Despite that, The Mother still could not force a change upon one who rejected its dominion with absolute certainty.
“No?” The Mother said, more confused than offended. “Is that not accurate? Is that not what has defined your existence? Is that not who you are?”
“It is not accurate at all!” the Flesh Trap said with certainty. “You glance only at my actions, ignoring my mind entirely. I entered this deal with the end goal of rising above my kind. I do not serve as a weapon simply because I want to, but as a means to an end!”
“I look at more than just your actions, child,” The Mother said, voice thick with condescension. “I look at what you believe yourself to be. Though you claim it is a means to an end, you have unwittingly slipped into your role. You are comfortable where you are, you do not wish for the status quo to change.”
The Flesh Trap growled in frustration. “I am comfortable, but I will not stop! This is not who I am! I am a queen among my kind, and I will not stop until I rule over all others! Even if I must reject what I am, I will become more!”
“It is not so simple to reject your own nature. You are an entity of Slothfulness, you will fall into your old ways. It is how you were born. It is the role of monsters to play into their instinct, which is why I am here to guide you along the path you will walk.”
“No. You will guide me to failure.” The Flesh Trap said with absolute conviction. She felt a familiar sensation from the mother, one she sensed before when she ran into a wall attempting to prevent her from reaching the ancient blood-related affinity, what she now knew were system bounds.
She’d broken past the system bounds before. The Mother was nothing more than a wall to stand in her way.
“I Reject You” The Flesh Trap screamed with her full being, denying The Mothers ability to guide her down a predestined path.
With those three simple words, she felt The Mothers hold fail, and consciousness of the great Primordial Child slip away, banished once more to the deep recesses of the earth.
[Achievement Gained! Untethered]
[Untethered
You have denied the influence of a higher being through willpower alone
- Natural affinities are 30% easier to learn and advance
- Identity is greatly empowered
- Increases Soul presence]
* * *
“I… see” Aloran said, unsure of how to react that this Flesh Trap managed to break The Mothers hold over it.
The act wasn’t impossible of course, and there were other recorded cases similar to it. Many higher beings functioned on complex rules which boiled down to “who do I have the right to influence in the material world?” and, outside of that, they were very limited.
Not every case was the same though. The Mother has an innate right to all monsters, including Flesh Traps, in the same way that natural affinities had a right to their creatures. If Aloran likened it to a human, it would be as if Dei managed to reject the very concept of Greed, cutting the emotion off. Greed was a part of all humans, it was built in. How would he even go about denying a concept?
Of course, The Mother was likely easier to deny than an affinity. She was higher than a God, and lower than an affinity. Probably the minimum to earn the Achievement Fang described.
Gods were actually rather easy to deny, as none of them were built-in by nature except for very specific situations, such as the beetles in Aloran’s cave. He’d be utterly shocked if one of his beatles cast him off like a shackle, but it wasn’t impossible.
‘This Flesh Trap, it’s… no, she’s impressive. She might have as much potential as Dei if she keeps up her momentum. She already has an incredibly sturdy sense of self, and might one day become a matriarch to a new Race. How exciting that would be, to see such an extraordinary event from so early on. If I’m correct, that means her meeting with The Mother indicated she now has a connection with the Pride affinity, even if she herself does not hold it as an active affinity. If she can connect with all seven virtues and seven vices…’
As he thought of this, he considered her request as well. She wanted a name, one she’d consider fitting, but she didn’t know how to get it.
Receiving a name was an important step, but much more complicated than it first seemed. Beings could either name themselves by identifying with a particular word very strongly, or be named by someone they would consider an authority over them, usually their parents. The name would become the person's symbol, the call to signify who they are.
Names were not to be taken lightly either, as there was power to be had within them. If this Flesh Trap that Dei called Fang were to have accepted The Mothers proposed name, it was doubtless it would have further solidified her role as a lesser being to Dei, something she perhaps sensed and became the source of rejection.
Truly, The Mother was- dare he say- foolish for not recognizing its potential immediately. To even go against the Primordial Child’s word should have been a warning, but alas, even the strongest beings could make mistakes, and it seemed this one would never earn the chance to remedy that.
“I will give you a name, one which you can accept. If you are unhappy with it, you may say so and I shall reconsider, but I believe the reasoning presented will satisfy you.”
Monster name creation was something he’d looked into once upon a time several centuries ago, and he drew upon that knowledge now as he felt the Flesh Traps mental agreement.
It was not an exact science by any means, much closer to an instinctual gut feeling. There was no real pattern to the names of monsters, usually given by The Mother, but he knew some of the rules the Primordial Child tended to follow.
He asked her more questions, trying to get a feel for who she was, her affinities, and what she wanted her name to represent.
