The Astral soul system-Chapter 208: Your own...

A gew more hours passed and Zen laid there on the grass while Freya picked through millions of possible designs, filtering out based on preferences, his budget and some other things.

Quickly the sun started to set and Sylphie suddenly got up from where she was sitting.

Under Zen’s gaze, she walked towards the edge of the cave and pointed her finger out. Glowing bits of dust appeared around her fingertips as energy coalesced. The wind in the area suddenly started swirling intensely before getting sucked towards her finger, compressing into a small marble sized ball.

She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath before firing, sending a thin blast of concentrated air out flying at insane speeds.

Zen quickly got up and looked out through the cave, seeing a massive crater with multiple destroyed trees. It looked like it had been created by some sort of missile instead of just wind.

"That was at least mach two"

Theia muttered, slightly stunned.

Zen immediately saw his energy go into the negatives before quickly being filled up again as his wings quickly absorbed more like solar panels to sunlight.

His system immediately reacted too.

[Codex has come into contact with skill]

[Skill integration has begun]

[Host can spend exp to learn]

[Time: 24hours]

"Impressive"

"Yes i am. You on the other hand are a burden"

Zen tilted his head

Sighing, Sylphie shrugged.

"It can’t be helped. My capabilities are linked to you. The stronger you become, the more energy I’ll be capable of holding and the longer i can keep my form. Right now if i don’t constantly absorb energy i can barely keep it active for about quarter of a day. Not to mention unless I’m in a place like this,all my power is useless "

"Your part of the deal is done. Time for you to help Neo"

"Yeah yeah,I got it. Whatever "

Forget looking like a teenager, she even acted like one too. Outright arrogant and cavalier in everything she did. It really was hard to remember she was probably centuries old

"Let’s go"

Zen was about to leave when Theia suddenly stopped him

"Uh... dude. What are you doing?"

"Taking her to Neo"

"Um... okay. How are you going to explain her?"

Zen shrugged.

"I don’t"

Theia was about to give up when Sylphie spoke up

"Actually I’d prefer to stay as secret as possible. I don’t like strangers"

Zen had no choice but to listen. Bringing an alien into earth’s military base was probably a bad idea any way, especially after what just happened

"What about the shadow dimension. Could she stay there?"

"I don’t think that’s a good idea boy. Shadows shift, change. For someone like you transversing them is about as hard as breathing but I wouldn’t advise it"

"It seemed he hadn’t thought this part through.

"Can’t she just return to the codex?"

Sylphie shook her head

"I just got this body. I’m staying like this for as long as possible"

"Can’t argue with that"

Theia said,her voice dripping with sarcasm

"Can i change her?"

Zen suddenly asked.

"This body is basically made from energy right,so it should be similar to a hard light projection. Can’t i just tweak her skin color. It’s really the only thing that gives her away "

"That should be possible. After all the codex has integrated every aspect of your physical form, even your human form. I’ll just give her your pigmentation "

The system informed him that Theia was requesting access to do something and he granted it.

The codex in Sylphie’s chest started glowing brighter and brighter and her skin color started shifting, becoming more similar to Zen’s, and in about ten seconds, the change was complete. The only thing you would find strange about her was her pointy ears but Zen felt like that wouldn’t be much of a problem. Even if people commented, he’d just say it was a minor mutation, like his eye"

"Okay, one final thing "

"What’s that?"

"Give her some clothes"

Theia said, sounding like it had been on her mind for a while and Freya quickly agreed.

"Yes, please. It’s okay if she’s in the castle or with you but I can’t let you walk her around in what’s basically a towel "

Zen looked at the green dress. It started from below her collarbone and ended around her thighs. Sylphie herself didn’t seem to mind but he guessed they were right.

He didn’t really have any clothes on him now so he took his hoodie off and offered it to her.

She put it on without a word and it went a bit lower now, covering her knees, although her hands were completely covered.

"We’ll get something for you later"

"No thanks. This is enough"

Zen shrugged and was about to leave when Sylphie suddenly cleared her throat to get his attention.

"Excuse me"

She said pointing to herself.

Zen thought for a few seconds about what she might be talking about before suddenly realizing and picking her up again.

"Much better"

Zen didn’t really know how to respond but she wasn’t heavy so he decided to just get it over with.

"Now how do I get down"

He said, looking at the long trip down. He couldn’t use his hands right now, and flying was out of the question with his curse and Astra being reduced every hour.

Time to improvise

***********

A few minutes later, Zen found himself at the door of his dorm and without another second wasted he opened the door, walking in. He immediately saw Maximilian and Xavier stare at him a bit confused but he didn’t explain and just set Sylphie down near Neo to do her thing.

"Um... Who’s that?"

"That’s Syl"

Zen didn’t know why but she wanted him to introduce her as Syl, which was weird considering Sylphie was already a nickname.

He didn’t argue though and just accepted. She also couldn’t speak to anyone so he added that she was mute. He’d have to teach her sign language later.

"She’s helping"

Was all Zen said before sitting down to meditate again, absorbing astra.

The two stared at Syl work for a while but in the end didn’t say anything. Zen seemed to know her so they just let her do her thing.

