CHAPTER 485: CONDUCTOR

‘I don’t really know your father outside of that one memory of him that we’ve watched together but… from what little I have seen, I’m sure that he would’ve been very proud of you,’ the clone said upon noticing his host’s elation. The crow nodded contentedly, the warmth in his soul a poor match for the chill in his crystalline bones.

Sadly, Micky had been separated from both of his parents at a very young age, missing the chance to learn the second part of the Dance from them – assuming they even knew it. Even after decades of fighting for his life in the coliseum, he had failed to discover the external elements of the boosting art by himself, dying a gruesome death at Mixcoatl’s hands.

Thanks to his second chance at life, he and Percy had finally amended that grave injustice, figuring out the rest of the spell. However, Micky’s most recent upgrade constituted far more than a personal achievement. It was an important milestone for the people of Huehue as a whole, and proof of something beyond the original form of the boosting art.

Going a step farther than anyone before them, Percy and Micky had upgraded the technique to the Carnival and Symbel of the Savage Gods!

Granted, those versions were tied to their unique circumstances, requiring their specific affinities and mutations to work, among other things. Suffice to say, they weren’t useable by anybody else. Even so, their ability to improve upon their Wild Arts to this extent had proven that Micky’s heritage had been incomplete to start with – that Rhaziel and his greedy allies had devastated Huehue before Micky’s ancestors managed to fully explore the limits of their grand invention.

If Percy was right, there was a lot more that could be done with it. Perhaps, he and his familiar would bring a more generalized upgrade of the boosting art back to the crow’s homeland one day, teaching it to its enslaved inhabitants and driving their oppressors away.

‘Let’s focus on surviving the Blues and Violets here on Remior first, before daydreaming about challenging gods,’ the clone thought with a sigh.

Turning his attention inwards, he resumed working on the same project that had kept him busy for the past few months. The clone had spent all his efforts trying to improve his Secret Art – at least whenever he hadn’t been helping Micky with his own spell.

Now that both the crow and Percy’s main body had reached the limit of their individual strength for the near future, it was time to finally perfect their teamwork. The two had already grown quite proficient at sharing their senses and fighting side by side without getting in each other’s way, but that wasn’t quite the same as fully leveraging the advantage of their intimate connection. That was why the clone had slowly developed a system that he hoped would allow his companions to cooperate better.

‘I’m ready to return,’ he told the original, peeling his wisp off the surface of Micky’s soul and unwinding the cords on the way back to his own body. His memories blended with the original’s, two similar but not identical recounts of the past few months flashing before his eyes.

Weaving the intricate Cloak… slowly perfecting Micky’s boosting art… eating half-roasted fish while gazing at the tall waves… his time in Thess’kala… registering the compression principle… chasing the slippery assassin… enduring the painful onslaught of his three subordinates… undergoing the dangerous ritual… returning to the mainland…

The clones Percy equipped Micky with were some of his longest-lived. Under different circumstances, assimilating half a year’s worth of memories would have been a daunting and disorienting experience. Luckily, the process was made smoother by the fact that they’d shared their senses throughout the majority of those moments and had been largely aware of each other’s thoughts.

Once his throbbing headache had calmed down a little, Percy pulled out another chunk of his soul, using his family’s technique to fashion it into a thrumming blob of grey mana. He knew he had to act fast – not only because the next group of Blues might show up at any moment, but also because this was the last morsel of practice he would get at crafting his clones before the operation in the Fungal Spire.

Percy hadn’t sent out any clones lately, opting to sacrifice a few weeks of adventuring to keep his cords available. He planned to possess as many Blue wasps as the situation would allow, to maximize his odds of getting his hands on the egg.

‘There’s still a good chance I’ll fail, but I suppose I can always place Nephthys’s soul in a different body and try again for a wasp familiar some other time.’

Shaking the unpleasant possibilities of failure out of his mind, he severed the grey wisp from the rest of his soul. All his senses went dark as a result, making him realize that he was the new clone. That state only lasted a moment before he found himself embracing his familiar’s soul again.

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Applying a layer of phantom mana to keep himself from merging with the crow, he allowed his wisp to spread along the silver surface, moving around one of the cords to wrap the second around it. As soon as the twin connections were tightly coiled together, he worked with the main body to widen them again, reactivating Soul Harmony – the spell that formed the very foundation of his ongoing project.

He and his companions then took a few minutes to clear their minds and get used to their new reality before continuing on their journey to the Fungal Spire. It wasn’t until a couple of hours later, when everyone had fully calmed down and made peace with their shuffled thoughts, that they began working on the spell.

