56 - Gaia (End of Book 1) (Patreon)

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With anxiety running through his veins, Ryan pushed the green gemstone into its place inside of the centre of Gaia's body. It fit in perfectly and was solidly held in place by the rock around it. Once Ryan felt confident in pulling back without the gem falling back out, he grabbed the last plate of stones that he had laying next to him. It was about a dozen of the rocks, already fully put together, so that he only had to do this one last thing. 

He pushed the stones onto Gaia's chest as the green glow of her mana lit up the stone around her. All of the small individual rocks that Ryan had pushed together to form Gaia's body were starting to grind against each other as a wave of spasms flowed through the spirit's new body. Her thick fingers were pushed to their furthest angles and her stout legs bent in unnatural ways. If her body weren't made of a bunch of stones, this would look incredibly uncomfortable, just as it did with Maximus before.

However, it didn't take long until Gaia's body went practically completely limp. The rocks were still properly attached to each other, but Ryan almost felt worried that they were about to fall apart as the gap between each small rock was 'widening', as if they were only held together by a thin, invisible thread. Really, he had no idea how their bodies were held together. He was just happy that they were.

"Gaia?" Ryan asked, as the golem's body slowly came to life. She took control and slowly sat up, pushing up against the rug below her. Since there wasn't a ton of space on Ryan's desk, he was only using it for the individual parts, and was instead putting Gaia's body together on the ground. She was pretty big, after all, about a metre tall when standing up properly.

The spirit carefully got up onto her legs. For a few moments, she was incredibly unsteady, but before long, as her magic continued spreading through her body, she was able to properly move her body. Without hesitation, she nodded her head toward Ryan. Truly, he didn't fully understand why she even had a head, considering that she didn't have eyes or a mouth, just a mass of rocks coming together like the rest of her body. But he appreciated it, anyway.

Before anything else could happen, Maximus stepped up in front of Gaia. The two looked at each other for a moment, before Gaia moved down onto her knees, leaning forward to the knight. Maximus pressed his forehead against the golem's. They stayed like this for a few moments, until Maximus pulled back to turn toward Ryan. He bowed with a grateful demeanour, happy to have his friend returned to him.

"Don't worry, I'm glad that it all worked out in the end," Ryan smiled, looking at the large model golem in front of him, "But that means at your 'regular' size you should be ten metres tall? If the packaging is to be trusted, at least... I guess you should fit into your domain properly, but will you be okay? You wouldn't be able to move a lot, if at all."

Gaia seemed to look up at Ryan, before taking a step toward him. As she did, her body broke apart into green threads that were quickly pulled into his arm, travelling up his veins, through his heart and into his head. Inside of her domain, Gaia's body now reformed. She was kneeling on the ground, staying still like a statue. The grass around her was waving around happily, as if excited to see her.

As Ryan thought, her body took up most of the domain. Ryan didn't even know if she would be able to stand here properly, considering that the dirt below her feet took up about a bit of space as well. Though, she didn't seem to mind all too much, simply sitting there happy and serene. But even so, she still quickly came back out of the domain, having just gone in there to show Ryan that it was fine.

With a smile, Ryan watched her body come back together, as a system message appeared next to him.

[The -Spirit Domain- Skill has levelled up]

Maximus and Gaia's domains expanded slightly into all directions, though not particularly much, after the skill reached level 6. But more importantly, this message did remind Ryan of something else. He had to take a look at Gaia's status window. It hadn't been available until now, but it should be ready for him to access at this point.

Just as he thought so, a deep green system window popped up in front of his eyes.

[Gaia]

[Garden Golem | Level - 1]

[MP - 30.5]

[Stats]

-[Intuition  0.71]

-[Mana - 0.81]

-[Naturalism - 0.76]

-[Sociability - 0.64]

-[Spirituality - 0.83]

[Skills]

-[Garden Golem's Division | Level - 1]

-[Garden Golem's Eye | Level - 1]

-[Golem's Garden | Level - 1]

Ryan looked through the information in front of him. The first thing he noticed was how high Gaia's MP was - it was higher than both Ryan's own MP or even Maximus' AP, and this was just her state at level 1. But then, the next surprising part was that Gaia had no physical stats at all. Actually, most of them, beside one, were the exact same as the ones that Ryan had, so the 'Garden Golem' was a magical class.

