LIGHTNOVELONLINE Chapter 33: Through the looking glass
The act of hunting down myriads of monstrous creatures on her way allotted Alicia a respectable amount points along with a particularly convenient skilltree of Autoanimaphagy.
It allowed her to use overflow of points to directly improve a statistic’s total tally - which she used extensively to improve her lagging vitality, something that bothered her to no end along with other miscellaneous skills she wanted to try out. However only after investing excessively into Constitution did she notice that there were diminishing returns - an improvement of only 2%.
‘It's better to discover skills related to their base and promote those than to brute force it but it's not a big commitment since I can reclaim some of it. Not an efficient conversion, but it is good to have options.’
In her hunting binge of familiarizing herself with beasts of prey Alicia felt stirring tingle within and an impulsive craving in a place where she didn’t know. At first imperceptible then growing in severity enough to be noticed, it was manageable then but as time went on the increasing zeal was disrupting her judgement and incitement causing her to be more aggressive and reckless. Trying to maintain focus was becoming difficult by the moment due to her disquiet mind.
Small mistakes and missteps were adding up to mounting injuries. Though they were promptly healed by Regeneration their frequencies were becoming closer to each other. After finding a safe place in a clearing she concentrated.
- ‘Alice are you okay? Is something wrong?’
- ‘…want to… kill… but not… hungry…’
Sharing a mind, even without direct communication two could understand each other on a fundamentally deeper level. As though a dam had broken Alicia’s thoughts were flooded by intense craving for blood, for slaughter originating from Alice.
- ‘Is this her… hunting instinct? Do I have to turn back into my original form… and kill something that way to stop this?’
>Recommendation. Educement of skill Kindred: Control allows administrators to assume direct control over units created.
During active control the administrator's consciousness shifts to the host unit.
- ‘You want us to split up our minds?’
>The action is expected to improve mental acuity.
- ‘Any one of them should work yeah?’
>System advises the candidate unit created by spell Mirror image; improved by educement Doppelgänger.
- ‘Whatever you say… go ahead……’
Wasting no time Alicia immediately created a copy of herself, in the only way she knew how. Using water, since there wasn’t any body of water nearby she had to gather some from the air and create the remaining through magic.
｢ Mirror Image ｣
↳ 〔 Doppelgänger 〕
- ‘Alright Alice… all yours…’
- ‘…’
‹ Control ›
As their consciousness separated her vision darkened into blackness, dissonant thoughts vanished in an instant bringing back the much needed clarity. Be that as it may be, Alicia was overcome with an inexplicable sense of loss and solitude. Hollow and empty, in her heart and in her mind. As she was recovering from the initial shock, something skittered away. Finally getting accustomed to her feelings her sight returned to her. Looking around she saw the glimpse of white escaping the vicinity.
- “Alice! Wait!”
Hurriedly she chased after her, kicking the ground. ‘She might run into something dangerous…’ Despite having the exact same agility stats, Alice was still gaining distance on her. Knowing that she wouldn’t be able to keep up she turned to the trees. Although emulating ‘her’ just from memory was difficult it wasn’t an impossible task. Jumping from one tree to another she could eventually catch up with her other self. ‘Sprinting’ a short distance then stopping motionless before doing it again until she chanced upon some doe-like creature.
Alice cautiously circled around it before rushing it from the side. Turning around to run took too long, before it could even start to flee Alice had her fangs sunk deep into its hinds. Still struggling to escape it was fruitlessly pawing the ground with its front legs loosening soil. As the venom set in its movements dulled and strength escaped its limbs. Dislodging one fang she moved upwards little by little up till the torso where organs were located. As Alice was consuming her catch in front of her Alicia jumped down from her perch.
