Stray Soul

Lamenting my stupidity for a few long seconds, I soon stopped being so harsh on myself because, even though the bug’s brain would’ve been helpful, there was also the fact that its loss wasn’t anything big as I had so much mana that the few points, I’d have gotten from it would’ve hardly mattered.

Turning my attention on the big pile of horns and hexagonal plates made of chitin in front of me, I started to think of what to do with all of these.

I mean, yes, I was obviously going to use the horns as spears, or spear heads, but the plates… while I had decided on using them as some kind of armour, there was a big obstacle in front of me that didn’t allow me to do what I wanted to do with them.

And that obstacle being the fact that I didn’t have anything or anyway to actually use them!

I mean, yes, I could always just slide them under my skin but that carried its own problems in the shape of me recognizing that removing my skin just to put a few loose plates in the gap between my flesh and skin to be a bad, bad idea.

Because, while the chitinous plates offered a good degree of protection, protection better than what my skin could ever offer even if I hardened it with harden! But there was also the fact that my skin could take many small hits, while my skin filled with loose plates of chitin could only take only one due to the fact that it would just get destroyed and drop all the plates to the ground.

And I didn’t even know how to slide those plates under my skin even if I wanted to! I mean, how would I even do that!? Cut parts of my skin and then just ram them in until they got far enough and got stuck?

A bad idea, a really bad idea even for someone like me who is not quite alive!

But I can’t just leave them to rot either can I? I mean, they are a part of my first ever real monster loot!

…Unless you consider exp and the corpses I’ve gotten as loot, but… why would you?

Shaking my head, I started to think of a way to use the plates.

I didn’t know how to make a real plate armour so I couldn’t steal ideas from the people of my old world, and neither did I know how to make some kind of organic super glue to stick them to my skin, so what to do… and then I started looking around me in the hopes of finding something of interest.

There was the river which was no longer overflowing and seemed to have returned to normal levels, though I don’t know what normal actually entails for this river as I’ve not been here for very long.

There were a few hatchlings around, birds in the sky, maybe a fish or two in the river, a few animals who came next to the river to drink water or something, trees and of course grass, dirt, and a few rocks.

So, everything I’ve seen plenty of in the last few days…

“Hmm… but is there anything I can use…” I said to myself, and my eyes once again started looking around.

After a few more seconds my eyes finally stopped on a particular patch of tall grass inside the forest.

“Hmm… people always make rope and such things from grass in fantasy crafting novels and such, right? So, can’t I turn those blades of grass into rope and then… I don’t know, make some sort of harness, put the plates of chitin on it, and then put the harness on myself?” I said to myself and… that sounded like a plan!

Except I don’t know how to make a rope and I don’t know how heavy something like that harness would be and if my vines could even lift something that heavy!

But I don’t have any other ideas and not many things to do so… why not?

Then I quickly grabbed a few horns with my vines… just to realize something…

“These are… not that sharp…” I muttered to myself after seeing something that should’ve been pretty obvious to me.

These horns were pointy and didn’t have any edges. So, if I wanted to cut any grass, I’d have to either find some flint and make a knife out of that or… cut it with my own teeth…

…Nah, not happening! I may be desperate for some cool armour, but I am not desperate enough to eat literal grass!

Am I being dumb? Yes.

But whose here to complain? No one.

Ah, what a tragedy that I will not be able to have some cool armour because of my quite normal standards! Ah, the tragedy… wait, actually… couldn’t I use the biggest horn as some sort of shovel?

Turning my head to the biggest horn, I dropped the horns that my vines were holding and grabbed the big horn, and to my surprise I could actually carry it!

…Somewhat, my vines were having a hard time carrying it, but they could do it, and with some work I could probably unearth those blades of grass and then… turn them into rope? Maybe?

I mean, for all I know, you need an extremely specific type of grass to make rope, so this might all be for nought, not that this will be that problematic because only thing I am losing is just a bit of time, which I happen to have an abundance of!

But before I go ahead with my plan and excavate that patch of grass, I should probably test the horn itself.

Holding the horn with my vines, I walked to a small patch of grass and dirt and rammed the horn into the ground.

Then I took a random rock and started hitting the horn from the top like a hammer, was that the best thing I could’ve done? Probably no. But did I care? Not really.

After like an half a minute or so, I managed to remove a small patch of grass out of the ground and the horn fell to the ground after I stopped supporting it.

Then I moved one of my vines to grab the small chunk of dirt and grass to take a closer look at how well I had managed to dig it up but instead of holding onto the chunk of dirt, my vine grabbed a blade of grass which promptly broke when I tried to lift it.

“Oops.” I said and dropped the broken blade of grass… but I stopped myself before I actually did that, a small chunk of curiosity appearing in my mind.

“Hmm… can I bind myself to grass?” I asked, not quite sure of the answer.

I mean, my skill bind did say that I could bind my soul to things that didn’t posses a soul and does a blade of grass posses a soul? I wouldn’t say so, so… why not give it a try?

Then I swiftly moved a piece of my soul into the grass, not expecting much but before long, I felt a connection between me and it.

“Oh! So, it does work…” I said then, absent mindedly moved the grass around like it was a finger.

“Oh, what am I doin—wait, did… did it fucking move?” I said, quite surprized.

Then, I started paying more attention to the blade of grass and moved it around and… it did just that.

I willed it to twist, it twisted. I willed it to sway, it swayed. I willed it to just do random things and, yep you guessed it, it did random things!

