It has been a few days since the day Dungeon Master 07 and I arrived at the Lunary Grace orphanage. Upon our arrival, he instructed "him" to introduce himself to the little girl. Satisfied by what he saw, or perhaps for some reason I couldn't understand, Dungeon Master 07 left. Before his departure, he gave some instructions to the middle-aged ascetic regarding what to do with him, and thus, by extension, "us." Thanks to these arrangements, I—no, "we"—were here in a room that was very much layered like a crèche, most likely because that's what it was. Inside the crèche, there was "us," her, the little girl named Celestina, who was seated just beside us, and two women who were, like almost everyone in this establishment, obviously ascetics. However, their role here was clearly that of caretaker, as they were watching over "him" and the little girl, who for some reason was almost kissing the slate she was drawing on.

"I finished," she declared proudly, raising her chalk-covered face away from the slate she was drawing.

"Oh," the "caretaker" said, "and what... is it?"

"This is Leodoro," she said, showing proudly her drawing.

"Oh... Now that I think of it, it really looks like him."

Perhaps prompted by the sight of the girl finishing before him, he began putting more effort into his drawing. As for what it was, had it been someone else other than me, I doubt anyone would be able to fully decipher it. The scribbled outline resembled what could be recognized as a house—or at the very least, a cabin. In front of the house were two "human" silhouettes, and on each corner of the slate were things that could only be described as an undecipherable scribble. But I, who saw how faithfully he tried to make the scribble and understood what it most likely referenced, knew that he'd been trying to draw the shadow creatures I've summoned to either protect the house or play with him.

In the few days since we’ve set foot and since then lived in this place officially known as the Lunary Grace Orphanage, Aiden had quite rapidly adjusted himself to the lifestyle, to an extent that it felt a little depressing. Well, I can't really blame him; the lifestyle in this orphanage is unexpectedly luxurious for a medieval-based “orphanage”.

In the early hours of dawn, Aiden would wake up to a caretaker already by his side, helping with everything he needed help with, mainly baths. At first, I really thought that Aiden didn't need such help, prompting me to take control, but realizing that there were things that were impossible for someone as young as him, I decided to let it happen. Aiden himself didn't seem to mind so... Speaking of that, this event allowed me to first notice how amenable Aiden was. Here I was thinking that years of being taken care of by mostly... well, me, he'd be at least a little reticent to strangers.

Did I raise that child wrong somehow?

After a nice bath and a change of outfit—from pajamas to the orphanage official uniform—his next destination from his dormitory, which he dwelled as a resident alone, would be the refectory for breakfast. There, he would join the girl who slept in the other dormitory, a completely different structure than where Aiden slept. Perhaps it was because of my meager culinary skills, but Aiden would marvel at the delicious smells wafting from there—the comforting aroma of freshly baked bread, the savory scent of simmering stew. Each morning, Aiden would eagerly dig in, which once was both a worth-rejoicing and depressing display.

After breakfast, they would head to the estate’s designated playground for morning activities. Without a doubt, with how large and well-furnished the designated playground was compared to the place he used to have as a playground, one could hardly blame him for having so much fun, running and playing with boundless energy. At first, the other girl would watch him from a distance, her dark eyes filled with a mixture of curiosity and apprehension, but after a few days, she began joining in. Still, she would always stare at him with a strange squinting expression that didn't take me long to figure out the reason for, having lived through it myself.

That detail made me even more curious about the girl—Celestina. No doubt she was someone straight out of Theta's facilities. The fact that Dungeon Master 07 mentioned his surprise upon hearing the new name she was going by was proof of that. That’s the thing: Theta simply did not give names to her subjects; she couldn't bother herself with that. What she would be doing, however, was giving them serial numbers, and she was very good at it, as strange as it was to say.

So yes, I had no doubt that she came from there. However, the fact that the little girl looked more or less normal, to a confusing extent where I questioned whether my initial assessment over her origins was right or wrong, made me question that fact. In times like these, I really wish I still had my appraisal skill to check out what's the deal with her.

Of course I still had the [Appraisal] skill, but it was lowered down to level.1—a level where all the skill would allow me to see was her name, which was displayed, unlike the name she introduced herself with: Tina. Anyway, there was nothing I could do about that, so all I could do was put aside the questions I had regarding her origins and her link to Theta. Back then, when Dungeon Master 07 dropped us off at this place, I didn't really feel like I was in a position to ask any questions about this place, but I was confident that in the future, I was going to get the answers I was looking for.

Back to Aiden and the girl's daily schedule—the rest of the morning would be dedicated to semi-recreational activities, like the one where the caretakers were clearly trying to set the literary basis for them to build on.

