Chapter 120: The Second Vessel

"E-Eh…? Me?" Kirika pointed at herself, still in a daze from what happened earlier.

"… I don't understand," Lust said after a short silence. "She does not seem to be the type to be prone to envy. Why her?"

"I believe in my judgment," Envy said. "Not everything is as it seems on the surface—you should know that better than anyone."

Lust fell silent after that, and no one brought up the hidden meaning behind Envy's words.

"Now…" Envy turned back to Kirika, and flew closer to her. "Do you accept to being my vessel? I cannot enter your body unless authorized."

"Er… sure?" Kirika said hesitantly.

"Such an unsure answer is unacceptable in my programming," Envy stated. "Yes or no. 1 or 0. On or off. Binary."

"R-Right." Kirika took a deep breath, closing her eyes, then opened them again and looked Envy dead in the eye (monitor). "Yes. I accept to be your vessel, Sentinel of Envy."

"… A much more adequate response, this is," Envy remarked after a short silence, then lowered herself and approached Kirika close enough to be felt, and then continued. "Touch my monitor. It will complete the process."

Kirika did as told, reaching her hand out and coming into contact with the Sentinel's display. As soon as they connected, Envy bursted into a rush of green energy, and crawled its way up Kirika's skin and body.

"Ngh…!" She groaned a bit at the feeling, but didn't resist and allowed Envy to fully enter her body.

Instantly, she changed form, black hair turning grey, green eyes turning pink. One of her eyes, however, was unable to take the sudden change, and began bleeding, but none of the group moved to help her. This was part of the process—it was a test she must endure herself.

Pain rippled through Kirika's entire body as Envy installed itself in her, and as her features changed to become even more beautiful than before, like an ethereal beauty, the pain slowly dwindled away. Her arms became skinnier, her skin more fair, and her entire body felt so much lighter than before. The transformation process was complete—and had the clothes not stayed the same, it would've been difficult to recognize the girl before them now as Kirika Kishi.

"Hah… hah… hah…" She sat on the ground, panting, as the green energy left her and condensed back into Envy.

"… It seems the process was successful," Envy noted.

"Not completely," Lust said. "The eye damage… but still, I am surprised she was able to undergo a full Ascension. With this, she should be a lot more powerful than before, and even be able to use some special Sentinel Arts."

"A full Ascension…" Cyanide murmured. "You can't do that with me?"

"Afraid not," Lust replied. "Like I said before, you are like a blank canvas. Any Sentinel can choose you as their vessel and it would work, but you are not especially compatible with any of us due to your utter lack of emotion. Sin thrives from emotion, after all."

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"She needs rest," Envy said, looking at Kirika, who had fallen unconscious. "Find somewhere to bring her."

"We do have the Teleport Waypoint set up back at base," Luna said. "Could that work?"

"It's best if we don't leave the forest, actually," Dianna interrupted, folding her arms a short distance away and leaning on the trunk of the tree. "From my past experience, I can safely say there are still tons of hidden treasures and puzzles to be found in this place. Also, it's a great farming location for experience, no? Unless, of course, you want to bring Kirika back then walk all the way back here…"

"Fair enough," Ragnar added. "I agree. The more EXP we get, the more prepared we'll be for the future."

Luna gave a sigh. "Well, if that's how we're doing it, we'll need a safe hideout to leave Kirika in while she recovers."

"Uh… we came across a small cave on the way here, right? How about there?"

"Are you kidding? That's not even a cave. It's more like a slightly curved inwards piece of rock," Dianna said with a dry smile.

"Just use this place," Cyanide said matter-of-factly. "Simple."

"That… could actually work," Ragnar said. "Huh. Didn't think of that."

"Luna, stay here and watch over her," Cyanide said. "You have the highest fighting potential out of all of us right now, and EXP doesn't matter for you anyway."

"Understood," Luna said with a bow. "I will let off a flashbang if anything happens, then."

Cyanide nodded. "Sounds good."

*****

While Luna and the two Sentinels stayed behind to watch over Kirika's resting body, the rest of the group—namely Cyanide, Dianna, and Ragnar—headed out to do some hunting. It would've been easier to swipe through the forest as a team, but Ragnar, being Ragnar, challenged Cyanide to a competition—whoever could slay the most beasts until the time limit hit wins… bragging rights. The competition would end at nightfall, at which they would reconvene in Envy's lair.

Dianna, being the playful type, decided to join in on this little competition as well for fun, so the three ended up going in different directions, each to hunt their own prey. All three were capable enough to handle themselves, and all three were used to working alone. There wasn't much to worry about there.

Ragnar headed downstream to a low-lying wetlands area in the rainforest since that's where anacondas usually dwelled—he wanted revenge from earlier—while Dianna headed for an area thick with a bunch of trees. She liked leaping from one to another and possessed extremely high agility, so she would be able to make the most out of her abilities there.

And as for Cyanide… he headed up. His goal wasn't to win the competition. He didn't care about that—he just went along with it because it would let him work alone.

His true goal… was slaying the Apex Predator of this rainforest, and obtaining the weapon Blueprint for the Mythic-rank weapon, «Eye of the Storm».

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