Mmm. Someone’s calling. The top part moves. She’s awake. Ahh, I fell asleep. I need my phone. She gets off me, retrieve the phone, and accepts the call for me.

“He-oo.”

I blink. Did I just control Tåke? Let’s give the phone to my actual body. Have we become one or something? Uh, later. I grab the phone from Tåke, or is that me now? As I put it to my ear to it she flops down on top of me.

“Sorry about that. Hello?”

“What was that? Where are you?”

Oh, hi mom. “Uhm, in the forest.”

“We’re just waiting for you now, the food is ready shortly.”

“Wait, what?” I check my watch. “Oshit, I slept for two hours! Uhh, I can be there pretty soon, but you can start eating without me.”

“You fell asleep in the forest? We’ll talk about that later. How long?”

“I’ll come flying, so probably no more than thirty mins. Oh, and don’t get scared. I really will come flying.”

“Are you still aslee- never mind. We’ll see you soon.”

“Uhh yeah, see ya.”

Okay. Tåke will have to get off of me, then. My bag’s over there. Flying form? Yeah. Can I make Tåke change into her tiny form? Ah, I can’t control her any more.

“Mmmm…” She rubs her face weakly.

Was she asleep? And that let me control her body? Interesting, I should try to recreate that. But not now. “｢Can you take on the puppy form?｣”

Some twenty-odd minutes later, I make Leda start her descent, aiming for the road outside my uncle’s house. I figured, Leda is a better and faster flyer than me, so why not make her do the flying? I had to make a basic riding harness, but in the end descending on the back of a (not quite) dragon with the (not quite) heroine is one HELL of an entrance.

It is also an entrance where I best be very quick at explaining myself, which is why I don’t actually land on Leda, instead jumping off once the ground is within my casting range, placing myself gently at their lawn. I quickly explain that I’ve been doing a lot of magic since the Upheaval, noting the business I am setting up, and then introduce a somewhat unsteady Tåke, and Leda, who has taken on her humanoid form.

There must be something in our genes, because after the basic introduction and sharing of the uplifting quests (which is a large reason why I wanted Leda and Tåke to come with me), the barbeque proceeds more or less as usual, though with a lot more magic displays, and some tutoring (mostly about safety).

By the end more or less my entire close family on my mom’s side have the basic mana abilities as well as aspect magic, and I’ve learned that Leda’s weak spot for offspring extends to the human variety as well. First she played with them in her humanoid form, and later she was played with in her full form, though with strict supervision. Apparently a wyvern is an excellent playground, according to my nieces and nephew.

On the way home I make sure to do a quick hunt in Artemis’ name, and I spend the rest of the day doing a much-needed re-organization and cleaning of my apartment. I stored the crafting stuff in a mix of spatial bags and a couple random objects used as subspace key, and wrote down a bunch of things to buy, as well as more things I want to test, the main one being making a pocket dimension.

I spend the next few days turning the website from its bare minimum state to one which looks at least halfway decent, and more importantly, works. With a system for taking orders and connecting it to a payment service, it has all it needs as a business site, but I also add the videos I’ve made, as well as detailed descriptions about each of the things I offer, all neatly categorized under goods, tutoring and magical services.

I also take a trip to IKEA to upgrade my storage solution to use spatial drawers instead of spatial bags, and to get a few decent-sized objects to replace the subspace keys. Because, as far as I can tell, they are merely keys. First making a subspace takes quite a bit of mana, depending on the size, but after that it only really takes mana to ‘open’ the subspace the key is connected to.

I make and then deconstruct dozen of them, but come no closer to making two keys connect to the same subspace. On the other hand, I’ve gained some insight into exactly how things enter and exit subspaces. Space itself twists, seemingly connecting the subspace to realspace for a brief moment, just enough to swallow or spit out the transferred object.

Looking at [Shapechanger], the same thing is used for the puppets. More interesting, however, is swapping my main body for a puppet. I had wondered how it could simultaneously absorb one form and summon another in the same place, and the answer seems to be this: The two spaces overlap as they twist, meaning the two forms are at the same place, but not really.

The last part doesn’t make much sense to me, but it’s not like I have a physicist’s education. I’ve just picked up a bit here and there in addition to what I learned in high-school. I bet people would love to science the hell outta these abilities. On the note of science, Thomas has been doing some calls. They’re gathering a multidisciplinary panel of scientists, from neuroscientists to lawyers, regarding uplifting and non-human intelligences.

As for my companions, Leda grudgingly accepts that she can’t see me more often. In response to that she has been working hard on her own uplifting quest, and her vocabulary and ability to speak is improving at a terrifying rate. I think she keeps her humanoid puppet constantly summoned, and it now looks and acts natural, but by no means human. Scaled, digitigrade, and with a long, slim tail, she looks like a standard ‘reptile alien’ when standing up straight, becoming a fierce raptor when running.

And she runs a lot. I thought of it when I realised just how huge her mana range is, but without moving her main body she can prowl the nearby forest. Thanks to an interpretation of the rules that I may or may not have given her, she’s started staying just outside the actual city, within range to send her little raptor puppet into ‘human territory’.