She wasn’t able to tell from a distance prior but now; ‘She looks different than I am…’
Though there was no difference in their lower halves except on one matter. One of her hind leg was missing. Alice was slightly shorter and younger looking than her but no less beautiful. Her hair with superficial waves was much shorter, ending at around her shoulders. Barely ruffled fringes crowned her ruby like eyes blazing with color. It would’ve made her seem brimming with energy, if she also didn’t have the disturbing impassiveness of a corpse while devouring her feed.
- “Hey? Alice?”
Alicia called out to her while waving her hands. Responding to the sound and movements her eyes shifted around relentlessly following her hand movements. Then after their eyes met Alice minutely tilted her head to the side in inquisition. The act would win over the heart of any if they had the mental fortitude to be able to look past the carcass underneath her being stripped down to its bones by her fangs.
- “…Alishya…?”
- “Good you remember me! Don’t mind me carry on, I just wanted to check up on you. How are you feeling? Have you uhm… calmed down?”
- “may be…?”
- “Don’t worry, just get it out of your system.”
Bone and cartilage jutted out of the creature's hide as its flesh and organs turned fluid and sucked out leaving behind an empty husk hardly resembling what it was.
- “more…?”
- “You want to go more? Sure thing… I’ll tag along though.”
Alice would occasionally take sharp turns and sudden stops before darting off somewhere dragging bodies upon bodies of monsters back in her fangs, the two’s search was cut short by rhythmic shaking of the ground becoming louder and louder. Pushing away trees aside, an olive skinned giant, 15 meters tall humanoid revealed itself. With its only three digits limply hauling a tree… whole fir tree, long dead whose leaves had withered away some time ago. Worn down, smaller branches broken off and its bark stripped away from repeated use. A club made out of a tree, crude weapon nonetheless effective at savagery due to its massive size.
Its vacuous eyes found the two, in a simple minded rage it let loose a cry causing the trees to shake violently, spitting mucus and saliva all over.
- “Forest giant… Don’t know if we can take it-”
Before she could even finish talking the giant swung their club over its head. Causing her to jump and roll to the side, while Alice quickly scampered sideways. Picking up and throwing away twigs and leaves stuck to hair and dusting herself off.
- “Well so much for a choice. You guys, out! Now! Get somewhere safe!”
Crawlers that like to reside in her hair crawled down her body to the ground while some took an abseil to the ground with their silk in compliance. After making sure all of them were out and away… she took some time to evaluate the situation. The giant was swinging at Alice, missing her smashing the ground again and again. Clearly it thought her to be more of a threat and ignoring Alicia not knowing that she was the one possessing their real body. As Alice tried to get close enough to attack it would try to stomp or threaten to smash her, necessitating her to retreat. However its attacks couldn’t land on her either. It was a stalemate but Alicia thought that this wouldn’t last for long.
‘Their skin if it's as tough as Sha’ko said it was, I wouldn’t wanna take my chances with just hacking away at it. Thinnest parts of the skin are… armpit, neck, back of its ears, eyelids… Going for the eyes might seem like a good idea but without sight it’ll likely fall into confusion and anger… wouldn’t want this thing anymore furious than it already is… Venom won’t set in instantly so that’s another problem… Crippling the arms should be my first priority…’
Her nose caught the whiff of foul stench right at that moment.
‘I’m not biting into that cesspool of filth. I’ll see if I can coat my sword with venom…’
⟨ Venom Fang ⟩
↳ ‹ Myotoxic ›
Pooling venom in her mouth; she sprayed her sword with the faintly yellow fluid - the excess flowing along the weapon and dripping down onto the ground - causing it to intermittently sparkle in golden sheen thanks to the crystal-like reflective underlayer of the blade.
- ‘Alice, I’ll make a large web to capture its hand. Have it strike there when it’s ready!’
- ‘…will try…’
‘Web should be strong enough to hold it there for at least a few seconds…’ Scanning around there weren’t any good places to anchor it to. Instead she linked as many trees by their trunk together as she could to share the weight and hoped that their roots were strong enough to hold on. Since her target was quite large, she didn't make their cells as small as she usually would have.
