Mind Demon's Path of Domination

"So what's the way for you to give me the shard when you are stuck inside the ice?" Mark blinked, touching the ice. "You said you used up all your power, and I myself can do nothing to this ice. It's like I am hitting metal with the hands of an ant."

He had tried everything that might work. For hell sake, he had even used Alchemy Shapeshifting on it but it was as if he was grasping at thin air.

His powers felt useless. The frozen waters of the River of Destiny were indeed not simple.

"Violence, violence, violence. Is that the only answer for you?" Reol'ran sighed. "Violence is not the only way, you f—" She stopped herself short and cleared her throat. "Anyway, Mark. Just do what I say and everything will be clear to you why I had worked SOO hard to come here and bring you here at the same time."

Mark just looked at the woman's beautiful figure buried inside the crystalline, transparent ice. She was motionless.

"Place your forehead against the ice shard," she said.

He placed his horns against it. He couldn't make his forehead touch the ice.

The woman's annoyance was clear in his mind. "Well, can't you just reduce your size with Alchemy Shapeshifting? Isn't that why you got it in the first place? Why are you still being so big?"

She seemed to be frustrated.

"Well, I am not that trusting of Alchemy Shapeshifting. I tried it on many others and whenever I tried to change their shape into something else, they just became a huge bulking mess and exploded."

"..."

"I have to get more used to the power and get some experience using it on other living beings to be comfortable using it on myself or people I don't want to hurt. Who knows, if I change my shape and mess up my biology somehow, it might get me killed."

"Whatever. Now, chant my True Name in your mind and try to sense the Karma Threads between us. With me no longer helping you sense it, you can't sense it anymore, but I will do the rest."

Mark muttered her true name in his mind and just tried to sense the threads. Even though he tried and tried, there was nothing like that in his senses. Sensing a Karma Thread inside the River of Destiny was one thing and sensing it outside was another.

Mark had no such talent. But he knew Reol'ran was not doing something bad for him, so he just sensed for it as she had told him.

A long moment passed and Mark felt a small mumble echo out from within himself; it was Reol'ran. His gaze grew slightly blurry and he felt as if someone was sewing threads around his body with a sharp needle.

But somehow, it felt comfortable. Warm.

After a while, it came to a halt.

"This is a process that should have been a part of our marriage ceremony but no matter. I just bound my soul to your Soul Space and professionally became your Soul Mate.

"There are no negatives in it for you other than the fact that I can now use your Mindpower as my own, but you can also use my Mindpower, so it is no issue. It's a boon for you to use my immense well of Mindpower, sadly, I do not have any remaining in my body.

"But the highlight is, a Soul Mate can move in and out of each others' Soul Space."

As she said that, the ice in front of Mark vanished from the basement with a sudden blip along with Reol'ran's body that was encased within it.

"..."

"What?" she asked, seeming disappointed.

"You should have explained before you do something like this."

"Why?" she seemed genuinely confused.

Mark didn't say anything and just silently used his soul sense to enter his Soul Space. Deep inside the unlit Soul Space was a crystalline egg made of Ice from the waters of the River of Destiny.

Reol'ran's body rested inside that.

The moment she appeared in his Soul Space, the entire space began to thrum with anticipation.

The violet mirror was trembling. That meant every other thing within him was trembling, too.

Mark just watched silently as the trapped woman's forehead lit up in a violet glint. When he looked again, Mark could see a shimmering light floating beside the bright, Violet Mirror.

He looked at it with astonishment.

Then, he turned back to look at the ice encasing Reol'ran with a stunned face—there was a thin hole in the ice.

It was as if something had sliced through from inside like a sword through butter.

It looked like a memory slot in a phone.

Reol'ran Will materialized beside him. She looked translucent but no different from her real body. The woman's white hair billowed behind her back while her amethyst eyes could barely contain her shock.

She floated beside him and turned to look at him curiously. Inside the Soul Space, he had the appearance of his older human self.

"What just happened?" he asked.

"The mirror shard was inside my mental space." She said, pushing back her white hair with a forced smile. "The shard was too attracted to its main body and just swished out of my space without my permission. And as I thought, this is no normal treasure to be capable of slicing through the Frozen Waters of Destiny just by moving—even my eyes couldn't follow its speed. It's probably as fast as light."

Mark took a deep breath, stunned. "So that's how you planned to give it to me?"

"Yes. Binding my soul to you officially as your Soul Mate would let me move in and out of your Soul Space, so the attraction should kick in and if the mirror moved, I thought it should somehow find a way to you on its own."

She sighed. "It's a pity. I had hoped to teleport into your mind without the Ice covering me but it seems to have become a part of my body, it just followed in."

Mark looked expressionlessly at the Detached Will.

Reol'ran shrugged.

"You can enter my Soul Space too with just a thought but I'd say not to do that if you don't want to be trapped inside the ice like me, too."

"So, what's up with the shard?" he asked and looked towards the violet mirror that was in the distance. It looked like a bright star in the dark space.

With a thought, he teleported beside it and looked at the small triangular violet shard floating there like a gem. Reol'ran's Will couldn't teleport inside his Soul Space—or so he had thought—until he felt a bit of his Mindpower being used by someone else other than himself.

Reol'ran appeared beside him.

"As I said, I can use your Mindpower. It's not of much use other than fighting in prolonged battles, though. But yeah, I can move around inside your Soul Space because of that."

Mark felt uncomfortable but stayed silent.

This woman, he didn't know what to feel about her.

Reol'ran looked at the solid, ancient mirror; it had a peculiar violet shine. She seemed fascinated.

"I knew the shard reacts to the main mirror—When I first saw you, the shard was trying to move out of me, too. It was thumping. But it was not that strong of an attraction, but since I moved into your Soul Space, it must have gained some true momentum."

"Did it coming out of you hurt you in some way?" he asked.

"No, no," she said, touching the Violet Mirror with her intangible Will-hands. "In fact, since it tore open a hole in the complete encirclement, maybe I can find some way to get out now. It should take some time but it no longer seems so hopeless."

Mark took hold of the mirror shard with his humane hand.

"What am I to do with it?"

"Read what's written on it," she said, her face dead serious. "That's what you must know."

Frowning, Mark turned the shard around and looked at the information within it.

The Violet Mirror always showed him everything written in the main mirror—his stats, his missions, contracts, and everything—in the form of a violet screen, and this shard, too had words written on it. It seemed like a missing piece from his own system.

Now, it was finally back.

Reading the words in it, Mark's heart skipped a beat. It was ominous.

"Is this the price of having the Violet Screen?" he asked, face paler than he would have liked to show in front of this woman.

Seemingly as a reaction to him having read that, the shard shimmered and vanished into the mirror itself. And his system screen began to change.

New stats appeared in his mind along with new details.

He looked at it with an uncalm gaze.

Reol'ran remained silent, just watching him.

[Marcus...]