*sigh* ‘What?’

‘Not used to people!? Oh I think that's a bit of an understatement!’ I think as I cover my face with one of my hands, but then I was surprised by a new voice.

‘!’

I take a deep breath, to distract myself from the thought that I have a spider inside my head, and ask:

‘Why does Cy sound so different?’

‘Could you please stop saying that?’

I sigh and decide that the best choice of action, despite what she did before, is to make up and get past it, I'd rather not be on bad relations with someone who can follows me around everywhere.

‘Fine, I accept your apology, but one more thing, you already said why her voice was different, but what about the way she acted? She talked in a completely different way than the first time we met. Also did you even know she had tried to strangle me before!?’

‘Don't!’

‘...’

I think about what's happened and what we've talked about for a bit.

‘Can I summon her?’

However Lizz is interrupted as the book jumps off of my back, starts glowing, and opens.

From within the pages of the book a giant black spike starts appearing.

It grows.

And grows.

And grows even further.

Eventually it reaches twice as high as the trees, at this point the spike then bends ninety degrees at the base and continues to grow even further, causing the entire thing to fall on it's side.

‘...’

However I'm too distracted by the giant spider leg which appeared from the book to even hear her.

And then it stops.

The book is still glowing and the leg is still leading to inside the book, however nothing more is coming out.

‘Uhm… Book? Please do whatever she said…’

The leg then straightens again and recedes back inside the book.

After I calmed down a bi-

‘What the fuck was that!?’

Okay, I hadn't calmed down at all.

‘No it wasn't! Cy was tiny!’

‘What is she even!? How can she be so tall!? And why's she gone quiet!?’

I wait for another explanation,however one doesn't arrive.

*sigh* ‘Okay, but what is she?’

‘I've been meaning to ask this for a long time, but how do you know all of this!? You talk about Cy like an old friend and you knew all kinds of things about the book, weren't you supposed to be a random researcher who had only looked at the book for a few years!? Really, how do you know all of this!?’

“Plush!”

But just as she's about to answer Lizz is interrupted by Shiona’s voice.

I turn around to where Shion's voice is coming from and see her coming towards me quickly from the sky.

Very quickly.

*crash*

She slams into me and pushes me into the ground, after she gets up I phase myself out of the ground.

“Are you okay!? What was that!?”

“That… I think that that was another of my familiars…”

I explain what happened in the underground city, what happened when I tried to borrow Lizz’s powers and my second meeting with Cy.

“Why didn't you say anything!?”

“Well, the first meeting sort of ended with her saying she was unable to actually do anything, so I didn't think she was going to be able to do anything…”

She just sighs.

“But I saw you flying earlier, what was that!?”

Two red lights appear below her eyes and she looks away.

“I… sort of… learned…”

“Hey!”

Lizz flies out of the pouch.

“Cy woke up and I talked to her, like you'd expect she'd rather you didn't try to summon her until you fix the book properly, but she gave me something else. Book, if you'd please?”

The book then jumps into the air, its pages facing one of the trees, and out from it shoots a shiny metal orb the size of me and a smaller matte black cone with an orb attached to the flat end.

The cone gets wedged into one of the trees, after a few seconds it starts shaking, eventually getting itself out of the bark and making it fall down to the ground.

while it's in the air the cone splits into eight equally sized parts, and by the time it lands those parts have been turned into eight spider legs which support the small black orb which was previously attached to the flat end of the cone.

the larger orb the has a strip the size of a sixth of the orbs area fold open, revealing what looks like an eyeball, and the cone-turned-spider climbs inside of it through the pupil, causing me to almost faint at the sight.

Two more strips of the orb the fold up, letting two spindly arms come out, the two strips becoming shoulder pads for them.

The bottom of the orb then splits into six triangles which then extends into six legs

[Hello. My name is Cy T. Adel, pleasure to make your acquaintance.]

I hear the same metallic voice which came from Cy’s machine from inside the orb-turned-robot.

“Err… Hello? I'm Shiona…”

It seems Shiona wasn't quite sure how to respond.

[Although proper introductions are important I believe it's within our best interest to keep making our way to Eastern Lake city.]

“... Hey, why do you speak so differently from before?”

Cy freezes up and goes quiet for a bit, Lizz responding for her.

“Excuse her, remember how I said she gets embarrassed easily? Well her best way of coping with it is somehow by acting like this…”

She then sighs and rubs her temples.

[... quite.]

The lens shaped strips which had previously acted as shoulder pads then folded back and became wider.

