A cacophony reached Nyx’s ears: first the voiceless rasps of wind, then an outright slice-and-dice massacre intercut by spurts, shrieks, and a few dull thuds. Their ears could tell Darling and Ethel’s work apart without even trying. And all in all, it sounded like a vast success.

The point was the soul-eating. Nyx got to it.

Here they were in Athalie’s boots, kneeling beside the body of a fallen storm jackal. The soul was yet to burst forth from its corpse, but it was a corpse, all right. Its coat was an odd mixture of tan on the lower half, dark-to-light greens on the upper, like a German shepherd with a touch of mallard. The eyes, squinted nearly shut now, were piercing yellow, and the long tongue lolled out.

All Nyx had to do was take these hands and rend. Rend until they got to the core.

The idea was a joy! Never again would they have to pick and prod around with fragile gardening implements just to find the precise location of the finicky soul.

No more pretense of Athalie’s fingers—Nyx changed them and their bracers into claws, pushed the jackal onto its back, and reached between the ribs. They pried it open. The crack was louder than expected.

No trouble tearing through, shredding everything, churning and slicing through organs.

Pretty weird that they didn’t have to close their mouth around the soul to consume it, but according to Dr. Adovozz’s instructions, all they needed to do was close their hands around the approximate area—and then they would feel it—and take it in.

As they reached another time into the jackal, a pang hit them. Lightheadedness? ...Sunspots?

No, just the most minor of headaches and a red-blue flash overlaid on their vision. Bah. They’d gotten similar sensations just by standing up too fast. They pressed both hands deeper—

The flash came with a sound now. Their whole body became uncomfortably light, feeling empty except for the specks laced throughout their arms, core, and brain. The world around them blurred, blue sky melting into bright tan ground...

Okay, noted, Nyx thought, eyes wide: consuming souls will make me really dizzy.

Their hands closed around the soul and the sensation only grew stronger. The red-blue flash and its whine only grew stronger, the world around became a hellish storm, Nyx spasmed and all sense of balance was lost, but the one steady thing, the jackal’s soul, ran up their arms in live wires and suffused them, hitting their heart and mind with thunderclaps.

The next thing they knew, they were still, lying twisted on the ground. Inside their body was sizzling. Outside, they were aware of nothing but the fact that both eyes were dry, yet wide open, and one was caked in dust, directly against the sand...

“Augh!” they cried. And it was really just about the eye thing—Nyx had never shed the human instinct of never wanting to touch them. They threw themself upright and instantaneously spawned two inner eyelids, those membranes that lizards have, just to scrape off the sand windshield-wiper-style.

Now that they’d come to their senses, though, there was definitely more to analyze and notice. For one, the desert was just as flat, normal, and...rocky as before, no longer a Dali-esque nightmare. Oh, wait, except for the inferno blazing a few meters away, that was new.

Just earlier, Ethel and Darling had been standing over that inferno with pride. No doubt it was the source of the charred-and-meaty-corpse smell Nyx was now getting. Looked like it all worked out for them. Good for them.

Nyx felt fried themself.

There was no way to empirically describe it except as the magical-physiological process of taking in another being’s vital energy and, in a shocking instant, becoming one with it. This wasn’t the slow metabolism that Nyx had experienced—had suffered, really—with Puckett the soul butterfly. Was it painful because they weren’t used to it, or because the whole method was, after all, experimental? Nyx would probably never know. In their opinion, it didn’t do much good to speculate.

Their teammates eagerly kneeled by their sides. Ethel put a comforting arm around Athalie’s back. Though she was a few inches shorter than Nyx’s current form, Nyx was doubled-over enough that this was that rare, golden occasion in which Ethel seemed taller.

“Tell me what happened,” Nyx breathed.

Ethel frowned for an instant. What she’d just done, and just been so ecstatic to try, seemed boring and inane in comparison. “I tested out some spells,” she said, “and in the end I killed four jackals at once in that fire you’re seeing. I did it by jamming a soul gem into the telhorn.”

“The gems don’t...”

“I had Dodd infuse it with some of her fire magic. I ran out already, but it works.”

“I didn’t know you could do that,” said Nyx, staring off into the clouds.

“And I just slaughtered them with basic sword techniques,” said Darling.

“We figured. Wait, you didn’t summon any spiders or shadows or anything?”

“I find it is rarely necessary.”

“Well...” The time had come for Nyx to share. They sighed. “It’s another double-edged sword for me. Even this tiny monster soul felt devastating. I’m pretty sure I had a seizure that my memory just didn’t retain.”

“I saw,” said Darling.

“What?” said Ethel. “You should do something next time. Seizures can kill.”

“Eh,” said Nyx, suddenly nonchalant. “Demon death doesn’t work the same as human death, you know that. If I swallowed my own tongue, I’d just grow a new one. Darling—and Ethel—the next time I consume any souls, your one directive is to protect me. And, um...to protect others from me,” they added, looking around. “Is that relevant? Did I punch the air or anything?”

“You might have been belligerent if you were not also writhing on the ground,” said Darling.

Ethel began to help Nyx to their feet, but Nyx gently pushed her away and stood on their own, without even a wobble. Athalie’s form was just as straight, graceful, and dignified as if it’d never collapsed, and the halfling was off walking before anyone else even thought to move.

“Hey,” said Ethel, watching as if spellbound. “Up already—this is great.”

“No it’s not. It’s just Darkworld District composure.” With every step, Nyx felt as fragile and ramshackle as a bundle of twigs. “Trust me, when we go to bed tonight I’ll collapse.”

There was a bright side, of course, that had yet to be acknowledged: the soul had already been fully consumed. Nyx’s shell felt fragile, but their core was brimming with newly integrated energy. Their body would need some recovery time, and some new strategies to cope with the inconvenience...but they walked tall knowing that every hurdle could be passed with a stride. The world was theirs to conquer.