At lunchtime, they would be brought back to the refectory for lunch. Once again, just like it was for breakfast, the food would be delicious, leaving Aiden rather happy with what he was being fed.

Afternoon activities would include other semi-recreational activities that would take place in the orphanage’s crèche, which was just a room above the refectory—to which they would once time head back for dinner. Once again, Aiden would be fed dinner, well-fed, so well-fed, in fact, that for the first few nights, I suspected there could be something wrong with the food, which is why there was a so-well set schedule for how vicariously Aiden and the girl were fed.

With Theta being involved in this orphanage through her ascetics, everything was possible.

I wouldn't be so much surprised to see that she had her ascetics put something in the food to see what "it" does. But as I inspected the food, I found nothing suspicious. Well, I did say “inspected”, but it was at most a surface-level, tasting-level, inspection.

My [Identification] was brought down to level.1, making me completely unable to tell what was exactly in my food. Being put in that position, there wasn't much I could do except allow Aiden to have his meal. I simply couldn't just have him skip a meal for seemingly no reason; he would starve after a while. So, I settled on just hoping that there was nothing in the food. However, if I were to notice anything, be it in the food or as a symptom in Aiden, I would definitely have a talk with Theta's ascetic. I might be stuck in the body of a little kid; however, I didn't mean that I lacked the means to make them talk.

After dinner, they wouldn't be immediately brought to bed. Instead, they would be taken to a large room on the same floor where the refectory was, adjacent to the room where Dungeon Master 07 and "us" were taken to wait for the little girl. In there, the duo would be made to sit together and play quiet games like checkers or simple card games.

In the former's case, he wasn't very good at them, mostly and partially because he was still in the process of being taught how to play these games, while the latter seemed to be already familiar with most of it.

Back when we were still living in that place, the nearest city was a lonely town in the middle of nowhere; there was nowhere to purchase little games like the ones in the orphanage. So most of the time, with me realizing that I needed to have something for Aiden to play with when I could not, I had the idea of having him play with my summons, which turned out to be a great idea, since it was both an amusing and safe way for him to play around.

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Now, I suppose he finally has real toys to play with. No wonder he's compliant. To be frank, if it weren't for what usually happened after those playing times and instances where he clearly seemed to remember our lives in the cabin like he did with his drawing this morning, I would've completely assumed this little gremlin had already completely forgotten about that place and, by extension, my existence.

But clearly, it was not the case. The fact that I had to interfere to put him to sleep was proof that he did not not forget. Left in that room alone or even watched over by one of the caretakers, he would always yearn, cryingly, for that place and request for the one he called "Maa," not knowing that I was there all along. Well, maybe not exactly as I should be, but I was here.

I had yet to inform him of my presence. I didn't know why, but I just had this feeling that I shouldn't. Why exactly was I thinking that? I couldn't even tell, but nonetheless, I chose to let things remain as they currently were, with me not yet revealing my presence, showing only when I have to, like I currently was when putting him to sleep.

"They're annoyingly persistent," I sighed, upon noticing the light on the corridor beyond the door going down as the footsteps quieted. I, who laid in my bed, stirred up to a sitting position. "But well, I guess that's normal for Theta's ascetics."

They barely budged when Aiden threw his tantrum over wanting to return home and thus unleashed his "innate" skill [Telekinesis].

In this world, for "humans" and mainly "humans" with access to the system interface, innate skills were skills that were acquired upon choosing a class, then and only then would humans acquire innate skills. However, for monsters, other sentient races, and also Homunculi like us, innate skills were skills we were born with. It was also the case for Aiden's Telekinesis, it was a skill he was born with. While I didn't have the Telekinesis skill to pass it to him, it was without a doubt that the reason for which he was born with—this skill was, as he was neither a monster nor did he belong to another sentient race other than human, a trait he inherited from me—an Homunculi.

Someone who is branded by the system as belonging to the "Verdenkind" human sub-race shouldn't be born with a skill as he were, and yet he was. So yes, the lack of reaction from the ascetic was without a doubt suspicious. While they were surprised by Aiden suddenly using his Telekinesis, they quickly adapted their approach. They adapted so quickly, in fact, that it made me feel like they were expecting if not to some extent were prepared for something like it to happen and thus knew exactly what to do in reaction.

Remembering how all of this place was tied to "her," I couldn't help but think that she most likely had formed them to know exactly how to respond. As to why they were formed exactly, I wasn't sure yet, but I believed I more or less figured the outline of it from what I could imagine this place being.