- “Done!”
As she shouted out, after hitting the ground once again, this time the giant sweeped the ground from where it had struck. Gathering soil, wood and gravel along it before hitting Alice. As she couldn’t jump high enough to avoid it and was swept along with it buried underneath the ground. Though it wasn’t a direct hit, through their shared connection even Alicia could feel that did some number on her. Although she was worried she also knew she was still there. Shortly afterwards Alice dug out of the debris. Visibly fine but Alicia knew she wasn’t feeling the best either.
- “Alice! Stay put… My turn now…”
｢ Pyroblast ｣
↳ ‹ Oxy-Acetylene ›
- “This is from me!”
It wasn’t the same large ball of fire she first created, It was smaller, more cohesive, supple and workable. Aimed deadcenter it struck at the giant from the side like a flying arrow. Roaring in agony its hateful gaze was squarely focused on the small girl standing in defiance. From the sizzling flames the horrid stench of burnt flesh emanated and revealed a little bits of the layer of white fat. Because she was amidst a patch of trees it didn’t sweep as it did before, instead falling back onto its overhead swings. Groaning loudly as its swing rankled its wounds.
Unfortunately its attack never hit home. Entangled on a silken net the club stopped a few meters aboveground, a few inches from Alicia. Using the opportunity she grabbed on to her net and climbed on top of the club, using it as a narrow walkway to run up. In panic the mammoth tried to pull back but the web didn’t let it go, the trees that were attached to it bending and flexing but not letting up. As she ran up using its other arm it tried to grab at Alicia. Just as it was nearing her:
｢ Sunder ｣
With a light flick of the blade a cut of wind sliced into its ‘palm’ as it smashed against it, spraying dark maroon blood to splatter down. The wind blew away most of the venom that coated her blade. Not caring much as she could simply coat it again. She often didn’t use these combinations of venom as it was rather dangerous even compared to her neurotoxic venom which was painless and swift unlike this one that prolonged pain and suffering in her victims.
⟨ Venom Fang ⟩
↳ ‹ Necrotoxic ›
Newly coating her blade going past her initial target of the armpit area which had relatively thinner skin, she went straight to the neck using all of her momentum to thrust her blade into it. Venom sat in much faster and the signs of necrosis were immediately presenting themselves. Alicia underestimated her own venom’s speed and intensity as the frame of reference she had was before she acquired Intensified Venom in the Kindred branch of skills. Black eschar spots increasing in numbers and growing larger by the second, sloughs of filled pustules dotted on all over its body bursting out in a rancid fluid. Its very own flesh started to liquefy and fall off in patches. Unable to stand upright it collapsed forwards crashing into the trees.
Alicia couldn’t do the same with naturally synthesized one but through some experimenting she found out that she could control the spread and activation of her magically created venom. Using this she purposefully didn’t let the venom damage the lungs, heart and the brain. Standing in front of its lying head.
- ‘And this is for Alice…’
She used Telepathy to make sure it knew for what and for why.
- ‘…… …’
- ‘Why would I? It’s my nature to fight with an unfair advantage. Give my regards to that girl for me, tell her I’m doing just fine.’
On the onset of hypoxia its eyes lost focus, vision blurred and darkened. Only thing it could feel was the biting cold and its own weakening heartbeat, it wanted to move its limbs… anything but there was nothing to obey its wishes for its limbs no longer exists, the pallid color of death creeped in and soon it fell into a coma, a slumber without morning…
Willingly undoing Mirror Image Alice’s mind returned to Alicia. Along with it the white noise of thoughts also came. It was something she didn’t know she missed so dearly. The gnawing, droning vacancy inside of her disappeared at once. And it felt as if she was… quite literally made whole again…
- ‘am… back…’
- ‘Welcome back, let’s have you go out on your own every now and then to occasionally have you quell that urge shall we?’
- ‘mmm…’
‘Though I prefer you not leaving me for too long you know…’
