Stray Soul

Carefully, I connect the bones on my disconnected jaw to branches and pull it upwards.

*CLUNG*

*snap*

*cackle~*

“Well... guess its back in its place now.” I muttered after putting my lower jaw back in its place.

It still felt somewhat... wrong, but it was at least attached back to my body.

Feeling the scales on my jaw and face with my claws for a few more moments, I turned my attention to my status screen for a moment, going over the things that happened in my last battle.

Name: William Race: Stray Soul (Pale Lizard)

Level: 25 Exp: 60/90 Rank: H

Health Points: 0/553 Mana Points: 452/1.070

Strength: 0 (90)

Vitality: 0 (55)

Agility: 0 (77)

Intelligence: 60 (47)

Wisdom: 40 (30)

Charisma: 0 (40)

Free Stat Points:

Skills: Ethereal Body (S), Mana Sense (Z), Bind (H), Soul Sense (H), Soul Manipulation (H), Mana Control (H), Mana Strengthening (H) +

Titles: Reincarnator (S), Otherworlder (A)

Quests: Meddling with the Unknown (S), What Lays Beyond? (C)

Quite a few of my skills had gone up a rank, and in addition to that, I gained another function for my Mana Strengthening skill, Haste, which allowed me to use mana to hasten the movements of my arms and other limbs, but it wasn’t a good idea to try to use it and sprint or dash on my legs at the same time as that would just disturb the mana flow and nothing would happen, other than me losing mana for nothing that is.

But that wasn’t really why I was looking at my status screen for, it was because of the increase in my mana control skill.

With the new increase in the skill, I was now able to put a really thin layer of mana outside my body and manipulate it.

Bringing a claw to a nearby tree’s trunk, I first moved a claw on it without a layer of mana on it, which didn’t really do anything other than damaging the bark a bit, and then I put a thin layer of mana on it and controlled it to have small teeth on it, and when I moved my claw back and forth, the bark started turning into wood dust and after a few seconds I was able to make a good dent into the tree’s bark.

Then I grabbed the mace I had taken as compensation and tried to coat it with a layer of mana, like how I’d tried a few times by now, but my mana cloud would be just deteriorated by the ambient mana, and would rejoin the mana in the air, without me being able to do anything of importance with it.

Then I tried to move my mana and soul into the iron mace, but my mana wouldn’t penetrate more than a few millimetres inside of it, and my soul would just reject going inside the metal.

“No good, huh?” I muttered, a bit saddened by my experiments as I had hoped to be able to infuse metal with either mana or soul, but sadly, I could do neither.

So, the mace would have to remain as a secondary means of attack because my claws could do much, much more damage than the mace could with my mana control.

And I don’t think increasing the friction on the mace would even do anything much honestly, it’s a blunt weapon for a reason, even though it has spikes on it.

Harden would be much more useful on it as it would make it tougher to break or damage.

“But its still quite sad that I won’t be able to infuse my body with metal... I mean, think about it! A gigantic lizard with white scales and red eyes, covered in branches, leaves, and eyes comes charging at you with claws made of metal! That would totally scare of most people!

.... At least most people from Earth, don’t know much about... whatever this place is called.

For all I know, gigantic lizards with metal claws are actually quite common!

...Though, I hope I am wrong on saying that...”

Then I took my attention from the mace, and onto the divine artefact I had managed to yoink from the goblin leader.

Carefully opening it, I saw an absolute darkness akin to the void I saw when I didn’t posses a body, and it immediately started pulsating the moment I opened it, and I started feeling... something.

I was feeling where something was, and the thing it was pinging back at me was standing where I was.

So, it was just pinging at me, and sending the information about where my where abouts were to me.

But it wasn’t perfect as it just basically pointed at a direction, like east, west, etc., it didn’t have the concept of up or down, so it was just something useful for 2d navigation.

Though it didn’t do that, and only showed me the direction of plant beings and undead not of the Dark Lord’s making.

But what did it mean by plant beings? I know that undead roughly means corpses with souls or whatever because even though the system doesn’t classify me as an undead, this medallion does, so it doesn’t use the system to do any of its pathfinding or whatever.

And pushing a small tentacle of mana inside of it, I could feel weird inscriptions on the mana stone that I was sure continued deeper into it, but sadly, I could not go deeper into the mana stone because its mana just didn’t allow me to.

Maybe after it used all of its mana, I might be able to see what’s inside it, assuming that it does use mana and the inscriptions won’t disappear after its out of mana, of course.

But returning to my main point, what does it mean by plant beings not of Dark Lord’s making? Does that mean the Dark Lord can make Dryads and Tree Ents or whatever?

Or is there to just classify plant beings as beings not made of Dark Lord? And what is even a plant being? Is the plant being thing quite literal and just refers to plants that are capable of... I don’t know, moving, living?

