Chapter 114: Done speaking

I was life in its purest form—water. Also, I was a unique monster. That had been made clear by now. An unclassified monster-type creature that people sometimes called a "water elemental" or "water spirit." Well, I had people call me other names like "hydrous slime" or the like, but that was way off. The fact was, I was neither of all these spirit-type or monster-type creatures.

What I was for sure, in a magical researcher's eyes, was just that: unknown. From my perspective, all I was was "alive," and that label was enough for me. In the first place, all I never knew for sure was that I wanted to live—so alive I was.

A unique monster-type creature that had never been known before. That meant I worked in different ways than most creatures and beings out there. In the first place, I would have never even become self-aware if I hadn't obtained the 'Consciousness' passive skill from that first storyteller guy in the restaurant.

Thus, I was a unique monster. Thus, I wasn't a common occurrence at all. Discarding the many questions one could have regarding the "how" and "why" of my existence, the old man focused on what he deemed was most important: my unique skills.

I was in my chair, and he was in his.

"...Wait a second."

"Hm, oh?"

"What does that have to do with my elf's condition? Her illness?"

By this point, we had talked a great deal already. Unfortunately, I was unable to answer most questions directed at me. But at some point, we found at least one topic I could answer.

"'Dwelling,'" the old man nodded. "When we first met in the forest, you told me that..." And the knowledgeable sage went on. When we first met in the forest, it was incumbent upon the monster to always be using a certain unique skill I had—Dwelling. That was for reasons the System didn't really explain. Basically, it was to ensure the Player's survival and allow me to proceed with the Main Quest I was pursuing at the time.

That was in the past, however. Presently, I could roam free without utilizing a "Receptacle" and not be admonished by the System.

"Let us think about why that is, young lad."

Obviously, I had obtained my human form, that was why. With the "Character" the System "created" for me, I could start "playing the game."

"Oh... But isn't there something that you miss, dear boy?"

After a moment's thought, I confidently said that I never missed anything.

There was in fact something that I missed. Primarily, according to the old sage's understanding, if I was now allowed, let's say, by the System not to be restricted in the way I lived, that is to say not being forced to be making full use of the Dwelling unique skill, it wasn't because I had evolved to a human form—"Or be granted... a Character from the... System, as you say, dear boy."—no, it was because I had grown much stronger since the beginning.

That argument made more sense, it was correct. According to my old advisor, had the use of Dwelling not been forced upon me right from the beginning, I would have died. As I was life in its purest form, I couldn't be allowed to die. Yes. Right at the beginning, it was clearly exposed to me: I was weak. Oh so weak.

And after a certain black swordsman of the Reinred Empire placed his sword upon my chest, I was mercilessly killed. So it's fair to say that I could have died at any time, back in the time.

My chances of survival were too low.

People were after me, and I needed to keep using one of my unique skills, Dwelling, climb into people's skin, take over them, use them as Receptacles to stay hidden, and survive.

"You had to. However, your natural attitude toward the world changed. As time went by, you were no longer required to use your unique ability, since you had grown an awful lot in the very short span of a week, and were not judged 'weak' anymore. Are you following, young lad? Believe this old man when he enlightens you—going from level-1 to level-40ish in a matter of a few days? Your growth was miraculously fast if even this old man says it!"

Okay. So that explained it. I sure was glad I brought this old man along, heh. And so, coming back to the initial topic of Cetha's illness, I understood that I kept growing and growing, back at the time. To this day, I still grow.

"And if memory serves, young lad, after you have undergone such a transformation from bullied low-level monster-type creature to relatively high-level unique monster, you have noticed you are no longer to fare well when using your unique skill Dwelling against low-level opponents."

Why that was, well, it was because my demonic mana was too intense to be contained within a Receptacle as I had done an awful lot of growing, as he said. The System itself notified me countless times about it, at the time:

"Overload of the Receptacle's mana core — Receptacle deemed defective — The Player has to..." and so forth. In a sea of engulfing white flames, a Receptacle was burned to a crisp, and that was the end of the story. And that's just what happened to Cetha, the elven princess.

So it was all very simple, in the end. Right...? Right?

Trembling with rage, I jumped up, slammed my fist on the table, and glowered at the old man. My chair was flung backward in my rage, and I stammered at the old sage. "W-W-What're— What're you saying, old man?! I didn't— I didn't kill Cetha! I'd never! I-I didn't kill her, all right?! You can't just go saying things like that!"

I mean, the old man did just say the same phenomenon, when describing the white flames, was what had happened to the girl I liked.

The old man seemed to have been pained by my reaction, so I calmed down after he begged me to lower the volume of my voice.

Finally, according to the old man's theory (which only made sense after all this talking), though Cetha didn't burn away in a sea of white flames, the simple fact that I "dwelled" within her for more than five consecutive days meant that her frail body must have endured a lot of strain during all this time.

If I had used her as my Receptacle indefinitely, she would have inevitably died at some point. Maybe not engulfed in a sea of the purest white flames as the overload wasn't so drastic, but she would have passed nonetheless.

Also, if she hadn't died right after I captured her as a Receptacle, I had the fact that she was already quite strong to thank for that. She was a noble of the elves. A high elf. The daughter of an elf king. The elf maiden who had inherited the Great Forest of Benelloan's benediction. So, obviously, she was powerful enough. Thank goodness she was, because otherwise she would have been killed by me, back then, so she would never have become so precious to me.

But... goddamn, I thought, to think I'm the reason why she fell so ill... What if she... can't forgive me when she wakes up and we tell her... Damn it.

Of course I worried about the fact my elf, my home, would come to loathe me like the others did, but hey, it wasn't like we ever got to know each other in the first place, so it felt too early and stupid to worry about that. I wasn't really aware, but you couldn't just decide you loved the girl you only first met, without knowing her. Even if that girl might be the only person in the world who would ever truly accept you for who you are when everyone else seemed to hate you. Even if that girl basically spent a week "sharing a soul" with you, knew and understood everything about you, and still accepted you when everyone rejected you. Even then, I guess you still had to yourself get to know the person before you cherished her so much... but that wasn't something I would do. She was the prettiest anyway.

So, to take back where we left off, I made Cetha sick. I damaged her body from the inside. Thankfully, she was a powerful elf, so I wouldn't lose her, but now that the old man knew the reason for her sickness for sure, he knew just what to do to get her back on her feet, fully healthy and recovered, and it didn't involve any rare medicinal herbs or a master alchemist like he initially thought.

As a side effect, Cetha the elf would grow much stronger thanks to me. If we looked at it from another perspective, the elf girl wasn't sick because she had been weakened per se. She was weak because I had forced my "strength" on her. As a natural result, if properly healed, she would be getting much stronger.

At any rate, the girl just needed mana to heal up. Any mana could do, and I was glad to think I could maybe participate in healing her. To my disappointment, that wasn't possible. Since I was a monster and my aura was different from the human races' mana, receiving too much of my mana for the elf would alter her too much, and who knew what consequences that would bring.

Sadly, I thanked the old man for educating me about all of this with a slight bow. He also thanked me for helping with his investigation, but I denied his thanks saying he was the true champion in the room.

And so we were done speaking.