==

The Collector clicked its mandibles in rising irritation exacerbated by its unbound emotion and the trigger of desire.

Or to be more specific, desire unfulfilled.

It looked down at the human female specimen craning her neck up at it, taking a shaky step back.

Pitiful.

The stench of fear, a scent that evoked the strongest sense of detest possible from the Collector, reeked from her.

Not at all like the male specimen who emanated only the scent and pressure of the fight.

The Collector had allowed the specimen to show his worth, and he provided ample challenge to exercise the Collector's desire for battle, not to mention the acquisition of several new valuable genetic material specimen from his weapons.

But above all, the Collector had desired the male specimen's core, to devour him wholly as a means of honoring his willingness to stand and fight through a battered body and the oppressive knowledge of facing a superior enemy.

Now, however, this female specimen had doomed the worthier male to the ignoble fate of fleeing like prey.

The Collector sensed the female specimen move, and with a quick flick of her wrist, withdrew a shard of red crystal from a small ripple in space, tossing it at the Collector.

Before it struck the Collector, the crystal exploded into a swirling pillar of fire.

The Collector did take damage from this attack, though it was highly minimized due to its Sapian shielding.

>>

Mana Level: 400>390%

>>

Sapian abilities were heavily taxing in their mana usage.

This included the makeshift bones and blood flow the Collector simulated in its injury. That alone would cost approximately 5% of its total mana every single minute.

But devouring the male specimen's weapons, so immensely rich with mana as they were, had overloaded the Collector by converting their excess spirit roots into pure energy.

This energy, the Collector's current form could not stabilize for long, and it deteriorated by the minute. Yet, while it was active, the Collector's combat capability would rise by 170%.

The Collector possessed great power in the moment, but it was on a timer, and within this timer, it could no longer afford to revel in another battle for its desire.

It had to finish its mission. Yet, it did desire something from this female.

"I will hold you back," began the female human as she stepped back again, moving to withdraw something more. "I-,"

The Collector disappeared in a burst of crackling red as it pumped mana into its tail and used {Dash}, It stopped when its fist had torn right through the female's chest, her heart still beating in its enormous hand.

The female's eyes widened as she coughed up a spurt of blood.

Then, she grew still. Limp. Dead.

The Collector held that heart gently, taking care not to crush it. It withdrew its arm from her body with the slick sound of blood and organs squelching against its carapace.

The corpse fell forwards, a growing pattern of blood forming in the ground around her.

The Collector beheld the heart, this core, seeing rainbow colored mana infused within it.

This female specimen had certainly vexed the Collector with her capacity to interface with some degree of hyperspace.

From the color and appearance of circuitry whenever she utilized magic, it would appear that this hyperspace accessibility was regulated by a 'god' of some kind.

In other words, the Collector would not utilize it through ordinary consumption, for that would mean not only bowing to a deity, but also to allow access within itself to some foreign presence. A risk it would not take.

But this ability truly was useful, and the Collector channeled the thrall's trigger for Greed, amplifying its desire.

Flashes of blue permeated the Collector's red aura, and it prepared itself to utilize bone binding.

To be sure, the Collector had utilized bone binding before in the fight with the human male, but only within its own bones.

The thrall could channel power from its bones to turn itself into mist, but the Collector was different. Channeling power through its bones only created more power.

Raw, destructive power in the form of shockwaves that accentuated its physical movements or, if analyzed further and focused, allow the Collector more ranged combat capabilities in the form of generating pulverizing, pressurized air through its punches.

Bone binding something else was different.

More difficult.

Would require the entirety of the specimen's skeletal structure intact, as well as the core itself. Involved taking all the roots from within the flesh and bones, infusing them into the core, and then infusing the core into a leftover bone.

The process would take several hours. The thrall itself with its horrendously undeveloped brain must have spent entire days working on a single bone binding operation.

The Collector did not have that time. But if its calculations were correct, then it would have assistance.

'I-I'm back!' came the female daemon's voice as she hovered to the Collector.

The heat-generating blade had pierced through her shoulder, disabling it nearly entirely, but the wound had cauterized, minimizing the chances for infection.

And, as the Collector noted from her movements as she floated to its side, her exceptional pain tolerance rendered her almost fully functional.

Good. Her functionality was needed, as was her superb magical sensitivity that rivaled even that of the Collector's, even exceeding it had she been undamaged.

'You…you're injured,' said the daemon as she stared at the muscle and Sapia constructs covering the hole in the Collector's chest. 'But…you've managed to seal a wound like this so easily and…and using Sapia like this…I…I've never seen the like of it, didn't think it would be possible.'

