CH810

<I thought I was going to have a heart attack.>

I think that would have actually been the better option than what I went through.

<Quiet you. Can you imagine how I felt when you wouldn’t let Thera grow you a new one?>

Can you imagine how I felt when my heart was destroyed by some bullshit trial design? Speaking of, where’s Nare? I have complaints.

<Busy right now.>

How convenient for him. Ben thought dryly, assuming the god had found an excuse to delay his ire with Myriad moving to correct it.

<The trial sustained more than a little damage. He and the other crafting gods are all already moving to fix it.>

What, damaged how?

<You mean aside from the platform you got your girlfriend to break? A platform I might add that wasn’t supposed to be able to be destroyed?>

Sure then, aside from that.

He could hear the god sigh in his head. <You weren’t the only one whose existence caused some trouble for the final floor. It might not have been able to replicate your mind but it was doing everything it could to draw the power needed for producing copies of Thera, even if it still wasn’t enough in the end. Some systems within it were basically destroyed trying to run as power was being diverted from all over.>

Huh, cool, good to know. If they’re already fixing it, maybe tell them to make it so people can’t have their hearts destroyed in the very first millisecond of the tower.

<I’d like to point out just how improbable that was.>

And yet, that doesn’t matter. It’s the fact that it was at all possible that’s the problem. I’m still pissed.

<Well, try to temper some of that once you get your new heart, though I honestly don’t know why you need to go back home to do it.>

Just wanna make sure no silly gods decide to get in my way, now if you don’t mind, I’ll just need a minute.

He was waiting at Thera’s family home, his girlfriend off to get some of the people he requested for help while the rest of them stood outside, all of them having tried to ask what he was going to do and all of them being rejected. Nobody would know until it was too late to stop him, even if that did leave other questions coming up.

“Alright, if you won’t say then so be it, I can be patient but in that case, what did you do to your copy?” Vasta asked the question she’d wanted to before the trial rewards had interrupted her. “How did you end things so smoothly?”

“Oh, that? I gave him a soul and merged it into my own so there’d only be one Ben on the world once again. Worked out well too, I got some decent levels.”

Not one of the three knew how to react to it and they weren’t given the time. Thera had come back to join them, two of her aunts in tow.

“Ben,” Lux greeted. “It seems my niece was right when she said you’ve been walking around without a heart. Did you ask Funa to come along too to try and fix whatever’s wrong with your head that made you think that was a good idea?”

“Not exactly but I appreciate you both sparing me some time to help. I promise this will be quick and probably won’t have disastrous consequences for me.”

“Ben, I really hate hearing that,” Thera sighed. “Was there something else you needed before we get out of here?”

“Hmm, if you don’t mind, I guess it would be good to get a new homunculus made early for the next bit.”

“...Fine, make me a knife then.”

He felt its bite across his arm as she took his blood, giving it new life as he materialized meat and plant matter to feed it instead of destroying the lawn and ended with a new Ben clone for him to use, materializing it clothing before inhabiting it and speaking in one voice.

“Alright, now if you guys don’t mind, let’s get back to Stonewall.”

---

With the way the trial had worked out the hour was still early when they got back home, walking through streets empty enough that not much attention was drawn to the great spirits, even as Ben stopped in place, still far from their destination as he remembered something else he needed to do.

“Hey Vasta, meant to try this earlier but I got a little distracted by everything, you mind if I test something with you real quick?”

“Is it somehow more important than getting you a real heart again?”

“It’ll mean I’m not distracted when I do that, so…”

He watched the older mage sigh. “Alright, fine, what do you need?”

“Just gonna merge into your mind a bit, I wanna see if I can help you materialize a soul.”

He was currently the only person in the world capable of it, with neither Mora nor his own copy able to pull it off, with the latter likely coming down to a matter of the number of minds it had held and limits of the trial that made it but he wanted to see if he could change that if they received his help to do it, along with what payoffs there’d be for such an achievement. He had his hope after all, it was an accomplishment so great that it had unlocked him a third-tier job and Vasta was officially a contender with her final level the tower had given her, he wanted to see if he could push her beyond that.

She seemed to get an inkling of what it was he was thinking as well, making no attempt to stop it as he merged his mind into her own, same as he’d just done for Thera but giving a vastly different type of information.

More complicated than a seed and less substantial in what he could provide, the biggest thing he could make sure she’d have that he didn’t was that she’d at least be able to get the sense of how to do it that he’d earned after his first success and spending her mana she made her attempt, only to fail in the end.

It was after a few times more when she gave up, rubbing her head as she did. “I don’t know how you keep so much information in you to pull that off but it doesn’t look like I can do the same. A shame.”

It is.

