So I wandered. God knows for how long, I hovered above the ground, moving at the highest speed that my incorporeal body would allow me to.
Which was, apparently, extremely slowly.
In reality, I moved at the same speed as when I was inside rock, something that was to be expected, but it still felt weird to be just as slow when there was only air around me than when I was surrounded by solid matter, so I had believed that I would be able to go faster once I was out 8n the open. Evidently, that wasn't the case. Compared to a human, my movement speed would be like a slow walk, the speed at which someone would go if they were admiring the scenery.
And that was with me straining my being to the max to move as fast as possible.
Well, at least I could move in any direction, in contrast to humans, but even if I went up above the treetops (believe me, I tried) I couldn't scout the horizons in search of human towns or cities.
I was missing my old sight more and more by the second.
That was one of the main reasons why I so badly needed a body, and some sort of weird instincts told me that I would be able to posses a dead one temporarily.
I could figure it out from then on.
But as I wandered, I began to realise the sheer scale of this place. I encountered several beasts, like a pack of 8th Rank Firefang Wolves, according to my [Inspection] Skill, and some giant birds in the 7th Rank called Aerial Greenrocks.
They were on the ground eating prey, but after they were done, they each went their separate ways. I decided to try something, which was very, very unlikely to work, but it was worth a try.
I approached it, and condensing my soul to a small sphere I entered the beast's head.
I felt a slight resistance, but it was broken with a slight push. It felt like I was starting to posses the beast's body, but then...
The bird's head exploded the moment I relaxed my control over my soul the tiniest bit, clearly not capable of holding such a powerful force. The sight was much too gory to my civil self, and I would surely be retching at this point if I physically could, so I hastily retracted my awareness from that zone and concentrated on something else. I had also felt something trickle into me when I touched its soul with mine, but since just a second later the soul in question was gone, I couldn't quite catch what it was.
For now, I decided to push those ponderings to the back of my mind as I focused on the slew of small blue screens that had appeared before me once again, giving me a nasty dejà-vu.
Level up!
Level up!
Level up!
Level up!
Level up!
Level up!
I checked my status to see that I was indeed level 6 now, with a total of 90 stat points at hand.
'This way of levelling seems way too cheaty. There's probably a limit to how strong of a beast I can kill this way, but it is too overpowered nonetheless.'
This... mishap made me realise that no normal body would be able to contain me, so I was forced to change my game plan. I would love nothing more than possessing a human body, but that might not be possible until some people become stronger and make their bodies sturdy enough.
'For now, I just need a powerful vessel. One of those lava serpents should do the trick... if I'm able to drive it's soul out like with the bird, that is.'
And so, I once again ventured underground. This time, some memories resurfaced during the long trip.
They came in the form of faces.
The first was an aged woman, with curly short blonde hair that sported some white and gray streaks, but it gave off an air of elegance instead of making her look old.
Her face was slightly wrinkly, and there was a patch of skin that stretched from her left cheek to her neck that had clearly been burnt, but she must have been a beauty in her youth. She was showing a kind expression.
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'Mom...' Had I possessed eyes, tears would have welled up in them. Some loose memories of her entered my mind.
They were of her raising me alone, working overtime to pay for my education. I worked part-time jobs too to help out once I became old enough, but she had always insisted in me focusing on my studies instead. The memories were jumbled, some of barely a few years ago and some of my childhood, appearing without an order.
The second face was younger, but I know it was of a person of similar age, just from a prior time. It was a man with lustrous black hair and a smooth face with few creases, a rogue smirk on his face and shining eyes.
Of course, it was my dad.
This was his face the last time I saw him, when he dropped me off at the school gates on a day of late spring, and said the last words I ever heard from him. "Have a good day at school, kiddo." In my mind, I was bawling. The words on their own were nothing special, but it was what happened after that made them so. That day no one came to pick me up from school, so I just went walking after waiting for half an hour. My house was in walking distance, after all.
What greeted me was the sound of sirens and my house destroyed, reduced to blackened walls and a collapsed roof.
My mother, Martha, was crying with bandages all over her arms and face, and a human-sized bag was being carried away.
