An understanding reached, Ben and the others left to fulfill his promise first, Ben at least knowing just how easy it would be. With his soul stretched out, he was already connected to a few of the creatures that were causing the maliae problems, leaving only the matter of how he wanted to deal with them.

An animal that was technically amphibious, even if they drastically preferred life underwater compared to dry land, they were creatures with a surprising range of habitat, just as comfortable at the deepest depths of the ocean as well as the surface, leaving their fins to also act like powerful legs depending on where they were, with the strength that let them handle the oceans crushing depths shining when they went above, having a size comparable to the tigers of Ben’s old world, making them significant predators.

Attacking both crops, livestock, and the maliae themselves, as strong as those animals were, the maliae could actually handle them, at least somewhat. None of them had died to those beasts at least, but their farms and infrastructure would keep being damaged before those pests could be chased off by the more powerful members of their community, and just because none had been killed yet, didn’t mean they never would be. There may have been both mages and warriors living in that town, but any animal that large could still pose a threat, especially if it only grew more starved.

Really, the simplest solution would have been for Ben to gather and kill them all. In the heads of a few dozen of them, he could either use their senses to track the rest that were outside of his range or else use their calls to gather the others to him before frying all of their brains with his mind, but that wasn’t what he wanted to do. Along with their senses, he also had their memories, letting him see exactly what had driven the creatures out there, and a different solution to the problem it left.

“Alright,” Ben nodded, beginning to gather the creatures within the range of his soul to solve things. “The issue looks like habitat loss. It’s not going to be super interesting to try and fix, so why don’t you three go and find an inn for the night and do a bit of tourism while we’re here? When I’m done with this, I’m going to be going straight to where the other talos are kept so I can find you all in the morning.”

“No fair,” Delair complained. “I wanted to come out to see you work.”

“Ha, trust me, kiddo, you’re not going to be missing anything from this first bit. It’s just going to be some final research. I’ll let you watch when I actually make my attempt tomorrow, so just have fun with Mora and Thera until then.”

“Mmm, alright.”

His student giving in, the rest turned to leave, off to enjoy the day since an unexpected task had arrived at Ben’s feet, with him holding only one of them back, Verbum not allowed to escape.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“Vacation and sleep, don’t try to stop me.”

“Verbum, I’m going to need your help looking at the talos again, which means there’s no point slipping off when this first thing is going to be an hour at most. Come on, if we get this done and we do our research quickly enough, I’ll let you go to sleep before I actually make my attempt tomorrow, deal?”

“What’s the point in asking if I’m not allowed to disagree?”

“Feels somewhat more polite,” Ben shrugged, before lifting the ground beneath their feet to carry the two of them over the ocean’s surface. “For now, just relax. It’s not like you’re going to need to do anything for this part, anyway.”

Standing above the ocean, far enough away from the town that there was no longer any land within his sight, Ben was finally ready to solve the maliae’s problem, not needing to push himself for something so simple.

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Within his range, all of the animals that had been attacking them were gathered, swimming through the ocean and completely under his control, while further down, he could sense the minds of the creatures that had driven them out of their habitat.

Demons, a swarm of aquatic ones that were already eating their way through the other creatures’ home, nearly a kilometer beneath the surface and undiscovered by the aquatic half of the planet’s hunts so far, leaving the matter to him, with the solution simple. With how far his souls could stretch, even as deep as they were, he was connected to them and, through that, exposed his mind to each of the invaders, the force of it killing them instantly, solving the problem in its entirety.

With that done, returning the other creatures to their original habitat was as simple as erasing their memories of what had driven them away, as well as implanting just a bit of fear in the direction of the town they’d been tormenting to make sure they wouldn’t come back, and with demon corpses littering the area to act as a meal for the hungry creatures, it seemed they’d be resettled soon enough, letting Ben nod to himself over a job well done before turning around to go back, while Verbum sat by his side as they turned around.

“Done already?” The other summoned asked, a bit more relaxed for how little he had to do on that detour as he instead took in the ocean around them.

“Yeah, it was a pretty simple fix with my skill set. Nothing left to worry about.”

Verbum shook his head. “What’s it even feel like to be you at this point?”

“Mostly stressful. Too much to do and too much I’m still struggling with.”

“I don’t want to hear that from a guy with the most third-tier skills on the planet.”

“Ha, fair, but when you consider that three of those five happened from me specifically failing to get the actual awakenings I wanted, maybe you can spare me a bit of sympathy. If building Inux a new body doesn’t work, then I’m really going to be scraping the bottom of the barrel for any other ideas.”

“You think it will get you whatever awakening it is you’re aiming for, then?”

“... No,” Ben admitted. “The odds are way too low, and the gulf between high legendary and low mythic feels pretty insurmountable. But, it doesn’t matter; I still need to try. I’ll do my absolute best, and even if it isn’t enough, it will get me closer, and even if I don’t have any better ideas yet, I’ll figure some new ones out. It’s only a matter of time.”

Trying to force some optimism, Ben couldn’t help but wonder just what he’d be forced to try next if he did fail as they made their way back to town, off to see the rest of the fallen talos.

“Right this way,” Seerly, the girl leading them, said briskly, doing as she’d been asked but clearly not happy about it, not that Ben intended to fault her for it. The introduction with the mayor revealed her to be the oracle of one of the maliae’s surviving goddesses, while a peek into her mind revealed her to be one of the talos’s caretakers in their final days, who’d already formed a poor enough opinion of Ben the moment she’d heard about him.

And why wouldn’t she have? He had failed to save Inux all those years ago and had apparently been holding onto his soul that whole time without sending any word to her people about what had happened. Add in that she could recognize him as the mad apostle of Myriad who’d spat on another god before her and so many others, and she was already filled with a bad impression that he didn’t let get to him.

Either he would fix it by fixing Inux, or else he would fail and leave, never to see her or her people again. He had no reason to try and improve her impression of him when he had more important things to worry about, and, led to the church’s basement, he was able to see with his eyes what he’d previously only seen with his soul.

Dozens of talos who had been laid to rest, a group that had to have once been the most numerous of the mythic items on the world by a longshot, were all respectfully laid out on ornate platforms, with fresh flowers placed by all of their sides. Even if gone, the Maliae hadn’t forgotten their departed protectors, and respect was still being shown all of those years later.

Which means if I do the same sort of dissection I did to Inux on any of these ones, there’s a good chance my reception is going to become a fair bit worse. Mmh, whatever, I shouldn’t need to at this point anyway. I’ll just get Verbum to go over them all one by one to see what the system shows us and figure things out from there. Worse to worst, I can try to let him look through my eyes while he uses his skill. Pair his power with my material and alien senses to give him something else to look through, and we might find something new; now all that’s left is to get started.

Without a word, Ben materialized a new circlet on Verbum’s head to begin their long night, with plenty to go through before he’d see if his efforts would bear fruit the following day.