Chương 168: 166. COME ON AND SLAM

Power coalesces around me, a terrifying showing of might that, back on Verdantop, I would have assumed was a potentially lethal attack. Not here, though. This is just… fun. A game. It's such a fucking wild concept, I don't know how to handle it. As usual, it's all familiar yet surreal. My Vita side has not only never played hoopball, but I've never played any sport, ever. The closest I've come to this situation is mock combat training, and in many ways I struggle to think of this as anything else.

I'm not even being judged by my performance, though. Absolutely nothing bad happens to me if I lose. I could just not put in effort and everything would still be okay. I want to win, though. Competitive spirit boils up from the Malrosa part of me, and I bask in it. The intrinsic motivation to just go out there and give my all for no real reason… it's silly, it's pointless, and I love it. I'm having fun. I get to have fun now. This is my life. Why not try my hardest?

Instructor Naga immediately opens the game by sending her hoop into a rapid spin to knock away any incoming balls, levitating it away from the center in erratic dodging patterns. We've gone with a single ball for this game, which is fairly uncommon. Since players can cast spells on the ball, single-ball games often devolve into arcane tug-of-war, where raw magical might controls the only method of scoring points.

This is much more difficult to accomplish the more balls there are since if a team focuses too hard on one ball you can simply use a different one. Despite Queen Vena's insistence on 'not going easy on us,' I don't think she'll start by just overwhelming us with raw mana output… though even if she did, Tala and I are using a risky double-offense strategy to gang up on her and negate that.

No, I bet she's going to save her energy at the start and use quick bursts of magic to knock the ball towards our undefended goal. Of course, as long as I get close enough to her before she scores, she can't do either. Vena's arms move in quick, elegant patterns as the ball shoots up into the air, launching over our heads on a trajectory that will most likely land in the hoop that we've left lying on the ground behind us. My sister blocks it with a burst of her own Motion as I continue to charge right at our enemy.

I mean, the other team. Unfortunately, Vena takes one look at me and retreats. Shit.

"Afraid of me?" I taunt.

"You're too transparent, girl!" Vena laughs.

"I may not know what you're up to, but if you want to be close, that means I want to be far away, yeah?" Bah, she's got me there. Fortunately, I'm no longer helpless at range. I use two hands to weave one of Vita's illusion spells as the other two summon an ankle-high wall of ice behind Vena to trip her. The Queen barely stumbles, though, quickly righting herself with a beat of her wings. My illusory self rushes towards Naga, who largely ignores it in order to scoff at me.

"What kind of brain damage did you take to make such an ugly-ass art?" she barks at me.

"No self-respecting Queen should move mana that way!" …Ouch, geez. They really hate Rowan's spell formula, huh? I guess the structure itself is… pretty bad, now that I think about it. Ugly and inelegant, like most everything I was taught on Verdantop. Ew. I'll have to redesign and practice all my spells all over again!

"Focus, Mal-Mal!" Hmm? Oh, right, I shouldn't get distracted! I keep charging Vena, lifting off the ground to fly right at her, but her relentless offensive manages to score a goal on our hoop before I can make much progress.

"S-sorry," Tala pants as we reset our positions.

"I can't keep up with her."

"It's fine," I reassure her.

"Charging her down won't work, so I'll focus on the ball."

"Double offense again?"

"Yeah." Across the field, Queen Venatila has scooped up my combat instructor in her arm, the two of them lovingly nuzzling foreheads. Naga catches me looking and shoots me a smug expression.

"I'll be awfully bored defending the hoop if you can't even get the ball past Vena," she smirks.

"Oh don't worry, I'm just warming up," I assure them. I get three sets of confused looks.

"Are you cold?" Naga asks. Oh, Progenitor damn it. I just groan and wave them off, moving the ball back to the starting position with a quick spell. The second round begins. I start trying to blind Vena with flashes of light and sound, but Queens aren't as easy to disorient as humans are. I knew that, I just… gah, it doesn't matter. Tala manages to bonk the ball in my direction and I jump up, physically scooping it out of the sky.