Good thing I’ve made some clothes for that form, a pair of blue shorts and an uncolored shawl, because she’s made a game of sneaking up on people undetected, then initiating conversation. I can’t get her to tell me what she talks about, though she says she’s ‘really good at saying hello!’. If her increasingly complex conversations with me is anything to go by, a large part of them is the ‘why game’.

The sneaky bugger has also started hanging around a café people often make their goal, or perhaps a stop, when hiking in the forest. She’s been getting chummy with some of the regulars, a large part of which is older people who use the place as an incentive for some not too intense exercise. When I started reprimanding her, a nearby old woman laughed and offered the three of us a waffle each. I’m not one to decline something like that…

And then there's my clingy wolfkin girl. I have recreated that state of synchronicity in breathing, heartbeat and mana flow, and with some practice we can now form it in half a minute when in an embrace, as well as over a distance. I can control her body if she falls asleep in that state. In fact, like an aspect puppet, I can read her senses as well. Though, I take care not to sense too much after experiencing the full force of her raging hormones.

While content with just being around me and the occasional hug, she’s getting quite frustrated. I won’t do anything to her in the foreseeable future, so she’s been taking care of her current needs while making a cute, if somewhat disturbing, mix of quiet whines, moans, and the occasional yelp. Afterwards I have to shower her or I’ll go mad from the smell. She seems to enjoy that care, though I’d rather she wash herself.

I also finally sold the spatial bag to that one guy who 100% wanted to buy one, and with the webpage looking quite respectable it’s been getting quite a few views. In fact, there’s a few people who’ve registered themselves as interested in buying one thing or another, mostly the bags. As soon as I had some strips of dyed silk I uploaded them as color samples. I’ve also made a few calls to interested people.

The fifth day after the barbeque I head to the psychologist again, as scheduled. I’m leaving Tåke in the apartment, which should be fine given that she’s generally pretty calm, and while she doesn’t quite seem to understand the concept of a toilet, she does seem to know that I don’t want her to do her business around the apartment and have been using it more or less correctly.

At the psychologist, I go over the events of the last week, following up with my reflections since the last appointment. She gives me what I think is a compliment on those. I speak of some of the questions the [System] have raised, which leads to a philosophical debate on the implications of the [System] and New World stuff in general.

We inevitably come into the topic of non-human intelligence, and briefly pick up the topic from last week. As the end of the appointment draws near, she tells me about a group (separate from the panel being made) that would like to do some research on the biology of non-humans, including the puppet forms that can now be made. I’m interested, and she’ll give me more details when next we meet.

Hmm, what to do first when I get home… I have a lot of measured and dyed silk, and I plan to make a copy of my current bag, as well a some clothes that aren’t just white or the honestly poor colors I made from plants. I’ve done a few experiments, but those colors only really work on a small scale. I’m also gonna make that toga, while I’m at it.

I finally put together the bow yesterday, even went to hunt a some monsters. Worked better than I had expected, and I unlocked the [Archery] ability, together with a new class: [Magic Archer]. I did a lil prayer dedicating the hunt to Artemis, too. So I plan on inscribing her name on the bow, though I’ve given it some though and I might be able to find a god more suited to myself.

Well, my Google-fu is strong, and if nothing else there’s probably some list of deities on Wikipedia. I get a feeling of distress through the companion bond with Tåke, and as soon as I am in range, I reach out with a mind bond. She does the magic equivalent to slapping my hand away, and I hurry up. As I open the door a subtle smell wafts over me.

When I cross the magical barrier I’ve set up, the second thing I notice is Tåke’s presence in the bathroom. The first thing? That she’s been in the fridge, based on the half-eaten sausage lying on the floor. Next to it is a whole sausage with one end covered in what appears to be bloody slime. I enter the bathroom and am greeted by a more concentrated version of the same smell.

She’s sitting in the fetal position in a corner of the shower, and look up at me with utter helplessness and a hint of despair. For a moment, hope flashes across her eyes, before she cast her eyes to the floor. Hope turns into deep shame, and she retreats in on herself. I survey the room. It seems to have avoided her plundering, and aside from where she’s sitting, the floor is clean.

I squat and look her in the eyes, or would if she looked back. “Hey. It will be fine. You’ll be alright.”

There’s no response.

I stay like that for a moment, then let out a sigh before silently cleaning up the room. With there still not being any response, I leave the door open and clean up the mess she left in the living room. The sausages go to the food garbage, then I clean the floor. Until now she never left any mess that I could see when I got up the morning after, though she mainly did it in the hammock. Hmm, should probably wash that. Ah, I’d need to hand wash it, huh. What was that bloody stuff? I hope she’s not injured.

All that’s left now is to clean and cheer up Tåke, and after the first attempt I longer bother trying to stay dry, so I undress. I walk over to her and reach out my hand and the mind bond at the same time. “C’mon. Let’s get you cleaned up.”