An Unborn Hero

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Some amount of clarity returned to Mystery as a portion of her blinding pain departed, permitting her to think in coherent sentences once more instead of just mentally screaming her head off.

Her first few sentences consisted largely of swearing, and weren't really any more coherent than her previous screams.

"Okay. Let's focus on survival," she decided once she'd got her anger out of her system. "I'm stuck in the middle of a road, who knows where, with my body driving off in a carriage that's no longer in sight. I feel pretty awful, and have no idea how much of that is overuse of [Astral Projection] and how much is the result of my situation. I'd been out for a while before this happened, and I have no idea how long I was stuck just now, so I'm probably reaching my limit. I need to get back to my body quickly. What messages do I have?"

For pushing far beyond your limits of mana capacity, [Increased Attributes] advances to level 3.
For heavily traumatising a poor, innocent girl, [Magical Girl Transformation] advances to level 4.
For viewing the outer wisps of the demonic forest's mana field, [Soul's Eye] advances to level 20.
Achievement unlocked: [Apprentice].
You have discarded your literal lifeline, detaching completely from your body and upgrading [Astral Projection] with [Untethered]. Level cap of [Astral Projection] increased by 20.
For committing an elaborate, delayed suicide, [Astral Projection] advances to level 15. Now we're going to need to summon another hero. At least it's still only a few weeks since your conception, so the resulting death toll from the delay won't be high.
You have tolerated overwhelming pain without fainting or losing your sanity, upgrading [Robust] with [Pain Tolerance]. Level cap of [Robust] increased by 10.
For experiencing a new aspect of injury, [Robust] advances to level 11.

Apprentice (Common)
You have reached level 20 in a skill, taking a step above the initial cap. Keep up the good work. Boosts experience gain for all skills below level 20 by 10%, or 15% for those below level 10.

Untethered (Epic)
The meaning of the word 'projection' is to extend one thing out to another. You seem to have forgotten that, leaving your former body soulless and your [Astral Projection] skill poorly named. Now you're less than a ghost, waiting for your inevitable end.

Pain Tolerance (Common)
Few people enjoy pain, a minority which you do not count yourself among. Nevertheless, you've seen more than your fair share of it. This sub-skill will make it more bearable.

"Lots, apparently. And 'we're' going to need to summon another hero? Is that goddess the one who's been mocking me through these message boxes? But I'm not giving up just because she thinks I'm doomed; I'm still alive. I can still find my body. And then... possess myself?"

The urgency of the situation having been made abundantly clear, Mystery shot off down the road at maximum speed. Then she saw a familiar tree, stopped, reversed direction and accelerated again. The problem with a dirt track in the middle of nowhere was that one direction looked much like the other.

Despite her major quantities of bad luck, there were still some points of good squeezed in. The ruckus made by the passengers had caused the driver to call an early rest break, stopping as soon as he found a safe place to pull over so he could find out what all the noise had been about. Furthermore, Mystery's levelling bonuses meant she had gained [Pain Tolerance] after only a few minutes of screaming. As a result, her soul hadn't significantly degraded beyond where it had been, and her carriage hadn't got far ahead.

Despite the short distance, by the time she arrived, she felt like she was burning and her top speed had dropped by half, but she'd made it, and Kellela was right there.

Mystery desperately zipped towards her, ignoring the curious scene where her parents were standing in front of the [Carriage Operator] and Platus's full group. Kellela and Hayedalf were staring down at the ground, looking embarrassed, while Platus let loose a storm of swirling colours that Mystery would bet half her soul weren't polite.

With insufficient time to stop and wonder why they were being chastised like naughty schoolchildren, Mystery ignored the scene and flew at Kellela's belly.

She bounced back off as soon as she reached the skin. Kellela didn't even notice.

It was only natural. She'd been able to get in before because she belonged there, with Kellela's soul providing only a minor impediment to her own. Now she'd cut the link. Yes, there was still an embryo in there, but that embryo had nothing to do with Mystery, who was nothing more than a wandering soul.

"Dammit! Now what?" complained Mystery. "I can feel myself burning out. I probably only have minutes left. How do I get in? Signalling Mum with lights? No, not only would she not get the message, but I strongly suspect that using mana now would be a fatally bad idea. Wait, what if I..."

Mystery lowered her gaze to the official access point of Kellela's womb.

"Well, this is another whole level of disturbing," thought Mystery. "I really need to speak to that goddess about the quality of my accommodations. I'm definitely not going to be leaving any glowing reviews. Still, if it's that or certain death..."

Mystery zipped towards Kellela's groin and started tunnelling.

Her former status as an embryo was actually the biggest slice of good luck she had. The shock of a soul being torn from its shell didn't only have negative side effects on the soul, but also on the body. The result was invariably instant and irreversible brain death. The [Untethered] sub-skill had its epic rarity not because of the difficulty in obtaining it, but because—as the messages hinted—obtaining it was a literal death sentence.

The embryo that used to house Mystery still had no brain, and was plumbed into an impressively complex life-support apparatus. It was still very much alive.

She lacked any lungs with which to pant, but as she shouldered her way through folds of flesh, she felt like she should be. Nevertheless, she made it back to her still-living former body with plenty of time to spare. Tens of seconds, at least. Maybe even a full minute.

She overlapped her soul with the embryo. Nothing happened.

"Uh..." she thought, the tide of panic that had only just subsided drawing itself back up into a tidal wave.

