“Something’s off, Boss.” The Golem stated.

“You are correct, my friend. Be vigilant and we shall endure!” I replied.

Those points in the Create Golem skill paid off. He is way smarter than he was before. That’s awesome. I wonder how far he can go. Guess we’ll discover that together. The march continued with no enemy contact at all.

The enemy had seemed to vanish leaving almost everything behind. This had alarm bells ringing in my head, it even had my Golem on edge with his newfound intelligence. I hopped off the Golem back to try to have a more stealthy vantage point.

Moving forward with caution, the pit in my stomach deepened. I don’t know what is going on, but it screams danger. As I was deep in thought trying to determine how serious the danger was, I stopped dead in my tracks. The dread I felt became so overwhelming that my body refused to take another step forward.

Sweat poured down my back as I stood still, my body paralyzed with fear, eyes darting back and forth. Bastards! Somewhere in this room, an enemy magic user is hiding with magical means. Side note I can see status afflictions in this world too! How do I know this you ask? Simply because I seem to have acquired the paralyzing fear affliction. It’s why I can’t move.

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed an odd shimmer in the air. Witnessing a slight shadowy figure moving in the distance unnerved me. I nearly thought I was losing my mind before I saw it move again. Found you, you slippery bastard! Still unable to move or speak I wondered how I was going to defend myself.

Without the ability to cast or issue an order to my minions, I was completely vulnerable. Move damn you! Do something! Mentally screaming in anguish I attempted to break through the paralyzing affliction to no avail. A fire raged through my body as every fiber of my being roared in defiance! I WILL KILL YOU!

Something deep inside my mind snapped and unknown energy flowed through me, penetrating to my very core. Agony followed shortly after, it was so profound that it would have brought me to my knees if I was free to do so. As the pain of this foreign energy source racked my body I still couldn’t force myself through the paralysis.

Struggling with all my might against the pain and the paralysis was pushing me to my limits mentally and physically. After what felt like an eternity the pain started to subside. Slowly my mental exhaustion faded and I was quite taken aback by what I started to sense. I’m not alone? Hello? Why is there another presence in my mind? Who are you?

It’s me, Master. Your best friend the Golem.

Why are you in my head? Why? How is this happening?

I don’t know my Lord.

As the Golem's words flashed through my head they were accompanied by a mental image of him shrugging his shoulders in his trademark dopey fashion. Not understanding why this is happening I was quite surprised at the new and alien inhabitant of my mind. The why doesn’t matter right this moment, with my life being somewhat threatened at this time. Well, let’s put this strange new mental link power to the test! Clearing my mind of distractions I began a new mental conversation with my trusty Golem.

Golem. I don’t quite understand this ability but it seems like now is the perfect time to use it. Can you see that blurry and shadowy figure moving?

Yes, I most certainly can. Want me to smash him?

Yes, but not just yet! What I need you to do is grab him and give him a little squeeze. Not too much now, don’t want the suffering of one who dares enslave me with magic to end that soon.

It would be my pleasure, Master.

The would-be assassin thought he was clever as he crept closer to his goal, which was my life. Unfortunately for him, he happened to be the unluckiest guy in the whole world at this moment. He reveled in anticipation of catching me off guard, but alas he celebrated too soon.

His cloaking magic shattered as a giant metal hand snatched him up and started to apply pressure by squeezing ever so lightly. Let’s face it though, how light can a giant metal hand squeeze someone? A look of surprise mixed with sheer terror was plastered on the silly little assassin. Jaw agape he started screaming out in his language, a language I, unfortunately, didn’t understand.

Language barrier aside, it wasn’t very hard to guess what was going through his head. You were outplayed by a Goblin. How unfortunate for you! Within the grip of my Golem, he was powerless, too afraid and shocked to attempt to cast any spells. Even if he was able to cast, the constant squeezing would have made it quite hard to concentrate anyway.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Spittle flowed down his face as he screamed and cursed. Now that he is in my grasp I wonder if I can find out any information. That language barrier does make it nearly impossible though. What to do? What to do?

A flash of insight and a splash of inspiration hit me and I had an idea. It might not work but I won’t know until I try. Here goes nothing! Focusing inward I tried to expand the boundaries of the mysterious mental anomaly, I soon came across a solid barrier that stopped me from expanding it any further.

