The Lone Wanderer

Chapter 605 – Mysterious material

Sinking into his new body, Percy found himself cramped inside the cracks in the beast’s soul. He was hit by a wave of rejection, his latest host clearly not big on sharing, nor interested in getting healed.

Percy didn’t know whether this was due to the personality of this particular beast or an excessive amount of aggression brought about by its higher grade, but he had no interest in trying to placate the creature.

With practiced ease, he stirred the slumbering fiends inside his soul, causing a series of thin, spider-like limbs and long hairs to sprout across the surface of his wisp. The spectral appendages dug into the creature’s soul, gripping the fragments tightly, but Percy was only getting started.

His wisp melted and wriggled, assuming more specialized shapes like clawed hands, hooks, tweezers and even suction cups, expanding to fill up all the available space and get a better hold on his host’s soul.

One thing that he hadn’t expected upon absorbing the Amorphos was how well it would synergize with his Parasitic Connection spell. This clearly wasn’t what the Mimicry trait was for – but then again it wasn’t what any of his traits were for – just a fortunate side-effect of having so many fiends scattered inside his soul.

Adding Micky’s assistance and the experience that they had accumulated after possessing thousands of hosts over the past few years, their Spectral Art had grown a lot more powerful.

Percy still generally avoided taking his hosts over by force when possible – especially when it came to sapients – but he wasn’t going to lose sleep over a random alien beast that wouldn’t have even been alive if not for him. And not just because he didn’t sleep.

Due to his connection to his main body, he wasn’t overly concerned about the creature’s injuries either, as he had access to all the phantom mana he might need to stitch its soul up.

‘I suppose this is good practice for the next time I meet an asshole host like Kassorith,’ he reminded himself as he slowly took over the creature and wove preservation runes inside its wounds.

Opening his eyes, he found himself submerged. After countless adventures, he knew that water was relatively abundant across the universe, as well as a necessary component in the biology of every living thing he had ever possessed, so ending up underwater was sadly a relatively common occurrence – even if he hadn’t found any aquatic civilizations since Atlantis.

‘At least we can breathe,’ Micky pointed out. ‘It doesn’t look like our host died by drowning.’

Percy nodded. A cursory examination of their body failed to reveal any physical injuries. He didn’t think that the beast had starved either. Judging by the age of its soul, he felt like it had simply reached the end of its lifespan – much like the three-eye cat that he had possessed decades ago. A rather rare phenomenon when it came to beasts.

The good news was that death by old age made the creature’s spectral injuries easier to fix. On the flipside, there was probably a limit to how much extra time they had bought, so they would have to move quickly. Overall, the beast appeared like some sort of aquatic reptile, its body long and lithe.

Scanning his surroundings, Percy noticed that the seawater was a little strange. ‘Hmmm? Why is it red? Is this blood or something?’

It didn’t taste like blood, but that might just be an issue with his host’s sense of taste. Then again, the unique colour of his environment could also be caused by the creature’s eyes, so it was hard to tell what was happening with any certainty.

‘I still think it’s water,’ Micky – who had also grown into a veteran in otherworldly adventures by now – argued. ‘It has the right viscosity and resistance. Maybe there’s something mixed in it?’

Percy’s new host quickly proved physically incapable of creasing its forehead, though that didn’t stop Percy from trying to do just that. Micky was right. The water had a faint grainy texture, almost as if millions of tiny needles were solved in it, constantly prickling their skin.

Luckily, the lizard’s exterior was fairly tough, preventing any injuries, though the same couldn’t be said about its interior. Every breath was unpleasant, the creature’s gills and whatever organ was responsible for filtering oxygen out of the water clearly not being nearly as impervious to the mysterious substance. They hadn’t suffered any notable damage just yet, but they might not be able to stay in this part of the ocean indefinitely.

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It made the area brighter too. Percy guessed that they were located quite deep, as he couldn’t see any sunlight reaching them from above. However, the whole place was illuminated by a strange, ambient glow, making him feel like they were suspended inside a giant, liquid ruby rather than an ocean.

‘Where to now?’ Micky asked.

