Chapter 1387 (Patreon)

One advantage of the time I spent up north observing the giant’s discovery of religion was that I could easily jump over to the Nexus Tower and check in. Due to that, it was a fairly simple and not all that arduous to visit Luna every day, often multiple times a day, and observe her ever-growing collection of bunnies. They were, quite frankly, rather adorable, even if I wasn’t quite sure I agreed with the way she was getting attached to them. She was treating them like pets rather than animals and test subjects, which meant she was forming a strong emotional bond with them. It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing; we had the strength and security to consistently meet and fulfil our own needs, so we had the resources to raise these little critters and wouldn’t starve as a result, but still, it didn’t feel quite right. Maybe because a part of me was still in the mental state of an apocalypse and prioritising survival, something these critters only contributed to by being a readily available source of protein. It wasn’t as if these rabbits could work for their food, like a dog could, or acquire anything remotely close to a dog’s intelligence. 

However, the more important thing I was observing wasn’t the living rabbits. Or maybe living wasn’t quite the right differentiator, as the rabbits I was eagerly and carefully observing were alive, or rather, they were getting to the point of being classified as alive.

Luna’s growth tanks, made from a clear, relatively durable crystal-glass and stone, held multiple rabbits at different stages of growth, as she experimented with their growth cycles and ways to speed up the process. After all, it would be rather annoying if Sigmir’s body came out of the tank as an infant and would need decades to grow up slowly. Not the end of the world, certainly, but it would definitely slow down my own desires. And I had no idea how an infant body would deal with the soul of an adult Sigmir, let alone the physical architecture to house an adult mind. Could that even work, or would trying to create Sigmir’s mind within an infant's body cause massive issues due to the mismatch? 

I had no idea, and it wasn’t something I was willing to test. Certainly not with Sigmir. Though the whole issue with testing this process was something else entirely. I had a vague idea that resurrecting her would be a big deal. As in, something the system itself, and certainly the various gods, would take notice of. And not necessarily notice in a good way, as resurrection, especially with this much time and into an entirely new body, making it more a feat of reincarnation, was most certainly a miracle. Their domain, and I was intruding. 

Even now, I easily remember the casual ease with which the divine wolf had killed me when I accidentally stumbled into His domain while working my Blood Magic. While that hadn’t been quite the same as I was planning now, especially given that Lady Hecate was giving me some support and, at least, tacit approval, I likely wouldn’t get struck by lightning or some other direct divine punishment. 

But that didn’t mean the Gods would simply sit by and ignore it if I decided to push my experiments too far. It was something I would probably have to discuss with Lady Hecate: how much experimentation with reincarnation and resurrection would be allowed, and how far I could push things before investing in a set of lightning rods or even a large copper dome for experimentation was necessary. 

For now, however, I was simply observing how the rabbits were growing from microscopic clumps held together by Luna’s magic into the fully formed beings they were decanted as. Granted, even then, they were only the size of large grapes, but that was just their size, nothing more. 

Unless they were part of Luna’s current project. For her latest series of experiments, she was trying to grow them into fully grown and mature adults, which came with its own challenges. Mostly regarding their growth after the foetal stage, at the point when they would normally have been born. During that stage of their lives, their bodies weren’t supposed to remain motionless within a fluid-filled tank; they would normally run around somewhere, hide from predators and feast on as much grass and greenery as possible. Maybe even start on that next generation of rabbits, as the old simile implied. 

But those weren’t really the rabbits I was focused on. Instead, my focus was on the rabbits in the early stages, starting when they were barely large enough to see with my enhanced senses. It was quite impressive; there was some very faint activity even at that stage, almost a precursor to the Mind and Soul I could detect in later stages of their growth.

The realisation wasn’t a particularly welcome one. From what I could tell, there wasn’t a singular point at which the Soul was, for lack of a better word, added to the fetus. Instead, the process was gradual, starting at that early stage, after about a third of the entire growth cycle and continuing right until the end. If I assumed that the same held true for Giant and Giant-blood, it would mean that the entire process would start roughly two months after the experiment’s start and continue on until Mind and Soul were fully bound to the Body, at the end of the initial growth cycle, roughly eight months later. Unless we used Luna’s work to accelerate the growth, this would mean I would have to cast constantly for those eight months, essentially sitting in front of the growth tank for the entire time. While I was willing to make that sacrifice for Sigmir, it wasn’t a proper solution, as even I would fold long before those eight months were over. 

And interrupting the integration of her Soul into the new body could be troublesome. Devastating even, as the formation of her Mind would be tightly tied into that same process. No, I would have to find a way to automate the integration so it can run with dedicated oversight rather than constant manual adjustments. Or something like that. I was once again reminded that this was all a work in progress on my end.

Which might just be a good thing, as it reinforced the need to continue my work on the Soul Gems and prisons, so I could keep Sigmir’s soul contained and protected while integrating it into her new body. Though I might have to consider something else.

Namely, how to keep Sigmir entertained while within the Soul Gem. Otherwise, I might essentially plunge her into a dark void for months on end, total sensory deprivation. Something I wouldn’t wish on an enemy, mostly because their mind would likely break long before the time was up, rendering them useless, and most certainly not something I would ever do to my beloved Sigmir. No, if the process truly needed Sigmir to remain within the Soul Gem for months, I would have to figure out a way to keep her sane.

Thinking back, I vaguely remembered the ritual the Grandmother had used to rid Sigmir of the curse that the stupid shaman had afflicted her with. The curse had clung to her Soul, implying that the vision, experience or whatever you wanted to call it, that allowed me to remove it had, somehow, taken place within her Soul, or in the space created by our Soul Bond.

Which, in turn, had a few interesting implications I had never fully considered, but now, they were quite violently smacking me in the face, making me feel more than a little stupid. Especially given that I was now able to see an obvious pattern, something I should have recognised, at least if I had ever taken the time to think and consider. But apparently that had never penetrated my mind, making me shake my head in disbelief.

The fact that every vision, every non-meditative experience I had that involved my own Soul had me take the form of a dragon couldn’t be a coincidence. If it had only been after my involvement with the Nidhogg, I would have assumed that the massive dragon had something to do with it, maybe making me consider him the epitome of power and something I wanted to emulate, but the first time I had experienced that was back in Neyto, healing Sigmir. Long before I had fully realised what was within the Soul Prison, when I had just started to journey to break it. 

Now, I only had to figure out what that meant, beyond some strange implications. And what I could do about it, if there was a way to make use of it or if it was merely a strange curiosity that I could acknowledge and move on, trying to get my Sigmir back without breaking her mind or soul in the process.