112(3) – Zenyo! (VIII)
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PART 4 – Mind!
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Ariel took only Verna to the top of the tower.
“She’s the most important person in my life,” Ariel said calmly, her nervousness and despair obvious. “After the fall of the gods of light, I lost her and did everything I could… she appeared in my life in a moment of need centuries ago, when I was nobody. She showed me what love and kindness are, she changed me in countless ways.”
She trembled as her hand landed on a door. Ariel seemed fragile. “Then don’t lie to me, I want sincerity.”
Verna nodded and the door opened. A slight vibration came from inside. A room that had almost nothing, just a huge bed in the center. The entire environment had been modified for the needs of someone who might be harmful to herself.
She saw runes and sigils that made no sense scattered across the floor, walls, and even the ceiling.
She recognized it: Beasts of the Void, horrifying cosmic entities possessing profound knowledge, but knowledge that logical minds cannot recognize or control, for even the Gods are corrupted.
This shows how far above the deities these creatures are, which are above or equal to the system itself.
Slowly the pair approached the bed; a naked woman lay upon it, without any body hair. Her head and eyebrows were shaved, her fingernails were not visible, seemingly surgically removed, but there were obvious signs of damage in the nail area and considerable calluses on her hands.
Her white, pure body, covered in bruises and signs of itching, but without fingernails, suggests the torture she must have endured to try to end this.
There were obvious signs of attempted self-harm. Verna surveyed her surroundings and saw some devices that she understood to be a way for her to "hurt" herself. She needed the pain to release some of her pent-up energy, or her madness would only worsen.
At the moment she is awake, her gaze vacant, focused on the ceiling, not even paying attention to the two of them. Her mouth moves, her lips dry; it's impossible to see her teeth, probably removed so she doesn't cannibalize herself.
There have certainly been countless adaptations to prevent her from mutilating or killing herself.
She is whispering incomprehensible things, probably repeating what the voices said before frying her brain, or she is just reading what was recorded on her retina or what she remembers from that moment.
‘They told me that Ariel's beloved wasn't even a Legend, but with her speaking of centuries, it indicated that.’ – The bedridden woman is an Elf, but not a common one, a High-Elf.
This explains her elevated position in the church, but she is the lover of a Demigoddess, so it's difficult to know if it's because of her species or connections. In any case.
“Erza~ it's me, love.” – Ariel leaned in and gently stroked her forehead. Verna observes her, having already probed and finding nothing wrong with her body, nor does her brain appear to have any damage. – “May I?” – Verna asks, and Ariel makes way.
Then Ariel shouts. – “What are you doing?!”
Verna simply touched Erza's breasts and vagina. – “Testing your stimuli, to see how your nervous system's perception and brain reception of such information are.”
Aah~
Erza lets out soft moans, her body writhing slightly. Verna pulls her hands back, becoming the target of Erza's gaze, which continuously moves up and down her body while she speaks nonsensically.
“And what is this for?” – Ariel asked, obviously irritated.
“Your body and brain have no damage, meaning it's not something I can simply fix or cure, since I can't see. So I have to test your perception and stimuli, see if it's still functioning as it should.” – Verna explains calmly.
“You’ve heard the story about how drunk people hardly get hurt when they fall, but a normal person falling from the same height tends to get hurt much more. This is because alcohol affects the individual physically and psychologically, so a drunk person, when falling, has a more relaxed body, where the distribution of damage from the fall is greater and considerably reduced, while an average person is always alert and reacts, even if instinctively.”
“Generally speaking, I want to see how your body and mind react to stimuli, what kind of hormones your body is generating, and if everything is correct. Even though I don’t have much knowledge about High-Elves, I have a basic understanding of the species’ capabilities.”
Ariel nods; she understands a little of what she means. – “And what do you think?”
“Your body is in perfect condition; it doesn’t seem like your brain is confusing your physiological reactions, generating the right kinds of sensations, but I want to conduct more tests. To know how you react to pain, happiness, and sadness.”
“Pleasure and pain I understand, but what about happiness or sadness?” – Ariel blinked, confused.
“I’ll have to think about that later. Go take care of Zenyo’s things. I’ll stay here, and when I’m finished there, I might have an idea of what’s going on in here.” – Verna lightly tapped Erza’s forehead twice.
