Percy’s wisp stretched, filling the gaps in his host’s soul.

Strictly speaking, this person’s injuries weren’t that serious – they had barely crossed the threshold of lethality, and they didn’t seem to be worsening very fast either. Whatever calamity had befallen the poor residents of this planet was clearly taking its sweet time in claiming their lives. It appeared to be a matter of years – maybe even decades – at the earliest. Probably not days or months.

Letting much of his stashed mana out, Percy used it to stitch the fragments together, weaving dozens of preservation runes in his host’s soul. It didn’t take long for the situation to stabilize, allowing him to tap into the body’s senses. Curiously, his host hadn’t yet shown the slightest sign of life, however.

‘Hello? Anybody there? Don’t tell me it’s another brain-dead person…’

No. That wasn’t quite right. This soul felt different to Takeo’s or Leo’s. If anything, they resembled Leo after the Wiseman’s Chamber. Their mind was there, in a seemingly healthy state, but it didn’t respond to his stimuli.

‘Sleeping? Come to think of it, I do feel a little sleepy myself…’

Percy instinctively moved his hand to cover his mouth, yawning.

Wait… yawning?

That didn’t make any sense either! Percy now possessed the Insomnia trait. All his clones should have it too. Not only should he not be feeling sleepy, his host should have also woken up by now!

Opening his eyes, he found himself resting on a bed. Not a very comfortable one at that. The mattress was just a slab of stone – cold, smooth and hard. The low ceiling was just a flat surface of the same material, as were the walls. Though he did see several lines delineating the stone in the walls, indicating that the architects of this structure had stacked several massive blocks together.

Countless rows of strange symbols adorned the material. It wasn’t quite like the writing he was used to – this language seemed more primitive than that, with elaborate hieroglyphs telling some kind of ancient story.

Still…

‘I think I can read these,’ he realized.

Whatever this language was, his host was clearly well-versed in it. That said, he wasn’t quite ready to worry about that, having yet to figure his own situation out. Left with no better option, he pulled up his Status to make sure his trait was still there, and to see what other information he could learn.

___

Rasef (Percival's clone)

Spectral traits:

* [Weaving] – Boosts one’s proclivity in manipulating one-dimensional structures.

* [Insomnia] – Eliminates the need for sleep.

Spells:

* [Soul-to-soul – Crude]

* [Secret Art: Soul Resonance – Refined]

* [Spiritforged Cauldron – Refined]

* [Reinforcement – Refined]

* [Spectral Art: Phantomscale Regalia – Masterful]

Alchemic principles:

* [Extraction] – Separate and condense an ingredient’s essence.

* [Pacification] – Delay an ingredient’s activation rate.

* [Redirection] – Adjust an ingredient’s effect.

* [Deattunement] – Prevent multiple conflicting ingredients from reacting with one another.

* [Bonding] – Enrich an ingredient with crystallized pure mana.

* [Restructuring] – Alter an ingredient's phase.

* [Scaling] – Brew a greater volume of ingredients at once.

Decrees:

* [Phoebe’s Decree] – Grants access to your Status.

* [Moirais’ Decree (Incomplete)] – Grants the seed of a second mana core. Requires potent life mana to germinate.

* [Metatron’s Decree] – Open a one-way portal to the Vault of Magic at will.

* [Ea’s Decree (Modified)] – Augments and enhances your Status.

___

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

Percy frowned at the sight.

Sure enough, his trait was exactly where it was supposed to be, which meant that whatever had induced his drowsiness had somehow overpowered it. Was the affliction plaguing these people somehow related to this insidious sense of lethargy?

More importantly, he quickly spotted a few other things he had never encountered before in his travels.

‘My host doesn’t have any mana cores! None at all! How is this even possible?!’

Everyone needed a mana core to survive. Even Takeo’s Status had listed both of his cores, despite the fact that the boy had never awakened either of them. Percy’s current host should have had them too. His soul was clearly at Green. Percy wasn’t an amateur – he’d learned to identify his hosts’ grades decades ago. But how could Rasef have a Green soul, without a Green core?

Furthermore, Percy had obviously passed him the Moirais’ Decree too, but the seed of his second core wasn’t there either.

