POV – Tobias

[Day 208, the next day…]

Bloody madman…

I’m not really sure what emotion I’m feeling right now. Somewhere in between rage, terror, and relief.

I suppose I should explain… I have some good news! I found my soul… You know the book that appears in my mind about soul defense?

Well… I was reading it and thought, ‘Why is it that whether I look inward to search for my soul I can only find this book?’

Then I realized it… That apparently, when I was accepting his other heritage that madman turned either turned a portion of my soul into the shape of a book, or somehow managed to put a book into my soul.

Before, I never even considered the possibility. After all, who would even attempt to forcefully mess with someone soul? Rather than succeed; it would be far more likely to kill me, or turn me into an idiot.

In my story, due to the fact I needed a weakness for Rin, memories and personality were all stored on the soul. Attempting to force it to change in any way…

I suppose that kinda explains the massive migraine I received when I obtained that stupid heritage.

Before I was thinking that migraine wasn’t that important. Don’t blame me, but I had nearly forgotten about it because it had already disappeared when I had woken up. Now though… Well, I would probably be relieved if that is all that heritage did.

That probably sounds silly, but… after discovering who it was from I was expecting something much crazier.

I suppose, before going further, I should explain more about The Mad Craftsman…

The Mad Craftsman used to be a respected master craftsman constantly building wonders and feats of magical engineering.

Then, one day, after building that dagger he suddenly changed… he stopped crafting goods that could be used.

The Mad Craftsman started create to even more astonishing impressive goods, but each of them more dangerous and hazardous than the last. All of them unusable to anyone who wished to continue remaining among the living.

Until, eventually, it reached the point that nobody dared to even attempt to use any of his crafts. But, despite his madness though his genius remained, every single new craft of his accomplished things that were previously thought impossible.

He was constantly pushing the boundaries of what was possible despite the fact that his works were never used. If anyone had any doubts about his new nickname with his new crazy actions they were forcefully silenced.

All this leads to the reason I’m relieved… changing the shape of my soul seems to be insane enough that I won’t have to constantly worry about another random surprise popping up. Otherwise, I’d be constantly worrying about something happening from his heritage.

I mean it, technically, is crazy and stupid, but… I survived it already. Meaning the resulting damage from it seems to be mild enough that I didn’t end up dead, or become retarded.

So… I guess that’s good new… I have discovered something else though.

It seems to be extremely difficult to mess with that book in any way… Meaning my soul will probably have this book for awhile.

Still, despite all that weird news, I did manage to feel my soul… At least, once I realized that was basically the stuff that surrounded that book.

I’ve been attempting to put to use a few of the understandable techniques noted in the book. As a result, I now two solid layers of defense inside my soul, although they are made of portions of my soul.

I'm not sure, should I be making the defenses out of portions of my soul? It doesn't exactly feel dangerous... but, unfortunately, that is apparently something the book considers ‘common knowledge’ and doesn’t talk about… I don’t exactly have many choices though.

Currently, I'm attempting to put a regenerative liquid layer in between that will solidify if it reacts with air, or whatever the stuff is around my soul is that isn’t my soul.

If I succeed, ideally, it will automatically heal small cracks that appear in the solid layers, and being made of liquid it should stop brute force attacks from hitting and damaging my soul through the barrier.

Although, making a liquid regenerative layer between the solid layers is entirely my own idea… I can't understand enough of what the soul defense book says to continue beyond a basic barrier using its ideas.

So, I have no clue if a regenerative liquid is an effective strategy. I doubt it will weaken my defense though…

Turns out that, while attempting to modify the book in anyway is extremely difficult, simply putting up barriers using portions of my soul is quite easy to do… All I had to do was imagine a barrier around it and they appeared around it…

I (somehow) doubt that’s normal though… Seems more likely it is something left over from whatever the mad craftsman did to me.

Still, I’m not going to complaining at this point. I’ll need every advantage I can get if I’m going to survive this stupid knife.

My current plan is to stay here and practice, at least until I’ve almost run out of supplies. I refuse to believe I figure a way to survive this if I’m constantly attempting to improve soul’s defenses.

Still, unless something changes… Well, I doubt I’ll ever have the chance to practice defending against weak spiritual attacks. Thus, I will have no knowledge of how effective my defense is, until… Well… Until, I bet my life by picking up the knife.

[Day 213, five days later…]

This clearly isn’t working…

The problem isn’t in creating the barriers… the problem, it occurs the instant I leave my soul. All my work suddenly disappears.

Everything in my soul simply disappears, or resets (I don't know). Potentially, hours of work to create an effective barrier… and it doesn’t last long enough for to use it.

I've read through the entire book, it doesn't mention anything about this. Admittedly, I only understood an extremely small part of it... But, somehow, I doubt that soul defense is supposed to become... well, useless the moment it stops being concentrating on.

At least, that is what I believe that’s what is happening. Honestly, I wouldn’t have a clue what could be going on if it's not.

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again… I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing. Literally, everything I know on the soul is just theories and speculation on based what I wrote or imagined for my novel (as that book really isn't helpful)…

Before, I was simply going to continue building more barriers. Guess I was probably too hopeful… hours worth of work to create a difficult to penetrate barrier and it seems to disappear even faster than it came into existence…

Even if I, somehow, became an expert at imagining and creating impenetrable barriers… If it only lasts until I suddenly get distracted by some random squirrel, any kind of impenetrability is utterly useless…

Well, to put it lightly, my current strategy isn’t working…

I should've known… it was never going to be that simple or effortless to create an effective spiritual defense. When has my life ever been that simple? Never, that’s when.