A few hours passed and Zen suddenly got a message. It was from Zaria. She wanted to meet at her "special spot"

Zen thought for a few seconds if he should go and eventually decided to. There wasn’t much to do here and Sylphie wouldn’t cause trouble,at least he thought so.

He got out of his bed and mentioned that he was leaving to no one in particular before stepping out.

He headed out of the school building, going towards the garden before looking behind him to make sure no one was watching before stepping into the secret garden.

He immediately spotted Zaria sitting on the bench and staring up at the stars

"Hey"

She said softly, patting the space next to her twice.

He accepted the invitation and sat next to her

"Did you need something?"

Zaria almost burst out laughing but held it together.

"Well you’re direct. Jeez,no, not really"

She sighed

"I just... don’t have a lot of people i can call to spend time here. You know... out there,i don’t like it, it’s so bright and loud, and in here it’s nice, but then it’s too quiet and dark. Having you here balances that out, even if you don’t really talk"

"..."

"So how’s Neo?"

"Getting better. Jade?"

"Getting better"

"..."

"What exactly did you do? It was weird. When they brought her in she was completely fine, barely even a scratch on her,heck, she was better than when she left"

"..."

"I already said you don’t have to tell me before so it’s not that -"

"I don’t know. I don’t know anything "

Zaria went quiet before sighing and looking up again.

"That bad,huh?"

"..."

"Don’t worry man, the worse that can happen is you die"

"That is neither comforting nor true "

She immediately burst out laughing again. At this point Zen was confused. What about him was so amusing that everyone laughed. First Aurora,then his roommates and now Zaria.

She suddenly looked at him,her eyes landing on the choker.

"Hmm?" What’s this?"

She asked, suddenly moving to touch it. Immediately, Zen sprung out of the chair backing away.

"Don’t touch it"

Zaria stared up at him in confusion

"What... did i do?"

Zen thought for a second. He’d already been considering asking around to get information on this. He’d been browsing online for hours already and hadn’t seen anything, and now he wondered if Zaria would know.

She was a rich kid daughter of one of the most powerful families in the universe. She might be able to find something out for him.

First of all, admitting he was now weak was something he’d never do, especially to someone as dangerous as Zaria, even if she considered him a friend, but on the other hand he needed someway to take this thing off.

Power dampening technology already existed right? Maybe this bracelet worked similar?

It was still just theory being studied by the leading families (at least that’s what people knew) so Zaria could definitely get him some useful information

He thought for a second and decided to explain what the choker did, but only mentioned it kept him from splitting and couldn’t be taken off, causing him pain whenever he tried either.

Ask for how it got on him in the first place, Zen himself couldn’t remember so he just blamed the Arcade.

"That’s..."

Zaria’s expression turned grim and she looked at the collar again.

"Oh my...are the others okay? I mean...are you all...there"

The wording for that question was a bit weird but Zen answered in the positive. They could still switch, just couldn’t split.

"That’s good. No wonder you feel weird"

"Can you help me?"

Zaria shook her head.

"My family is indeed lead in the research but I’m pretty sure a prototype hasn’t even been produced yet, and i don’t have to be the one to tell you that it never will considering the federation law"

Right. The first time it’d been discovered that the leading families were thinking of things like this,it caused a huge storm and had been shut down almost immediately due to the effects it could have, after all, abilities were the cornerstone of their society now. Rumors had even come through that the idea had first been gotten from Eclipse.

Eclipse, like the Arcade was another dangerous organization. Though nowhere near as dangerous it was still of valid concern.

The unique thing about this organization was that they were originally a faction of the void family almost half the size of the entire family who’d decided that all abilities other than their own were unholy and cleansing the world was their divine charge.

Azrael had met a few of them and had one word for them all. Unpleasant.

They were a bunch of raving lunatics with a collective god complex that was rooted in absurdity.

This had happened centuries ago so the backlash and stigmatization Xavier’s family had suffered had been mostly recovered from but it didn’t change the fact that they were still at large and dangerous.

When ability suppression theories came out, people had exploded saying it was Eclipse trying to push it’s agenda and even some wild rumors saying the technology ran by using people as batteries.

"I’ll see what I can dig up, but...what exactly is your... split? It isn’t an ability, and I know better than to ask about your secrets but it might help if i knew"

Zen honestly couldn’t even answer because he didn’t know either. It didn’t run on some form of energy like other skills,it was just there, and it worked.

He shook his head and Zaria sighed, though he felt she meant he wouldn’t tell her rather than couldn’t. It didn’t matter. She didn’t change her decision to help.

She suddenly chuckled again, trying to cover up her laughter.

"What is It?"

"Nothing it’s just... this reminds me of that story you told me"

"Story"

She nodded, slowly reaching out to gently touch the gem on the choker, preparing to pull back at the slightest reaction.

"Remember? The monkey king"

"Oh"

She started speaking in the almost perfect chinese he’d taught her

"Sun wukong was, chaotic, and evil. So to get him to behave,a golden, his master gave him the jingu that would tighten and cause him pain whenever he was disobedient "

"..."

She switched back to the standard language

"I was just thinking this thing was like your own Jingu"

Zen suddenly flinched and Zaria pulled back, thinking she might’ve activated it but Zen didn’t start screaming,instead a strange feeling bloomed in his mind and he suddenly spoke

"Jade is awake "