Michelle lay in the bear's cave in Serena's vampire form all through the winter

The bear lay dead nearby as her body subconsciously absorbed all the bear's blood, leaving it a dry withered husk, even with it's flesh and skin still intact and somehow well preserved

Michael's mind slowly healed as he wrestled with the memories of Ryania, Florencia and Serena, finally managing to isolate them and place them in separate parts of his mind

The problem was that all 3 had several hundred years, many lifetimes more memories than Michael did

Each memory was as real to him as they were to their original owners, and he had a hard time reconciling them

Fortunately, when Elderich tried to destroy his mind, it cleared away much of the unwanted memories

For example, he retained the skills and abilities part of their minds, enabling him to access the 3 women's battle experiences and how to use their skills and magics. This applied to his own battle experience and abilities too

However, an important part of everyone's memories were wiped out

While he remembered their histories, who they knew, and places they've been to

But all the other associated memories were destroyed

For example, he would remember the name of his first girlfriend, where he brought her, what they did together and what they ate. But there were no emotions attached to them. He would remember that she was pretty, but did not remember the feeling of his crush on her.

The smells of the food he ate brought no emotions and triggered no memories. It was like he was reading a book about another person being in love with this random pretty girl

That applied to all his memories absorbed from Florencia and Serena too

Only the parts Elderich didn't destroy, the memories of Ryania's love for him remained, and he found that because he could remember what she did for him, and experience himself her love for him, he realized that he loved her back!

He slowly sat up, experimenting on his body as he now could control his transformations. He transformed to Florencia, then Serena, then back to himself. He couldn't transform to Ryania, since he only shared memories with her and didn't absorb her abilities directly

So while he had the knowledge of Ryania's abilities, he couldn't use any elf magics, rather he used Florencia's succubus magics to make similar effects to Ryania's magic. This applied to Ryania's telepathic powers too

Serena's vampire abilities were different. She didn't perform magic like Florencia did. But she did have mental abilities to hypnotize her victims, turn them into vampires with her bite, control the weather in a minor way like controlling the mist, as well as transform into a bat or wolf. She also had blood magics, which was the power to control blood!

Another change was that Michael no longer referred to himself as Michelle in her female form! Since in essence, he had became them and assimilated their identity. He felt comfortable calling herself Florencia in her succubus form, or Serena in her vampire form. 

Finally, Michael stood up slowly. Absorbing the bear's blood helped him recover and rejuvenated his body. Although he wasn't at full strength, his severe injuries had healed up

He walked over to the bear and turned into Serena again. As it was still cold outside, as Serena, he was more resistant to the cold. 

So far, he could only transform his whole body from one being to another, and not partially like only using Florencia's claws or Serena's fangs

She carefully cut open the bear and skinned it. As the bear's snout was ripped off, she cut it completely off

Using the skin, she created a bearskin cloak, as well as rudimentary cloth to cover herself

She could not go outside in his male form as it was still too cold, even when wrapped with bearskin clothes

After several months, she was very skinny, so she started a fire and cooked the withered bear meat

Three days later, Serena felt that she had eaten enough to get back to a functionable condition

With that, she left the cave wearing only the bearskin over her naked body

It was dark and the two moons shone brightly in the sky

She looked around, trying to figure out where she was. She had no idea as after Elderich slammed her into the ground and crushed her telekinetically, the bear brought her body to the cave

She sighed as although she now knew how to track Ryania through their telepathic link, the way she could with him as Michael, she could not sense anything now

Elderich did sever their link between them!

She sighed. She had to grow stronger somehow, then she will return for Ryania

Perhaps if she mastered aura/mana/chi, she would actually be the level of the other summoned heroes

But will that be enough to face Elderich? From what he's seen, no. 

However, the heroes' level and use of energy was at it's basic level. She assumed they would have improved tremendously by now

For now, she needed to get out of the cold, and perhaps find a nearby village

She would use her guise of either Florencia or Serena for now, and not reveal his male visage

--

As she ran through the forest, she found that Serena's form felt different than Florencia's form

Florencia felt like a battle mage, able to fight in melees with her physical prowess, yet able to use spells at the same time. 

Serena however felt like a pure melee warrior who is able to use some magics, perhaps like a paladin 

In that sense, Florencia's form used more intelligence and guile, and preferred to fight from a distance, while Serena's form preferred to fight in close combat. 

Or at least that was the best way she could think of it

"Look! Over there!" a voice yelled as several footsteps could be heard heading her direction!

Suddenly, a shadow jumped out of the trees, slashing at her with a sword!

Serena dodged in midair and avoided the attack, but the slash cut her bearskin clothes open, revealing her front of her body

Before she even landed, another person slashed at her from another side!

This time, she was forced to block it with her claws

The clash generated sparks as the man slashing her looked shocked as his sword was covered with aura!

She blocked several more slashes from several more swordsmen, and dodged a fireball

After a few near misses, Serena quickly formed an opinion of her opponents

Serena estimated that the team consisted mostly of A Rankers!

And while she felt she could successfully defeat 3 or 4 of them, they numbered nearly 20 beings, and not all of them were human

Suddenly, the sky darkened and a large lightning bolt flashed, striking Serena mid-flight

She screamed as she crashed to the ground in a ball of fire

The group surrounded the flames as Serena threw off her burning bearskin

"Wait! I surrender" Serena said, walking out of the flames naked with her hands up

She was angry and being attacked for no reason, but surrendering was the better option than continuing the senseless fight

The group surrounded her, consisting of both men and women, human and otherwise, all in varying attires

"Is this the one?" one of them said, wearing a straw fisherman's hat and holding a katana shaped sword glowing with a blue aura

"No. I don't think it is. She certainly didn't leave the footprints of our target" a ranger aiming his yellow glowing bow at her

"Are you sure? You saw how she stopped my aura infused slash with her hand" one of the swordsmen that attacked her earlier said

"And she survived my lightning strike without any injuries" a male mage said, staring at Serena's body

"While there are things puzzling about her, that is not our concern. We need to find the mass murderer before he kills again" the man with the straw hat said

"Are you sure it's a he, not a she that is the murderer? Maybe she's a shapeshifter?" another female archer said

"We can't be sure. Lets take her in first and interrogate her" he said

An elderly male mage cast a spell on her and Serena suddenly lost control of her body, becoming paralyzed!

"Lets bring her in" the mage said, as a lizard man picked Serena and carried her on his wide shoulder