38: Legacy of Aspect

After a whole day of talking, Jonathan finally had a moment to himself. He climbed a tree branch and lay back, looking up at the large branches and leaves above him.

"So, what should I do next? I need everyone to stay here for at least a month. I don't remember how long it took for Sunny to realize this tree was a nightmare creature... It's a... Nightmare creature."

Realizing a significant problem he'd forgotten, Jonathan focused his soul sense and...

...An indescribable horror engulfed him as he sensed the soul threads of the soul-devouring tree. Among its threads, countless souls could be seen, heard, and felt screaming in agony.

Jonathan could feel part of the suffering of the trapped souls due to the tenuous connection he formed with others' souls to feel and control them. When he tried to form the familiar connection to make the tree his puppet, he felt all those poor souls suffering in the tree's soul, trapped for eternity.

The horror was so overwhelming that he began to vomit everything in his stomach, expelling a large amount of yellowish liquid, his nose covered in snot and his eyes filled with tears from the sheer terror.

He fell to the ground unconscious after experiencing such torture directly with his soul.

***

When he opened his eyes again, Jonathan noticed his vomit was still fresh, indicating that less than an hour had passed since he fainted.

He looked at the tree and its dark, black wood with frightened eyes, recalling the horror he felt within its soul.

"At least this tree is of the large class, and when I felt its cores, it had five. It's a damn great tyrant. Damn Sunny and his cursed 'predestined' attribute for encountering this being while it was still dormant. It's truly unfortunate."

He shuddered as he remembered the sensation of the tyrant's soul and almost vomited again but managed to control himself enough to calm down, resolved not to try such connections with high-level creatures.

Jonathan climbed down from the great tree and searched for his cohort. There was no one at the camp they used to rest when they found Cassia, but he could see his friends' tracks leading west.

...

Nearing the natural mound that rose on the western border of Ashen Barrow, he noticed everyone atop that hill.

"Ha, they must be feeling desolate right now. I'd better start giving them fruit tomorrow."

He climbed the hill, and as he expected, everyone was there, even Cassia.

When they noticed his presence, they all looked at him without saying a word. He approached the edge and looked at the seemingly endless expanse of a colossal crater stretching to the horizon.

He looked down and saw how the ground sank, sank again, and continued to sink. It appeared to be an abyss with no bottom.

He looked back at the horizon and saw no high point where they could shelter their lives at night. He, of course, already knew about this crater. He saw it in the novel and was neither disheartened nor discouraged.

It was time to do what he had planned during their journey in the labyrinth.

"Well, this is certainly daunting. But hey, maybe we can go around the crater? Or stay a few days in this tree and try heading east to look for an unclaimed citadel."

The importance of finding the castle beyond the incredible crater was, of course, the gateway in each citadel. The gate was the exit for the sleepers when they entered the realm of dreams.

"Do you think we can go around this thing? That would take several months, and I don't think we can survive that long in this hell." Ludwin's voice sounded dejected and low, as if he had lost all hope of returning to the waking world.

"That's true. Going east isn't good either, or any direction really. The whole labyrinth must have horrors we were lucky not to encounter, but if we explore more, rest assured something stronger than the demon will kill us." Sasha sounded more pessimistic than Ludwin, but her eyes still shone as she looked west, indicating she hadn't lost all hope.

Nephis, Sunny, and Cassia were silent, each lost in their own thoughts.

"What do you think we should do? I don't think we can cross this crater, go around it, or head in another direction. We're doomed here." Isaac had the most normal and calm voice by far. He didn't seem particularly affected by the news, perhaps because he still thought they could survive and escape or for another reason Jonathan didn't know. After all, Isaac was also very mysterious.

"Well, how about staying here for a few days? There are no monsters around this place, and it elevates us above the black sea. It's also big and keeps away the creatures of the black waters." He suggested this to give the soul-devouring tree a chance to enchant the sleepers and prevent them from leaving, at least for a while until he got them out of here.

"I wouldn't mind. I'm very tired and don't feel like doing anything at the moment." Ludwin sounded dejected but seemed to accept the fact that they couldn't leave this place.

"Fine, we'll stay here for a while, then head east and try our luck." Nephis said, her tone normal and her expression indifferent.

Sunny and Cassia agreed, and everyone returned under the shade of the great tree.

"Ha, damn it, I'm hungry." Sunny complained, looking at the demon with dangerous eyes.

"I think I could cook a demon quite well. Does anyone fancy demon steak?" Sunny asked, addressing his friends and Jonathan's cohort.

"You know, I don't think that's a good idea. I won't eat it, but you're free to eat the demon." Cassia said, directing her gaze in Sunny's general direction.

"Why won't you eat it? Aren't you hungry?"

Confused as to why the blind girl didn't want to eat, he turned his face to Nephis, who responded to his silent question:

"Eating an intelligent creature is something Cassia doesn't seem to find acceptable." She explained for her friend, questioning whether they could eat an intelligent creature.

"Well, it's a monster. We've been eating monsters all the time out there, so why would it be different now just because it's intelligent?" Sunny questioned his friends.