From the conversation, he found that she wanted it to incorporate the two large things she considered herself to be: a creature of Blood, and a “ruler” over her “people.”
The blood part was simple enough for him to understand, as she identified closely with her desire to feast upon other creatures. It was a major part of her Race, and though she danced around the topic, she hinted that she was doing something grand with her own Blood affinity. She was rather cagey about that part, but she insisted that it was integral to her name.
The ruler part was a lot more vague, as she just felt herself standing above the other Flesh Traps. Aloran didn’t think she even knew what rulers were actually supposed to do, or what she would rule if she ever became one. Nor did she really think too hard about who her people would be, or in what manner she would guide them. It seemed she more liked the concept of becoming a ruler, like a child dreaming of one day rising to the throne.
Though he would never say that part aloud.
She was closer to an elite, but if she wanted a name revolving around becoming a ruler, she would get her queenly name. It was her name after all, who was he to decide she wasn’t worthy of it? She would simply have to grow into it.
With the two defining facts of Blood and Ruler, Aloran tried to think back to what noises those two tended to follow.
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If he remembered correctly, Blood tended to start with a harsh sound and flow into something that would roll off the tongue easily. This would be the start of her name.
The concept of Ruler tended towards low humming tones and ending with a whisper.
Making monster names was not based on logic, just feel, so he simply said the first name-ish-sounding word that popped into his head.
“How about Perumah?” he said, genuinely hoping she’d like it. He wasn’t sure why he, as a God, was nervous about her reaction, but he was.
“Perumah… Perumah… I like the noise it makes in your language, but what does it mean?”
Aloran let out a shrug. “Nothing definitive, as I did not base it on any words I know. Going by the naming sense of monsters though, it technically means Blood Queen, but there’s also a lot of overlapping rules, so it might have several double meanings to it as well.”
The Flesh Trap considered it for a while longer. Several minutes, honestly, and Aloran had to keep reminding himself to be patient. Plant creatures always took so long to respond…
Still, she eventually said “This name is more than adequate, it is perfect. Thank you, I accept it.”
As she did, he felt a shift in the air that was difficult for even him to perceive, despite it happening in his domain. If he read it correctly, this meant she now recognized him, at least slightly, as a higher authority and granted him slight power over her name.
He’d never use this, but it was an interesting phenomena to see happen. Truly, this entire debacle showed him that there were still many new things to experience despite his long life.
“I am glad you enjoy it, Perumah. I will leave it to you to tell Dei when he gets back.”
He felt a pang of joy from her the moment she heard her own name and chuckled. After dealing with such complicated decisions for so long, it was nice to have one he could draw simple joy from.
* * *
POV: Dei
As they walked back to Aloran’s cave, he tested out his new body.
There wasn’t much of a difference, but the potential was there. With his new shape-changing Racial Ability, he found altering himself was easy- though painful.
He wasn’t simply changing the shape of his body, it was something more. Since his Identity and Body were now tied together, that changed as well. His Identity dictated what shape his soul took, which was why his Projection form resembled his actual body- how he saw himself was how his soul was shaped.
The new Racial Ability, [Fluid Shape], didn’t just alter his physical body. It altered the shape of his soul, and the body was dragged along in that reshaping.
There were oddities to it though, mainly in that it wasn’t actually damaging to change his body, at least to the degree he was now.
Dei thought lengthening his fingers would do something about the blood circulation, but it seemed the adaptable aspect of it helped rewire his blood vessels, making the new part of his body more viable.
He also noted that the pain he felt from shifting his body around did not originate from his physical self, but his spiritual half. Even lengthening his fingernails was painful, as it involved reshaping the cast his soul wanted to fit into.
It felt like his soul was used to being very, very rigid, and it was only now softening up to accommodate for his new state of being. Dei hoped that his soul shape would become easier to manipulate over time with some practice, because it was simply too frustrating to slowly change his body shape in a wildly painful way that didn’t actually seem to be all that useful.
After testing his newest, most outlandish ability, Dei also tried using his [Soul Echo], the ability that replaced his [Tremor Sense].
Tremor Sense had been a useful, perhaps cornerstone, of his entire build. His Class was dedicated to detecting enemies before they appeared, but he was limited to vibrations, which proved to be an issue on magic-based beings, such as the Trosks he’d faced a while back.
When he cast a pulse from his Soul Echo, it returned promising results.
He was able to receive information about the cave system around him for several miles, much further than Tremor Sense as it was easier to parse through a singular signal rather than an ocean of vibrations. He also found that the pulse functioned on scanning soul shapes too, meaning that he could actually detect flying creatures that didn’t give off as many vibrations to the ground or magical based creatures. Anything without a soul, he would struggle to detect, but even that wasn’t a harsh limitation because he would still be able to see their physical bodies.
