It was surprisingly easy.

I am not sure if I was just used to my old body still, being heavier and all that, but his was surprisingly agile. I was able to pull myself up without much of an issue and get myself up to where the thicker pieces of the canopy were starting.

That’s where the hard part was.

I think I was correct about my estimations of his strength.

Before, I would be easily able to push myself up through this thicket, but not with those hands. Sure, I was agile, but without boosting myself with mana, I had trouble even pushing away branches that were in the way.

Sure, I could always drain them, but I wanted to keep that to the minimum.

Saying that, I slowly started draining away the pieces that were barricading my way.

And those were pretty sturdy.

Sturdier than expected.

My earlier observation about nature here being a lot tougher than I thought it would be was on point. Even though I was deliberately trying to touch the branches with pieces of my body that were completely converted to crystal, I still had to focus on actually draining them.

I guess that was good and bad.

Good, because I didn’t have to worry about the canopy suddenly giving out under me.

Bad, because it was taking time.

Sure, I wasn’t really in any rush… besides the sun going down, there wasn’t much I was worried about.

Okay, there was still a chance that we were chased by people from the city, but I doubt that. Besides, they would have a hard time finding me up here.

People rarely look up, after all.

But, besides that, there was also another thing I was worried about.

The strength of my absorption.

Sure, that was not really an issue per se, but more that what it meant for me.

Was this drain so slow only because of the resistance of those trees? Or maybe… there was something more going on too?

Like… his crystal being weaker than mine.

But why would that even be the case? Weren’t we made out of the same thing?

Origin Crystal is Origin Crystal, right?

Well hopefully.

But, the truth is, I wasn’t sure.

He already told me about his weird composition, and that was still bothering me.

Mostly because now I wasn’t feeling it at all.

Sure, I knew we had some pieces of crystal inside us, that was hard to miss. But not to the degree he mentioned. And the supposed pain? Also not really existent.

Hopefully that won't be a problem in the future.

But, we’ll get there when we get there.

During all that thinking, I was constantly climbing up.

Honestly, it really was annoying. I expected to break through the canopy a long time ago, yet even after all that thinking, I was still not done.

How thick and tall was that canopy even? I’ve seen dense forests in my time, but this was something else. It was hard to believe that it was natural. It was almost like someone did this on purpose, to slow me down. I mean, how many branches can a tree have?! And how fucking resistant can they be?

The answer was “too much” for both.

Even with using the crystal, I had problems.

But hey, at least I managed to gather a lot of magic on the way.

I started doubting myself after a while.

Why did I even want to climb up there?

Wait…

Why was I doing that?

I was about to stop and rethink what just got into me, but instead, with one last grasp, I finally emerged on top of the canopy. And decided to postpone my worries about my sanity because of the view.

If I didn’t know any better, I would say I was back somewhere near Arbo.

The trees were everywhere. The green sea was stretching in every direction as far as I could see, without even small breaks. Like one large carpet.

How was that even possible?

Didn’t we just not so long ago leave a rather large city?

How the hell wasn’t I able to see it at all?!

I mean, he did run fast for a while there. But to cover that much ground? Even after I told him to slow down?

I couldn’t believe it at all. But, that was what happened. There was no explanation, barring some teleports… That didn’t happen, though. I would know. A gateway like that was hard to miss. And mana, of course.

No. We really made that much ground.

I guess we didn’t have to worry about the pursuit after all.

-Eh…

I sighed.

But I had to worry about my own sanity.

Yeah… What was with that?

I had just jumped towards the canopy like a fucking monkey, just to get some fresh air and sun? For nothing?

What was wrong with me?!

Sure. Sun, regeneration. That would help in the next process, but that was definitely not something I would consider necessary. If it was available, sure, I would’ve taken it, but not like that! I could tell that climbing like that was pointless!

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Yet, I was right now sitting on top of the canopy and basking in the sun that was still well and high up.

Something was wrong with me, for sure.

Well, at least it wasn’t harmful to me.

At least in this case.

A little bit annoying, sure, but besides that, this place was nice. I could go for a break right now…

NO.

Stop thinking like that.

This is the Crystal’s fault.

Or rather not Crystal’s directly, but the owner of the one I was in right now.

Was it?

I mean, I get it, if that was just some other urge. Like a human urge. But to climb a tree? What, am I a monkey?

That ridiculous thought made me freeze.

Was I?

It has never occurred to me before that someone was stupid enough to try and absorb animals…

What would that exactly do to a person?

Most people would just brush it away and not even think about it. Animals don’t have souls, they can’t have those. So what’s the harm about that…?

Wrong. So wrong.

And I don’t mean just about the humanitarian aspect of this. Yeah, sure that was a part of it, but let’s not get into that. The main issue at hand: souls…

And what are souls, anyway?

To me, at least, that is just your mana. Whatever has it. And let’s not start with the “people without mana aren’t people”. First off, there’s no people like that.

Everyone has one. Hell, everyone and everything. I know trees that had better, stronger presence than some people. Doesn’t matter if one can use it or not, it’s just the basics of existence…

I think.