Yes, she'd found her way back to a soulless, living embryo, but it was no longer hers. The metaphorical lock on the front door had been changed, and just like Kellela no longer permitted her entrance, neither did her own body. The link was simply no longer there.

"Crap..."

While Mystery was rapidly dying inside Kellela, Kellela herself was dedicating most of her brainpower to wondering how she could scratch a really strange itch in a sensitive place without making herself look worse than she already did to the crowd of people berating her.

"So, let me summarise," said Melody. "You have an unknown, intelligent parasite living inside you. No-one has been able to tell what it is. No-one has been able to stop it or even find it. It can steal your mana, and has been casting spells of an unknown purpose with it. And you're just... okay with that?"

"It's only a child. It's curious about things," said Kellela in Mystery's defence. "It didn't respond to [Detect Evil] or [Detect Hostility]."

"So?" snorted Platus. "Neither would a dragon. They aren't usually 'evil' or 'hostile'; they just by their nature tend not to notice when they step on someone. And you, Hayedalf—why are you just going along with this? No, never mind that. Why did capital security go along with it? What the heck were they thinking, letting you leave unsupervised? From what you've admitted—and I doubt you've admitted everything—they should have had Kellela strapped to a table undergoing invasive surgery the moment they had confirmation she was the source of their problems."

"Dad!" exclaimed Rose, appalled.

Hayedalf frowned. He knew that was wrong; that letting Mystery live had been the obviously correct thing to do. The [Royal Knight] had agreed completely. But when he tried to vocalise why, he was coming up blank. It was certainly true the creature was benign, but how did he know that? When he ran over the facts that he had, they didn't seem to add up to that conclusion. The thing had even invaded the prison of Zarklaxxos! Yes, that could be chalked down to idle curiosity, but...

No, it was definitely idle curiosity. It had just innocently passed through the wards, and had returned immediately without doing anything once the alarm went off. The ward trace showed it had only been there for a few seconds. Nowhere near long enough to have committed sabotage, or even for spying. Everything was fine. It was an honest mistake, just like the half-finished spell cast on Rose had been.

To any right-thinking individual, it would likely come as a surprise that Mystery was still alive, or at least that Kellela was wandering free and happy, rather than having a breakdown in a prison cell about the monster growing inside of her. Yes, the [Royal Knight] had made some justifications about keeping Hayedalf happy, but such was the effect of the [Hero] class. A [Hero] was implicitly trusted by all who called themselves the enemies of demons. It wasn't mind control, as such. They still had free will; they simply found themselves reaching favourable conclusions given the presented evidence, however ambiguous.

Kellela, with the [Hero] literally living inside her, was the one who'd had the greatest exposure to the effect. She had long since been treating Mystery practically as her own child. Which was appropriate, because she was.

Hayedalf was better off, but not by much. He'd had enough exposure that short of Mystery directly attacking someone right in front of him, he was going to struggle to imagine her as anything other than peaceful.

Even so, non-consensually casting a spell on Rose like that was not only impolite, but was actually criminal. Yes, there were exceptions for things like casting healing magic on a dying stranger who wasn't in a position to consent, but in general, casting on someone against their will was banned however beneficial the spell. Being forced to consider Mystery's behaviour in that light shook the hold she had over him.

"Yes, just an honest mistake," he muttered under his breath, unheard by the others, as the [Hero] class did its work and helped him to convince himself.

It helped that it was an honest mistake. The [Hero] class didn't let someone misbehave with impunity, and if the action had been malicious, the protection would have been weaker. Had Mystery made an outright unprovoked attack, she'd likely have lost the [Hero] class completely.

Of course, all the trust in the world might protect her from the attentions of the [Royal Knight], but it did nothing to save her from the backfire of [Astral Projection]. Given that messages about the skill had repeatedly warned her of the dangers, it had been extremely foolhardy of her to use it with as little care as she had, deliberately stretching her tether and degrading her soul for skill levels. Now she was paying the price.

As such, while Kellela and Hayedelf were busy defending Mystery, Mystery herself was still preoccupied by dying. Dying tended to suck up all of a person's available concentration, even if it wasn't required to succeed at the actual event.

"Not... giving... in..." she thought, struggling to string words together through the fog that was encroaching on her thoughts. "New... skill... Any... time..."

"Please..."

Spoiler

μ̵̼͉̐υ̴̡̽̿σ̷̭͓̃̀τ̸͉̤̾̆ή̶͎̱͌ρ̸̤͕̏̿ι̷̬̾͜ό̸͈ (Human)
Age: -9 months
Occupation: Hero (L)
Skills:
- Soul's Eye (U) (20/60)
>> Sense Vitality (U)
>> Sense Soul (R)
>> Sense Mana (U)
>> Sense Light (C)
>> Sense Sound (C)
- Astral Projection (U) (15/50)
>> Sure Navigation (U)
>> Uncontainable (U)
>> Untethered (E)
- Robust (C) (11/40)
>> Hardened Soul (R)
>> Secured Mana (U)
>> Pain Tolerance (C)
- Stealth (C) (3/20)
>> Camouflage Vitality (R)
- Magical Girl Transformation (R) (4/10)
- Light (C) (4/10)
- Increased Attributes (C) (3/20)
>> Mana Storage (U)
Achievements:
- Early Bloomer II (R)
- First Skill (C)
- Apprentice (C)
- Survivor of Zarklaxxos, the Arcane Infernal (R)
- I Broke The System, And All I Got Was This Lousy Achievement (E)
- Astral Explorer I (R)
- First Spell (C)

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