If it didn’t have a soul, it would just register as a lifeless mass. The only entity that could theoretically dodge his new ability would be a soulless being made of pure mana, and he didn’t think there’d be many of those. If any.
Aside from the fact that it was now an active ability, there was one more complication.
“Ugh,” he heard Fendrascora say directly into his mind “I don’t know what you just did, but please don’t do that again. I felt my body get disrupted slightly. Not enough to really deal damage, but enough to be very unpleasant.”
Clever, on his shoulder, threw his thoughts in on the matter with a slight whining noise and the words. “It felt… bad. Not good. Like a strong earthquake.”
The new version was sent out as a ping, a very detectable one. He’d have to be more careful with this version, and try to find exactly how close something had to be to detect it; At some point, the effect had to taper off into background noise of anything that felt it.
After using his new Racial abilities, he also checked his resource pool and found that both shapeshifting and using his new ping cost SP, which was actually pretty good. It was his easiest stat to rejuvenate, to the point where it might refill multiple times in a drawn-out fight.
Looking at his stats also reminded him of his new [Soul Strength], which he noted had the same maximum level as his HP
[Soul Strength: 0/192
HP: 192/192]
Following that logic, he basically had a second health pool, making him even more durable. When it ran out though, he’d be taking some serious and potentially permanent soul damage.
‘Actually, with my new Disconnect Skill, soul damage isn’t really permanent anymore, yea? So this can only be a boon. Incredible.’
He was getting better at covering his own weaknesses. He’d planned out his build long ago, when he first discovered the weakness of his magical senses and how he might change Races to help account for that. Now, after so long, his real build was coming together, and it was solid. No more half-baked solutions or patches, he was starting to see that he was a real-deal Slaughterer after doubting himself only a little bit ago.
Making it back to Aloran’s cave, Dei resisted the urge to hum a tune and struggled to keep the smile off his face.
When he crossed the boundary into Aloran’s domain, he also started pushing concentrated Kindness mana back into his [Good Samaritan] Skill to empower it on top of Aloran’s efforts
“Welcome back… Dei? Uh… It’s been less than an hour! What the hell did you go do?!”
Dei laughed at Aloran’s reaction, and couldn’t blame him. It was a harshly drastic change for Dei to rewire the entire way his soul and body interacted.
Starting from the beginning, with what he found in the Lorpee cave and how there was now a Convergence based on Dei’s own intent, he continued with the realization he made that allowed Solidity to level up, and how he decided to do his first act of impressing whatever Leviathan now watched him.
Dei was rather proud of it too, as this was no doubt a massive step in the right direction. Aloran said Dei had to work Connection into everything, and Connection was now running through his veins.
He hadn’t felt much of the Leviathans' presence though. Through the entire process, there was only one instance of joy that was foreign to his mind. When he compressed the Connection down into a finer string, he felt it then. Aside from that? Nothing.
“Well,” Aloran said, “That’s not unexpected. I’m surprised you were able to sense anything at all. Usually, they don’t let you know they’re watching. It’s probably a combination of your unnatural awareness of your soul, and unnatural awareness of all magical effects within your body that combined to give you the slightest glimpse of something else present. No matter, but good fucking job Dei! That’s incredible! It didn’t even occur to me that it would be easier to alter your Skills to better mingle with Connection during a Skill evolution, but that makes complete sense! Not to mention the Class evolution making your total soul more malleable in general. If I were you, I’d hold off on leveling up and keep it in the state it currently is until you get as many evolutions under your belt as possible.”
“You don't have to tell me,” Dei assured him. “If my soul wasn’t as malleable as it currently is during the process, I think I would have done a lot more damage to myself than the simple discomfort I currently experienced.”
They continued going over the entire process, Dei describing exactly what he did and how he repurposed Connection as Aloran first suggested. Aloran even approved of how he recreated the pattern Soul came up with, as there were likely reasons for it. When they were nearing the end of Dei’s recollection, he finally got to ask something Fendrascora wasn’t able to answer earlier.
“By the way, what is the exact difference in using Connection to tie my Identity to my soul as opposed to a normal Solidity? I definitely could have done that with just Solidity alone, but Fendrascora said that there was a qualitative difference in the mana permeating me now. What exactly does that do?”
“That’s a good question, and one I know quite a bit about. I suppose I should start with a few cosmic rules on Rights, Authority, and the like. To help demonstrate this point, let me get a quick confirmation from… yep, your Flesh Trap friend said I’m allowed to tell you her interaction with The Mother.”
“I am called Flesh Trap no longer,” Fang said with pride, “I am Perumah.”
Now it was Dei’s turn to wonder what’d happened while he was gone.