In the end, the rest of the day past without incident, and the pair set up camp. Kat took the first shift and Xiang the second, with Kat taking the much longer shift. Kat hopped up into one of the trees beside the road and settled in. She sent off a few messages to everyone, and considered sending a message to Minor, but decided to hold off a few more days just in case.
There wasn't any news from back on Earth so Kat relaxed, and tried to flick between meditation and full alertness to see what happened. Kat found it really uncomfortable. There was no feeling of sluggishness like she was expecting, but instead, she felt as though parts of her mind were grinding against each other.
As if someone had thrown a few grains of sand into a well-oiled machine. Luckily, it seemed that her mind was robust enough to recover quickly, and it only happened if she entered and exited her mediative state a few times in a minute. I have to wonder if there is a reason this feels so strange when I try to rapidly switch into meditation. I feel like it's a skill I want for some reason, but I'm not sure why.
And so that was how Kat spent her evening watch. Swapping in and out of meditation letting her mind deal with the aftereffects as she tried to find out any additional information from repeating the action. In the end, she obtained no further enlightenment regarding the process but resolved to keep trying while she was on watch.
There was no talking when she woke up and Xiang ate. Kat checked her internal supplies to see if she needed to eat and found the answer was still no. It did give her something to think about for the first few hours of the morning though, as she watched the plain scenery pass and consider what she needed to do now to actually feel hunger, while considering that at Rank 2, she just might not need to eat anymore.
She did consider asking the system after the first hour, but quickly realised that defeated the point. She was using it as a decent distraction to avoid getting board. The road she was walking on was so strangely consistent. It was an endless straight line as if God himself had pointed in a straight line and said ROAD.
To top that off, it featured no cracks or even much dirt, and the similar trees didn't help at all. If Xiang was more worried or if the mountain in the distance was further away, Kat may have started questioning if she was moving at all.
As it stood, she felt she was making decent progress. Xiang followed behind her, and Kat walked at decent walking pace, just slightly faster than would be comfortable for a human planning to walk all day.
It was after lunch, if Xiang grabbing a few more crackers to snack on counted as lunch, that Kat started to consider her two special wishing tokens she had obtained so long ago when she scared off that guy, Berthelm, from trying to find out too much information about demon society.
So system what are my options?
D.E.M.O.N.S cannot properly process the question please elaborate.
I mean, what can I get with those two tokens?
User Kat can get almost anything. The only restriction is User Kat's current Rank. Thus, waiting may allow for access to greater treasures.
Well, the plan was always to use them to give Lily and Sylvie magic. Can you give me some more information on that?
User Kat, please define additional parameters. Such as if a Racial change at the genetic level is desired. If User Kat desires additional elements to awaken in the Entity. If User Kat desires the process to be quick. If User Kat desires the process to bind the Entity to User Kat. And other further parameters.
I'm starting to think this might be something I should discuss with the others first now. And it was such a simple idea to. I am bored, and I wish Lily was here. Simple answer, give her magic, though as it turns out, not so simple.
Can you start out explaining why additional racial changes are a thing? Like why is that a parameter? Does it need to happen?
A number of Races are inherently magically awakened. Thus, an item that converts chosen Entity to that race would awaken magic. This however, is often frowned on as Entities tend to have a strange loyalty to old race.
In much smaller letters at the bottom, the following was added.
Occasionally causes Entities mental landscape to complete fracture.
Wait, don't try to sneak that last part past me, why would that even happen?
It is rare, but some Entities resist the racial change at such a fundamental level that Entities' mind does not survive, or survives in a fractured state.
Right ok… so, I guess that's something to ask Lily about later. I don't know if she wants to be human or not but… is there anything else major I should know about the whole race change thing?
Some races, such as Vampires, require complete unique dietary measures. D.E.M.O.N.S recommends User Kat be aware of these before choosing any race change.
Kat nodded. Yup that makes a tonne of sense. What about additional elements?
Some Entities do not inherently have any magic at all. This requires forcing additional affinities on the Entity to then awaken magic.
Do you know if Lily needs this?
No. Because Accomplice Lily resides in a Dimension without any form of Higher Energy, D.E.M.O.N.S cannot scan Accomplice Lily for this information and receive an accurate answer.
Right… any reason you don't want an extra affinity though? It seems useful.
Baseline Human like Accomplice Lily is suspected to be unable to handle more than three affinities at once without spontaneously combusting.
Aaahh… how likely is that to be an issue?
Unknown. Having three affinities is rare, and as Accomplice Lily is in an Energy Inert Dimension, the chance is likely low, but without additional samples it is impossible to know if all residents of User Kat's home Dimension have even more affinities that are able to remain dormant because of the lack of Higher Energy.
So basically… more stuff I can't worry about? Plus a warning that I probably need to take Lily to Minor's dimension to have a safe place to do this so that you can test her for these things. What about speed? Is the time variable?
Yes. Most common with items that would convert chosen Entity to another Race, they can take years or centuries. Some faster acting processes may require a higher Rank to access and certainly involve more pain.
Ok… well we are going to completely ignore the whole 'bind her to me' thing, because I certainly don't want that… um… I know I can't make her a demon, I remember you mentioning that even you hadn't figured out how to do that when I was first starting out…
Um is there anything else that I really should be aware of?
D.E.M.O.N.S recommend User Kat, if opting for Race change items, considers the lifespan of chosen Race. D.E.M.O.N.S suspects that User Kat would like Accomplice Lily to remain around.
What do you mea… oh… um… is that? System when would I die of old age?
If User Kat was to remain at Rank 2 for the rest of User Kat's existence, it would take approximately…
Estimating
Examining Bloodline
Examining Soul Strength
Estimating…
User Kat would live approximately 300,000 years as measured by User Kat's Home Dimension's Earth.
Kat gulped. This… this might be a bigger deal than I thought. Can humans live that long?
Humans with access to higher energy are capable of it, however it is extremely rare. D.E.M.O.N.S suggest choosing another Race, if User Kat desires to remain close to Accomplices.
Damnit. What will I do about Vivian and Callisto? They took me in and are shockingly close to family even though I haven't known them long. I… I think I'll have to look for something to give them as well now. Dammit I didn't need something this heavy to think about. I just wanted to know if I could give Lily cool magic powers, but now, it had to come with at least some existential dread and questions I don't want to answer didn't it.
Kat sighed as she considered picking up the pace, but decided against it. She needed the time now more than ever, because it seemed that she really needed to properly start figuring out what she wanted to do with those tokens, especially knowing that they needed to be more than just a quick way to get magic, but also a way to not have everyone pass away on her in just a hundred years.
Might as well get started. System, bring up a slow-moving list of all the known Races in your database.
User Kat would require significant time to view that list.
Kat shrugged.. I've got all afternoon, and maybe all of tomorrow.