Why does the soul book continue to exist and yet everything else disappears? I cannot exactly use the soul defense book to defend against soul attacks… or can I?

No… I doubt it… It might work for a short period of time, but if anything tries to attack from another angle…

Maybe, that’s what I’m missing though... I need the kind of permanence the book has in my soul.

How would I obtain that level of permanence? I quickly came to answer I didn’t like… I could attempt to effectively sacrificing a part of my soul to create a permanent barrier…

I didn’t like it for several reasons, mainly because I have absolutely no idea what effect that could have on my soul…

Altering my soul to create a barrier instinctively felt safe, as if my mind subconsciously always knew it was only temporary…

Turning a part of my soul into a permanent barrier… Well, putting it mildly, my instincts are screaming that it couldn’t be considered in anyway ‘safe’…

It would be effectively permanently turn a portion of my soul into the barrier… At least, for the time being this is the only way I can think of.

Considering the soul is where memories are stored in this universe… Doing that could potentially cost me an equal portion of my memories. Simply put, I don’t have enough knowledge to know whether attempting to create such a permanent barrier would have that effect.

Could I choose which memories I lost?

If I lost enough important memories what could I do? Would I even be able to continue surviving?

Would I know what memories I lost? Did I already lose memories from when the soul defense book appeared in my soul?

Would attempting this even have the effect of losing memories? Will it outright kill me?

Unfortunately, I have too many questions… and absolutely no answers to any of them.

I was hoping to wait until I could find someone to help me before attempting to do anything dangerous like this.

Sadly, the fact is that I’m currently lacking the time to find an alternative solution. I’m running out of time to find options quickly.

I hate the idea of giving up memories for my life… But, this might be the best chance of improving my chance of survival when confronting the knife…

Well, despite all my doubts and problems with this idea… From the moment I thought the idea I had already decided… I’m simply delaying, like always.

Now, the only question is, what percentage of my soul should I use to make the barrier? Too little and the entire idea becomes pointless; too sizeable a portion and I might not even be able to survive afterward...

Maybe, practice the idea by making something small, but relatively thick, barrier close to the middle of my soul? Something that shouldn’t even use up more than a percentage of my soul.

Seems like a good idea to me…

I don’t even know if this idea will work… it feels possible, though, it also feels extremely dangerous… I don’t know how to explain the feeling in words…

I suppose it doesn’t really matter how I feel. I’ll attempt it and we’ll find out.

First, let’s try making an barrier around soul defense book…

[Around four hours later…]

Well, that was… something…

Not really painful, though just nerve-racking… so, that is a relief.

Although, when I say that, I mean it felt extremely weird… struggling to convert parts of my soul into a permanent barrier felt like… like I was walking on a bridge made of already cracked egg shells. A bridge that would crack and fall apart at any moment if I wasn’t absolutely careful.

After I finished, though... it felt like the complete opposite. It feels as if that part of my soul is completely protected and absolutely nothing could ever get through it.

Honestly, that part of my soul feels extremely strange now. Somehow, at the same time, it also feels spectacularly nice.

I haven't felt as safe and sheltered as that part of my soul feels, since... Well, since I entered this universe. It is an extremely addictive feeling.

Still, it took forever… The entire time I was creating the barrier felt agonizingly slow. Although, I didn’t dare to attempt to complete it faster.

On the topic of my memories, I… I don’t think I’ve forgotten anything? Then again… it kinda hard to know if you’ve forgotten anything… Plus, humans forget things all the time…

I wonder if that means humans are constantly losing small portions of their soul?

Stop, theorize later… before anything else make sure everything actually works now.

I hope this time the barrier stays in place when I stop focusing on it…

Hopping up from my meditative position I observed the room I had been staying for about a week.

I’ve developed a deep hatred for this room… It doesn’t have much in terms of comfortable accommodations, and I’m basically trapped here.

Before now, in all my life, I have never been physically confined to a small room.

I mean, I suppose before the tutorial, I was in that starting room that didn't have an exit… but, technically, I could still leave by choosing a difficulty level. This place though... unless I want to commit suicide, or die attempting to use that dagger, there isn’t much I can do to leave.

I don’t even want to mention using the bathroom, and I didn’t carry enough water to bath, or shower, to properly clean myself.

Short version, I have had quite an uncomfortable week (though I suppose, technically, it has only been around six days)…

Actually… As far as I’m aware, Protective Barrier is airtight spell… Is the oxygen in this room going to run out? That… I’m not sure, maybe it is an edited version of the spell?

I don’t know that much about the quantity of oxygen a person uses in a day. I haven’t really had trouble breathing though?

If there was a problem, I probably would’ve already noticed some signs of oxygen disappearing by now… Well, unless my basilisk manual somehow changed my biology to no longer need oxygen? Somehow, I don’t think so.

Though, if the Basilisk’s inheritance somehow did change my biology to not require oxygen, that would be quite convenient…

Right, I suppose that’s enough distracting myself… If the barrier hasn’t disappeared by now it probably is permanent… sitting back down on the red carpet I continue mediation. Focusing on the soul defense book to quickly peer into my soul.

Nice, the barrier is still there! Wasn’t really sure what to do next if the barrier had actually disappeared. Now, I simply need to repeat that process on a larger scale to cover the majority of my soul…

Ugh... I'll try to get this done as quickly and carefully as possible... I can't wait until I'm able to actually leave this room again...