Adam stood in front of Cruxannith's cell breathing heavily. Anxiety wasn't something he felt a lot before or after the [System] came. He was feeling it now.

His eyes roamed all over the cell. From the walls to the floors to Cruxannith's robe, he checked everything to make sure it was clean, as if what he was about to do would require physical surgery. He observed the unmoving Red Clan member in the cell to make sure she seemed healthy enough for what he was going to do.

It was odd for Adam to realize that he had spent so much time looking at Cruxannith since capturing her that her grotesque visage no longer bothered him. He still thought her hideous, but no matter how badly, he had grown accustomed to it. All the Red Clan members looked like they were from horror movies, but he had simply grown to accept that this is what they looked like.

Adam was stalling. His idea, taken from Jordan Lane's boring nerd lecture about computers, was only half baked. There was no explanation, manual, or expert he could consult about this. He would only have one chance at it, and it was all guess work.

Idly, Adam wondered if in all the uncountable worlds within the [System], had anyone tried this before. If he had to guess, only the Red Clan had the ability to attempt it, and even then, they wouldn't really have a reason. Adam knew it was pure arrogance to think he was unique, and yet the invaders and even the [System] said that he kept doing things that had never been done before.

If future Adam was able to merge souls and send them back in time, surely what Adam was about to try wasn't at that level of difficulty. Then again, future Adam had a full class and loads of lifetimes of experience. The current Adam had guesses and desperation.

The results of this would show whether this was smart or dumb. Whether he was a genius or idiot. Alive…or dead. Adam saw no in-between here.

With a deep breath to try and steady his nerves, Adam opened a small box. Inside were five of the vials of blood he fed to Cruxannith. He took out three. One by one he rolled them to the former speaker and watched as her instincts led her to bite off the stopper and drink the fluid inside.

Adam needed her to be in peak health. He needed her to have as much energy in her soul as possible.

His hands were trembling as he opened the cage. He stepped inside.

Two Leputi warriors in Tier 3 stood nearby, weapons at the ready. They didn't know what Adam was about to do, just that it was dangerous. Adam didn't expect that they would be in danger, but he felt like someone needed to be on alert, since once he started, he wouldn't be able to handle other issues.

Adam set down a chair and then sat. He didn't think physical proximity was necessary, but this felt right. It felt like he needed a physical anchor to keep his mind settled.

"I can always back out," said Adam to himself. "Maybe I don't even have the tools for this. Who knows if it's even possible."

As if to postpone this even a second longer, Adam brought up his redacted status sheet and split it into three. He focused on future Adam's skills.

Core Skills: Soul Shatter █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ Memory Manipulation Soul Resonance Mental Fortitude █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ Soul Vision Emotional Manipulation Soul Lock █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █

Adam thought he had done a good job unlocking the core skills from Adam's status. Unfortunately, not knowing what other skills were blacked out felt ominous. Maybe it was one of those that Adam needed. Or maybe none of them mattered, and it was just a matter of figuring it out on his own.

There were more skills in the regular category of skills that Adam hadn't discovered than in the core ones. It still didn't bring Adam any confidence. Skill, pseudo-skill, or dumb luck, Adam wasn't sure if any would be enough.

When Adam closed the status displays, he took a few more breaths. Hope was a two-edged sword. It could carry you through tough situations out of the desire for it to be true, or it could lead a person to a worse situation due to desperation.

"If I'm going to do this, then I'd better give it a good try," said Adam as he tried to give himself a pep talk. No amount of reason or rationalizing would make him feel better about this. At least unless he survived it.

Even though Adam knew intellectually that he didn't need to do this, it felt necessary. It felt like he had no other options. A sliver of hope had crossed his path, one not based on any tangible experience but simply because he wanted the result that he imagined. But was it even possible to get that result? Could he turn the imaginary into reality?

Everything since the [System] came had been guess work. From the first time he fought the goblins until he was able to face down armies of invaders, it all came from doing, not thinking and planning.

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Adam was practically holding his breath as he dove into his soul. He had spent so much time inspecting it and Cruxannith's that he knew them like…well, like they contained all of him.

Moving to a spot in himself, Adam looked for that part where a normal person had their class arranged. It was shriveled and compressed, with no energy in it. This part of his soul was as empty and impotent as possible. He would have expected jokes demeaning his manhood if anyone else could see this.

The soul image of Adam sniffed around at the energy that suffused the soul. It was thin, even though his fight with the Drathan should have filled him. Most of the energy vacated through the wounds at the boundary of his soul. That was why he gave Cruxannith so much blood, and high quality at that. He needed her to create the energy for this procedure.

Still, he couldn't have the energy dispersing when he needed to use it, so Adam activated [Soul and Body Shaping]. He didn't need it for the river or heat, so he used all of it to try and hold his soul together. Hopefully he could leave the skill active while he proceeded with the rest.