But there was also the 'Naturalism' stat, an incredibly rare one that appeared only in a specific type of known classes. It referred to how close one was to nature and how well the world around you reacted to your presence. It was thought that it related to the concept of the 'Green Thumb', and that those with a higher naturalism stat could raise healthier plants more easily.

That being the case, Ryan was more interested in those three skills right now, and he pulled up the first in the list.

[Garden Golem's Division]

[Level - 1]  [Proficiency - 0%]

[Allows the user to split off parts of their body to act independently to a degree]

[Effect - Create up to two sub-Golems]

"Huh... this is a passive skill? That..." Ryan looked over at Gaia, a bit surprised, "Could you show me what that means?"

Gaia didn't hesitate for even a moment, as some of the rocks on her torso started rumbling and moving around. Two lumps of rock fell off her body onto the rug, and before Ryan knew it, stood up. The lumps shaped themselves into smaller versions of Gaia. Though, they were a bit thinner and had proportionally longer arms and legs, even if not by much. And each of them was just a little shorter than Maximus was. Looking at Gaia, she now had two lumps missing from her body, but considering her size, it didn't seem to make all too much of a difference right now.

With a light smile on his face, Ryan moved closer to the two 'sub-golems' as they were just standing there. They were almost cute standing next to Gaia and Maximus like that. Curiously, as the two sub-golems climbed back onto Gaia's body, Ryan looked at the skill window.

Considering that the 'Effect' section specified the 'two', it was possible that this would increase as the skill's level went up. But either way, that was something that they would have to see about in the future, and for now, Ryan pulled up the info of the next skill.

[Garden Golem's Eye]

[Level - 1]  [Proficiency - 0%]

[Allows the user to see the information of applicable plants]

[Effect - Gardener's Eye]

[Cost - 2 MP]  [Cooldown - 1 Minute]

This one seemed more straightforward. It was an appraisal-type skill. At this level, it wouldn't be able to show much information, but then again, Ryan had never seen this specific skill before, and appraisal skills were pretty rare so, ironically, there wasn't a ton of specific data about them. Either way, it was exciting and fun, so Ryan couldn't wait to ask Gaia to try it out on the balcony later. But before then, he had to figure out what the last skill did.

[Golem's Garden]

[Level - 1]  [Proficiency - 0%]

[After establishing a space as the user's Garden, it will receive benefits according to this skill. At the same time, the user's body will be affected by what is grown in said garden.]

[Effect - +5% Growth Speed]

"Oh!" Ryan wasn't able to hold back his surprise and curiosity. This one was a caretaker-type skill! After specifying and choosing a valid space, people with this type of skill could exert some kind of control. The exact type of control was different depending on the class and exact skill, but usually, like in this case, the space would receive a number of benefits based on the user, and the user would receive benefits in return.

And before he was able to make the suggestion, Gaia reacted first and a window appeared in front of Ryan.

[You have received a new Quest!]

[Gaia's Garden]

[Gaia needs a Garden in order to use her abilities to the fullest. Please find her an adequate space]

[Conditions – find a Garden that Gaia is satisfied with]

[On Success – Random Selection of Seeds for the Garden]

[On Failure – Gaia's disappointment]

With a smile on his face, excited to see the quest, Ryan got up from the ground. He looked at Maximus and Gaia, smiling at them both.

"Well, in that case, let's check out the balcony first."

---

---

---

Richie walked through the roads of the Channel, pearls of sweat dripping down his forehead. He was called here by the company he got a job offer from for some sort of orientation meeting. Being an Awakened, and a Technomancer at that, probably meant that they wanted to put him to work as soon as they could. Though, of course, he didn't really mind. That just meant he could get paid sooner.

But the annoying part was that a ton of the roads around the building were locked down. During that villain attack last weekend, there was so much damage done that it messed up basically all public transport. There'll be construction going on here for months. The fact it was so hot right now really wasn't helping either.

"Oh gods, I thought it was supposed to be kind of chilly today," Richie groaned, loosening his tie to let some air into his button-up. Peeking under his jacket, half his shirt was completely drenched in sweat. And he was even seeing things, he could swear there was something moving under his shirt. He tried to grab at it, but there was nothing.

"Uhm... sir?" someone stepped up in front of Richie, and the gnome looked up at them surprised, "We found that the structural integrity of the nearby buildings has been compromised, could we ask you to vacate the area?"

"Hm?" Richie stared at the person, for some reason taking a while to really register what they were saying. They were looking at him with an almost disgusted expression, and Richie awkwardly nodded his head, "Oh... oh yeah, right, for sure..."

