Shared Control

The spirit's power settled into her body. However, control of the body was no longer hers.

Now, the girl was looking at her own head — its hair a different color — with her own eyes.

Her hair had been a plain brown, but now it was a pale blue-white like an autumn sky, with streaks of vivid blue throughout.

… No, she wasn't seeing this with her "eyes". Let's correct that. She could see her body from the front without moving. An expanded sense, from a place that wasn't an existing body part. The girl's consciousness had become a halo floating behind her head.

She had sight and hearing. It was a strange sensation, but it reminded her of a book her mother had read to her as a child.

"Spirit-Possessed" — beings who had offered their body, heart, and even their will to a spirit. Or perhaps had them stolen.

Operating on principles different from humanity's, they were beings you shouldn't get involved with if you valued your life.

It seemed she had become such an existence, the girl thought.

Also, though her appearance had changed so drastically — starting with her hair — that she looked like a different person, she could clearly recognize this as her own body.

The spirit stood before the rocks that had crushed her limbs. They were boulders larger than her standing height. She had been crushed under four of these.

"Oh, I can control this. Nice to meet you, Tria-chan."

Tria. That seemed to be her new name. Her old name — perhaps because she'd offered it to the spirit — she couldn't remember. Though whether her current self would even have the opportunity to use a new name was unclear.

"Let's start by checking out the surroundings."

Saying that, her body kicked at the rock that had pinned her arm. —Or rather, it looked like she was trying to move forward but getting stuck.

"This area's blocked by obstacles… This way's passable. Let me try attacking too. I didn't have enough SP for a weapon though～"

She started punching the rock. The sensations of "moving your own body" and "having your body moved" coexisted, overlapping.

Her new arms seemed sturdy, and punching stone didn't hurt much. They must be pretty tough.

"Good, good. Oh, looks like I can roll with flick input… But maybe this would be easier to play on something other than a phone? Shoot, I'll check later if it's cross-platform. Let's see, what else…"

While chanting incantations, the spirit began rolling forward toward the rock wall. A diving roll, yet not actually moving from the spot, just spinning in place on the ground. Then jumping, doing side-to-side hops. Crouching and standing.

What kind of ritual was this? Or perhaps a minor miracle? There was no way Tria — who had been just a village girl — could understand what the spirit was thinking.

"Alright, I've confirmed all the controls. So… what am I supposed to do?"

The spirit tilted her head in confusion.

While saying that, she kept repeating crouch, stand, jump. If it were her old self, she would have been out of breath after just five repetitions, yet she did it over and over.

"Oh! My strength just went up!? I see, so this is the type where just repeating basic actions raises your parameters. Wait, this might be an early-game bug — I mean, feature… Yeah, let me keep doing this and grind my parameters. Goal is 15 each for strength and stamina!"

No sooner had she said that than the speed of the actions increased.

Tria didn't understand half of what the spirit said, but from words like "strength", "goal", and "stamina", she could deduce this was about training the body. She didn't know what the purpose was, but being stronger was never a bad thing.

If she had been stronger, maybe she wouldn't have been made a sacrifice. Maybe she could have escaped the village and become an independent adventurer.

"Oops, it's already this late. Guess I'll take a bath. Logging out for a bit… Hm? Set behavior guidelines during logout? Oh, so idle mode is possible. Then I'll have her keep training. Take care, Tria-chan."

As the spirit said that, her vision blurred with a whoosh, and she was pulled into her "body".

Her vision became that of her original eyes, using her eyeballs. Though this was how it had always been, compared to the halo's free-viewing perspective, it felt almost inconvenient.

"… Ah, I can… move my body."

Those were words spoken by Tria's own will. She panicked for a moment, thinking the spirit had vanished, but looking up, she could see the halo still floating there. She felt the spirit's presence within it and breathed a sigh of relief.

It seemed the spirit had entrusted control of the body to Tria and was resting.

"… Um, I should just continue what we were doing, right?"

She didn't understand the word "kintore"strength training but she understood the spirit had said "keep doing this," so she began repeating the crouch, stand, jump routine.

Strangely, she felt almost no hunger or fatigue, and her body moved exactly the same no matter how many repetitions she did. Normally, fatigue would cause her movements to falter and she'd run out of breath.

Tria realized this must be the spirit's power.

After continuing for about an hour, she felt the spirit's presence grow stronger.

Immediately after, her consciousness was yanked from her body back to the halo. The spirit must have finished resting.

"I'm back～… Oh, they're going up, going up. Strength hit 15. Stamina's at 14 too, should be enough. If I left this overnight, how far would it go… No, I should probably progress soon. Leveling up normally might raise parameters more anyway, and I have work tomorrow so I want to sleep by midnight."

She didn't really understand, but apparently she'd done the work the spirit wanted.

She breathed a sigh of relief — though as a halo, she had no body.

"Alright, let's continue the tutorial."

Saying that, the spirit moved Tria toward the shrine. The moss-covered shrine that looked ready to collapse.

"In-ves-ti-gate!!!"

The next instant, she ripped the shrine up as if pulling it out and threw it. Naturally, the shrine shattered into pieces, its fragments scattering everywhere. A green ore that must have been the sacred object rolled among the debris, and the next moment it floated up with a light "ping" sound and vanished.

Tria understood the ore had been absorbed into the spirit's domain.

"So you can investigate boxes with the pointer like this. Let's actively investigate."

Apparently, the moss-covered wooden shrine… had looked like "just a box" to the spirit.

Perhaps the arbitrary faith of humans meant nothing to higher beings like spirits who actually received worship.

"What I got looks like vendor trash… A tutorial souvenir? I can't decide whether to keep it. I want to complete all items, so I just want to know if I can get this later…"

The feelings of mere villagers meant nothing to the spirit. The ore that had been the sacred object was merely an offering to the spirit. Watching the villagers who had tried to sacrifice her get trampled like this, Tria felt a small sense of satisfaction.