“How the—PLANTS DON’T HAVE ANYTHING THAT CAN ALLOW THEM TO MOVE LIKE THAT. WHAT THE ABSOLUTE FUCK!” I said still a… bit surprized? If you call screaming being surprized, I was surprized. I would, so it is just me being surprized, yep.

But, seriously, how?

…Wait, are—are my vines just… vines too? I thought that they were just some weird magical organs or something! I didn’t think they were actual vines! I mean, who would fucking think that they could move actual plant matter with some mana?!

I fucking wouldn’t!

“…Wait… I can bind myself to anything that doesn’t possess a soul… does that mean…” I said, looking at a random rock on the ground, and quickly sent a vine to grab it and then moved a bit of my soul into it and… my soul didn’t go in.

It was, thankfully, stopped by the rock.

And no, I am not saying that the rock had a soul, that would be dumb of course, not like there is any weird things going on in this world that might cause a rock to have a soul, right?

Anyways, like I said, my soul just didn’t go in, and I sensed a thick layer of mana in the rock… well, not really that thick, but my soul just wouldn’t go inside.

Then to make sure that the rock I picked didn’t have an actual soul in it, I decided to test it by trying to bind myself to a tree, which couldn’t go wrong now, could it?

Quickly dropping the blade of grass and the rock, I moved to a tree and moved one of my vines into it and pushed my soul into it and… instead of feeling like I wasn’t able to go inside the tree, it felt more like… I was being rejected by it.

Which proved that the rock I picked up randomly didn’t have a soul.

And to test it further, I went around a few more trees and tried to bind myself to them, which ended in something similar to my first attempt, ending with me being rejected by the tree.

But even though I was now sure that the rock I had picked up randomly earlier really didn’t have a soul, I was more curious about something, could I feel the souls of these trees?

I mean, I did manage to feel my own soul so… it should be possible, shouldn’t it?

So, I just started ramming my soul into various trees and… nothing really happened.

I just couldn’t feel the soul of the tree from the thick bark… not that I was sure I could feel it even without it.

But thankfully there was something without a tich bark near, grass.

So, I just moved a vine down to the ground and grabbed onto a blade of grass and just start pushing my soul into it.

Was that the greatest or the easiest way to sense a soul? Maybe? I don’t know, but I can use my experience from when I first sensed my soul to maybe sense this blade’s soul too!

Hopefully.

Then, I just continued what I was doing. Ramming my soul, and mana cloud, into the blade of grass, and trying to sense its soul by using mana.

And even after a few hours passed, my dedication remained strong—mostly because of the fact that having a staring contest with a blade of grass was actually one of the most entertaining activities I could do, but I am not saying that shit to anyone with the capacity of thought because, god, is that a really, really sad thing to say…

But, like what I said, my dedication remained strong, and after hours and hours of doing the same thing and expecting a different result… which is totally not the definition of insanity, I started to feel… something, something familiar but also not.

So, I grasped onto that feeling and focused on it, trying to somehow improve or expand the feeling.

And soon after a total of… god knows how many hours, but the sun is around the top so… maybe 8?

Anyways, after many hours of trying I finally felt it! I was finally able to feel something else’s soul!

*ding*

Congratulations! Your skill Soul Sense (Z) has improved to Soul Sense (H)!

2 exp gained from skill improvement!

10 exp gained from advancing your quest Meddling With The Unknown (S)!

Congratulations! You have leveled up and become level 10!

While the system notification was good, especially the level up I gained, what I was sensing was far, far more important than anything else right now I kinda hoped that the system wouldn’t bother me with any messages or alerts.

Because the soul of this blade of grass was the most interesting thing ever to me.

And to start off, no, I couldn’t see all of the grass’s soul, only the part where my mana cloud was able to penetrate the mana cloud of the grass, and, even then, I felt like what I was sensing was… incomplete.

Like I just couldn’t see the whole picture, I just couldn’t see the whole soul. But other than my incapability to see the whole soul the grass’s soul itself felt… incomplete.

It wasn’t incomplete as in the sense that… I don’t know how to explain it, but my soul and it were just so different, not because its soul was somehow more complex than mine but wow, fuck you nature, coming up with something greater than what I could do in a few days!

No, it was… something wrong with the grass’s soul itself. Like what I said, it was just… incomplete in a sense of the word that I can’t quite put my finger on.

But I didn’t even know where to start with trying to understand what’s wrong with it! It doesn’t even look like my soul to begin with its something that is… argh!!! I just can’t put my finger on it!

Its soul is just wrong and incomplete in a way I am incapable of explaining… but after a few more… maybe weeks, maybe months, maybe even years of research I should be able to put a finger on it, but not now.

After looking at the grass’s soul for a bit longer, I moved my vines to touch different things, like a trees, bugs, and other grasses. Basically, whatever I could reach.

And they were all… unique.

Grasses’ souls were actually the most similar ones to mine, because they had one long stalk that went through the centre of their bodies, but unlike mine, they were able to make a lot, a lot more branches, expanding their souls throughout their bodies.

Trees had this weird twisting shape to their soul, it felt as if their soul was made up of many different souls, even though it was not.

And the bugs, instead of expanding their souls throughout their bodies like plants, had a central point from which many branches grew and expanded out to the rest of the body.

Was that central point useful in any shape, way, or form? Were there any practical differences in what the shape of a soul was? And why do the members of the same species, like grass’s, have a general shape but their soul just twists in a different enough way to make each and every one of them unique?

No goddamn idea, but before I discover the truths of the universe or something, I need to get up and finally make myself some cool drip.