Vena quickly yanks it away from me, but not before I manage to slap a rune on the outside and a soul on the inside. I start spreading more runes over the ground around Vena, trying not to cringe at how amateurish they are. I keep defaulting to doing Vita things, but Malrosa should know how to play hoopball! I mean, I do know how to play hoopball, but the things Malrosa would do can't win against Vena.

Malrosa lacks the raw power and out-of-context abilities that Vita has, while Vita lacks the skill, experience, and motivation that Malrosa has. None of my habits involve combining the disparate aspects of my skills, however. Mentally, I find my plans swapping between Vita things, Melik things, and Malrosa things, but never really doing all of them at once. But like… it's a lot! I have so many memories now I feel bloated with the damn things.

This is my first real opportunity to practice being all of me, and I can't help but be a little excited for it. Besides, they're looking down on me. They think I'm an injured Princess, but I'm not just Malrosa anymore. I am a goddess, I am a Queen, and I am going to fucking destroy them. … At hoopball, I mean.

"Your glyphs are hideous too, Malrosa!" Naga growls.

"Who the fuck taught you to weave this way?"

"A woman named Theodora," I answer flatly.

"And ugly or not, you have to admit her formulas work. Ready up, Tala!" Triggering the glyphs on the ground just as I bat the ball back towards the other side of the field, Vena finds herself yanked violently towards them, disrupting her concentration enough to prevent a rebound volley. She rights herself quickly, only giving the ball a little more time to approach the goal before she bats it away again. But the moment she does, I activate the glyph on the ball, reversing its momentum immediately.

"You're out of tricks!" Vena growls as my last rune disappears.

"Time to show you what I'm made of!" Likewise, old lady.

"Die," I order my shard, and the soul in the ball shatters, releasing my mana all around it. For an instant before the screeching explosion, the ball is immune to any spell I disallow the existence of. Vena's volley is denied by my reality, and the ball flies true to the enemy goal. But Naga's hoop-spinning trick is a classic strategy for a reason, and the ball is smacked away by the rim the moment it tries to get close. The problem with classic strategies, of course, is that they have classic counters.

"Got it!" Tala announces, and her own spell blooms to life. A cage of ice solidifies into existence around the enemy hoop, enclosing it with the ball. The enemy team may not block off their hoop, but there's nothing to prevent us from doing so, and now every time the ball is smacked away by the spinning rim it rebounds back, its momentum enhanced by the strike.

It clatters around inside, nearly bouncing faster than the eye can see until, after dozens of ricochets in the span of a second, it manages to pass through the rotating hoop, scoring us a goal.

"Yes!" Tala cheers, rushing up to me and jumping with her palms outstretched. I jump up to meet her, giving her a celebratory high-twenty.

"Princess Malrosa," Queen Nagatilka chides.

"I do not approve of you using all these sloppy arts. You're better than that."

"I know," I sigh.

"I'm sorry, Naga. I haven't had time to refine them. They're all really suboptimal, but I have to use new tricks to get the upper hand on you."

"Hmm," she grumbles.

"Well, I suppose as long as you intend to fix them."

"Aw, quit being so stuffy and congratulate them, Naga," Vena laughs.

"They took a point from us! And those new tricks are very interesting. They stem from your new memory core, don't they, Princess?"

"They do," I confirm.

"I admit, I'm using this game as a bit of a testing ground. It shouldn't be anything too dangerous, of course."

"Dangerous? Ha!" Vena barks.

"You're getting cocky, girl! Though I'll admit you gave me a bit of a fright when you ordered us to die all of a sudden."

"Don't worry," I reassure them, crouching down as Naga levitates the ball back to the starting point.

"That wasn't directed at any of you. It was a Pneuma art."

"... You have new memories in your core," Naga concludes.

"But how… Vena, I'm sure I didn't find anything even remotely like this in her soul."

"Nor I," Vena confirms.

"I'll explain if you beat us," I taunt. Naga and Vena glance at each other while my sister stares at me in horror.

"Oh no," Tala whimpers.