Ariel clenched her teeth and, feeling confident in Verna’s tone, decided to trust her. – “I’ll go finish things there; it should take a few days.”
“Then have your fairies continue with the work, tell Lina I’ll be busy, and… can I ask your fairies for things?”
“Yes. But what kind of things are we talking about?”
……
Ariel went to take care of Zenyo, and Verna stayed with Erza, who became spaced out again. Then came the physical stimuli. Verna testing her reception of pain, how she interprets it.
For Erza, pain is both pain and pleasure. She felt her happiness, but also frustration and sadness.
Verna then had her take some mild medications; she wanted to see how her body reacted to depression, spontaneous happiness, focus, adrenaline, etc.
Verna found no apparent flaws or traumas. She only appeared to be in immense confusion, disconnected from reality.
Of course, this is the physical view; Verna needs to study magical patterns, the presence of sacred energy in her body, and finally understand her soul.
Verna knows better than anyone that the soul is a vast source of information. Since she doesn't seem to have problems with her body or brain, it means there's a lot of information overload being forced upon the brain, but the largest volume must be in the soul, perhaps engraved within it.
And because the soul possesses a perhaps unlimited capacity for information, her brain must still be trying to process it, far from reaching its end. Perhaps it will take decades, centuries, or millennia for her brain to go through everything. Perhaps it will never reach its end.
…
Verna studied her Mana, stimulating it using her own Internal Energy and Mana. She created a kind of filter using Internal Energy, as she didn't want to receive the volume of information that would drive a centuries-old High-Elf to a state of madness and disconnection from reality.
But there was nothing present in her Mana; the problem wasn't there, nor had she used it. It was expected.
Verna then went to the Sacred Energy; she was a Priestess and certainly connected to the Corrupted Deity. To interact, Verna used [Order God Mantra], her Elemental Energy of Order resonating with the Sacred Energy.
It was here that Verna felt a strong reaction; Erza began to convulse. – ‘Even now she's receiving information.’ – Verna noticed something and quickly invaded Erza's soul using her Internal Energy of the Order Element.
Verna growled, finding the connection and cutting it. And in this way, the Corrupted Deity, which is apparently alive, had its connection with Erza undone.
Without the connection, the Sacred Energy that was in large volumes in her body began to rapidly dissipate, and Erza fainted, her eyes rolling back and her body spasming.
Verna spent hours observing and using her own energy to expel the Sacred Energy from Erza's body, fearing that she might somehow try to re-establish the connection.
The good thing is that without the connection, all this Sacred Energy has no basis to sustain itself. So it's leaving the body and not returning, fragmenting and integrating with the environment.
With that, she removed the "poison," she needs to extract the rest. It turns out that the Sacred Energy was like a USB drive full of viruses that opened doors for someone to invade her "computer," gaining access to everything and being able to send things as they pleased.
Now that the "USB drive" has been removed, the virus continues and is dissolving the Sacred Energy. Verna is at most removing a small portion of this virus; one could say that she needs to manually find and destroy the entire virus.
But the enormous problem arises: the damage. One could say the "motherboard" and "hard drive" were damaged and corrupted; "formatting" isn't an option, nor is destruction.
Verna hasn't dared to take a look at her soul yet, but she has an idea of what will happen if she does.
…
"How are things?" Ariel asked, watching as Erza was tended to by her Ferlins.
Verna handed her a book, documenting what she had done. Ariel read it and her eyes widened. – "You managed to break the connection with her divinity and expel all the Sacred Energy from her body and soul?"
"I didn't expel everything; there are still remnants. Unfortunately, I'm unable to interfere with the Abilities. But it's certain that the information contained in the energy has been purged," Verna said calmly.
Ariel continued reading Verna's assessment of Erza's condition, the extent of the damage, and the tests performed.
"Do you think there's a cure?" Ariel asked.
"It's not a matter of cure," Verna said calmly. "There's no magical or spiritual system that can take care of this, because it's not a wound or an illness, it's knowledge. Knowledge is literally the basis of all existence; there's no cure for it."
Ariel shuddered.
"If you wanted, the easiest method to get her back, but it wouldn't be her, would be to damage her soul and erase her memory. Then restore her soul, and she would be a new person, still her, but without her memories, able to relearn everything," Verna said calmly.