Scanning his surroundings once more, Percy focused on a detail he hadn’t paid much attention to earlier. Everything around him was monochrome – the bed, the room, and even his own body softly glowed in a deep shade of red. Earlier, he had ignored that fact, chalking it up to his host being colourblind or something. Perhaps there was more to it than that, however.

‘It looks a bit like mind mana…’

There was no mistaking it. Percy had run into the rare affinity a bunch of times in the past. Phoebe’s mana had permeated the temple where he had tested for his affinity, and the enlightenment potions he had fed to his familiar had sported the same colour.

It could be a coincidence, but he didn’t think that was the case.

So, was that what this was? Could it be, that he wasn’t in the physical world at all, but rather… inside someone’s mind?

Getting off the bed, he felt the ground beneath his host’s bare feet. It was solid – made of stone like everything else. Walking up to the wall, he traced the engravings with his fingers, feeling the jagged edges – even nicking his skin on a sharp tip at some point.

‘It sure feels real…’

Even if Rasef’s mind had somehow been extracted from his body and stuffed inside someone’s mind – or perhaps his own – that didn’t explain how Percy had managed to possess them. Souls were supposed to go inside bodies… And minds – in his experience, at least – went inside souls…

‘Maybe that doesn’t always have to be the case…’

Percy couldn’t help but think back to Rei’s words. Souls were a record of one’s experiences. If somebody’s mind found itself in some kind of virtual world, where it could survive and walk around in some semblance of a physical form… Would their soul then adapt to the situation, inhabiting the fake body as if it was real?

It was admittedly quite a leap of logic, but he felt it was close to the truth. Still, that left several questions unanswered.

Who or what had done this to these people? Another faction? A powerful god? Or something else entirely? Was Percy currently inside a dream? And if so, who did this dream belong to? Was Rasef simply trapped inside his own mind? Or where they currently in the dying god’s mind?

The thought made him shudder.

‘Well, if I’m lucky, the god might be asleep too. Though I could end up the same if I’m not careful.’

Whatever the case was, this was certainly a dangerous place. Percy could think of a dozen things that could go wrong, just off the top of his head. At the same time, it was a place brimming with opportunity. If he was truly inside a god’s dream, then who knew what knowledge he might find, lying around.

Percy doubted he’d find anything tangible that he could bring back to Remior, but treasures came in all forms. This world – or at least the world his host had originally come from – had definitely produced gods in the past, so he might find some alchemic secrets in here.

‘Let’s make this quick then.’

Before leaving the small room, Percy scanned his body more carefully, to see what he was dealing with. His host appeared humanoid, though he was quite lanky. If Percy gauged his proportions correctly – and if they correlated to this person’s original body – he was probably a man standing at around two metres tall. His limbs appeared thin and frail, each only sporting four digits. Rasef wore nothing but a simple kilt, just about covering his privates and his thighs. There was no reflection in the room, so Percy didn’t have any way to check his own face, but it didn’t really matter much either.

Next, he shifted his attention to the engravings on the wall, hoping they contained information that could help him.

‘Rasef… Orange-born… fire affinity… born in 13,234 AC… son of Beku and Lenut… resident of Dir’Ylos town in the Maharian desert… husband to Henia… father to Sefen and Tiya… enlisted as a Divine Knight in 13,307 AC… succumbed to the Slumber in 13,325 AC… sealed in the Sanctuary in 13,327 AC…’

There was a lot more there, but Percy quickly realized it just listed his host’s personal information. Whoever had stuffed him inside this dream – the Sanctuary, presumably – had clearly felt the need to preserve the information, probably not expecting this man to ever wake up again. Even with Percy’s trait affecting him, the guy’s mind appeared too corrupted to as much as stir in his slumber.

‘Well, I don’t know how long this illness would take to overpower my trait entirely, but I’d rather not bring this crap back to my main body...’

Percy briefly considered leaving immediately, not wanting to risk getting infected. That was when he noticed something that sent a chill down his borrowed spine.

He could barely feel his cord!

He had no idea when this had happened, but something was blocking his connection to his main body! Unless he solved this issue, he might not even be able to return.

He was stranded!