Strawberry Devil in a Fantasy World

In preparation for the transfer, I began creating the perfect clone for myself.

Vorte was here to guide me, or he would have liked to if he had the knowledge. Right now, this stuff was completely new to him that even I could tell he was excited at the prospect of gaining new experience. There weren't many fey beings capable of creating clones like the way I did, at least none that I was aware of.

This one was unlike any other clones I had created. It was created in the image of me, a masterpiece with no flaws.

Reproductive organs? There was no such need! I had the ability to create them if I really wished but I just didn't feel like it.

I nodded with a satisfying smile.

"Perfect, isn't it?"

"Indeed."

It was lying in my bed with its eyes were closed but I knew for a fact that they had the same magical patterns. There was nothing I could do about it.

Unlike other clones I had created in the past, this one was special. I was manually adding pieces of information a bit at a time.

One of the most important was a fey core. Without a fey core, it wouldn't have any abilities or traits. Speaking of which, I wondered if other races had these energy cores.

"Vorte, do other races have cores like we do?"

"For those born with physical bodies, an external core isn't needed to interact with this world. Therefore, some do and some do not."

Basically, that would mean if I didn't have a fey core, I wouldn't be able to have a fey body. Otherwise, if I stayed a normal plant, I didn't need a fey core.

The clone in front of me could be considered a physical body in some sense. However because it wasn't made from flesh like other living organisms, it was no different from a fey body. This one was made from dust and mana, literally. There wasn't a single blood vessel to be found. If I had the power to create a human body from scratch, I would have done that.

"Now what?"

"Add a fey core to it with the abilities and traits you wish to keep."

"And how do I do that? Those are usually done without my knowledge..." I asked while checking my [creation] menus. Immediately after I said that, a new function appeared.

I quickly added, "Wait, never mind. I know how to make one now."

Yet, just as quickly, I ran into problems. For abilities, I could only add [charm] and [strawberry substitution]. Then, for traits, only |bewitching|, |devious|, and |parallel bodies| could be added. The other traits couldn't be added because they only applied to the main body. If I was to transfer myself into that clone which didn't have |creator| and [creation], I would become super weak. That wasn't something to be scoff at. I wanted to be strong! Super strong! Heck, my original wish was to become a god.

"Vorte, I can't transfer my special traits and abilities. Is there another way?"

"Indeed. But first, how familiar are you with your [strawberry substitution] ability and |parallel bodies| trait?"

"I teleport all the time with [strawberry substitution]. As for the latter, I have never used that trait before. It's the only one I'm completely unfamiliar with. Apparently it's supposed to preserve my information in my clone bodies."

"And how exactly do you teleport?"

"I swap a strawberry that I have previously created..."

"I presume these strawberries also act as your clones, with their individual fey cores?"

"Uhhh... I think so? I have been creating ones without statuses recently but that's only recently and only with my hands..." Then, something clicked in my mind, "Wait, does that mean I have been unintentionally allowing that demon to eat my fey cores? That's... not even remotely funny!"

The strawberries grown from plants would always have statuses. Normally, someone eating it wasn't a cause for concern. The issue was if a demon capable of eating souls ate my strawberries. In that case, they would devour the intangible fey cores, and everything stored in those fey cores would never return to me.

"Indeed, if statuses were displayed, then they indeed contained fey cores."

That's just plain creepy. It was eating my fey cores without my knowledge? I knew there was something fishy about that contract! I finally figured it out after all this time. Demons, they're just too cunning! I'll have to dissect his belly and take back my stuff!

"I lost so many fey cores. Is there a way to get them back? What's going to happen to me?"

"Fear not, in the worst case, you may have only lost a few soul fragments. If you wish to retrieve them, you will have to defeat that demon. I trust that is what you intended."

Losing a few soul fragments!? That's no trifling matter! If I hadn't figured anything out, my soul was going to be slowly but surely devoured!

Still, to this date, I didn't feel like any part of me was missing. I still had my memories as far as I was concerned.

"That fiddle doodle, I'll beat him blue and black! I'll teach him a lesson never to mess with the almighty me!"

"Let us not be hasty."

"Yeah, I know. So what now?"

"Your teleportation ability and your |parallel bodies| trait function very similarly. You can think of it as one and the same."

"How so?"

"You see, both your ability and trait links all of your clones. The former links you to strawberries which allows you to swap at your leisure. The latter links all your clones and keeps a backup of all your information stored in your fey core."

"Oh, I see! But I don't get to choose what gets backed up, or... Do I?"

"Very good, you're seeing the bigger picture. Go on." He prompted.

"Basically, I should try to alter the backup to my ideal by removing contract information and the unwanted trait. If that is successful, I would kill myself and allowed to reboot?"

"Indeed. However, there might be clones that contain your old information. You must sever those links or destroy them to prevent their information from overwriting your ideal self."

Either destroying or severing the links to my clones required the same amount of effort, that being a simple command in my [creation] menu. It was kind of sad that I would have to destroy all those saved teleportation locations. Furthermore, I would have recreate more clones later to gather resources for me.

The moment I destroy all my clones, De Planck was bound to take action. This seriously wasn't a trivial matter.

Hmm... Why don't I just collect the fey cores from the clones? Either way, that stupid demon is going to notice something went wrong.

"Vorte, I've decided to destroy some of the clones and leave some clones around. I can retrieve the fey cores from here."

"Very well, that is your choice."

With a single command, I destroyed all the special clones that specialized in collecting resources. Without their fey cores, I wouldn't be able to control them anymore and they would simple become lumps of biological matter. By destroying them using my ability, most of the resources spent on creating them would return to me, including the fey cores.

As for the clones that grew strawberries, I only extracted their fey cores. With the fey cores returning to me, I would no longer be able to control them both remotely. This also meant the original fey plants immediately returned to normal plants. Well, this type of clone was only found in a few locations so the ramifications were quite insignificant. One of them was the kobold villages, or kobold mountain as I called it. The other was where the elves visited daily. Whether extracting fey cores would kill the physical bodies, I didn't know and I didn't care.

I actually had to destroy the ornamental strawberry plants in my garden as well. They were then replaced with some fake grasses and pebbles.

"Phew! All done!" With that said, I closed a tiny portal that connected to the outside world.

On a side note, I only removed the fey cores from Smoothie clothes. I didn't want to hear her complaints the next time she saw me.

For now, I couldn't teleport to her anymore but it was just for a short while. I had a gist of her whereabouts anyway.