So, were they seeking something other than me, and I just happened to get in their way, or were they seeking me?

If they were seeking a plant being, why look for an undead? And if they were seeking me, why look for a plant being?

Being thoughtful for a moment, I saw a leaf from my branches on the edge of my vision.

“OH! THAT’S IT!”

They must not have been sure of what I was, after all I was a moving plant, so a plant being, and I am also able to posses corpses, so an undead.

They must just have been confused about what I was!

Or they were really just looking for multiple things that included plant beings and undead, and they just came across me... yeah, doesn’t seem plausible, but I hope that’s the case because I don’t feel confident in defeating the fucking Dark Lord while I am a mere rank H!

Closing the medallion, I stared at the moon, which would be there for a few more hours, but the lack of sunlight wasn’t bad for my main pair of eyes as they had night vision!

Though the weird red tint was bothersome... I could get used to that!

After all, my eyes usually didn’t have that much colour anyways, so I was more than ready to welcome red!

And I had to wait for my mana reserves to fill back up, so there weren’t any problems with just standing here for the next few hours for me.

Then I opened my chest cavity by flexing my will on the branches that kept it closed, I had removed all my organs like before and had already put the weird papers inside there, and putting the medallion inside, I grabbed the mace and started thinking of what to do with this.

I mean, I wasn’t dropping it off here after the trouble I went to steal—confiscate it!

But I also couldn’t put it into my chest cavity as doing so would just damage my ribs and spine, which would damage my bodies structural integrity, which was bad and, while I could repair some damage with my vines, I wasn’t sure about repairing my spine.

Thinking for a few moments, an excellent idea hit me, and I proceeded to a few nearby bushes and started excavating them, which was made easier with my newfound strength and claws.

After I had made the forest floor a bit less habitable, and branches and leaves covered my body fully once again, I grabbed the mace with my branches and moved it to my tail, and tightly put it in place, making sure it wouldn’t, and couldn’t, fall easily.

And after I was done, I was officially the first stegosaurus in this world!

...Well, the only one I knew of at least, for all I know there could be herds of dinosaurs in this world... hopefully not though, that would suck quite a bit and ruin the whole fantasy world aesthetic, you know?

Feeling the mace at the tip of my tail, my thoughts were...

“You know, this was a shit idea!” The mace, being made out of metal and all, was quite a bit heavy, and having it there would force me to constantly pay attention to my tail and keep it up, which while not something that couldn’t be solved by a lesser soul made to control the tail, was still a bit bothersome.

“But at the same time... I genuinely don’t have anywhere else to put it into... so I guess it stays there?” I muttered to myself and just sat down.

While the sun had started rising, and the world was all shades of pink and orange right now, my mana cloud network, for which I still didn’t have a good code name or an acronym for, was fairly underdeveloped and moving with it would just make my life a pain.

So, I sat down and slowly started improving it.

A layer of soul was covering all my branches, but that wouldn’t do. If left like that, I wouldn’t be able to control the branches easily, so I pushed a thin tentacle of soul into each and every branch, making sure each branch was completely separated from all the others.

Then I started fine tuning my soul, so when I moved, it wouldn’t start raving around.

After I was done, I started moving around the tree I had experimented with a few hours before, making sure everything was as fine tuned as I could make them.

But as I decided to leave, the urge to test one last thing hit me.

“Hmm... I wonder if I can move on 2 legs?” I mean, I could stand on my hind legs, even if that was for a moment, so I may be able to, maybe, fine tune my body into walking like a humanoid.

And, who knows, maybe I’ll be able to make bodies that can walk on 2 legs in the future!

Putting both of my arms on the tree for support, I slowly raised myself off of the ground, and yep, I could stand straight!

And I think I could even climb the tree I was leaning on, if I wanted to that is, but my... totally reasonable weight might cause it to snap, so that’s a maybe for later...

Gazing around from the new height I found, I spotted some humanoid shapes skulking on the forest grounds.

“D-did the fucking goblins follow me here? How did they even follow me here!

...Actually, forget I said that. Following a gigantic lizard was probably not that hard but, seriously? They want to go at it, again? Are you for real?” then I quickly summoned my status screen to see how much mana I had.

Mana Points: 812/1.070

“Yeah, I even have more mana than I had in the last fight!

... I think... no matter that, do they really thing they can beat me without their leader’s weapon and without any undead? If so, they must be smoking some good stuff and I want some of that!” Not wanting to deal with the goblin menace, or possibly some scouts right now, I just roared, embracing my... probably not semi-draconic glory which I will continue to assume as my semi-draconic glory, wanting to let the gobbies know that I knew they were there.

*Roar*

But instead of running off like I thought they would, the humanoid figures just continued to liven up and turned towards me a few more times.

