Ed left Kenny Jr. to its own devices. The main reason was that Kenny Jr. was a fusion of two skeleton's souls. This meant that it now had a higher learning capacity and the best way to let it learn a thing or two was to let it roam around the room. It wasn't like it could go anywhere anyway.
'Now, I should work on strengthening this body' Ed thought as he examined his skeleton body and recalled his attributes. They were quite lacking and his assimilation had gone off cooldown. He may as well do something about it.
The only problem was that all of the items he really wanted to use were inside of the storeroom and he had no access to it at the moment.
'What should I do then?' Ed pondered seriously as he observed the army of skeletons before him. It wouldn't be a bad idea to start gathering their consciousnesses but since the dungeon was currently watching it would be unwise.
'I wonder how I might be able to increase their strength' While intelligence would go a long way, it didn't matter as long as the skeleton's remained equally feeble.
'The surest way is to equip them with my sets of armor but they might not be strong enough' Ed had no way to gauge this until he tried, but it was definitely true that the skeletons would be weighed down by the armor if they weren't sufficiently strong.
What he really wanted to do was directly increase their constitution. Similar to how his bone had increased his.
'I wonder how they would react if they touched it' Would the skeleton's become stronger? It seemed likely. Unfortunately, that method wasn't at all sustainable.
'This is definitely in the domain of a lich' Ed lamented not having gotten the chance to learn death magic from the lich. He could still remember the eerie skeletons wearing knightly armor and their deadly sword skills.
'Unfortunately, it wasn't optimal at the time' He definitely wouldn't be able to summon death knights on the first try. At most he would probably summon a slightly stronger skeleton and at the time that would be of no help. He had thus opted to advance with the earth element.
'I really need time mag-' Ed's thoughts were interrupted by a fierce tremblor.
His footing became unsteady as a result and Ed had no choice but to try his best to remain steady.
Some of the skeletons fell simply while others even chipped their bones. Kenny Jr. for some reason seemed to be having fun though.
The vicious shaking stopped. Ed observed the room and found that some of the cracks in the dungeon's walls became more prominent. The flickering torches remained lit, however.
'What was that?' Ed thought as he regained his footing. The earthquake was simply too sudden and unwarranted. A dungeon didn't have earthquakes and natural disasters did it?
The dungeon had shown itself to be in a separate space from reality. At least that was how things seemed to Ed. The room that was forming before his very eyes, the portal that led to a completely different environment, the dungeon's god-like powers. It all pointed to being in a different space. It couldn't have such powers in the real world.
Perhaps with sufficient mana, one could act as a god on the outside...? There was no way for Ed to know since he hadn't gone outside and all.
'Did space itself shake?' Ed's thoughts seemed a bit abstract and ridiculous from a logical point of view but there wasn't any other possible explanation for the sudden tremblor.
'Damn, I am not a space magician' He only knew one space element spell so one couldn't possibly expect him to understand the principle between separate spaces. It was especially so since the one spell he knew had nothing to do with that.
Thus, Ed had no choice but to give up on forming any further conjectures. The information was insufficient to make any real determinations.
'I'll investigate this another time' The only way he could possibly do that was to explore the dungeon and see what the shake had caused but for the moment it wasn't what he was looking for.
'Status' Maybe the dungeon stopped watching after the earthquake? If it was something bad it would certainly be preoccupied.
[Name: Edw#&!]
Type: Skeleton
Health: 600/600
Mana: 176
Strength: 2
Agility: 1
Constitution: 5
Dexterity: 2
~Skills:~
[Adept Throwing lvl. 4] -Show info-
[Swordsmanship lvl. -1] -Show info-
[Hoarding lvl. 6] -Show info-
[Mental Fortitude lvl. 5] -Show info-
[Transmission Lvl. 4] -Show info-
[Minor Explosion Resistance lvl. 0] -Show info-
[Assessment lvl. 1] -Show info-
[Assimilation lvl. 5] -Show info-
[Thought Manifestation lvl. 1] -Show info-
[Language lvl. 1] -Show info-
[Mana Manipulation lvl. 4] -Show info-
[System Link lvl. 2] -Show info-
[Eloquence lvl. 3] -Show info-
[Sixth Sense lvl. 0] -Show info-
Nothing had really changed since last time so Ed quickly swept his glance past the window and locked gaze with the system link skill. It was indeed revealed.
Without too much fanfare, he went back to his trusty wall and prepared to enter the space once more.
Ed lost his focus and his thoughts grew slow and drowsy.
[System link activated, connecting to host user]
The white plain expanded past his sight. He had returned without too much delay.
'Let's hope the dungeon learns to leave me alone more often' Ed's thoughts were unlikely to come true especially if you consider the fact that he was using that time to conspire with the system.
'Well, I am not sure you can call it that since the thing rarely responds' He would admittedly be a little weirded out if the system had its own personality. It would be like a voice inside his head. At that point, he would have to consider the possibility of having gone insane.
'And I am in a coma and this is all a dream' He joked as the white temple shook the ground and appeared before him.
It was a bit annoying to have to wait for this every single time, like a forced cutscene, but he could only wait. The system was likely just hiding the evidence for whenever the dungeon walks by.
Ed entered the temple and made his way towards the storeroom. He planned to first get some assimilable items before continuing with his mad scientist experiments. Using a furnace to melt life to then combine it sounds pretty crazy.
The storeroom was much less crowded now. Following his expulsion, all of the lively wisps were returned to the storeroom rather than the spirit room. Which was alright since he still needed to sift through them and find Vorgarag.
Before that though, Ed transformed his human-shaped body to grow multiple hands. Each hand reached out to grab pieces of armor or similarly useful items. Mainly armor though.
'The sky's the limit' He joked to himself as a reminder before disappearing from the space.
He immediately woke up back in the dungeon. Beneath his feet, there were pieces of armor on the ground. There was also some rope and a couple of mana crystals. The crystals were just handy to have and the grass rope didn't seem like a bad thing to assimilate.
Ed didn't bother with them though as he simply moved aside and prepared to reenter the system space.
[System link activated, connecting to host user]
In no time at all, he was back inside the lustrous white temple.
'It seems that it doesn't reset unless the dungeon comes by' That proved his earlier conjecture as well as made it extremely convenient for him. Getting things out would have otherwise been a real pain.
'I wonder how the dungeon will react when it sees all of the things I brought' Ed thought as he prepared to send more pieces of armor back to the crypt.
He did this same procedure three more times before moving on to more important matters. He couldn't only have Kenny Jr. in his entourage.
'I don't have many skeleton wisps though' Ed felt it was best to leave it like that too. Who knew if it would call over the dungeon for some reason?
It was instead much wiser to start experimenting with the orcs. It was clear that they were too potent for the skeletons' current bodies but if that was the case all he had to do was lower that potency.
'I should see if it is possible to remove the memories from the orcs' consciousness' Ed felt that this could improve the chances of success.
Of course, even if this method worked Ed didn't plan on stopping there. There was no way he would delete Vorgarag's memories and there was also no way he would put him into a skeleton.
'Those things are prone to die' Which was funny since they were already dead.
Ed didn't go to the storeroom to get the consciousnesses but went to the spirit room instead. The ones there were ready to be experimented on and already sorted.
He was also considering examining the damage that Gharol's wisp of consciousness suffered. Who knew if it was sufficient to be reintroduced into a skeleton?
'Let's hope I get the hang of the forge' Otherwise he would have to expose the spirits to the outside to try and weaken them which seemed like a rather crude method.
All in all, Ed was looking forward to the results he might obtain.
