Say the Word
Just how far does the correlation between soul and body actually go?
Even now, decades after the day I was cast into this body, it remains one of the things I've never been able to pin down.
One school of thought holds that flesh and soul are separate entities entirely — that there may exist a body "suited" to a given soul, but that body and soul are never truly one and the same.
Another holds that they are one, inseparable and bound inextricably — that no matter how the soul is swapped out, the body will, in the end, always align itself with its original soul.
Frankly, I can't tell which side is right.
Even I — the very person whose body and soul were swapped — still don't know who I am.
I am Lily.
I am …
These days the weight has tipped so far toward Lily that I call myself that name without thinking, and yet.
Who knows.
If it had truly been the original Lily before the possession, would she think the way I do now? Might I not be Lily at all?
That line of thought chased its own tail in circles until, one day, I simply gave up on it.
Because it no longer mattered.
I am Lily Elbrit, and that fact does not change. This is the life I chose to live, so it's the life I'll keep living.
But that wasn't the problem.
"Sgaredo."
For me, right now, the relationship between soul and body had to be the former — and there was a reason for it.
On the first day I sealed Sgaredo, I combed through her memories.
As it always had, a colossal Frost Dragon soared toward the azure sky. And then the heavens split open.
An darkness so piercing it hurt to look at manifested itself into the world. In her presence, even the act of drawing breath was forbidden — a temperature beyond the limits of endurance.
Even though it was only a fragment of memory, my whole body locked up as though I were facing it in the flesh, cold sweat sliding down my back.
A being that could never be reached, not even at the very last moment.
The pinnacle of the Demon Tribe. The Third Seat.
The frozen soul — Demon King of Severe Cold, Temperie.
A sliver of her Demon Realm had briefly bared itself through a crack in a sundered dimension, and a single fragment had fallen through.
I don't know why the dimensional gap opened, or why the Demon King's remnant dropped out of it. It may have been nothing but chance — or perhaps the Demon King had some design of her own.
What was certain was that this Demon King no longer existed in this world.
I couldn't begin to fathom how the absurd Six Demon Kings and the Eight Seats had all ended up dead or unable to manifest — but Temperie was definitively absent from this place. Had she been here, Sgaredo's body would have collapsed long ago.
Above all—
It was never a child.
There had never been any offspring of Sgaredo's to begin with.
The Hatchling was a life created by the Frost Dragon Sgaredo's own power.
Sgaredo, it seemed, had ultimately failed to endure the Demon King's fragment. Whether it was sheer survival instinct that made her manifest it or something else entirely, she brought forth the Hatchling — and in the end, her main body lost its self and its will, becoming, quite literally, a "monster."
The Hatchling had slept for a long age, growing up safe and sound beneath the protection of the monster Sgaredo had become.
Like a 'mother.'
I couldn't tell whether some unconscious drive — this came from me, so I must protect it — had taken hold of her, or whether this was simply the fate she'd been headed toward all along.
What mattered was this: the "soul transfer" that Sgaredo had once, unconsciously, attempted — I could carry out in her stead.
If the theory was right, and soul and body were separate things, then I could move Sgaredo's soul into a "suited" body that faithfully copied her own.
Given that Sgaredo herself had seemingly laid the groundwork, if I handled the fine-tuning there would be no side effects, nothing that could go seriously wrong.
And yet.
…The Hatchling has a self, too. That much is certain.
Because Sgaredo had been unable to intervene for so long, the Hatchling had been born with a self entirely its own, not just an empty shell. It had never emerged from a womb, but the Hatchling was, without question, a true dragon's child.
"……"
Was it really right?
To kill the Hatchling in order to bring Sgaredo back?
The Shadow Spirit I'd met in the Blue-Ring's forest — it had lived on in a beastman's body, been sealed and stripped of that body, and yet the shell itself, the beastman form, had kept a complete and whole self to the end.
The Hungry Mimic that had followed me had long since been annihilated by the Spear of Annihilation, and still some thing had remained in that body — enough to deliver a message to me.
"What am I supposed to do, Sgaredo?"
Did I have to follow the original plan, kill the Hatchling's self, and resurrect Sgaredo? Or did I have to let the Hatchling live as it was, and leave Sgaredo where she lay?
My head ached.
