minutes. The monster looks sick, maybe my soul-vitality bridge is faulty. I push more vitality into the monster, and it helps. Monster recovers. I smile. It’s the first step.

Next, I try to recreate vitality flow in a dead monster. I use another of its kind (a small rabbit) for reference. It’s hard and complicated work that takes me half an hour. It's too long, but I need practice. I insert a soul. The construct wobbles for some time, but I feel it’s not fully held by me anymore. I push more vitality in, and it slowly gets better. Not intimidate recovery, but it will probably live. I let it go, and the monster starts deteriorating. Damn. I don’t have enough time to observe it.

Let’s try another experiment. I kill the monster while holding its vitality together. Rather than pushing its soul back, I sent in another soul. I need to know if I can send Axi’s soul into another body.

The start is promising, as vitality grabs the soul. As I continue to push in more vitality, it is getting worse, though. I notice vitality flows start to splinter and morph. I observe for some time. In the end, the vitality flow starts to crumble on its own.

If I have to guess, this is the result of the soul not matching the body. I know souls are the brains of this world, but it seems there is more information in souls—maybe a body print. That would make sense from the tropes' point of view. Normally, in novels, when you lose a body part and it’s no longer possible to heal it, you need to change your soul or something like that. I have no idea if that’s the case here, but it is possible.

I repeat the experiment once again for more data. Ideally, I should repeat it at least a dozen times, but I don’t have time now. The result is the same, so this means I need to restore Axi’s body. I go to Axi’s corpse and try to resurrect her. No soul broke in my experiments, so it should at least be safe for Axi.

I place her soul inside her head and push my new mana into her, trying to shape it into the usual vitality flow. It doesn’t work at first, but that is because vitality fails to attach to the body. I move my vitality from the core and create better flow. I push more vitality into the previous failure point, but it doesn’t work. Vitality fails to flow. I check my mana pool.

Mana:123/216

I grimace. My whole pool should be around the vitality of two, maybe three 2nd tier monsters. That is, the amount I could get from the Transfer Vitality skill. Her body has been dead for half a day. It's probably still poisoned as well. I sigh. It’s a lost cause. I need to figure out how to resurrect her in a different body.

I have two options now. First, I can evolve. It would probably take around another hour, but that should be fine. If I’m lucky, I may even get a resurrection spell. I now have a vitality core and some soul skills. It’s possible. I know priests can do so.

The second option is skill creation. Just like I got Strategy by sacrificing some levels, I can create a new skill this way. Obviously, the sacrificed skills must have something to do with the new skill. I want Resurrection, or maybe something like Soul Transfer. I can sacrifice both soul skill levels. Mana Manipulation and Mana Sense could also help. Transfer Vitality? Actually, it may work too. I don’t have any levels in Vitality Mana Control, or I would be sacrificing skills in it too.

However, I leveled up some of those skills for evolution. So, it’s better to evolve first. It’s time to become a hobgoblin.