Chapter 222: Creating A Soul Membrane

[Day 130]

It has been four days since I began the soul treatment with Benladann. These days I've made her consume souls of monsters every day, by the hundreds.

Eating souls was something she wasn't capable of doing naturally, I had thought about making Soul Puree and then add it into her soul manually before, but now that she got the ability to eat souls thanks to her mother's gift, things were faster than I had expected.

After four days of eating almost a thousand souls, her Soul Mass and Soul Density had reached a good enough amount to cover the entire area of her soul after I compacted it a bit using my Soul Hands, to squeeze her soul a bit.

Using this Soul Mass, I used my newly acquired Death Magic Spell "Soul Membrane" which could be used when connecting my soul with another and it let me create a soul membrane using the target's Soul Mass. It was a very specific spell.

And then, like putting a very fluffy mass of fur inside a tight balloon, I began to extend the membrane around her soul and tried my best to fit it inside, but it still needed some more Soul Mass.

I could sweat it was enough! And the System had also calculated it was enough...

Perhaps her soul had just grown a bit larger now out of the energies she got by eating souls?

Damn it.

Alright, I'll just do my plan B.

I extended my own soul and cut a large chunk of it after taking out any consciousness within it and added it into the Soul Membrane. The pain was quite horrible, it was as if you were having your entire body shredded into pieces while being alive...

Anyways, as I was used to pain, this was nothing compared to my love for her.

Using my piece of soul, her membrane finally was able to enclose the darkness within her soul, and it was done!

I pulled my consciousness back as I fell over the ground, I was exhausted, my soul had reduced its mass massively due to what I did, but I had a lot of souls ready to eat at my side, so I began to consume them for a few hours while Benladann slept.

"Oof... It was close." I sighed.

<You could have waited some more; you didn't have to sacrifice part of your soul like this.>

"Don't worry about that. And if I had resettled everything, we would have to wait even more days for her to get enough Soul Mass, and there are too many variables, such as her soul sometimes expanding progressively without any explanation! Now that it is enclosed within the membrane, she has to use her Soul Refine and fuse it together. With a compact soul, her power won't risk leaking out nor busting, or dissipating into nothingness if she gathers too much. Like having a layer of very tough skin over her soul."

<Sigh... I had managed to block your stats from dropping due to the large loss of primordial essence, but this will only keep you for a few hours, eat as many souls as possible to regain mass before you lose stats permanently.>

"Alright, thank you for your care."

<Seriously, why do you always put other people before you? I know that Benladann is your partner, but even then, what you did... Could have killed you...>

"Eh? You've gotten very expressive!"

<Hahh... I forgot you're just an idiot. A goodhearted idiot.>

"I think you're exceeding your protocol by insult your host..."

<Anyways, continue consuming souls.>

"What I did was what family would do," I said.

<...>

"Or are you going to tell me that a father sacrificing his life so his child can live is something an idiot would do? Or that a husband protecting his wife with his life is something wrong? That it's bad to love someone so much that I am willing to give up my life so she and my child can live on?"

"It is not just Benladann's life that I am saving now, it is also my child's life. If she dies... I am sure that my child will also die with its mother... And I would rather die instead of them."

<Drake...>

"I guess I am being a bit melodramatic there... Anyways, things went well, and we are all fine, so let's just relax."

The System's A.I. had developed complex emotions and a personality at an alarming rate, but I suppose what she said back then was because she was worried about her host, me.

What I said to her was the truth, something wrong could have happened to Benladann's soul if we had waited too much, the soul mass she could lose might affect her soul even more, and I didn't want to risk so many variables that could lead to her doom and that of my child.

I am not pretending to be a hero or anything, in fact, eating souls is already something that would be considered monstrous, after all, they're literally like lives, future living beings that I am making disappear forever for the benefit of myself and my family. Isn't that something that only villains would do? Indeed...

But they are just necessities, wild animals also do this, the parents sometimes are willing to give up their lives fighting a predator to save their young, it is a natural instinct to want to preserve your offspring, even if it is still a small clutch of cells.

Hahh... I am so tired...

I continued to eat souls without stopping, although at some point, my soul recovered quite nicely and it was filled up with a lot of mana where the wound was, recovering quite fast. Perhaps I might be able to extend part of my regeneration abilities from Immortal Body into my soul, but only limitedly and temporarily...

As my soul was slowly repaired, I suddenly felt dizzy, and ended falling asleep on the floor...