Remembering how Adam had manipulated the energy when he coated Cruxannith's memory space, he gathered up the energy within himself and tried to form a tube. It started within the deflated area of his class, then he slowly moved towards the gaping opening in his soul where he was connected to Cruxannith. At every ethereal step, he pulled the energy and shaped it to continue the tube.

Realistically, it resembled a small straw more than a tube. Even as he shaped the energy, Adam could feel the pressure of his soul, the fullness of the other parts, trying to squeeze out his odd creation.

The [System] had said he had no space left. Even manipulating the energy into this small shape was pushing on him, and it was made worse because the energy did have a place to go, outside of the wounds where it would be lost, barely held by his skill.

While the soul-scape that Adam traveled through and manipulated wasn't physical, he could feel a strain on his physical body. It was as if his body was descending too deep while scuba diving. His muscles, heart, and brain all felt an increase in pressure trying to burst the flesh they were made of. He hoped he didn't get the bends of the soul from taking too long.

Fighting through the pressure, Adam tried to methodically draw in the energy, shape it into the tube, and continue moving to the soul bond. He wasn't sure how long he spent before he reached it.

As soon as he passed from his own soul into Cruxannith's, the pressure fell away. He had to maintain his vigilance to prevent the tube from being crushed but just being in Cruxannith's soul allowed him to feel how much more open it was. Of course, it had a lot less in it considering the memories had been destroyed, clearing out at least a third of all the essence.

The energy within Cruxannith was more plentiful than within Adam, but it wasn't as compliant. Over the months, their souls had seemed to acclimate, adjusting to the other and becoming similar. This did allow him to manipulate the energy easier than when he first found himself within her.

The tube he created, continuing from the part inside of his own soul, was much thicker and robust here. He wasn't sure whether this would matter as long as both ends connected. Every proverbial step seemed to increase the strain on him as he gathered, shaped, and extended the energy.

Just like every fight Adam had had since the [System], he ignored the pain and pushed through. If he succeeded, then healing was possible for his physical body. If he failed, he suspected having only corruption in his soul would feel like a blessing.

Eventually, he did reach his destination. In the physical world his body was breathing heavily, and he could feel wetness around his nose, mouth, and ears.

The tube was barely holding together, but he wasn't finished yet. Keeping it solid in his mind, he first flew to the end that connected to his class region. The end of the tube was pressed against the boundary of the class area.

Adam looked at the visualization. It reminded him of a piece of paper pressed against a glass. This was Adam's last chance. He could give up and let the energy scatter, or he could follow through and hope the outcome was worth it.

The plan that he had gotten from Jordan's explanation of network clusters, was that if he didn't have the space for a class within himself, and he was already irrevocably bonded to Cruxannith's soul, then he would use each soul for a different purpose.

She didn't have a memory space while he was full from memories. He didn't have space for a class, but she already had a class. Adam's hope was that if he connected his own class space to Cruxannith's, then in the best-case scenario, he would gain access to her class.

Of course, Adam's mind had already thought of dozens of ways this could go wrong, each feeling more likely than what he hoped would happen. Yet, he pushed all those to the side.

He wanted this. Adam needed a class. A class was necessary to grow, to keep up with the other races. His mission to protect his family and friends was only possible if everyone didn't pass him by.

With great determination, Adam reached into the inner circle created by the tube pressing against his class region, and he used his pseudo-skill.

"[Soul Shatter]."

Unlike when he used the pseudo-skill to blanket the entirety of Cruxannith's memory region, this time it was a precision use. A tiny circle was cut in the boundary, completely sealed by the energy tube he had made.

Taking just a moment, Adam waited. All the pressure was still there, and he felt it ravaging his body, but nothing new could be felt.

With haste, Adam traveled to the end of the tube on Cruxannith's side. When he got to the larger tube end, connected to the larger class region, he once more invoked [Soul Shatter] and cut the circle on the inside of the boundary within the tube.

This time the puncture had a stronger reaction. It felt like there was a suction within the tube. Like pressing a vacuum against a smooth surface, there was a catch. The tube's density hardened. The space became separated between the energy outside the tube and that coming from Cruxannith's class.

Adam wanted to hold his breath, but his body was already struggling to get air inside. He wanted to know if it had worked or not. He returned to his own body, blood and sweat dripping from his head and down. Not sure what else to do, Adam pulled open his status.

What he hoped for was to see Cruxannith's class and skills listed on his status sheet. At the worst, he hoped to see a fourth layer of status, one belonging to Cruxannith added to the complex mess his status already contained.

What Adam saw was nothing different than usual. Black lines that split into three statuses.

As Adam sat there struggling, a bit stunned by both his effort and the uncertain results, something definitive happened. A message window appeared in his view.

Critical Alert: Class incompatibility found… Soul integrity failing… Soul collapse imminent…

Adam had failed.

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