I mean, I am not some master on that topic…

Although I do have the most experience, really…

There was still the problem with some void spots that had been created sometimes thanks to me, sometimes thanks to something else. But recently those were scarce. And that’s a good thing.

So what did that mean? Did I just accidentally channel some random monkey’s feelings or something stupid like that?

I wanted to say impossible. At least not consciously…

That didn’t mean that it wasn’t the case.

Whenever I wanted or not, Mike had a lot of time to fuck around with the body and his own mana, so what else he had in stock there was a question that I had no answer to.

For now, I had to be more careful. What if me pouring more mana into this body would awaken something that was more dangerous than just craving to climb a tree or eat a banana.

Good thing that we were alone here. At least I can monkey around in peace.

Speaking of. I still had something to do. And while being on top of a tree didn’t really help things, I was going to proceed with my idea. The sudden realization only made my mind clearer about that: I definitely had to separate myself from him.

But first things first. I had to make something to put him in. Or myself. Either would work.

I focused on the mana I gathered so far.

There was quite a bit of it. It wasn’t the amount I remember Kon and company used while remaking a certain body, which was a bit worrisome…

Well, while he was good at that, I still thought he was wasting a lot of magic back then. And on top of that, he had some… “distractions”, so to speak. I bet if he was to do it without any external interference disrupting his work, he would’ve used less than half.

If I was half as good as him, and I wanted to tell myself that I was, I probably should have enough and some to spare. On top of that, thanks to my monkey side, I also was now basking in the sun, so that would help regenerating whatever I was going to conjure. And I wasn’t going to make a full body anyway. Just a piece was enough

Eh, whatever. It’s not like I had any better idea.

I took a deep breath and focused.

First off: to make a crystal.

Or rather to procure one.

This one was going to be infinitely easier than what I had to do before. No complicated spells to try and break a piece of my crystal. But, that doesn’t mean it would be light to do…

I clasped my hands together, and before I changed my mind, I cast a spell.

-Visu lmophu!

Next was a lot of pain.

-FUCK! AHH!

A trickle of blood started pouring down my hand.

In my palm, I was holding two severed fingers

With the spell, I conjured a blade made out of stone that swiftly appeared in my hand and lobbed off a pair of fingers and nearly disposing of the rest of them as well.

Since pieces of our body were crystal, I was able to cut off a piece of it without actually having to cut through crystal. Just had to go through regular flesh.

Not a pleasant feeling, but it was far easier than trying to chip a fully crystalized body. I could deal with pain.

I mean, I said that, but it was definitely hard.

Hell, I think having no senses for that long span of time had made me forget how painful regular bloody cut can be, not to mention a wound like that.

Even the spells that I’ve been pelted with before while using this body weren’t that bad, which was strange.

I guess I wasn’t used to the body yet, so the senses were a bit dulled… which wasn’t the case now, somehow.

Weird.

Clenching my fists, I focused and tried patching myself.

I used more mana than I wanted, but the wound had closed up, growing crystal in place of the missing fingers, stopping the bleeding.

I took a breath and looked at what I was holding in my other, still healthy hand.

A pair of fingers. Half-crystal finger, to be exact.

But, I needed only the crystal…

Eh. More gruesome job…

Realizing that I still had my blade not dispelled, I used it to remove excess… material. Yes. Material off the crystal, leaving me with just two small pieces of Origin Crystal, the size of a fingernail each.

It should work. At least as a start.

But who should I put in there…?

Right, it was pretty small, sure. But the size of a crystal doesn’t really tell how powerful it can be, nor how much you can stuff inside. But the human mind was definitely large…

Was there enough room for someone here…?

I was not going to experiment on my own self, no matter how tempting it would be.

Mike was also out of the question. His mind was larger than most likely, having that many people with him. Plus animals, apparently…

How about the countless souls he absorbed? I mean, he had plenty, and not like they had any room to complain…

That made me remember the rest of my party.

Would it be possible that I could separate one of them from him? He did say that they were already gone, but…

I had to check myself.

But…

But he was right.

However much of a weird and tangled soul Mike was, he knew what he was talking about. There was absolutely nothing that reminded any of the people I knew inside his own soul.

That is besides the abundant amounts of mana that screamed “ILMA” that has been mixed with his own, inseparable and dazzling…

But there was also something else…

Something that was… familiar? Something I’ve seen before…

For a moment, I couldn’t place it at all.

What kind of creature was still not connected to him? Did I find someone who was resisting?

Yes. Yes I did.

But not for the reasons I thought.

It was not some almighty being that had endured all this time, trapped inside the soul of Mike, waiting for any occasion to spring back and take revenge on him.

Mostly…

It was just a janitor.

The same janitor that was the massive pain in my ass before.

Yeah, it made sense. It hasn’t been that long since that whole scuffle, and after he absorbed him, he definitely had some more plans for his mind than to turn him into fuel instantly.

And not like he had time for that either.

The moment we escaped and managed to take a breather, he fainted and I took over.

It was strange.

I thought he was a bit more powerful than that.

I mean, if that was me, I would’ve tried to… well, do what I just did. To take control the moment the host was out.

And yet, he was still there, just floating at the edge of his mana… his consciousness.

A perfect testing dummy.