"Let's get back to it then," Vena smirks, and the ball rockets towards our goal so fast we barely have time to react. Holy shit! I knew Vena was sandbagging but I didn't think she was holding back this much! I barely manage to defend the hoop by casting a powerful repulsion art in front of the entire hoop, curving the incoming ball just enough to save us from getting aced.

But Naga has thrown her hoop into the sky, letting momentum defend it for now as she follows up on Vena's serve, batting the ball towards the hoop and nearly scoring again if not for Tala pulling our hoop away. This all takes less than a second, and suddenly Vena is charging me, apparently no longer content to play keepaway and prod at us with her superior power and skill. She's going to try and fight on my terms, both curious as to what I'll do and confident she'll be able to beat me, no matter what it is.

So be it, then. I weave an elegant spell, one that Naga did actually teach me. I freeze the air, but not into a wall or trap. Instead, I craft myself a weapon. A long, blunted spear, forged of magic and might, its skin-scouring coldness easily ignored by my dragonscale gloves. I enjoy the feel of it for an imperceptible moment, wishing Norah was here with me as I heft my weapon with two hands. An Athanatos makes herself weaker by having her hands full, as she's unable to craft complex arts as quickly.

But I no longer need arms of flesh to form my ephemeral body. My soul stirs, my body tenses, and I fill my new weapon with dregs.

"Die when you are struck," I whisper, and jab my spear at the incoming Queen. Vena doesn't stop casting spells on the ball as she ducks under my newly-formed staff, twisting her body to dodge in a way that only a creature capable of flight can expect to work. She's getting inside my reach! I try to jump back out to my ideal range, but Vena is faster. Of course, it's not like I need to hit her with the tip of the 'spear.'

Vena grabs at me and I block with the middle of the shaft, freezing her hand and sending a pulse of mana bursting around her as one of the souls I put in the spear shatters, breaking Vena's art. Unfortunately, the massive Queen seems neither surprised nor deterred, swatting my spear aside with that very hand and barreling into me, hooking an elbow under each of my lower armpits and forcing my hands up above my head. With a complex joint lock she holds down all four of my arms with two of her own.

Ah, I see her game. She's limiting both our casting abilities, but trying to limit me more. She'll still be able to use two arms normally while I'm stuck with just finger-wiggling, which is easily disrupted if she jostles me during the cast. Too bad for her that none of it will work. This is exactly what I want. I can't help it, I start to giggle. A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

"Oop, am I tickling you?" Vena asks, weaving together an art that will knock Tala to the ground so Naga's attempt at scoring will succeed. I don't answer. Why should I answer? I let my mana do the talking, pushing it out of my body and shattering what the Queen is crafting like thin sheets of glass. Simultaneously, I use my tendrils to weave more frozen air into the world, sculpting a beautifully-curved ramp which catches Naga's shot and uses its momentum to slingshot the ball in the other direction.

Vena's eyes widen with shock. I didn't move my hands. She knows I didn't. I laugh harder. This is the best body I've ever had, sure, but did you really think I needed the body!? Aaah, this is so fun! Vena starts sprinting away from the action, knowing that magic is weakened by distance and that, if I'm taken out of the game, Naga will still beat Tala one-on-one. So clever! She's much stronger than me, at least as I am. I want to grin, but my mouth doesn't quite support it. I let my mandibles open up anyway.

I don't care that it's improper. Why should I? I'm free. I'm not wanted for the crime of existing. I'm not being forced to hide. I have a family. I'm having fun. I don't need to hold back anymore. My laughter reaches a fever pitch and my shell cracks. The husk of Malrosa I lapped up from the inside serves no purpose anymore. She lives in my true soul now. I am all that's left of her, and that's okay because I've become so much more!

My tendrils burst free of their prison, wrapping around my limbs and helping me pull myself out of Vena's grip. Her muscles strain against me, threads snaking out from the inside of my soul to assist my tendrils. It's time to properly claim this vessel.

"Vena!" Queen Nagatilka shrieks with alarm, her team's hoop clattering to the ground behind her.