Moving along, he continued walking on the sidewalk. Was it getting hotter? Richie took off his jacket, folding it over his arms. At the edge of the area that he was supposed to leave, there was a small convenience store. Richie still had plenty of time, so he rushed into the store and headed straight for the fridges. He pulled out one of the chilled bottles of water, opening it and chugging the contents.

It didn't take long until the bottle was empty, and he grabbed the next. It was helping, but it wasn't even close to enough. The freezers caught his eye, and he quickly grabbed one of the cups of crushed ice, holding it against his forehead. That was much, much, better.

"Yo, dude, be careful," the pimply teenager behind the counter called out to Richie, "If you bleed on those, you gotta pay for 'em. You need some paper towels?"

Confused, Richie turned over toward them, "Huh? Bleed? What are you..."

As he spoke, he started to feel a slight coppery taste in his mouth. Richie put down the cup of ice and touched his finger to his nose, still holding his jacket in his other hand. When he pulled his fingers back, he saw dark red blood on there. Actually, it was a bit too dark for blood, black. Just then, he noticed an almost rotten taste accompanying the blood's copper, as his stomach began to churn.

"D-Do you guys have a restroom?"

The teen slowly nodded his head, pointing to the corner of the store. Quickly, Richie rushed over and stepped into the small single-person restroom. He placed his jacket onto the closed toilet seat, and then stepped up to the mirror.

The dark blood flowing from his nose stuck out only more on his sickly pale skin. But it wasn't just the blood, the veins on his neck and forehead were dark and bulging. Along with his heartbeat, they were pulsating. No, they were writhing.

As if triggered by the realization, a deep, visceral pain coursed through his body, starting from his chest. It was like something had burrowed its way into his body, like dozens of worms digging their way through his veins. Anxiously, Richie pulled open his button-up shirt that had already gone translucent from sweat. The same as on his face and neck, dark veins were bulging all over his chest.

Before he could even react properly, he felt a stinging in his eye. Glancing back at the mirror, he noticed blood flowing down his cheeks like pained tears.

"W-What the hell is..." 

The sentence was interrupted by an animalistic retching, as if had bitten into a piece of rotten meat, and maggots were now spreading around and filling his mouth. Though Richie was fighting against it with his whole body, Richie vomited into the sink. It was a black, viscous liquid, like some kind of thick ink. But what was even worse was that it looked like that whole ink was made of disgusting, thin black worms. As he grabbed his cheek, he could feel some of those moving threads still clinging to his cheek.

Richie lost the strength in his legs and fell down onto the ground. He vomited again, covering the ground in those rotten, black threads. They clung to his fingers, trying to climb back up. Pulling back, Richie tried to get back, but the threads were faster than him. Moving along underneath his shirt, dyeing it in a foul black, they climbed back up onto him. Instinctively, Richie knew what was about to happen. The tendrils climbed up his neck and forced their way back inside his throat.

Richie could feel them force their way down his throat.

He grabbed at the threads, trying to pull them back out, but when he did it felt like he was tugging on exposed nerve-ends, feeling a disgusting pain that made him shrivel back completely. But not all of the threads were making their way back inside. In general, the dark, inky mass was growing larger, as if the threads were becoming longer and intertwining further with every second.

It didn't take long until they covered the whole ground, and glancing at the sink, the parts from there were already climbing up the mirror and walls. Richie watched as the entire small restroom was covered in these threads, as if he was about to be devoured by a black hole.

And then, when not an iota of light could be seen, everything went silent. The singing pain all over Richie's body was getting worse and worse.

The blackness was closing in on him.

He was scared and exhausted. Richie barely clung to consciousness.

As his eyes went blank, and the tendrils forced their way into him even if it meant digging their way through his skin and muscles, the blackness won.

And then, Richie stood back up.

He pushed himself off the ground, straightening his tie. After checking his face in the mirror a few times, Richie picked up the neatly folded jacket off the toilet seat and put it back on.

Practicing his smile, Richie's eyes glanced down at his chest, and the silver sparrow pin that adorned it.

He should hurry. At this rate, he would be late for the orientation meeting.

-----

Howdy, everyone!! Just letting you know that this is the end of Book 1 of Totally Spiritual!!!

Thank you all for your massive support, I could not be more grateful for you all! The first chapter of Book 2 will come out this Friday, as per the regular schedule! See you then :D 

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