"Don't you think it's immoral to eat another living being that was intelligent?" Sasha asked, seemingly sharing the same morality as Cassia.

Sunny was very confused but understood what the girls meant. He also thought and questioned the lack of moral sense his master Julius hadn't taught him.

Thus, the hours passed and no one ate anything. They occasionally talked but mostly focused on their own thoughts.

As for Jonathan, he spent the whole day puzzled, not by any danger, but by a strange sensation he felt when sensing the souls of his friends.

He could, what? Intuit what they felt at the moment. That was something he had never experienced, so he decided to check his runes to see if anything in his abilities had changed.

"Runes."

Name: Jonathan

True Name: Soul Appropriator

Rank: Sleeper

Class: Monster

Thread Cores: [2/7]

Soul Threads: [874/2000]

Attributes: [Lost Soul] [Deception] [Lost] [Voracious Soul] [Flame of Divinity] [???]

Aspect: [Puppeteer]

Aspect Rank: Divine

Innate Ability: [Foresight]

Aspect Ability: [Soul Control]

Nothing seemed particularly changed but... When he glanced a bit lower, his mind froze for a moment as he read the new runes below his aspect ability.

Legacy Aspect: [Path of the fool]

Description: [A legacy specially made by -unknown- to aid his blessed on the path to divinity.]

...

"Legacy... Aspect... Legacy Aspect! How, when, and how did I get a legacy aspect? That doesn't... Wait. Maybe... it happened when... That could be the reason. But the legacy's description, I really don't get a good feeling about its name, and again this -unknown- is mentioned."

Closing his eyes for a moment, Jonathan entered his soul. Still fearful of the being hiding there, but not as much as the first time, since thanks to its help he managed to kill the corrupt demon.

Still, he feared disturbing such a being, so he only planned to check his soul for a moment and then leave.

...

It was the same as before the demon invaded. There was no longer a crack in his soul, nor a lack of threads in his skies. It was calm, with ethereal thread rain, fog everywhere, and a wooden floor.

But, there was also a change. Now there wasn't just one thread core; there were two thread cores.

"Alright, it's time to test this." He closed his eyes and concentrated, searching for the feeling he had grasped during the fight against the corrupt demon.

...

Ethereal threads began to move, and his cores started to spin. All the threads were chaotic, moving erratically everywhere, his soul now a chaos of erratic movements.

"This feels very strange, controlling my own soul in the same way I would control another to make it my puppet feels the same but with different results. This is more like controlling countless threads one by one and guiding them somewhere. The puppets feel like an extension of myself in another body, dividing my mind in two and having precise control over myself and my puppet as one."

Reflecting on this, he let himself be carried away for a while, controlling all the threads, reaching the farthest ones and...

"What is this? It feels different." He attracted the ethereal thread so deep in his soul that the fog obscured what made it so strange.

When the strange thread arrived, Jonathan's eyes widened at the sight of a human he didn't recognize or remember killing.

The figure was tall and athletic, exuding a certain natural authority despite hanging there. His face seemed well-defined, his eyes deep and penetrating, with long, dark hair falling down his back. He wore garments reminiscent of nobility from my world, but what surprised me the most was what adorned his silky hair and kept it in place.

A crown very similar to "The King's Legacy" given to me by the corrupt demon. "It can't be, right? I killed a grotesque creature, it can't have turned into a handsome man out of nowhere, right?"

Confused, Jonathan decided to leave the mysterious man for later and exited his soul.

He looked at the others who weren't far from him; no one was speaking, each lost in their own thoughts.

He began to sense their souls again, and once more, he felt something different in his sense.

From Nephis, he could sense something akin to unwavering determination. In Sunny, he detected confusion and caution.

Sasha seemed to feel apprehension about something, perhaps her thoughts causing such a feeling.

Ludwin seemed desolate, his soul projecting a feeling of sadness. "Poor guy, he thinks he'll be separated from his family forever or die here without seeing them again..."

He looked at Isaac, and, well, he didn't seem to feel anything, or at least Jonathan couldn't sense anything from his soul. It was something unfathomable and elusive concerning everything related to him.

"Alright, this is useful in its own way. Now, for why I got here and what I need to do, it's time to prepare things."

"Hey, I'm really hungry and, I don't know if you've noticed yet, but those fruits over there look really appetizing." When everyone turned to look at him, he pointed to a large fruit growing from the tree.

Everyone looked at him, and Sunny spoke before anyone else.

"You're not thinking of eating that fruit, are you? It's obvious that there's something really wrong with it if it grows on this tree." Sunny said, feeling caution and some fear at the idea of eating the tree's fruits.

"Well, if I turn into a monster, you can kill me, but I'm going to try that thing. Don't bother saying more, I won't back down." He said as he got up and ran towards the juicy fruit.

He was fascinated to know what the fruit described as tasting celestial in the novel would be like.

He grabbed a large fruit and took a big bite.

The taste was, to say the least, exquisite.

Putting aside the fruit, it was time to put the plan into motion.