Ch 151

  Relaxation, as it turned out, did wonders for Matt's attempts to partition his mind. The first notable advancement that he made was visualizing the portions of his mind as interlocking puzzle pieces rather than simple identical balls. While this still caused him to deal with pain each time the pieces were reconnected, it was dramatically less intense. It felt more like a mild migraine that lasted ten or so seconds rather than several hammer blows directly to the brain. The only downside was that with this method, the time between separation and assimilation did increase the length and intensity of the pain.

  To solve this, Matt shifted how he was envisioning the connecting points such that there was only one connection point per piece, which had the result of making assimilation take longer but with even less pain. From what Matt could comprehend, for every 100 seconds a self was isolated from the whole, it took one second to completely assimilate back into the whole. This was about as good of a trade-off as he could get, and suddenly, he was all his puppets and none of them all at the same time. The sensation was like being everywhere at once while simultaneously nowhere—a paradoxical state of consciousness. He wasn't even truly his main self as he saw it, and he experienced everything only after it had occurred.

  This meant that as Matt’s main body opened its eyes with less than two days remaining before the deadline set by Radoznaormr, a separate self was controlling it. Not that this self perceived it that way. Instead, to it, it was just Matt, and when it dreamed, it would assimilate the information from all of his puppets, as he was currently utilizing all of them simultaneously. It was slightly unsettling to look at his puppet and know that it experienced things in exactly the same way as it stood there and assumed a fighting stance. After all, even though its stats had only grown to be ten percent of his own, Matt knew that wasn't an acceptable level yet. So, as his puppet launched attacks, he focused on blocking, dodging, and doing everything other than counterattacking, knowing that doing so would end poorly for the puppet, and he didn't have the time to create a new one.

  An hour later, all Matt had to show for the fight was an exhausted puppet that had passed out after its stamina was completely depleted. He had even taken the time to rest, reassimilating and separating from the whole to gain insights from both sides. It was through this process that he discovered something very interesting. While none of his own stats had improved, the same couldn't be said of the puppet, which had reached 11% of his stats. Despite the fact that it was a slow process, Matt could feel that the sparring was working, and he hoped it wouldn’t hit a wall too soon.

  The issue was that he needed time to recover because, even now, he realized just how much his puppet's self had been pushed to endure as long as it did. He needed a way to speed up its recovery, and all he could think to do was try to heal it as if it were injured, hoping he could transfer some of his own stamina to restore its stamina. However, after several unsuccessful attempts, the only recovery came from the passage of time. When his puppet was finally ready to fight once again, Matt felt even more frustrated.

  This process repeated four more times as his puppet reached 15% of his stats, and night fell, marking the end of the eighth day that Matt had to work with. Matt wasn't even sure of this fact, as he had lost track of time while working to partition his mind and constantly assimilating multiple selves, each experiencing time separately, really threw things off. So, after one last round of combining selves and splitting them back off, Matt called out for Radoznaormr.

  "If you’re watching me, I have a request!" he shouted into the void, hoping his voice would reach the enigmatic presence.

  "What makes you think that I am in the mood to stifle your growth by solving whatever issues currently have your progress slowed, with just two days before I kill you?" replied Radoznaormr, sounding rather smug and pleased about something. "Though I must say, your growth in controlling two bodies at once has been excellent. Care to share the how with me?"

  "No, I don’t trust you, and if you can’t figure it out on your own, then I don’t feel a need to give away more than I already have," stated Matt firmly. "What I need is a way to restore my puppet’s stamina because, while I am getting its stats up to my level, it is taking too much time, and I know how much you want me to succeed."

  "This is more of Tempormr’s specialty, as he would just accelerate the rate your body experienced time, like he was constantly doing to you when you were healing injuries back on the goblin-infested world."

  "He was doing what?" asked Matt, his surprise evident in his voice, not even thinking before he spoke.

  "He would accelerate the healing process on any part of your body that was injured, allowing it to mend and enabling you to advance the level of your regeneration skill more quickly. Even though you can never know the precise level of any of your skills before reaching B rank, when they become solidified, they all still level up the more you use them. From what I understand, you were frequently injured in the early stages and often took on the injuries of others. It’s why your body being so adaptable regarding its composition doesn’t surprise me, as it simply illustrates how it is constantly adapting to the need for self-repair."

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  "Really, that is rather intriguing and makes me wonder why he never informed me that he was doing that."

  "That’s simple," Radoznaormr stated with a chuckle, "he wants you to develop as much as possible without missing out on any invaluable opportunities. Even now, he is observing, waiting for the right moment to make you realize that turning your back on him was a mistake. Which it was, since, even if you do what I want, I intend to exact a price from you that will make you regret incurring my wrath."

  "I thought that was why you were threatening to kill me if I didn’t meet the standards you believe are necessary to execute my plan," Matt commented. "Or are you implying that, just like Tempormr, you think you own me?"