She cocked her head, nodding to herself. 'But…now that I see it, it seems reasonable. Simple. I…I see now.'

Her thel reached to the Collector, and when the spike touched the thin layer of Sapian shielding around the Collector, their psionic auras merged again in a tether.

Through this, the daemon closed her eyes, taking care of the cost of creating and circulating the Sapia-construct bones and blood vessels.

The Collector clicked its mandibles.

This would minimize continual mana loss. And with this specimen to assist it, the time to complete this bone binding procedure also drastically reduced.

Estimated time of completion, provided the female specimen was as effective as calculated: 10 minutes.

"I require your assistance," said the Collector.

'Y-yes!' said the daemon as she perked up, wanting to be useful.

The Collector knelt down by the female human's corpse, holding the heart over her. The female daemon stared at the mangled corpse without a shred of pity in her eyes, just a sense of curiosity.

"First, I shall remove any potential interference." The Collector sensed insects swarming around it, and though they still feared the Collector, if its mana diverted into something other than a display of power, the lowly insectoids might well have attempted to interfere.

The Collector opened its maw and activated its pyrocatalytic glands, sending out a torrent of white-blue flame that turned any insect it touched into ashes within a second.

Rotating its head, the Collector created a ring of flame far enough away from itself to grant it time for this procedure.

"I will engage in a procedure meant to circulate the spirit roots imbued within this specimen's flesh and bones into this core," said the Collector. "Once the core has compacted the roots within itself and stabilized, I will then once more compact the core into a bone, imbuing the osseous matter with the condensed core and roots."

'Wow…it's…it's like something I've read about. A…twin-forge procedure, except instead of using monster roots and cores, you're using a human's,' nodded the daemon girl in understanding. 'I…I have some knowledge in doing something like this.

Thorian, my old teacher, he-he knew how to coreforge a little, and he taught me the basics, and…this sounds just like it.'

She cocked her head and put a hand to her chin in thought. 'But…but we need something that can touch the roots. Tear them from the flesh. Something…something spiritual.

In a forge, that would be a soul-shear, but-,' She looked around. 'We don't have one.'

The Collector clicked its mandibles. It took its free hand and focused, channeling the thrall's bone binding powers. Thin lines of blue wrapped around its fingers before spooling out from the fingertips in threads with hooked tips.

"I sense these are close approximations to this tool you classify as a 'soul-shear'," said the Collector.

'Oh-ooh,' said the daemon in wonder. 'I…I had never seen bone binding shears. They…they say that northern goblins had this power passed onto them from Facestealers, monsters of legend.'

"Another specimen that seems interesting to consume. Yet, a species that too will assimilate into the Collective when it dawns." The Collector clicked its mandibles. "I sense you are familiar with this procedure to great degree.

You will assist me in removing the roots from this deceased specimen's flesh."

The daemon female nodded, using Sapia to move the five bone binding shears on the Collector hand.

"I will now open this core manually and prepare it to receive an influx of roots. As I do this, you will place the roots within." The Collector ever so slightly dug its fingertips into the heart, sending the soul-shears within, willing them to move through the cardiovascular organ.

Blue light shone from within the heart, coloring the red a pale, icy shade as the flesh and blood organ started to grow pale and freeze over, preserving it.

The daemon acted with precision. She hovered a hand over the body, and the five soul shears on the Collector's other hand fell into the body.

There was no physical sign of entry as the hooked threads sank into the skin.

The threads instead phased through, and when they came back out, smaller bundles of threads, some colored green, some a faint shade of rainbow, emerged attached to the hooked ends of the blue threads.

Where the threads emerged, the flesh grew pale, cold, and shriveled, as if it had been frozen away for years.

These threads, the daemon willed up into the frozen heart, entwining them in an ever-growing ball of wound up spirit roots.

"I see," said the Collector. "You are not targeting single roots, but areas where they intersect greatest, allowing you to withdraw dozens of threads at once."

'I…I've got the hang on this, yes,' said the daemon. She bit her lip in nervousness. 'But…but this will take some time. Maybe…maybe an hour?'

"You do not do well to underestimate my processing capabilities. The rate of your removal in this procedure is notable. Yet, can be greatly assisted."

The Collector sprouted its six arakka arms from its back, and six ghostly blue shears unspooled from their tips.

The Collector could faintly sense the daemon's intent, where she wanted to enter and pick at, and knowing this, it assisted her, the six spider legs on its back rushing in and out of the corpse at breakneck pace.

In the end, the Collector and the daemon finished the entire procedure in a time span just shy of five minutes.