The next day, Erani and I left town to go et up with Ainash in the early morning. I had sothing I needed to do, after all.
I’d looked at my Spell choices the night before, and while they were good, it simply didn’t compare to finally being able to bring others back in ti with —especially when I wasn’t actually giving anything up, just slightly delaying when I’d be able to get it.
I still hadn’t told Erani what, specifically, we were headed out of town to do. Part of my not telling her was functional—talking about ti travel in public seed like a great way to spread my secret to strangers—but honestly, I also just wanted to be able to build up the fanfare. I wanted to see her react fully, without having to limit her words or hide her emotions due to people being around us.
Once we t up with Ainash outside of town, I finally got to telling her.
“Wait, really?” she asked once I was done.
“That’s what Index said. Once we’ve both given Ainash Tribute, we’ll be able to transfer mories between us. Which ans you’ll get to keep your mories through Ti Loop, effectively.”
“...Wow.” She blinked, giving her head a minute shake, eyes staring off in the distance as though she could physically see the possibilities. After a mont, she looked back at . “So are we doing it now?”
I laughed. “I don’t know why, but I was expecting you to take a little more ti to process before trying to jump headfirst into ti travel.”
“Listen, there are so things you just can’t wrap your head around. Ti travel is one of them. Trust , I’ve tried. Several tis. But this is sothing where it’s impossible to think before leaping.” A slight smile spread across her face. “Plus, I just really, really want to see what it’s like.”
“Yeah, I get how you feel.” I turned to Ainash. “So, how are we supposed to actually do a Tribute?”
“Do not know!”
“Wait, really? I thought you’d be an expert on that.”
“No, I am expert at receiving Tributes, not giving them.”
“...Huh.” I frowned. “Well, let’s see. The other tis you’ve gotten Tribute, it’s always been with the person touching you in so way, right? So…”
I placed a hand on her forehead and closed my eyes, trying to focus my mind. For a mont, I didn’t feel anything, but eventually, once I found the right way to think to get the System to recognize my ‘intent’ to give her Tribute, I felt sothing in my mind unlock. I tried pushing and pulling, forcing the intent through, but it didn’t budge. Seed like the System really wanted to make it difficult to do this—though I got why, considering doing it by accident would be quite the mistake.
It took so ti to figure out, but eventually I got the ntal block to move. It was like I had to clear my mind of everything entirely, while also completely filling it with the intent to give up a Level all at the sa ti. A difficult thing to do, but I figured it out. Eventually, I got a notification.
Beginning Tribute of 1 Level to Level 33 Draconiad…
Breaking physical contact will stop this transfer.
I held on, and felt a warm sensation coming from my hand. Opening my eyes, I saw that the spot of her head, where I was holding onto, had begun glowing. A second passed, and…
Tribute has been completed.
Your Level is now 20.
-You have lost 1 Endurance.
-You have lost 2 Conjuration.
-You have lost 1 Intelligence.
-You have lost 3 Stat Points.
-Ti Loop Talent Rank is now 20.
-You no longer have access to a Spell.
I sighed, taking my hand away.
“Alright,” I said, “so now—”
Your Bond with Level 33 Draconiad has evolved.
Due to your Bond being evolved, it has undergone the following changes:
-Your Mana has increased by 70
-Your Mana/Minute has increased by 4.71
-You may now transfer mories between yourself and Level 33 Draconiad.
Threshold reached.
Your Bond with Level 33 Draconiad has deepened.
Due to your Bond being deepened, it has undergone the following changes:
Stat Increase: From 14 to 16
XP Gain: From 7% to 8%
Heat Resistance: From 35.2% to 39%
Mana Increase: From 70 to 80
Mana/Minute Increase: From 4.71 to 5.39
Threshold reached.
Your Bond with Level 33 Draconiad has deepened.
Due to your Bond being deepened, it has undergone the following changes:
Stat Increase: From 16 to 18
XP Gain: From 8% to 9%
Heat Resistance: From 39% to 42.7%
Mana Increase: From 80 to 90
Mana/Minute Increase: From 5.39 to 6.06
“Woah,” I said, blinking and looking over the sudden barrage of notifications. “...Index, you didn’t say anything about Mana increases.”
“Yeah, I had to leave that part out. But I’d say that’s a good kind of surprise, right?”
“For sure,” I said. “More than makes up for the Conjuration I lost.”
“Father, Bond got stronger!” Ainash said.
“Yeah, that too,” I replied with a nod. “Did you really appreciate the Tribute that much?”
“Always makes like this. Feels very nice to get one!” She stepped forward and gave a hug, and I laughed, embracing her in return. It was always a little awkward to hug her, considering how different our forms were—and the fact she was covered in flaming embers, even if they wouldn’t burn unless she wished them too.
“So it worked?” Erani asked.
“Well, let’s test it out,” I replied.
I took a deep breath, holding onto Ainash’s skin, and dug into my mind to find a mory I wanted to transfer. Just to test it out, I picked a simple one—the mont I was lying in my bed last night, trying to fall asleep. I could instantly feel a passageway open in my mind between and Ainash, clearly existing through the physical contact we made with each other.
