The Lone Wanderer

Delivering his ultimatum, Percy doubted Sol would accept his terms. He’d made a whole lot of demands, promising very little in return. It wasn’t like he could help it though. After all, he couldn’t give her much in his current state. Any favours from his end would have to wait until he recovered.

Surprisingly, the girl agreed – against all odds.

‘I guess she’s serious about making the most of her trait.’

Either way, this appeared to be quite a novel experience for them both. Percy could tell his host wasn’t used to swallowing her pride and working with others. Meanwhile, this was a first for him too, as he was stuck in one place, unable to interact with the world around him. Without access to the girl’s senses, he couldn’t see what her house was like, or how big her town or city was. Hell, Percy still had no idea what the locals even looked like, or how they used their soul mana.

‘All the more reason to come back then…’

While their initial interaction had been a little rocky, he didn’t hold it against the girl. Percy could tell she was rather young too – maybe in her mid-teens? In any case, he very much intended to uphold his end of the deal, returning to this place the first chance he got. After all, there was plenty of value to be gained here. Of course, that was assuming he managed to return to Remior first…

Sadly, their results in that area were rather mixed. At Yellow, Sol was among the most magically gifted class of natives, so there was hardly a better place to find soul mana than right inside her core. Despite that, it was already a struggle for her to prevent Percy’s condition from deteriorating further, let alone helping him recover.

‘I don’t think my clones were ever meant to heal on their own…’ he thought bitterly.

The severed chunks of his soul he crafted his clones out of weren’t exactly dead, but they couldn’t be considered alive either. His bloodline allowed them to survive for an extended period of time on their own, yet repairing the isolated wisps outside his body was a tall order. Both Sol and her father – Mi, as he’d come to learn – were currently working together to that end. They were focusing their efforts, fighting an uphill battle to fix Percy’s soul faster than it broke.n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

Watching the father and daughter operate on him over the last couple of days, Percy had learned a lot about healing soul injuries. While he was no stranger to mending his soul – having done this countless times since discovering his affinity – he now understood just how crude his methods were by comparison.

Blindly flooding a wound with mana and hoping it closed was the healing equivalent of tossing orbs of soul mana at the wood goblins to kill them. Suffice to say, there was plenty more to the art once he dug a little deeper.

For example, Sol had shown him that applying soul mana uniformly along a wound’s surface was inefficient. It was better to focus it in several interspaced locations, growing lots of thin tendrils. Afterwards, the gaps between the tendrils could be filled a lot more easily.

‘It’s really eye opening…’

This wasn’t something he would have ever discovered on his own. At least, not without decades upon decades of tests. Percy couldn’t wait to learn more from these people. This was a veritable treasure trove for a soul affinity user like him!

And that was just the beginning.

Another thing he’d learned was that healing a wound directly was ill-advised. It was better to use the mana to activate and enhance the soul’s natural regeneration. The results appeared slower at the beginning, but the gains accumulated over time, resulting in a much faster and more complete recovery with a mere fraction of the cost.

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

Finally, there was one last nifty trick they’d shown him.

“Hey, stop dozing off!” Sol said in an irritated tone. “If you want this to work, we need your cooperation!”

‘Easy for you to say…’ Percy protested. ‘I have trouble even staying awake.’

Apparently, the healing was more effective if the patient actively participated in the process. This was a unique aspect of soul-based injuries, as people had a much stronger connection to their soul than they did to their flesh. With some prodding, Percy could help the mana along, guiding his soul to grow.

Of course, this wasn’t always applicable, as the patient needed to have some rudimentary understanding of souls and soul mana at the very least. Suffice to say, Percy wouldn’t be able to use it when healing others, but it was definitely helpful when dealing with his own injuries.

Yet, even with all this, the three had barely made any progress. Percy’s clone had grown slightly larger, though the improvements had started to slow down by the third day. Despite all the measures they’d taken, and all the sophisticated healing techniques, his deterioration was beginning to gain ground over his recovery.

‘At this rate, I’ll stop improving by the end of the week.’ he thought grimly.

“Father says you’ll have to make the trip soon.” Sol suddenly said, confirming his suspicions.

It wasn’t ideal, because he estimated he’d only reach about two thirds of his original size before he began to shrink again. Even worse, his own mana stash was all but exhausted, so they’d have to work on supplying him with some of Sol’s.

‘Do you think we can take a short break?’ he asked. ‘I want to test something.’

Mana cores were the very organs responsible for seizing control over ambient mana, allowing their owner to convert it to their affinity, while attaching their willpower to it. Percy had been able to use his hosts’ cores in the past, adding his willpower to the mana thanks to their bond. However, he didn’t know if that was possible right now, given his half-baked connection to Sol. If he couldn’t do this, he’d have to fight his way through the horde of spectral fiends essentially unarmed…

Listening to him, the girl paused the recovery process, allowing Percy to give this a try. The latter reached out at the core’s walls, trying to enhance their connection as well as the circumstances would allow. It wasn’t much but, at least, he was in direct contact with Sol’s core, so he was able to tap into it a little better than the rest of her body.

‘Let’s see… Can you try withdrawing your willpower from the mana?’

From his current perspective, the girl’s grasp on her mana was firm and borderline unshakeable. He was too weak to pry it from her control. If he wanted to snatch some for his own use, he needed her to actively relinquish her hold on the substance.

Heeding his request, the girl did that to the best of her ability, as Percy tried again. It was still difficult, but he did manage to seize a sliver of mana eventually. Granted, it was way too little to make a difference.

‘Ugh… It’ll take me days to gather enough…’

They couldn’t afford to pause the healing until then. The only solution would be to do both at the same time, with Percy trying to restock his reserves as Sol and Mi continued to mend his soul.

“Well, this sucks. If you’re focused on that, you won’t be able to help with the healing either.” Sol pitched in.

Percy nodded. It was even worse. It would be harder for her to ease her control on the mana while using it to heal him too. Like this, they’d run out of time even faster.

‘Well, there’s no helping it.’ he sent her the mental equivalent of a shrug. ‘Having some mana to defend myself is just as important as my soul’s integrity. I suppose we’ll have to do both things to the best of our ability…’

“Make those three things.” she said after a moment’s hesitation.

Percy frowned.

‘What do you mean?’

“You have a soul affinity with your main body, don’t you? Since you didn’t seem to know anything about the spectral fiends, I suppose it’s safe to assume you don’t have a trait either, right?”

Percy’s heart would have skipped a beat if he had one. But he didn’t say anything, letting her continue.

“I’ll use what little time we have left to explain how to attract, capture and absorb a fiend into your soul.”

And there it was. Percy naturally wanted to learn this above all else, though he’d decided to not push his luck too far. He was already glad Sol had agreed to demonstrate her healing art and help him escape this place with no guarantee he’d come back.

‘I thought you’d keep this as a bargaining chip to force me to return.’

“That was my intention at first.” she admitted. “But I considered your earlier words. Percy… I wasn’t lying when I said I intend to make the most of my trait. In this case, it means establishing a good relationship with you.”

‘Meaning?’

“Meaning, that I’m going to start demonstrating some good will.”