Strictly speaking, recycling the clone hadn’t been necessary, because the main body’s role in the new technique was minimal. The brunt of the work would be handled by the clone, who already understood what he was supposed to do, having spent months planning everything out. That said, bringing the original up to speed would only make everything easier.

‘I’m starting,’ the clone warned.

A soft melody rang in their shared mind – one that they all found intimately familiar. Naturally, it was the song that the original Micky had played on his kik’lit for Percy back on Huehue – the music that Percy had tried his best to replicate on his shoddy ocarina. The very same tune that had allowed him to inadvertently, yet successfully, restore some of his friend’s forgotten memories on a couple of occasions, upgrading his Secret Art both times in the process.

Initially, the clone hadn’t intended the song to form the basis of a third spell upgrade – he had merely wanted to help his friend. Seeing how his main body had been too busy with other matters to play the instrument for Micky, he had taken it upon himself to reproduce the melody directly through the connection, in an attempt to jog more of the bird’s memories.

The intimate connection provided by Soul Harmony was already potent enough for the song to sound crisp and clear in everyone’s minds – especially to Micky who even shared a body with the clone. In fact, the music currently sounded as if it was played on a real instrument by a master musician, since Percy could just ignore any physical limitations like his lacking pair of limbs or insufficient practice.

Of course, the tune was slightly different from the original, though that was by design. At some point, the clone had decided to play around with some variations, because he hadn’t been able to dig any new memories out with the previous version in a while, and because the song had an additional purpose now. ʀÁNƟꞖÊš

The main part of the tune was the one that Percy had never quite managed to reproduce on the ocarina – an uplifting melody, like something a mother would play for her child to cheer them up. Percy had given it some extra flavour, however, enriching the music further.

It was performed by the gentle voice of the whistling pines that Percy and Micky had spent their early days listening to, a healthy dose of added optimism forcefully injected into the song to remind the crow that he was no longer alone in the world. It spoke of a fresh start and a new family. Of camaraderie and a second chance at life. Of dreams and ambitions.

The second part had changed somewhat too, but not as much. The clone was playing it in the sound of the original kik’lit again, though it was more prominent than before, as if demanding an equal place in the composition as its louder counterpart.

It was solemn and melancholic, reminding Percy and Micky of all the hardships that they had endured – of all the challenges that they had overcome. It spoke of adversity and of the fight for one’s place in the world. Like a people cursed without an affinity, trying to protect their home. Or a boy with a Red core, looked down by all.

But it now also spoke of Remior’s wrath, and of the frigid wastelands on Huehue’s dark side. Of cruel gods, scheming titans, and treacherous allies. Of countless enemies seeking one’s death, and of the tragic fate that had befallen one’s family. Of decades spent imprisoned in a dark cell, or enslaved by a sadistic boy. Of longing toward an impossible goal, and a bitter race against time itself.

Micky had actually been the one to request many of the changes.

The crow had told the clone that he no longer sought to return to the person he’d once been. He did wish to recall his past, but to also retain his present – the new life he’d been given. And to fight alongside Percy, forging a new future for them both.

Fortunately, the melody’s more balanced duality worked in Percy’s favour too, given what he wanted to achieve with it. What had started as the clone’s attempt to help Micky had transformed into something else – something just as important. He had realized at some point that this was the perfect way for his main body and Micky to coordinate in battle!

Like a conductor, the clone could push either part of the melody to the forefront, to signal the others to attack or fall back. Even better, the dense information contained in the rich song would allow him to convey more detailed strategies to his companions. By adjusting certain features – such as the tempo or the pitch of either tune – he could let the others know whether to group up or spread out, when to defend each other or put pressure on their enemies, or even when to change targets.

That way, the original and the crow could focus on their own battles for the most part, while the clone tapped into their senses, observing the entire battlefield from two distinct vantage points, and making the best decisions for the group.

‘The best part is that they don’t even need much practice to get this to work,’ the clone thought, a hearty grin tugging at the corners of his borrowed beak.

The clone had spent a lot of time considering how to best communicate the information to the others, fine-tuning the strategy to its most fundamental and actionable building blocks. By sharing Micky’s body, he could nudge the crow in the right direction until the latter got used to the spell. Meanwhile, by feeding his memories to his main body, he had already taught him everything he himself knew – meaning that they were almost ready to put everything to the test.

Now, he just needed some volunteers to try the spell on. Luckily, Remior’s elites didn’t keep him waiting for too long, the second group of Blues barring his path the very next day.