I began pushing the mory through. Even for a mory that short and small, it actually took quite a lot of ti and effort to actually get it through that passage. I had to transfer each and every detail—how the bed felt soft but slightly crunchy under my weight, how I was thinking about our plans for the next day, that I was lying on my side with my arms slightly curled in front of my face, how it felt warm under the sheets, but not so warm I was uncomfortable, how it was dark in the room, so I could just barely see the silhouettes of the furniture within when I opened my eyes, how that silhouetted furniture was arranged in the first place, how my hair felt itchy under my head, the residual taste left in my mouth from the juicy dinner from Boy I’d had beforehand—everything had to be relayed through this link. And every one of those details needed ti and effort to convey.
Eventually, though, I felt like I got everything through. When I opened my eyes, I realized it’d been several minutes. When it was that much effort for sothing that small, I hoped I could find a thod in the future to get mories transferred more easily. If I had to do that for an entire several hours worth of mories, for two people, every ti I used Ti Loop? That’d be a problem.
Ainash opened her eyes, too, eyes wide and mouth agape.
“Did it work?” I asked.
“That was so cool!” she ntally yelled to . “Felt like I was in your body! Like was living in your life for so seconds! Could feel and hear and sll and taste everything, could even think what you thought! Father, you are so weird with your thinking! So different from ! And wow, the bed is so soft! Way softer than rocks!”
I laughed. “Yeah, I’m sure it’s softer than a rock. So you think that, if I gave you Erani’s mories from a different tiline, you could give them back to her without anything lost?”
“Probably!”
“Well, that’s as good as we’ll get, I guess.” I looked over at Erani. “Seems like it’ll work just fine. Plus, you get free Mana out of the Tribute, so it can’t be a bad idea, regardless.”
“I suppose so,” Erani said, taking a step forward. “Okay. Walk through how you did it?”
It took so ti, but we eventually got everything figured out. Erani gave Ainash her own Tribute, then we took turns swapping random sample mories between us. Ainash’s amazent of the mory transfer was very accurate, I found, after I’d had it done to . It really was like I’d suddenly found myself having lived soone else’s life. It wasn’t just having my mind put into their body, it was having my consciousness put into their mind. I had these mories of their thoughts, their feelings, everything. And it turned out different people thought in very different ways.
Ainash’s perspective was the most unique. I supposed it naturally would be, considering she was a completely different species from . Her thoughts didn’t take the form of words, and she didn’t even think in numbers, which felt bizarre to , considering numbers were the main way the System communicated with us. Rather, all of her thoughts took the form of more vague concepts and feelings, while still sohow being fully able to achieve the sa level of complex thought as anyone else could. It was just in a totally different shape.
As for Erani, the mory I got from her was slightly distorted from Ainash’s transfer, but not too much. At the very least, I could understand what the mory was just fine—I just missed out on the finer details.
“Okay,” Erani said once we’d gotten everything working, “I want to go back in ti.”
I raised my eyebrows. “That’s sudden.”
“Oh, co on, I bet you used your ability the mont you got it. It’s ti travel! There’s no such thing as patience when it cos to experiencing that.”
I laughed. “Well, that’s pretty true. But I can’t just use it for no reason. I’m trying to keep as many uses as possible unspent, rember? That way I get the Stats out of Recycled Loop. So we should probably wait until we have so sort of a reason, at the very least.”
“Alright,” she said, looking down. “Let’s see, let’s see…”
“What are you doing?”
“Coming up with a reason.”
“I can help co up with reason!” Ainash said, looking down and putting a hand to her chin in mimicry of Erani’s pose.
I chuckled. “I don’t know if you can just randomly co up with a reason. It’s gotta co up naturally.”
“Oh! Have idea!” Ainash suddenly said, looking up with an excited look on her face. “Can explore Human settlent, and go into places you normally cannot go! Humans get you in trouble if you do that, so if you go and get into lots of trouble, and then go back, they will not rember you are supposed to be in trouble!”
“But what would we even do?” I responded. “Normally, the reason you aren’t allowed to go into those places is because if you did, you'd steal sothing from them, or whatever. But we won’t be able to keep anything, so there’s no point.”
“Well,” Erani interjected, thoughtful look on her face, “the adventurer’s guild normally has a delay between a job being requested and it actually being put up, right? They take a while to figure out all the details for most jobs before making them public. But all the jobs that haven’t been put up yet have to be kept sowhere, written down. So if we break into that place and read through as much as we can before going back, then we basically have a couple days in advance where we have first choice on all the newest jobs.”
I nodded slowly. “Certainly helps us with the problem of getting past competition. We just go and do the job before anyone else has the chance to, then once the job is actually posted, we go in and hand in the reward? Or, at the very least, we can prepare to do the job while everyone else has no idea, so we can go and do it first.”
“Exactly. Seems like a good enough use of your abilities, if you ask . Sneak in and out, and if we get caught, no consequences.”
“What about Ainash, though? If the whole point is stealth, we probably won’t be able to have her with us.”
She frowned. “Hm, yeah, I guess—”
“I know!” Ainash interrupted. “Can go into forest and practice recruiting Goblins! That way, if I have to kill any Goblins for being bad, they will not stay dead, and can go to do it again! Will be able to try so many thods that would normally not work because they kill so many Goblins! And then will keep all mories of what worked and what did not work.”
“...Right,” I replied, “I guess that works. Especially since the Dragon is dead now, seems like a good ti to ramp up your recruiting efforts.”
“Try not to hurt them too much though, okay?” Erani said.
“Okay!”
I looked back at Erani. “Alright, let’s go back to town. And on the way, I guess you can just ntally prepare yourself to travel through ti. You’ll probably need it.”
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