"You would have her, but she wouldn't be the woman you remember, and she wouldn't remember you. She might not love you, maybe even hate you."
"No," Ariel refused. "That wouldn't be any different from killing her."
Verna looked calmly at Ariel and said, “It’s better to be dead than to live in this state. Why do you think she constantly mutilates herself or tries to kill herself? Whether she wants to or not, Erza is still in there, fragmented and wanting to die, because this is no way to live.”
Ariel bit her lip. “You have another method, right?”
“Yes. The problem is information. Her brain is overloaded. The brain is a filter for existing information, it goes beyond the physical; we’re talking about the soul. The soul retains information beyond the mundane; we use it as a filter for magic or divinity. So at this moment, her soul must be full of knowledge, an ocean of knowledge that her brain is trying to filter and organize, but it can take millennia, even with the connection having been broken.” Verna explained calmly.
“So it would be necessary to access her soul and purge this information?” Ariel asked.
“I think you already knew this. But I haven't looked into your soul; I'm not an expert on the subject and I have few countermeasures. If I access your soul, I'll be vulnerable to the sheer volume of information, and I'm the one who might go insane.”
“If it were a human or any species that lives for only a few centuries, their soul wouldn't be so deep, and there would certainly be a certain limit to the information. I would feel confident entering, and even if affected, I could protect myself. But she's a High-Elf. Even if she's not a Legend, we're talking about a powerful lineage, where, just by being a species, she can live for millennia—practically an immortal species—and her soul inherits traits from her species and ancestors. So we can talk about a soul capable of retaining information comparable to tens or even hundreds of thousands of years. I doubt my soul could withstand more than 5,000 years.”
“Honestly, you'd need a High-Elf Demigod, a Soul specialist, to try your luck and avoid being overwhelmed by so much information. Perhaps a Deity specialized in Souls would be the safest option.” – Verna says calmly and then sighs.
“I could help more, but I need to be cautious and I won’t risk my life for something uncertain. In a few decades, when I understand this area of study better, I could try to enter her soul and treat it.” – Verna says calmly.
“So you still have confidence in healing her?” – Ariel asked, noticing something.
“I study many things, and the Soul is one of the areas I study most diligently. I personally have a mountain of books with studies on the soul; it will take me decades to read everything and even more decades to truly understand and implement all this knowledge. So in a minimum of 40 years and a maximum of 100, I should achieve mastery to bravely face whatever is on Erza’s mind.” – Verna explained calmly.
Ariel nodded, seeming more relieved, because there is hope.
“In the report I detail my concerns. If you go and call other Demigods or even Transcendent beings and Gods to help, have them read my concerns carefully and not try to invade Erza's mind lightly. If the individual doesn't have the confidence to protect themselves or withstand tens to hundreds of thousands of years of information, then they shouldn't try. You don't want a Demigod, or worse, going insane here.”
Ariel agreed. – “I understand the concerns, but… is this categorized as your favor?” – She asked curiously.
“No. If I had healed her, then it would be the use of my favor, but I didn't heal her.” – Verna said calmly. – “I still owe you the favor, and if I master the knowledge to do so, I will let you know in the future.”
“Wait.” – Ariel called before Verna left the room. – “You said you have a lot of knowledge about souls, would you be able to give it to me and compensate me for the favor? I can study it myself and heal it. Or die trying.”
Verna observed her, then nodded. – “There’s no way. Making copies would take too much time and resources. The thing is, I need this knowledge because I have my plans and objectives.”
Ariel bit her lip, staring at Verna, then looked at Erza. – “Is there any way I could access this knowledge? I believe that two or more demigoddesses working together would be more advantageous for the study of the soul.”
Verna looked her in the eyes, then said. – “I have a cube that is its own dimension, containing a colossal library with millions of years of content, and as we speak, the books are still being compiled and the languages translated. This cube is in my residence in my world.”
She said nothing more, and Ariel nodded, having much to think about.
Verna then left; she went to find Zenyo because she wanted to see what changes had occurred.
(Author's note: Honestly, this was supposed to be the last chapter of this arc, but what happens next isn't something I could fit here, not with all the weight I put into this chapter. So the next one will be the last one related to Zenyo.)