Hmm, interesting! I experimented with the barrier and pushed and prodded over the entirety of it. Certain areas were somewhat flexible while others were solid. Some areas of the barrier even pushed back, repelling me with a force equal to or greater than the force used against it. Like flexing a muscle I attempted to extend beyond these more flexible areas and avoided the others.

Sweat began to pour down my body as I strained against the mental barrier. Every muscle in my body tightened as I used every ounce of strength I possessed, both mental and physical, in my attempt to defy this barrier. The pressure I was applying to this singular spot of the barrier continued to increase as the strain on my being amplified. As my body and mind neared the breaking point the barrier continued to stretch.

Immense pain flooded into me as I heard a loud snap. My vision blurred and distorted as I very nearly blacked out. Every single part of my body cried out in agony as my vision slowly started to return. As my vision became less blurred, the barrier came back into my focus. Staring in utter disbelief I couldn’t help but cry tears of joy. The pain was worth it. Well maybe.

The barrier in my mind had the tiniest of holes in it. It worked! As I was examining the hole and attempting to make it larger, a loud boom resounded through my head. A multitude of cracks appeared in the barrier immediately after the sound hit me. The cracks spread like wildfire and shortly after the entire barrier exploded.

The shards rocketed outwards, propelled by the force of the explosion, embedding themselves in my mind and causing an indescribable amount of pain. My knees buckled immediately and I collapsed to the ground, blood leaking freely from my nose and mouth. Writhing in pain on the floor I was completely withdrawn from my surroundings.

The agony of breaking the mental barrier was all-encompassing. The mental backlash had rendered me nearly catatonic even without causing any physical damage to my brain. Shortly thereafter a system notification popped up in my view.

What seemed like an eternity passed in a flash. The pain in my head ebbed and flowed as I struggled back to my feet. Trying to regain my composure after suffering such mental anguish is difficult, to say the least. Holding my eyes closed as hard as I could I gently rubbed my head in a feeble attempt to assuage the torment raging through my head. Soon enough the throbbing dulled to an acceptable enough level to allow me to function properly again. I slowly opened my eyes as the pain continued to assault me periodically. Ugh! This damn pain needs to go away!

While my senses were still recovering I felt even more strange energy presences slowly appear around me. Confusion and shock filled me as my mind brushed up and vaguely connected to a plethora of undead one after another. The mental presence of so many minions hitting me at once was overwhelming, to say the least. My mind slowly acclimated itself to the numerous mental links, and while trying to process all the new information another energy presence was discovered. This other energy presence was unlike the others, it felt unusual and hostile. It was unfamiliar and had a hint of uncleanliness. This energy presence infuriated me for reasons yet unknown, so I directed my complete focus towards it.

This unfamiliar energy presence shifted to the right in front of me as my attention was turned toward it. Did it move or did I? Man I need to explore this new power and figure out its limitations. Don’t distract yourself and lose sight of your goal. You’re supposed to be investigating this energy presence. Remember? Getting back to the task at hand I thought about how to access this presence directly instead of the vague background connection I currently had with my minions. As I contemplated how to access and connect to this other presence, something strange and vastly unexpected happened.

Inside the mental zone, I could see numerous green spheres that I instinctively knew represented my minions. On the other side of this field of green spheres sat a lonely red sphere. As I thought about accessing the red sphere a green light coalesced in front of it. A large green sphere formed out of the gathering light and held its position in front of the red sphere. The green sphere continued to gather light until it grew to be twice as large as the red sphere. The gathering light dissipated and all that was left was an overbearing green sphere looming in front of the red sphere. Let’s try out a new skill. The words Mental Invasion cascaded through my thoughts and without speaking a word a skill was used. The large green sphere started to merge slowly with the red sphere. This process was completed in a matter of seconds and both spheres had completely fused into a large yellow sphere.

Outside of the mental zone, some pitiful soul began screaming, but it was only a distant whisper inside the mental zone. Knowledge flowed like a river through the yellow sphere, calm and raging at the same time. Urging my mental self closer to the river, a small bit of light formed and manifested itself into the shape of a small goblin. Is that what I look like? Hell, it could be worse I guess. Maybe. After the light formed goblin appeared it floated towards the bank of the river of knowledge and knelt. Slowly the goblin tested the waters by dipping a single finger into the river.