Percy shrugged. Shrugging was apparently well within his host’s capabilities. ‘The glow is more intense that way. I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s where the demigods are, so we’ll definitely want to check it out at some point. Maybe we should leave that for later though, after getting a better feel for the local ecosystem.’

Not hearing any objections from his companion, he began swimming in the opposite direction, while keeping an eye out for any lifeforms. Fortunately, it didn’t take long to find some. And there were lots.

Much like he and Micky had previously surmised, their host was at Green, placing them solidly at the top of the local food chain – at least if they ignored the existence of the three quasi-divine beasts hiding somewhere on the planet.

That was not to say that it was impossible to get attacked by other Green creatures, but it seemed like food was abundant enough in this area that beasts of their level didn’t need to risk attacking each other. As a result, Percy found it easy to relax and observe his surroundings in peace.

The fauna of this planet shared some similarities with marine life on Remior. Reptile-like beasts were admittedly more abundant than he was used to, but he did find plenty of things that resembled fish or mollusks.

Pulling a scythe out of his spatial seal, he turned it invisible and incorporeal, using the insidious weapon to hunt some of the faster creatures without having to exert his old body more than necessary. Just because other

beasts were less inclined to attack his host, it didn’t mean that he wasn’t going to attack them.Biting a chunk out of pretty much everything unlucky enough to cross his path, he seized the opportunity to learn more about the biology of the native creatures, and to fill his host’s belly so that he and Micky wouldn’t have to worry about starving anytime soon.

Interestingly, none of the creatures possessed anything resembling an internal skeleton. Instead, everything – including his host and even the mollusks – was covered in an extremely hard shell that he had some difficulty biting through even when separated by a full grade.

He wouldn’t exactly describe it as an exoskeleton like what the Starry Wasps on Remior possessed, as it consisted of a series of tiny scales that individually felt harder than any mundane gemstone. They shone in a faint crimson colour, greatly resembling the mysterious powder scattered in the water, making Percy wonder whether it was the same thing.

‘Its toughness isn’t a joke,’ Micky pointed out as they nearly broke their fangs trying to eat some kind of Yellow pufferfish, and not even for the first time.

While Percy couldn’t see the inside of his host’s mouth, he was convinced that the only reason they succeeded in the end was because their curved fangs were also made of the same material as their scales.

‘Yeah… if there’s anything valuable on this planet, I bet it’s going to be this red substance,’ he agreed.

Percy was tempted to store a few litres of polluted seawater in his seal already, though he decided to study this place a little longer first, in case they found something of a higher quality.

Swimming in what he hoped was the same direction, he wanted to see whether they would come across anything different. Nothing seemed to change for several hours, though he eventually noticed that the red glow in his surroundings had grown dimmer, the concentration of the mysterious substance having clearly plummeted.

This only served to reinforce his guess that both the source of the material and the location of the quasi-divine beast were in the opposite direction, but he wasn’t in a rush to turn back just yet.

The water around him had darkened and shifted to a deep purple colour. Presumably, it would turn into something closer to the familiar blue of mundane seas if he kept going this way – at least if he could see anything through the darkness – and if there was anywhere on this planet that had none of the crimson powder.

Luckily, the local fauna illuminated the place somewhat. The creatures were still covered in the same luminescent scales as before, which stood out even more against the dark backdrop of the ocean and helped Percy examine the abyss.

‘Their shells are also a little darker than before,’ Micky pointed out. ‘Just… not as much as the water.’

Evidently, the wildlife in this ocean had the ability to gather the strange material by eating or breathing, using it to reinforce their scales.

Unexpectedly, this place was more popular than the depths of the red region. After a cursory scan, Percy counted roughly twice or thrice as many creatures as before in his immediate vicinity. Their average grade had dropped significantly, however, with more Oranges than Yellows, and even the occasional Red.

If Percy’s hypothesis about the mysterious substance was correct, this didn’t really make sense. Shouldn’t these beasts have flooded the area where the material was concentrated so that they could collect more of it?

‘Maybe they can’t stay there for too long for some reason…’ he guessed.

Breathing the material in had been rather painful even for his host which was a Green, so Percy could only imagine how much prolonged exposure might hurt weaker creatures. Then again, it was just as likely that he was missing other important information.

He was broken out of his thoughts by a Green mollusk lunging at him.