[Have a seat.]

“But… we just learned to fly?” Asks Shiona.

“Please do it just this once, only way to get Cy to open up is to be close to her, please go along with this, at least until she gets more comfortable with you.” Responds Lizz in an almost whispering voice.

“Fine.”

Seeing that the both of them seem to have decided by themselves I then sit on one of the shoulder pads turned seats, Shiona follows on the other while Lizz sits on my head.

Shiona then suddenly speaks up.

“Plush, I already told you about what I did for these past few years, but what about you? What happened to you after you came to this place?”

I then tell her about how I woke up in the forest, my meeting with Charlton and my meeting with Lizz, about the quartet and their inn, about the adventurers guild and about how one of the city guards tried to attack me with goblins, about how I discovered the pickit city and how I eventually came to get her, after I finish everything she then asks me:

“Wait, so you got an illusion ring as a reward from that Rupe guy for capturing the goblin guy, did you ever even use it?”

“... No…”

“Why not?”

“... I forgot…”

She sighs at me while Lizz giggles.

“...”

“...”

“... Well?”

“What?”

“Try it out then!” She tells me with an annoyed voice.

Without me even asking it to the book stretches out a blue hand and gives me the ring.

I sigh internally and out on the ring, and once I do the ring fots disturbingly well.

‘Since both my skills, the bangle, AND the familiar thing just needed me to focus energy where whatever it is that's going to happen is going to happen, maybe this does to? For now let’s start with something simple.’ I think quietly to myself before focusing energy arm.

My arm the turns black and seems to grow fur, I then try spreading it to my hand and adjust the shape, once I've got the hang of it my arm looks like Cathy’s.

“Pretty good. But why just the arm?” Says Lizz after she flies down and lands on the machines eyeball.

Despite what she says I keep working on just the arm, this time however I make it look like Rupe’s scale covered arm.

I then quickly move it up to Lizz, I then pretend to flick her forehead, however due to it just being an illusion it just goes through her.

At least she still eeped in surprise.

“Don't do that!” She shouts while stretching her arms downwards.

I then do it again.

“Ha! I won't fall for th- *pok*

However this time I made one of my claws longer by solidifying air in a long straight line from it and gave her a real forehead flick while also using the illusion ring to hide the elongated claw.

“Uuu…” Moans Lizz while rubbing her forehead.

A blue slip of paper then shoots out from the pouch on my chest.

Trickster’s Sleight

Due to combined the use of a skill that allows you to create physical objects and a skill that allows you to create visual objects you have been given this ability.

This ability lets you more easily use skills of these two natures in tandem to create imitations that both feel and look like the real thing.

This will be easier to perform the more practice you have in the two combined skills.

‘Wait what? What do you mean combined two skills? I only used one skills, the other thing was an item!’

Another blue slip of paper then shoots out next to the first.

Risen Apparition

You have been given this skill due to your ghostly disposition.

This skill allows you to create intangible apparitions for the sake of fuddling the senses of others.

Ease of use goes up when creating apparitions of creatures.

‘...’

“Try it!”

I turn around and see that Shiona’s seat has been moved behind me while I was absorbed in the books messages.

Getting distracted by how Shiona’s seat has moved I look around at the rest of the robot and see that each of the six legs has curled up into small half-orbs which are now propelling us forwards much the same way a car’s wheels does, with the two hands having a wheel each as the take care of steering us, we’ve also been lowered a lot closer to the ground.

‘It looks like someone put together two motorcycles next to each other… Well, with four extra hind wheels that is...’

“Well? Try it!”

At this point Shiona is looking very excited so I decide I might as well.

I stretch my arm forwards and…

Realize I’m not sure what to try and make.

Both Shiona and Lizz look at me abit confused, and then an idea hits me.

I focus energy throughout my body and imagine certain parts of Charlton overlapping with me, looking down I see that I’m slowly being covered by a black haze.

The haze eventually disappears, showing that I am still myself, however I am now wearing the same suit that Charlton has been wearing every time I met him.

‘Well other than the first time that is.’

The both of them make “Ooo” noises and start clapping, however I start feeling tired and lean back in the seat.

‘!’

Only then do I realize that even though the suit had been made from the solidification skill I was still able to move in it as though it was fabric, something that would’ve previously been impossible.

I undo the suit, however it’s already too late and I faint from exhaustion.

‘Well this hasn’t happened in a long time, guess this takes a lot of energy to use then… I’ll have to experiment when I wake up…’ I think before my consciousness fades fully.