"Get back!" Ah, she cast an anima sight spell. She sees me. She sees the hundreds of tendrils poised and hungry to rip out her lover's soul. Vena, to her credit, drops me and turns to run, causing me to laugh even harder. Such a powerful soul, running away from me. Delicious. I chase her, and once again I nearly crack my own legs from the force my threads put them through. How nostalgic. My spiked, prehensile tongue falls out of my mouth as I continue trying to grin, laughter ringing through the arena.

They're going to be mine. I throw my spear of ice at Vena's retreating form, causing it to shatter against the back of her skull and release a massive bloom of glorious blue. Her attempt to fly away sputters, and immediately I'm on top of her, tackling her to the ground. My tendrils wrap around her soul and she freezes, terror blotting out any attempt at consious thought. Naga starts casting something to protect Vena, but she's too slow. It's over. I win. The ball drops into the hoop.

"Point to us," I say between my giggles, and then Naga blasts me with a wave of force that knocks me heels-over-head to the other side of the arena. I slow my momentum before I smash into the back wall, holding up my hands in surrender as both Queens turn on me. I'm still laughing. God, hatching feels so good! I've been cramped inside a shell for way too long!

"What the fuck was that!?" Naga demands, preparing another spell to launch at me.

"Who are you!?"

"Uh, I'm Malrosa, and that was me kicking your ass at hoopball," I chuckle.

"Fuck hoopball! Explain, now!" Bah! How could she say something so terrible about hoopball? Still, I sigh in acquiescence, one of my arms spasming slightly as my threads grow rapidly down it.

"Does everyone have anima sight on?" I ask, knowing that only Naga does. The other two quickly cast the spell, each reacting with horror and surprise.

"Progenitor's perfect turds!" Vena swears.

"What the fuck happened to you, Malrosa?"

"I think… apotheosis, technically?" I hedge.

"You… you got rid of her," Tala whispers, her body shaking in horror.

"She's gone."

"What!?" I yelp, immediately retracting most of my tendrils.

"No, no no! Tala, it's still me, I'm still Malrosa. The… the shell, I mean, what was left of that part of my soul was inert. Oh no, please don't freak out. It's me, I promise it's me." She takes a deep breath.

"Your entire soul is different," she shudders.

"All of it."

"The brain is a backup to the soul," I remind her.

"The soul is our true self, the one that passes on when we are reborn, but even if it's damaged our soul can be repaired from the brain." I tap my head.

"I am Malrosa. She is in my soul, even though it's different. Nothing has changed from an hour ago."

"Promise," she says.

"Promise you're not just some lying monster piloting her corpse."

"I promise," I assure her.

"I'm so sorry, Tala, I did not mean to terrify you like this. I love you. I was just… really cramped in there, you know?"

"Am I going to get my explanation any time soon, or do I have to insist?" Naga growls.

"You… you make the very air around you feel like an anathema to life. I've never felt a more dangerous presence. I was sure you were moments away from killing my love!" I mean, she smells delicious and I was definitely tempted, but no sense telling her that.

"Sorry about that," I chuckle.

"I, uh, might have leaned into the shock and awe a little bit too much. I think something about being an apex animavore makes me ping on danger senses like that." Tala clears her airways for attention.

"Queen Nagatilka, Queen Venatila, I'd like to reintroduce you to my sister, Princess Malrosa," she intones formally.

"Though she now also answers to the name Vita. Her injury at the recent battle for The Pentiful Wood was no mere act of spite from a savage. She has merged in body and soul with the one she killed, for they, too, were Athanatos. My sister is now a Queen of Death."

"And yet she lives," Vena notes.

"And yet she lives," Tala confirms.

"She is fused with a Lich that can take still-living bodies without preparing or killing them, but doing so apparently causes the merger in personality she now experiences."

"So she's… half savage now," Naga concludes, her eyes emoting mild disgust.

"No," I correct her.

"I'm all goddess. I am a font of unique mana. I am kin to The One Below All. And I'm a fifteen-year-old Princess who just scored a point against you while you were going all out. Woop woop!" I pump my arms in a victory dance, though everyone else seems rather nonplussed.

