After successfully reviving Ren, daily life flowed peacefully.
That should have been the case, anyway.
"Hoo...."
Until I had a nightmare.
For some reason, the things I had experienced back when I was in Dark Souls appeared in my dream.
I wouldn’t say I had any especially good memories there, but among them, the worst and most miserable of the lot was...
A memory that had been burned into my brain and refused to disappear, even after countless deaths.
The battle with the Soul of Cinder.
The memory of my body being sliced, pierced, cut apart, and burned into ruin all over was truly disgusting when it came back in a dream.
Thanks to that, I ended up having an unusually unpleasant morning.
"Hi! I came to wake you up... huh? Did something bad happen?"
Natsumi came in while I was sitting up in bed, feeling lousy from the nightmare.
After checking my face, she asked that question.
If having a nightmare counted as something bad, then I guess it was something bad.
"...No, I’m just a little off today."
I didn’t want to worry her over something like that, so I brushed it off and got out of bed.
"Really? Well, if that’s all, then I’m glad."
Whether my excuse worked on Natsumi or not, she nodded and let it go.
Relieved by that, I reached out and messed up her hair a few times.
"Ah, ah! What are you doing!"
"Because you’re cute."
"......"
Natsumi couldn’t argue against being called cute, so she just stood there and let me keep petting her head.
After a few more strokes, I turned toward the bathroom to wash up.
"I’m going to wash up now, so go on."
"Okay."
With that, Natsumi left and the door shut behind her.
And I treated the grumbling I heard from beyond the closed door as background music while I went into the bathroom, washed, and changed clothes.
"Haaam...."
Maybe because of the nightmare, even though I’d slept, it didn’t feel like I had slept at all. I yawned my way down to the living room, where I found Mayuri and Yoshino making breakfast.
"Good morning, Hi."
"Good morning, Hi-san...!"
"Yes, good morning."
After exchanging light greetings with the girls cooking, I sat down and greeted the others as well.
"Good morning to you too, Hi."
"Greetings. Good morning."
"Good morning, everyone. But where did Tohka go?"
I looked around the living room, but Tohka was nowhere to be seen.
She would normally be seated before anyone else, so when I asked the Yamai sisters about it, they said Tohka had gone to eat breakfast with Itsuka-kun.
"Well, Tohka does like the food Shido makes."
"Ah, good morning, Ren."
Ren, who had come down from her room at some point, sat down and spoke.
After becoming young again but somehow managing to be revived, Ren had decided to stay at the spirit mansion.
Part of it was because she was a spirit, and unlike Rinne, she didn’t really have anywhere else to stay, so she ended up living here by default.
Thinking about it, from the very beginning, the only one who had a house when she first appeared was Rinne.
Born with your own house, huh. Kind of makes me jealous.
"Yes, good morning. I’m reminded all over again that you people are unusual for accepting the person who caused all that."
Ren rested her chin on one hand and looked around the living room as she said that.
As she said, it is unusual to accept as one of the group the person who tried to kill Itsuka-kun, and by extension, us.
But accepting someone who had tormented us, the same way we had accepted Ren, wasn’t actually a first.
Right now, Natsumi—the one who had just come to wake me up—had also tried to socially bury me.
And besides Natsumi, there was another person who called herself a senior in this matter.
[My ears were itching, so I came to check. You weren’t talking about me, were you?]
That would be Arus Marina, speaking from inside my phone.
"No matter how many times I see it, it’s amazing. How does someone have spirit power inside a cyberspace?"
I could understand Ren’s reaction of wonder when she looked at Marina.
I was amazed too.
"Yeah. Looking at it like this, spirit power really is something strange."
Spirit power really did seem like something peculiar.
It could create spirits like Ren, Rinne, and Mayuri out of nothing.
And even give others special abilities called angels.
How spirit power came into being, or whether it had existed in this world from the start.
Considering that this power was strong enough to be compared to souls, and that even an AI existing in cyberspace could possess it, it really was strange.
[Well, I doubt it’s as strange as the soul you have.]
"That’s true. I know from using it myself that souls are even more dangerous than spirit power."
"It’s similar to spirit power, but with one difference: souls are the very force that forms the basis of life."
I shrugged and answered them.
Souls are the force that forms the basis of life in the world of Dark Souls.
Even aside from the powerful and prosperous kingdoms, and gods like Gwyn of Lothric, the so-called land of gods, even weak humans possessed souls.
And if you think about how other races all had souls too, though their characteristics differed, it’s clear that unlike spirit power, this thing called a soul spread across the entire world.