I came out of my sheet, left Aiden’s bunk bed to stand in the large hallway formed by the two parallelly layered bunk beds—clearly this room was meant to accommodate at least three other residents, but since there was only Aiden and the girl in this establishment, Aiden had, for the time being, the room for himself.

Standing there, I stared at the door, attentive to any sign of the caretaker returning to check on him.

"It should be safe for now," I concluded after a while before turning around, looking in the opposite direction where there was a window from which moonlight entered the room.

The room Aiden was currently residing in, in the boy's dormitory as that's what apparently it was, was on the third floor.

As to why they would put him in a room with window access when the said room was on the third floor, I didn't know, but at least they had the decency to have the glass inner window closed and put the window out of reach for someone Aiden's height. Since it was out of reach for him, it should've also been for me, who was in control of his body. However, I had something that the interface deemed "he" did not: [Heightened Physics].

While the skill was lowered back to level 1 because of what happened back then, it worked exactly as it should be at the current level it currently was, allowing me to walk up to a chest of drawers with six drawers and push it, with not so much trouble, to where the window was. Climbing upon it allowed me to be just high enough to open the inner glass window, allowing the breeze to refreshingly flow into the room. I could've just climbed the window, but weakened as I currently was, aware of how helpless I would be against an incident, I safely chose not to.

From the look of it and the few experiments I tried these past few days, it seems that while all my skills and even my attributes were brought down to the ground/level 1, they still work well with what I have left of what used to be my resource pool, be it M.P or S.P. If anything, my only complaint would be that I don't really feel like I'm totally up to 100% of what I should be able to do with my skills at their current level. But that was, I could very much tell, because of the frailty of the body that I currently wield, preventing me from using my skills to their fullest level.1 potential.

So, nothing to blame on the skills and their functioning themselves. As for my abilities, well...I suppose one could say that they were still there.

I reached my arm outside the window, seemingly extending into the clear, moonlit night. As I did, I mentally stirred up my main ability, and soon a noise echoed in the distance. Not long after, another noise followed, the flapping of wings. At first, it was distant, but soon it grew closer, so close that the next instant it was there in front of me. A dark, vague figure landed on my extended arm. One might take some time to realize it, but upon closer inspection, one would eventually realize that what landed was not temporally vague, silhouette-like; it simply looked that way.

Amidst the blur that formed its silhouette, it looked like a bird-like creature, made of utterly black, semi-corporeal matter that seemed to waft out of it, giving a strange impression of it dissipating away and yet paradoxically it did not like it were thinning out the slightest. Many aspects of the creature's appearance gave it a specter-like appearance, but I knew better.

"Caw," the creature cawed, allowing me to behold for a split second the inside of its mouth, which seemed made of utterly black fabric, giving the creature what any normal person would describe as a frightening appearance, if not an outright horrifying one for those able to read the creature's stats. But to me, it was not; in fact, I had a hard time imagining it being so. After all, this bird-like creature in front of me was the one that Aiden, back when we lived in that place, called "Crow"—one of the shadow creatures that, along with "Owl" and "Snake," I had summoned to watch over him and play with him when I could not.

Snake, Owl, Crow... Now that I think of these, the naming sense clearly wasn’t quite there yet, but it was without a doubt that Aiden enjoyed these creatures' presence.

"I'm sure he'd be happy to see you at least survive," I said to the crow-like shadow creature, which I brought closer to me by retracting my arm. "But I can't have him see you yet."

For the same reason I didn't manifest my presence to him, I didn't have Crow interact with him yet.

"Caw."

"In the future, without a doubt, but not yet."

As I looked at the shadow creature that, with as me as its summoner, was under my control was able, through that link existing between us, to glimpse into its very basic stats without the need of relying on [Appraisal], I was met with a sigh that me let out a depressive sigh.

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Name: Crow

Type: Animalistic Monster (Shadow Creature Summon)

Race: Stormwing

Level: 25 (Locked)

Status (Summoned)

- H.P: 120

- M.P: 150

- S.P: 120

- Fatigue: 0%

- Defense: 120

- Offense: 160

Skills

Shadow-Infused Bolt (formerly Lightning Bolt) : Level 6

Shadow-Infused Frostbite (formerly Frostbite) : Level 5

Shadow-Infused Whirlwind Slash: Level 6

Shadow Cloak: Level 2

Evasive Dive: Level 5

Shadow Strike: Level 3

Abilities

Darkness Conversion: Unlocked

Stormwing Adaptation: Unlocked

Shadowmeld: Unlocked

Ethereal Flight: Unlocked

Void Veil: Unlocked

Darkening Aura: Unlocked

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