Later, I found out that mom accidentally left a butane bottle open after having a barbecue, and then went out for a walk as my dad laid down on the couch for a quick nap. Some stray spark from who-knows-where made the thing explode and my dad, as a deep sleeper, didn't even notice as the oxigen was replaced with deadly carbon monoxide. He died without ever waking up, before the flames even touched him.
My mom came back from her walk and found the house burning, and she immediately went in to try to save dad. She got the body out and quite a few nasty burns, but it was far too late.
My dad, David was his name, wasn't an angel, but I dearly loved him. We loved him. He was a troublemaker who got arrested once for causing trouble while drunk and got into debt from gambling a couple of times, and he probably fooled around with a couple of girls, but he loved his family.
He didn't deserve to die like that. 'I remember now, that's when I decided to become a firefighter. Looking at it from this perspective, it's kind of a cliché backstory.'
As I kept descending and the strange order started appearing again, a third face, this time more fuzzy, reached the edges of my mind. It was a young woman with a dark chestnut, smooth, long hair, a fairly pale face, big, brown eyes, and delicate features.
After some time, memories started drizzling into my mind. 'She was my friend at school until she moved away...then we met again when I was in university, it seems, and she became my girlfriend...?'
Yes, we were together for 10 years, her name... Cass was what I called her. Her friends used Cassy. She didn't like people to use her full name, Cassandra.
Before I could force any more memories out though, I encountered a lava serpent once again.
Looking at it closely, the sizzling-hot, rock-skinned creature was as magnificent as it was terrifying. It took some courage to decrease the distance between us, but being intangible helped quite a bit in that regard. When my soul 'touched' the creature's own, a lot of information made its way into my mind, such as the creature's basic composition, abilities and weaknesses, along with a rough picture of its attributes. Something similar had happened with the first creature I killed too, but the contact had been so brief due to the animal's early demise and the shock of feeling the brains splattering everywhere so great that I had barely paid it any mind.
As I finished my pondering, I saw another blue screen patiently waiting for me to read it.
Due to managing to make an in-depth analysis of a creature through special means, [Inspection] has been directly upgraded to level 5! You will now receive much more extensive data (branch of species, age, element, attributes and description) and can actively decide how much of it you want to display.
Wow, it seemed having such outrageous Soul Power came with more boons than expected. Immediately, I cast [Inspection] on the serpent.
Deep Lava Serpent (Lesser Wyrm)
5th Rank - level 1
Age: 1d
Element: Fire
Attributes:
-Strength: 297
-Agility: 381
-Endurance: 572
-Vitality: 263
-Intelligence: 3
-Capacity: 83
-Soul Power: 64
Description: similar to their wyvern brethren who are the masters of the sky and the mysterious water serpents that rule over the deep oceans, these lava serpents that can only be found at the bottom of volcanoes or in underground lava lakes are the descendants of dragons. They are of diluted bloodlines, but powerful nonetheless, being already 6th Rank creatures at birth and reaching 5th Rank at adulthood. If given the chance to reach 4th Rank they will evolve proper dragon scales and dragon breath, and in the unlikely case they reach 3rd they will become actual fire dragons. Beware, their extremely high body temperature, extreme toughness and lava spitting glands make them very hard opponents to face in a melee, although they are not very magic-resistant, and relatively weak to water and ice magic.
'Wow... So much to unpack. So first, this Skill is waaay too good. Next, it seems some, if not all, creatures level up just by existing. Or is reaching level 1 very easy? Did it get there by killing lava critters? Somehow it doesn't seem very likely... do those even exist?
Anyway, the stats are clearly unbelievable except for Intelligence, guessing that a human's average should be around 10 across the board. Also good news for me, its Soul Power seems fairly low, at least compared to mine, so I should be able to take it over. It seems these guys are related to dragons too, although I'm not sure if I would be able to get there by possessing this body...'
Excited, I hastily made my way into the beast's mind, and utterly crushed the soul inside it. It made a bit of an effort to resist (actually it did its very best), but although it was harder than with the bird, destroying it was still like an adult bullying a child.
I got excited when I discovered that the brain did not explode immediately. But just as I was trying to get a handle on things and connect to the body... the creature's synapses overheated and died, completely foiling my attempt.
'Tsk, I'm way too OP, seriously.'
Looking at the five messages in front of me, I felt a tiny bit better.
'Well, at least I levelled up'