“Ahh.... for gods’ sake, just fuck off please. I have a lot more important stuff than beefing with the local goblins.”

Then I roared once more, but this time louder to drive in the point that I wanted them to fuck off.

*ROAR*

This time the humanoid figures stood still for a moment before all of them turned towards, and if I could, I’d flip them off but sadly I didn’t possess enough fingers to do so, so I just starred at them... wait, what am I talking about? Think with branches William, think with branches!

Then I moved one of my arms towards the humanoid figures, and coiled branches upon themselves a few times to make fingers that were closed in and left a claw or whatever a singular finger on a claw is called up while pointing directly at the humanoids.

For a few moments, they stood still, and then started pointing at me and turning towards each other. This happened a few more times until one of them moved in front of the others and directed 2 open hands towards me, and then one of the figures moved past the other one and started moving into the light and... OH FUCK!

It was the fucking elf woman from before!

NOPE!

NOT DOING THIS.

NUH UH.

Channelling the spirits of all of my ancestors that realized they had done something they shouldn’t’ve a bit too late, I quickly climbed up the tree, hoping it wouldn’t break, and started hissing the moment the elf came close to the tree, and swinging the mace at the end of my tail, making sure she knew that I would be quite a bother if she decided to approach.

I am saying a “bother” and not a giant lizard that will fall upon you from the heavens with the power of god because I am 100% sure that she can kick my ass.

Did I gain some sort of danger sensing ability while you weren’t looking? Perhaps improved my mana or soul sensing abilities?

Nope, but the aura she gives off while just walking is enough to set off alarms in my head.

And I am sure she is much, much faster than me on foot so... there is literally no reason to try to run.

I might be a gigantic lizard covered in all sorts of greenery in an another world, but I don’t want to be manhandled by a woman that is literally quarter my size.

Or even less!

I am 6 metres, remember? Length wise anyways, and she is at best 170-180, so nope. Not being manhandled by her. I don’t think woman are lesser than man or any of that stupid bs, but I just don’t want the first woman to defeat me in this world to be literally less than quarter my size.

That’s just pathetic.

As I continued swinging my tail aggressively, and hissing sometimes, 5 other figures started leaving the tree line, and into the light where I could clearly see them.

First came a half elf with purple hair that I wasn’t sure was natural or not, fantasy world, you never know, that had glasses, after him-or her, elf’s, you know?

After they, came a buffed-up man that was easily 190 or maybe over, he had a large tower shield and a great sword strapped to his back.

Next to him was a small woman—or a really ugly child, that looked at me with an expression I didn’t like.

Then came a drunk man, and a witch.

Not like an old hag, no. Just the textbook definition of a witch, nothing more, nothing less.

She even had the pointy hat! Are you serious!

After they all came out of the forest, they started talking for a bit and I was semi-confident that they wouldn’t attack me or try to kill me as... well, they seemed like they’d be able to kill me easily, so them not doing it only could be a sign of... maybe a sign of good will, right?

I hope fucking so because I am not escaping from here.

After a few more seconds of them talking in a language I could not recognize, the purple haired elf moved towards the elven women and opened a pouch and... came out a fucking branch?!

Okay, fantasy world, fucking space magic, understandable. But I’ve always thought real fantasy worlds would have magically enchanted backpacks or something.

Not the cheat item from all the shitty isekai I’ve watched!

After taking the branch from the purple haired elf, the elven women pointed the branch towards me with a hand and kept it like that.

...W-were they trying to fucking tame me?! No sir, I am not a fucking tree eating critter that you can, somehow in god’s green fucking earth, tame by making it eat a branch!

I am William, The Reincarnator, The Otherworlder, The, self-claimed, Master Of Souls and The, once again self-claimed, Lord Of Undead!

I will not be tamed by a single tree branch!

After a few moments of me not moving, the elven women started to just move the branch up and down, basically telling me to come and take it.

“NO SIR, I WILL NOT BE—Oh, wait, is that what I think it is?” Going through my memories, I suddenly remembered the time I had broken a branch off of the gigantic tree, and the branch in the elf’s hand seemed weirdly similar to the branch I had broken off then.

“Ohhh... she is giving it back to me... but why? Is the tree not as important as I first thought it was? If so, I don’t want a random ass branch, no thanks!” But as I was planning on just continuing to stare, a thought hit me.

“...Maybe not, maybe the magical nature of the tree is the reason why they want to give back the branch to me...” not having anything to lose, I started moving towards the side of the tree closest to elf, keeping to the branches of course.

*CRACK*

But as I was moving a sound came from the tree’s trunk.

“Ah, of course. You break not when the giant fucking lizard climbs you, but after. Classic fucking fantasy shit. Never does what physics tells it to do.” I complained as the 20 meter or so tall tree started falling onto the party of adventurers or whatever, and I directly onto the branch and the elf holding it.