Avery ended up needing only a few days to master the alien language. Apparently he was still underestimating how much his mind had progressed, and how overpowered his quasi-omniscience cheat was.

  Eager to put his new skill to use, he made his perception sphere zoomed back out to the scale of a dozen meters, and the march of time sped up accordingly.

  The living rock he was interested in was currently calling to the rest of his group, asking advice on what to do with the magical fragment. Glad he had reacted fast enough and hadn’t missed anything, Avery paid close attention to what they were saying.

  “I found something. It is sharp. Very dangerous. Useful for Traps. But it is different. It is strange. Invisible but not. I want to touch it.”

  This message got a response from everyone in hearing range, making it quite difficult for Avery to understand. He might be a master in theory, having memorised all of the vocabulary and grammatical rules of this unique language, but he had absolutely no practice. It was still a challenge to follow the fast flowing conversation, despite its simplicity. Fortunately, most of them said the same thing, so he was able to make out the following conversation.

  “Move it closer. We want to see. Unknown is valuable.”

  “I cannot move it. Touching it hurts. I want to touch it. Why do I want to touch it? Touching it hurts. I still want to touch it.”

  A few of the older members of the group grew concerned, and advised him to be careful.

  “You want to touch it but it hurts you. It is a trap. Our prey wants to approach us, but we hurt them. We make traps. We do not fall in traps. Do not touch it.”

  Unfortunately, those wise words were drowned in the mass of excited comments that came immediately after.

  “You want to touch? Then touch! Follow the instinct! We are Sil'piceus! Our instincts are the best! How does it feel? Does it hurt? Do you see it better?”

  Spurred on by his companions, the creature stopped hesitating, and led by his instinct, he carefully extended his tentacle again. He realised a section of the mysterious object seemed more grounded in reality than the rest of it, appearing gray rather than translucent. This was the part that was calling to him, demanding he touch it, and as if by magnetism, his tentacle was inexorably drawn to it.

  Unsurprisingly, attempting to hold an object capable of easily shredding through his powerful muscles did not go well.

  It wasn’t only a problem of the magical fragment being sharp, or having any harmful physical properties. There was obviously some kind of magical shenanigans going on, because despite only the very tip of his tentacle touching it, his wounds were slowly spreading up his limb.

  His tentacles started dripping copious amounts of pungent black blood dripped from the wound, but as it fell onto the fragment of the butterfly of fate, it seemed to be absorbed. And the more blood it drank, the more solid it became.

  “It hurts! But it also feels good. It hurts too much. I stopped touching it. I want to touch it again. It is calling me. Calling harder. Touching is important! And now I can see it a little. I want to see more. I am going to touch it again.”

  The calling grew stronger still, becoming increasingly unresistable. While some other instinct inside of him tried to push back, screaming that hurting himself intentionally like that was folly, he paid it no mind. Despite the pain, touching it felt right, and he knew it demanded that he reach out to it again.

  Once again dismissing the advice of his more experienced peers, the headstrong monster caressed the mesmerising object. In his foolish bravery, he silently bore with the pain as he watched it feed on his black blood.

  There seemed to be an odd magic at work here, one unknown even to this world's creator. Slowly, the cursed item became more and more concrete, until finally, it was satiated, having become a completely real object.

  Realising that his blood was no longer being absorbed and that he was now hemorrhaging all over the ground, the reckless creature hesitantly retracted his tentacle. It was in such a sorry state it would be easier to rip it out and let a new one regrow rather than to let it heal, but somehow he felt it was worth it.

  “I did it. It wanted blood. I gave it blood. It felt good. It hurt. I didn’t like it. I like it now. I can see it.”

  “What do you see?”

  “It looks like me. It has tentacles. It has a shell. It is a Sil'piceus. It is small. It does not talk. It is not a true Sil'piceus. But it is big. It is a better Sil'piceus?”

  “What are you saying? Is it big or not? Why is it a better Sil'piceus?”

  “Size is not big. Importance is big. Very very big. My importance is small. Very very small. I need to touch it again. It needs me. I will help it.”

  “You said touching it hurt you. Why do you want to touch it? Hurting a Sil'piceus is bad. We should use it to hurt prey.”

  Still hypnotised by the mysterious object, he reached out for a fourth time, ignoring all of the advice as always. This time, however, the magical fragment was already satiated. When the first drop of blood fell upon it, it did not get absorbed, but rather it spread to cover the entire surface of the object, definitively anchoring it in reality.

  As soon as the entire item was coated in blood, it seemed to become complete, and it accepted the owner of the blood which had given it substance as its master. This caused said unfortunate creature to be suddenly released from the spell he was under, and he finally recovered all of his rationality.

  With that freedom came an overwhelming sentiment of righteous indignation against the thing that had caused him so much pain. He waved his tentacles around menacingly, before screaming and hitting the cursed object with all of his strength.

  “It hurts! Stop hurting! You hurt me. I will hurt you too! I will hurt you more!”

  As if responding to his demands, the cursed fragment suddenly pulsed with light, and his tentacles started healing at such a rapid pace it was visible to the naked eye.

  The creature froze, not knowing what to do as it felt a mystical energy entering his wounded limb, restoring it to peak condition. With the pain fading away to become a mere memory, his simple brains grew increasingly confused at the situation. What was this thing? Was it helpful or harmful? Why did it wound and then heal?

  “What is happening? Are you okay?”

  “It was a trap. I was prey. But it did not kill me. It did eat me. But I am alive. It did not eat all of me. Now I am not prey. It helps me. I am the master. What is a master?”

  “We do not know. This object is strange. Strange and dangerous. It is also valuable. We must use it to improve our traps. But we must also be careful. We must ask for advice. The Elder will know what to do.”

  The elder they were referring to was not an older member of their small group, but rather the oldest member of their entire race. It was rumored he was more than two hundred years old. It was even said that while he himself did not invent or discover any revolutionary technique, he had taught many who did. It was an accepted fact that anyone who was lucky enough to become a part of his group was destined to live a long and fruitful life.

  The Elder was a legendary figure, the only Sil'piceus who had ever lived long enough for his reputation to become known to every member of his species while he was still alive. Unfortunately, It was very hard to contact the Elder.

  It wasn’t that he did not want to help or that he was hiding, it was simply a natural result of their excruciatingly slow traveling speed. The plains they lived on were not huge, but they were not small either, and it would take decades for a determined Sil'piceus to crawl across it.

  In addition, the Elder himself was also constantly moving about, and his whereabouts were unknown. The only way to locate his group was to ask any group you met if they had seen him, and to follow their directions, while mostly relying on luck.