It took me three days to sort through the dilemma. In the process, I pored over Sgaredo's memories again — and ended up seeing her memories of me as well.
Me too.
If 'I' disappeared, would 'Lily Elbrit' simply remain in that place? And if something else remained instead — was that not a 'soul,' but merely a residual consciousness the body remembered?
No — wait. Was there even any meaning in drawing that line in the first place?
'If it has a soul, it must be saved, because souls are sacred — and if it doesn't, it should be discarded'? Really?
"Wuuuu…"
The Hatchling in my arms mumbled in its sleep.
I stared down at the little one for a long moment.
Fwoooosh!
Wings of pure white spread wide behind my back. The immense ritual unfolding from them draped itself gently over the Hatchling and Sgaredo alike, warm as a blanket.
My deliberation was over.
"That's right. It's Sgaredo."
"Wuu?"
Sgaredo.
The Hatchling had no name of its own, so Sgaredo it would be. After all, it was also Sgaredo.
I said it with a smile.
"Oh, and by the way — if you take down this little one, it counts as clearing the World Boss."
"Hmm, so that's how it… wait. WHAAAT?!'"
Yena shot to her feet, chair screeching. Anyone watching would have thought the sky was falling.
"That's insane! That! I mean, the baby counts as the clear?! Are you kidding me!!"
"I don't see what's so shocking about it."
"It's EXTREMELY shocking!!"
I held Sgaredo — currently making short work of a chunk of meat — up to the camera.
Wuuu, she grumbled, fixing the lens with those big round eyes before blinking once. A pink tongue swept briefly across the screen and vanished back into an adorable little mouth.
I skimmed the chat window and nodded.
"That's right. This little one needs a bit more time before she becomes the World Boss. Or should I call it — 'Synchronization'?"
"Synchronization?"
"The Hatchling is, by every measure, Sgaredo's child. Since their bodies are nearly identical, with enough careful adjustment she can become one and the same being. Reaching that point takes time and support — plenty of both."
I handed Sgaredo over to Yena.
Yena took her in a daze, but with the creature's World Boss status now sunk in, she couldn't bring herself to actually touch her, hands trembling all over. Only when I nodded silently did she finally start petting her with everything she had.
She's thrilled, isn't she.
"The deadline works about the same as preventing the Initial Damage. Roughly three weeks. Depending on how far the synchronization goes, it could take longer…"
"Hehe. Oh. Hold on. But didn't you just say that killing it now would still count as a kill?"
"It would. Even now, she 'is' Sgaredo."
If all I wanted was the reward, there'd be nothing wrong with putting Sgaredo down right this second.
However.
"The Sgaredo at the summit is Sgaredo too, remember. Until the synchronization completes, killing the Hatchling won't stop the Despair Frigid Cold from erupting on schedule. The quest only counts as resolved if she's 'complete.'"
In other words, if anyone wanted the quest finished within three weeks, they'd have to somehow take down the Sgaredo at the summit. Even if we brought down a fully synchronized Hatchling-Sgaredo three weeks from now, the one atop the snowy mountain would still be there — though by then the Despair Frigid Cold would already be a thing of the past.
"Hmm…"
Yena lifted the Hatchling up with a troubled look in her eyes. Still wary, the little one let out a low rumbling growl, but she didn't swipe her claws or attack — if anything, she was studying Yena with wide, alert eyes.
Yena looked back at me.
"…You're not going to kill it, right?"
"That's a surprise. I figured you'd be the first to vote for killing it."
This was the same Yena who had chosen to slaughter beastmen wholesale for a Mythic Grade item, after all. And now she didn't want to kill the Hatchling?
At my question, Yena's face fell flat.
"Huh. I suddenly feel like garbage."
"Oh, come on. Who'd even say anything if you did kill it?"
"…Lily?"
"Me?"
"You're not even denying it."
"I'll just have to do my absolute best to make sure it never comes to that."
Yena handed Sgaredo back to me. The Hatchling settled into my arms and let out a drowsy yawn.
"By the way — be careful. Now that I've said all this on stream, there are bound to be people coming to try to kill the baby one way or another."
"……"
"And in three weeks, there'll be people telling you to do it in the name of the greater good."
"Just say the word."
Bend me, break me — I'd hand Sgaredo over as many times as it took.