Demon's Virtue

Looking at the book in his hands, Eiro was actually quite surprised. Of course, he was hoping that this would work, but he hadn't expected to actually summon such a physical object. It was a tangible book, even if only given shape temporarily through the combination of different magics. Just sustaining it here outside of his body was constantly draining some of his mana.

But no matter what it was, he had just created a physical object that hadn't existed beforehand. He didn't store and retrieve something that always existed in the physical realm. Looking at it more closely, it seemed to be a physical object created through Arcane magic. Similar to what he created when using spells like 'Mage Hand', simply imbued with different magics, most notably, Knowledge magic.

Eiro flipped the book open. The pages felt like real paper, the covers felt like real leather. And just remembering the actual physical book that he had read, as this was just a memory replicating the memory of that book, it felt completely identical. Eiro grabbed the key that was still stuck in his chest, removing it to allow himself to move better.

The incarnation inside of his soul was now fully part of him, so it was fine to do this.

"Bavet, come here," Eiro said, and the slime, still in the form of a cat, slowly approached with a nervous demeanor.

"Erm... what? What are you doing?"

"Undo your transformation for a second."

"..." slowly, the slime did as told, and the feline melted apart into a translucent goo. And then, without a moment's hesitation, Eiro pushed the key inside of the slime, twisting it around. Similarly to how it happened with Eiro, a small 'door' opened up, revealing a space that wasn't visible just looking through the physical part of the slime's body.

The demon tried not to pay too much attention to the form of Bavet's soul. It was a small, simple space. Surprisingly simple, really. And inside of that space were a number of different beasts and objects and monsters and people that were all clearly Bavet's 'aspects' taken shape. Since he was a shapeshifter, his aspects didn't adhere to any particular form.

Eiro still didn't know why his aspects were nowhere to be seen within his own soul, but that was something he should soon hopefully figure out.

But more importantly, Eiro focused on Bavet's soul. Since the book was made of magic, Eiro was able to affect its physical form, compressing its size to make it fit into the space within the slime's soul better. Eiro placed the small book into the space, and then closed the door to Bavet's soul.

"What the fuck, man, I-"

"Just be quiet for a second. What's the name of the baron mentioned on page 211 of the book 'The Life of a John Doe'?" Eiro asked, and Bavet slowly turned back into his cat form, shuddering slightly.

"There's no baron mentioned, it's Count Lanchester," the slime replied, and it took a few moments until he realized what he had exactly just said, "Wait... how do I... I've never read that book."

"And you won't have to, because you just know it now. The memory will probably fade with time, like any other will. Right now the whole thing should feel like a single sentence you only just read," Eiro explained, smiling broadly as Bavet was still trying to figure out what was going on. And so, the Demon filled him in.

Confused, Bavet stared at Eiro, "That was a memory of yours? You summoned a memory with your treasury ability? How did you even- Did you seriously change your soul just now?"

"Well, yeah. If I can change my body, I should be able to change my soul. It's mine, after all," Eiro pointed out, taking a seat on the armchair stood just a few steps away from him.

"So... what? You can just give people your memories now?"

"I guess so, yeah," Eiro replied, "Now that it's in your soul, it's no longer draining mana from me. It doesn't physically exist anymore. Maybe I can use this to give specific techniques or spells to the others."

The demon quickly thought of some uses for this ability. If he created some tomes explaining a technique in extreme detail within his mental library, and then summoned that tome through the treasury, he would be able to place that into someone else's soul and they would immediately learn all the information.

They would need to practice according to it to properly keep the information in their mind, of course, and they wouldn't be able to instantly use it, but they would at least understand it. Especially in regard to teaching others spells, this would be an incredible ability.

That being the case, there were other things that had to come from this; from connecting Eiro's soul, mind and abilities in this way.

As his incarnation walked through the library, Eiro noticed that he was able to sense things in here much better. Or rather, sense this space at all. Before, it only existed within his mind, so he simply knew of it, and the knowledge of the specific part he focused on would appear in his mind.

He simulated senses to make it all appear as though there was a library, like an illusion that his own mind created. But now, it was a lot more tangible, something that he could actually interact with. The books were physical, their weight was real. The smell of the pages and the ink that the mental duplicates were using to transcribe new things in here truly entered his nostrils.

This was a wholly new way for him to experience his memories, and it was... weird. Unexpected. But incredible, nonetheless. And of course, he could still experience this space as he had before, instantly accessing any part of it just through his mind. But if he wanted to interact with things closer, he could through the eyes of his incarnation.

The incarnation continued walking through the library, making his way to a new space that had been formed. The library itself was a massive open space stretching up high, with many different floors stretching up high along the walls. And now, at the top floor, there was a walkway that surrounded a large golden crystal many times the size of Eiro's body. This was the splinter.

The part of the arcane that was within his body. Eiro could tell from its shape that there were multiple different parts fused together. Though one solid piece, it was clear it was once many.

As Eiro placed his hand onto the splinter, he could feel the power of the arcane flow through him. Just standing here felt the same as standing within that space at the core of the system together with the Administrator. This splinter would only keep growing as Eiro absorbed the aspects of others. But for now, there was something else that he wanted to do.

Eiro flicked his wrist as a card appeared in his hand, pulled over from the treasury to here. It was one of the pentacle cards, the card of the Ultimate Agility. Pentacle cards were ones that didn't have a physical form, instead directly bonding with the user. Due to this quality, the other pentacle cards, once Eiro activated them, already fused with the splitner.

The others were still 'free', though thightly connected to his core already, even if not inseparable. Eiro took the card and pressed it against the splinter, watching as it quickly sucked it in, as if fusing with the material of the card itself.

The card melted away into the form of another smaller arcane splinter carefully attaching itself to the outside of that most massive one, as Eiro absorbed the ability of the ultimate agility.

The moment he did, he could feel the affect running through him. Though, since he was seated, Eiro was still trying to just not move and simply slowly get used to it. Right now, his muscles were rapidly adapting though, and the constitution of Eiro's body was certainly making this process much, much easier on him than it usually should be.

The way that he activated this card was... different to the others, though. He felt himself connect with the arcane artifact much more easily, as though he was more used to it right off the bat. And with that in mind, Eiro wondered something. He pulled up another card. It was an artifact that he was not likely to use to often due to the side-effects connected to it; the Dungeon Map.

Holding the card of the wand suit in his hand, Eiro carefully touched it against his splinter, watching the card be absorbed into it.

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