Though I’m not sure whether plants have them too.
[Anyway, enough of that. Today, right?]
"...Ah, right. It was today."
[What, you forgot!?]
I had briefly forgotten what day it was.
So when I scratched my head, Marina complained in disbelief and woke Maria up.
[Hey! Maria! Wake up!]
[Marina... you’re loud....]
[No! Hi forgot what day it is today!?]
[Hi...?]
After being forcibly dragged out by Marina’s call, Maria looked at me with a disappointed expression the moment she heard the truth.
Well, I was in the wrong, but getting that look from someone on a screen felt a little strange.
"Ah, then this would be that day."
"So today is the day Maria and Marina’s bodies are completed, right?"
The Fire Keeper, who came down last, mentioned the fact I had forgotten and sat down beside me.
Right. Today was the day Maria and Marina’s bodies would be completed.
Using the Fraxinus frame I had briefly used in my fight with Ren last time, and through the experience of reviving Ren, I had managed to get a rough idea of what to do.
I could already make the bodies themselves, but I had been stuck because it was impossible to put the two of them into them. That problem was now solved.
[Hi, forgetting is really awful of you.]
"Ah... um, I’m sorry."
It was my fault for building up their expectations and then forgetting the very thing I was making for them, so I apologized.
Then Maria continued, as if she had been waiting for this.
[Then as an apology, once the bodies are complete, let’s go on a date.]
"......"
The moment Maria said that, the atmosphere around us froze solid.
Once again, I’m reminded that most of the spirits in this spirit mansion are spirits I’ve already conquered.
In other words, in this mansion full of women except for me, most of them feel affection toward me.
"Oh? A date, huh."
[M-Maria! Cutting in line isn’t fair!]
"What are you talking about, Marina...?"
While Ren spoke with interest, I saw Marina grinding her teeth over being cut in line and realized I had fallen right into a trap.
So AI really is an intelligent menace.
"No, I think Hi is just stupid."
"Eh."
After Natsumi’s counter from the side, I briefly wondered if that might be true, then shook my head and dismissed it.
There’s no way I’m stupid.
"So, will you go on the date?"
Seeing Ren, that old lady who’d lived for thirty years, showing interest in someone else’s love life made me annoyed, which was only natural, right?
"...I just felt weirdly irritated for some reason."
"Must be your imagination. And I think a date would be a little difficult. Both Maria and Marina will need time to adjust to their bodies."
I brushed past Ren’s sharp intuition and gave the two of them a proper excuse.
Though I did wonder if I could get away with it by saying they needed time to adjust to their bodies.
[Well, that makes sense.]
[That’s true.]
Fortunately, both of them accepted it.
[Then once we’re adjusted, we’ll do it.]
[Wha...!]
Nope, apparently not. Damn it.
******
After breakfast, we gathered at the Fraxinus.
"Ooh! Body creation! I really wanted to see this!"
Among the gathered group was Mana.
Why was she here?
"...I only called you for a physical examination. You happened to come at the same time."
"I see."
I nodded at Murasame’s explanation.
From what I’d heard last time, there was apparently something wrong with Mana’s body too, so I guess she came for that and ended up drifting over here.
[Hi, let’s get started quickly.]
"Understood."
At Maria’s urging, I nodded and placed my hand on the prepared frame.
This frame had been made by Fraxinus for Maria and Marina alone.
The task was to cover the frame, which had been created so their powers as artificial spirits could manifest in reality, with souls and turn it into life.
More precisely, I guess it would be the task of granting life.
The method was the same as always.
Let the soul flow out, cover the frame, and solidify the wavering soul to fix its shape.
Then I let a tiny amount of the spirit power existing within me flow out and settle into the frame.
The Fire Keeper handled all the resistance that arose during the process.
"Hoo...."
Wiping the sweat from my head, I looked at the completed bodies.
[Now we just connect, right?]
"Yeah. Go ahead."
The moment I gave permission, the two figures disappeared from my phone screen.
Then the bodies that had now become theirs opened their eyes.
"Oh...."
"This feels strange..."
The two who had awakened clenched and opened their hands, getting used to the sensation.
But there was a slight problem....
"H-Hi! Close your eyes!"
"Aaaah!!!"
"Don’t look, Shido!"
"Gehuhk!"
For some reason, the moment the two of them entered their bodies, they ended up naked.
Thanks to that, Mana poked my eyes, and Itsuka-kun got kicked by the commander and sent flying.
Why are you taking it out on us....
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