Ed watched the earthen statue with excitement. The consciousness of lofty successfully went into the body which was half the battle. It wasn't like he could insert things into everything and anything after all.
'It's taking a bit…' Ed was starting to worry. Yet he could only wait.
But wait as he might nothing happened. This was a usual occurrence so he was not discouraged. If he could succeed on his first try every time he wouldn't even be a genius, he would be a cheat. Simply put, that was impossible.
Since after waiting for five minutes the result was nothing at all, Ed approached the statue once more and tried to retrieve the consciousness. Unexpectedly, he failed.
'Why is nothing happening!?' Ed's whirlpool of clouds continued to suck at the sculpture but Ed never felt as if he had received anything. This caused him to frown intently.
He couldn't reach Lofty. Ed took a couple of steps back and gazed at the statue he carved once again. It was hefty. Its arms were like barrels and its body was spherical and firm.
'I made it strong because it couldn't see but… This might not work' Looking back at other creatures. Ed realized that they all had a location for their consciousness. For the living, it was the head and for blobs like the blood clot, it was their center.
That implied that the golem had its consciousness at the center as well. That meant that the small whirlpool-like portal that led into the spirit room could not reach past the hefty chunk.
Ed, therefore, had no choice but to use mana manipulation to try and pull the thing apart. He carved out the center like a sphere. He did so relatively easily but there was something that felt different. It was almost as if there was subtle resistance. It was like pulling a bottle cap from a wet surface.
'Huh…' This got Ed thinking. He thought back to himself and his theory on the body.
Whenever Ed's limbs as a skeleton were separated from his body he would still feel a subtle connection towards them even if he was unable to control them. This suggested that the consciousness which had stretched out towards his arm for example was isolated but not killed.
As it was isolated his consciousness could not connect to this piece and give it commands. It was as if the path in the nervous system between the arm and the brain was cut off but without any nerves and purely spiritual.
That meant that after he reattached it there would be no problems since the isolated stretched out consciousness and the main consciousness were now back in touch. The severed nerves could now communicate with the brain again so to speak.
If he applied this same logic to the golem then Lofty's conscious core was still at the center he carved out but the results wouldn't be good. He would be leaving behind much of Lofty's consciousness in the form of an invisible film.
What would happen to these isolated portions if he took the consciousness might turn out to be interesting but Ed didn't want to fool around with Lofty's life.
'Sigh… this is going to be troublesome' How was Ed supposed to regain these pieces now? The answer actually came to him rather quickly.
Ed reconnected the center he carved out through earth manipulation and removed it promptly thereafter. This was just to verify that what he had felt earlier was not his imagination and it wasn't. He felt that same subtle resistance.
This confirmed his earlier suspicions. He no longer hesitated to take Lofty's consciousness back out. He created a hole that would fit just his arm leading straight towards where the core would have to be.
Ed did this all rapidly, he had no intention to try and slowly catch the consciousness as it darted around the earthen body trying to center itself.
The spirit insertion and worked and Lofty's consciousness was thus retrieved. As for why collecting the core would cause the thin film to be absorbed… Ed felt it was rather obvious. The film came out from the core and was still connected. It was different from when the film was forcefully caught off.
After retrieving Lofty, Ed didn't celebrate. He got right back to work. The first change he made to the earthen body was to create the head. Previously the body was connected together as if it was a spherical lump. Ed didn't want this.
He made the head its own independent thing like the skulls on skeletons. A short test however revealed this was also a failure. Although the consciousness did not wander out of the head, Lofty could only control its upper body.
'The film isn't reaching the bottom since most of it is concentrated at the head' Ed could now understand why the consciousness always tried to center itself. It was to cover the most ground possible with the most minimal of effort.
'Then… what can I do?' Thinking back, the skeletons didn't suffer from this problem. That meant that Ed's golem was fundamentally flawed.
'The skeletons are pretty light and the dungeon might have already instilled into them how to properly disperse into the body' Ed imagined that the way the dungeon inserted spirits into its mobs was much more sophisticated than his own.
Ed's efforts were like brute-forcing a solution while the dungeon likely had actual techniques and algorithms in place to make sure everything worked accordingly. They couldn't compare.
Regardless, Ed continued to brute force a solution. His first goal was the root of the issue which was the heft of the earthen golem. He could circumvent this problem by increasing the strength of the consciousness but that obviously would cost him more.
'Then it's a trade-off of resources and power' The more resources in the form of consciousness the more power. Ed had to find an ideal balance or abandon the idea of having senseless blind golems.
'I guess it's fine to create a slimmer one for now' Something skeleton sized.
Ed immediately cut the empty golem into three. He split the three into different versions of themselves. One was a humanoid with a head and the other was one without. The last one was a hollow version of the first.
Ed was curious about whether or not the denseness of the material influenced the ability of the consciousness to stretch out and cover the whole body. The third golem was key to figuring this out.
'Lofty isn't suitable for this anymore' Ed had to go back into the system and empty three orc consciousnesses right after finishing the three bodies.
He returned quickly as he was accustomed to the process and inserted the three consciousnesses one after the other. He watched closely as the three golems stood still without a single trace of movement.
'What now?' Ed was confused. Everything should have gone and worked accordingly so why could the golems not move?
'Hm?' That was when Ed finally saw something happening to the hollow skeleton. It seemed to be vibrating softly. These movements were almost indiscernible.
[Living Earth Statue (Struggling)]
{ A statue made out of the earth with consciousness in it. It's confused and struggling to move. }
'Ah….' Ed's entire world seemed to be crumbling down as he forgot the most obvious reason for his problems. He didn't create any joints! The hollow golem could hardly move simply because it was lighter.
'I need to thank myself for that' Ed's original intent for this golem was to find out how the denseness of the material affected things but he quite honestly couldn't tell. Fortunately, it wasn't a wasted effort.
Ed was about to retrieve the three consciousness when he stopped to consider if there would be any adverse effects to not doing this.
'The assessment called it an earth statue' If he added joints would the assessment change? If it did would they now be able to move? These were simple curiosity but Ed knew that the former question had some use.
Ed manipulated the earth. The weird sensation of subtle resistance appeared again but Ed ignored and it and crafted on. The limbs were now less stationery. One could clearly tell there were joints.
[Living Earth Puppet (Confused)]
Ed assessed the golem again, no, the earth puppet.
'A fitting name' Unlike the statutes these things were in theory able to move. The task was only made difficult by the fact that they couldn't see anything.
'In the end, this will be my greatest bane' He could probably upgrade the living earth puppet to a living earth golem if he overcame this issue but he was hard-pressed to find a solution.
'I guess I lose nothing by trying to give them faces' The current puppets only had a humanoid shape but were otherwise no different from polished stone. Ed decided to give them some personality. He crafted each of them a face.
There was one with sunken eye sockets, another with a sharp nose, and the hollow one which had holes for eyes and mouth.
[Living Earth Puppet (Confused)]
But the result was the same. Ed really wasn't sure what else he could employ. Yet the sun was now beginning to set and he couldn't loiter around anymore.
'I've been doing too much experimenting' Ed's own strength had stagnated as a result. Ed believed it was a good time to find a new sparring partner.
'Who would be a good match?' The current Vorgarag was not accustomed to his body and Shel could be easily overpowered. This left none other than Sharog.
'I wonder if she is up for it…' Ed had never actually seen Sharog fight as odd as that was. He was usually too busy elsewhere whenever she was in battle. Yet that only made the prospective fight more interesting.. What could she cook up? Ed didn't know.