  "The real question you should be asking is what makes you think that you can be free as you currently are," retorted Radoznaormr, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. "Truly, you are weak, or do you deny that? If so, attack me and land a single blow on me."

  "Just because I don’t feel like discovering just how far from the current peak I am doesn’t mean that I am weak," stated Matt firmly, his determination unwavering. "One day, I will reach the point where I can kill you and Tempormr, and then I’ll happily enjoy a quiet existence, sure that none may command me."

  "Sure, but until then, you need to realize that you live at our whims," countered Radoznaormr, a sinister smirk playing on his lips. "Once you leave here, this planet will become my hostage. If you don’t do as I wish, it will be destroyed, and I’ll destroy your home world too once the system allows those not born there to enter freely. Even if doing so will result in another penalty period, I’ll destroy everything you hold dear."

  "I’ll kill you," declared Matt, his voice steady with resolve. "Just for saying that, as you are the worst kind of person—the kind that thinks they have the right to do as they please simply because they have the power."

  "I am no person; I am a dragon, and we do exactly what we please until someone slays us. So, unless you can actually slay me, shut up and do as you’re told."

  Matt found himself struggling to resist the urge to attack as he looked into Radoznaormr's slitted eyes and knew that the dragon wasn’t bluffing. Worse yet, Radoznaormr had already gained more ground than Tempormr had before their falling out. Yet, Matt held back, feeling that he needed to play the long game with his current situation. After all, the only option he could think of that made any sense was to find a way to make Radoznaormr lose interest without killing him. For that, he would need to play along for a few years at the very least.

  As if Radoznaormr sensed what Matt was thinking, he asked a simple question. "How long do you think I was working on my experiments with those goblins?"

  "A few decades maybe," answered Matt with a shrug of his shoulders, his eyes deliberately avoiding the dragon's piercing gaze. "Why should I care?"

  "Simple, you are the one who ruined it, and I was about two hundred years into my work there. It should have taken another three hundred years before I had any results. So, if you are counting on me getting bored, I would rethink that and instead resign yourself to knowing that if I do get bored of you in less than two hundred years, death is all that awaits you."

  "Got it, so are you going to help me with my puppet's recovery issue or should I get back to struggling helplessly?" Matt asked, keeping his voice level despite the churning in his gut.

  "Struggle, as I think killing you might be more fun than letting you live."

  With that, Radoznaormr left and Matt found himself alone once more. Only this time he had a bit of rage coursing through his blood as he started to be a bit rougher with his puppet during the next round of sparring. This rage quickly spread to each of his selves as they assimilated and split over the next few hours. It also caused Matt to get an idea as he noticed that the owl-man that he had placed a puppet inside wasn't far from their current position, perhaps only a few miles to the north.

  While Matt wasn’t sure about the exact reason why the owl-man thought it was a good idea to be anywhere near him and Radoznaormr, he felt it was an opportunity he could exploit to his advantage. Previously, Matt had only been able to sporadically check in on the owl-man’s whereabouts, and exerting full control over him had seemed unwise. However, the situation had changed. Now, Matt could have the owl-man start hurling insults at Radoznaormr to provoke him and see if Radoznaormr would attack them, thereby demonstrating that he was indeed unaffected by its rules as he claimed. The only problem was that for this plan to work, Matt had to ensure that Radoznaormr would never suspect it was him orchestrating the insults, so Matt carefully considered a few possibilities.

  As the ninth day drew to a close, Matt's puppet had only reached 30% of his own stats, and desperation began to truly set in. At best, he could push it to 50% at the current rate, and the rage he felt towards Radoznaormr had only grown as he battled against his puppet. Dodging and blocking had already been replaced with overwhelming it and forcing the puppet to tap into the same instincts that had saved Matt countless times before. Yet, he felt as though he was still missing a crucial piece of the puzzle, even as his puppet self within the owl-man succeeded in taking full control of their body.

  This fact made Matt feel like he was beyond powerful, as the owl-man was far above his own level. The only problem was that, even with taking control of the owl-man's body, he had no access to his memories and couldn't use any of the owl-man's abilities beyond what was possible through raw stats. Still, all Matt felt he needed was the man's voice as well as his own skills, which he found he had access to, even in such a foreign body. The sensation of flexing the owl-man's taloned fingers and feeling the power in those unfamiliar muscles had Matt wondering just how far he could take things and if it was possible to achieve the level Radoznaormr was after through the use of others' bodies like he currently was.

  In fact, Matt was already thinking about using enemies exactly like he was using the owl-man and having them act as representatives to the other organizations. That way, none of them would know that he was really the one always dealing with them. Matt could see this playing out very poorly or extremely well. It all simply depended on how well he was at diplomacy, and suddenly he felt like it was pointless with that single thought. Even so, he knew he would need to explore it at least a little bit, if only to understand the full extent of his parasitic puppet’s abilities.