"You cast like a savage," Naga accuses.

"Well that's—okay, first of all, humans suck but that's no reason to call them savages. Second of all… yes, you're right, my casting today was hideous and it's entirely the fault of gross human spell formulae, and I am absolutely going to be spending at least a tenday refining, correcting, and breaking the bad habits of my former bodies because ugh, yeah, the way they do magic is so ugly and gross. I'm sorry to have subjected you to that, teacher." She seems a bit stunned by that, but mostly in a good way, I think.

She emotes acceptance with her eyes. Naga the angry artist is quelled, at least temporarily.

"Okay, can we fuckin' talk about the tentacles now?" Vena butts in. I turn to her, extending a few more of my glorious tendrils out of my body.

"These?" I ask.

"Yes! Those!" I glance down at my wiggly anima bits.

"Well… I… have them," I answer slowly.

"And… they're awesome?" She stares at me. I stare back.

"That's it!?" she demands.

"I don't know what you want me to say here!" I yelp.

"What you can see pretty much sums them up!"

"Why do you have tentacles?" Vena groans, seeming exasperated.

"I… I dunno, to grab other souls with? Why don't you have tentacles?"

"Can we, uh… touch them?" my sister asks hesitantly.

"Well no, they're…" I stop. They totally can touch my tentacles. The Queens all have anima contact spells! Holy shit holy shit holy shit.

"I mean, uh… yes!" I say.

"Yeah, they're anima constructs but like… feel free to? I mean, if you want." My sister steps hesitantly forwards as I reach a few tentacles out to her, one of her hands quickly flicking through the anima contact spell.

"Talanika," Naga barks.

"Careful." Tala looks back at her.

"Come on, Naga," she sighs.

"She really did see the Progenitor about this. And besides, my sister would never hurt me."

"With respect, I seriously doubt that is your sister." I wince a little at that, partially because it hurts to hear and partly because my soul threads have started growing out through the inside of my eyeballs. My whole body shudders as Tala steps forward and holds one of my tendrils between two hands.

"Mal-Mal is very different now," Tala agrees.

"It's scary. It's… terrifying, really. But she's the only sister I have. Probably the only one I ever will have. Our mom's not… you know." Naga's suspicious glower softens ever so slightly and Vena wraps an arm around her shoulders. An ache in my chest pulses. I barely remember our mother. Tala and I… we haven't seen her in ages. We've been too ashamed to. Tala kneads my tendril between her fingers, worried and inquisitive. Slowly, I move two to hug her waist, which she allows.

"I'm just saying," Tala continues, "I don't have anyone else. And I'm the big sister now. I know she hasn't been like this for long, but we've talked a lot, and I… I just have to trust her. I'd rather be killed by a pretender than… look. Mal-Mal lost old memories and gained new ones. But she's still my sister, and that's final."

"Ohh, Tala!" I blubber, unable to help myself anymore. I extend dozens of tentacles out, wrap her up, and pull her to me.

"You're so perfect! I can't believe how lucky I am to have you! I love you so muuuch!"

"I-I love you too!" Tala yelps, squirming fervently in my tendril cocoon.

"Now p-put me down!"

"But you're just so great and I want to hug you so much!"

"Aaaagh, Mal-Mal I like hugging you too but this is too much so please put me down!"

"Okay, okay," I grumble, letting her plop shakily to the ground.

"I'll get you to enjoy my tentacle hugs, though."

"Th-that sounds like a threat!"

"I'll take a tentacle hug," Queen Venatila declares.

"Vena," my combat instructor says harshly.

"What?" Vena asks.

"She's not that scary."

"Honey, I didn't say she was 'scary,' I'm just—""Hug me, girl!" Vena demands. I shrug and wrap my tentacles around her, yanking her towards me. She lets out a terrified and highly undignified yelp. It's so unexpected that Tala has to choke down a laugh.

"Oh no, she's going to be obsessed with this for months," Naga groans.