He’d wanted to create a new third-tier skill holder but it seemed that ambition for the day had ended up just a little too grand. There was a reason that neither spirits nor gods had been able to accomplish the same thing and while he still believed it might be possible, it would be something he’d need to put far more planning into than the random attempt he’d just given.

So one more thing to think on, I’ll work on it in the back of my head with everything else for now then but I guess it’s time to finish up here.

“Alright,” He sighed. “In that case, this way.”

By all accounts, it looked like they were going home. As they passed street after street, eventually Sonya’s house came into view but that wasn't the final destination, veering instead to a different house, going around the side to its backyard.

<Oh, infinite hells Ben, what are you about to do?>

Nothing anyone up there can stop.

It seemed like Thera was also growing in suspicion as she looked between him and what appeared to be their final destination as he opened the door to his greenhouse, letting them all inside.

“Ben-” She began, already feeling worried but cut off before she could say more.

“One second, just a couple more things to set up to make this as safe as possible for everyone. Let’s see, Lux, could I bother you to close a wound in a second?”

“What wound?”

“This one.”

He released his hold on the homunculi as he said it while at the same time pulling blades from his rings to cut off its limbs. No arms or legs to support it, leaving the still living torse to fall to the ground.

“Jesus Christ, Ben! A warning!” Amy yelled at him as he looked between it and her.

“Huh, yeah, I guess that’s my bad. Sorry. In that case, as a warning, we'll be grabbing the heart from that to put in my chest. Um, Lux? If you would close those wounds like I’d asked please.”

He’d managed to surprise the light spirit with the act as much as anyone else but she did as he’d asked, unable to imagine the point of any of that but curious enough to see where his mind was going. It was obvious he wasn’t just replacing his heart with a homunculi’s, that would be no different from growing a new one but as she closed the wounds he worked on what remained of it himself, wrapping every inch of the body save for the mouth, neck, and a bit of space for the heart in moribusial.

“And then just one more thing and we’ll be ready,” He muttered as he took off one of his mythril bands before reshaping it around the homunculi’s neck. “Funa, I’m going to need you to please cast all of the sleep spells you know on it at my mark, Vasta too. And Lux, since I’m pretty immune to mind spells, if you could apply something to me for pain-killing during surgery then that would be great, I’d appreciate it seeing as how I technically have to have my chest opened up for this next bit, but first, one final thing before we actually get to the heart surgery.”

“Ben, is this even safe?” Thera asked him, having figured out the full picture of what he was going to do, even if nobody else did while he could only shrug.

“Honestly, not sure, I doubt anyone else has ever done this before, but… Well, no risk, no reward.”

“...If you die because you decided to experiment on yourself then I’m going to kill you.”

“Ha, don’t worry, I’ve got a little something called faith. In a second I’ll be laying down next to it but if anything seems dangerous, all of you, be prepared to cut off the homunculi’s head.”

Yet another worrying warning they weren’t given time to respond to, before they had the chance to even fully process what he’d just asked of them, Ben had already gone over to the heart of the giant fruit tree filling the space, ripping the soul crystal that was bound to its trunk and shoving it into the clone, ensouling the body with an imprisoned god.

He was immediately on guard, prepared for the worst but it seemed his preparations had done their job. The moribusial covering it was keeping the god in a state of mana exhaustion and the spells of Funa and Vasta were providing cover in case the magic metal wasn’t actually enough, with his clone not stirring, even if its body began to warp from the beastform skill that was acting on it.

“Alright,” He said as he laid down next to it. “Now I’m just going to close my eyes so I don’t have to watch heart surgery be performed on myself so just let me know when it’s done.”

True to his word, he had no desire to see how it would turn out, instead focusing on the sounds of movement from the others around him until he felt a knife sink into his chest.

It was unpleasant but nowhere near the feeling he’d gone through on the first floor of the tower, telling him that even if not completely, Lux’s magic was working and as they pulled back muscle and broke through his ribs, it wasn’t long until he felt hands reaching inside him, removing the artificial heart that had been keeping him alive.

…Why did I think this was a good idea again?

It was too late to stop but he was left with the distinct feeling of his life counting down, nothing there to shove blood through him as seconds stretched into hours as his minds raced despite himself, forcing them down and hearing the frantic movement around him as more hands went in, attachments made through both Thera and Lux’s magic and a change that left every nerve in his body lighting up in pain until just as fast, it was gone, replaced with new notifications going off in his mind.

<ACQUIRED SKILL INTEGRATED DIVINE BODY LEVEL 0>

<VITALITY ENHANCEMENT LEVEL INCREASED>

<VITALITY REGENERATION ENHANCEMENT LEVEL INCREASED>

<ACQUIRED SKILL MYTHRIL BLOOD>

Oh yeah, that’ll do.

Author’s note

One sort of epilogue chapter next and then you get my usual arc-endnote