"I am not!" Vena calls out from within our cuddle cocoon, trying to fight her own abject terror. Gosh, I didn't mean to do that to her!

"I'm sorry for traumatizing you, Queen Venatila," I tell her honestly.

"Should I let you go?"

"No!" Vena yells at the same time Naga says "Yes!" Uh. Hmm. I decide to split the difference and remove most of my tendrils, hanging Vena up by her armpits the way she restrained me in the match. My fingers spasm wildly as most of them finish getting threads pushed through them, causing Naga to jump and weave most of an Ekphrasis construct to repel hostile magic.

"Not scary, huh?" Vena taunts her.

"Okay, put me down, Princess. It's my job to truss people up like this, not the other way around." For some reason, Naga seems more embarrassed by that than she did by nearly blasting me with another spell for no good reason, but I decide to ignore that and just drop Vena like she asked.

"So…" I start as casually as possible.

"Hoopball?"

"No," Naga insists.

"No hoopball. Not until I have a talk with the Great Mother." I'm disappointed by that and I let it show. I want to play more hoopball, sure, but I also want my beloved instructor to trust me. I care about her. It'd hurt to learn she no longer cares about me. On the other hand…

"You know that means we win, right?" I point out smugly.

"Shit!" Vena swears.

"Naga, honey! We've gotta go another round!"

"No. We're leaving, we're setting a meeting, and we're getting to the bottom of… whatever this is," she insists, motioning at me. Vena sighs, walking over to her lover.

"I understand. Well, we'll catch you later, Princesses. And we'll kick your asses next time." I nod at her, smiling with my eyes. I hope she mellows Naga out some. The two of them fly off, so I turn to my sister.

"Wanna go a round?" I ask.

"Nah," she sighs.

"I think I'm done for the day. Like, completely. It'll be night soon, so… I'm gonna head to bed."

"Tomorrow, then?" I ask hopefully. She glances over to the court.

"Uh… maybe not hoopball," she chuckles.

"But yeah. Let's hang out sometime tomorrow. Bye, Mal-Mal." She lifts up off the ground and flies away as well, leaving me alone. I let out a long, painful sigh. I guess I got ahead of myself, there. Not everyone in Liriope is going to accept me for who I am. I should have expected that. But still, I'm allowed to be me. I don't have to hide. I have people I love that love me back. And for now, that's more than enough. I craft a flight spell with my tentacles, lifting myself gently into the sky.

Threads of anima fill my body now, wrapping around and piercing through my organs. It doubtlessly looks rather horrifying. Once again, I feel my heartbeat, the constant pulse of blood through my body, the way my breathing tubes expand and contract to nourish my body with much-needed air. My stomach vomits horrid fluids within itself, constantly adjusting the acidic concoction it uses to dissolve food. My intestines suck moisture out of waste product, creating the shit and urine I'll need to expel in an hour or so.

Countless muscles clench and unclench, some at my command and some beyond my ability to consciously affect. All this crowds my senses, and I find the refreshing smell of Liriope's beautiful air to be that much more distant because of it. It reminds me of Jelisaveta. I wonder if she's doing alright. I'll never forgive the Templars for what they did to me, but at the same time there are many of them that I hope are okay. Her, Lark… my whole squad, really. Would even one of them be happy to see me again?

I suppose I'll find out when I return. I'll find Penelope, get her to help me take over Verdantop, and bring peace between our islands. That's the plan. The goal. It's nice to have one, after so long. To be safe and happy enough in the short term that I can care about the long term. It's so strange, yet so wonderful. I think I'll go home and tinker with automatons for a bit before bed. I have hobbies now, too. It's so beautifully odd, to feel like a complete person.

I wish I didn't have to steal someone's life to get that, but here we are. I fly home, enjoying every second of it. I order my servants to organize my metal-powered constructs and they happily obey, utterly ignorant to the massive changes in my life. I suppose it's unlikely they would care. I play with my toys for a bit, only eating about half of them, then clean myself with a quick spell and get into bed. I go to sleep, and when I wake up my eyes are a deep, deep blue.