Chương 237: Mari Finds Her Place

Leou informed me that a whole bunch of mysterious items had been popping up in unexpected places–People were apparently finding these inside their own homes, uncovering them when looking for something, stumbling upon them randomly outside, and adventurers had even pulled some out from the entrails of creatures they had hunted down…

The last one was especially odd since it wasn't actually found inside their guts themselves, but wrapped amidst the intestines, making it seem like these abnormal objects had grown or appeared out of thin air rather than having been eaten by the creatures. These items could be split into two categories: Those that were mechanical constructs, and those that were more closely linked to the domain of magic… They all had something in common, though.

They all contained images and sounds, or as it was becoming more and more common to refer to them as… Videos. On its own, although absolutely bizarre and abnormal, it wouldn't really have tickled my interest. The problem? As Leou noticed as well, these videos clearly all had the same subject, and this subject was me. Good old Mara Maeve Maya Nebulo… If I had to guess, it seemed like the footage was extracted from a whole bunch of A. R.

DLs, featuring my gorgeous self in various forms that were probably brought about due to a whole variety of different circumstances that had led to the proper awakening of my powers. I wasn't actually recognisable as my human self in many of them, it seemed, but the descriptions of deep, dark purple eyes, of a shade of purple that people were certain did not exist… It made it pretty damned obvious that the various monstrosities showing up in these videos were me and no one else.

I didn't have a single flying clue what the hell this was all about, or why it was happening. Did I do something to flood what sounded to be the entire continent with tapes of my greatness? Because if I were given a choice, I wouldn't have done it! I am supposed to be quiet and lie low–Now everyone and their mothers will be able to take one look at the eyes of my 'Base Form', and immediately associate me with those countless pieces of footage.

Without the eye colour, Leou probably wouldn't have associated them with me either. In any case, these tapes and such would all destroy themselves after being viewed once, but with how many were popping up, it wasn't much of a saving grace–Also, although many depicted me, some were about other members of my lovely crew, and also about things that could probably be associated with me to some extent, but not quite… I suppose some of those alternate versions of me had wildly different powers or something.

The only thing that seemed truly interesting for me about this whole situation was that some of those videos seemed to depict forms I hadn't unlocked, based on the fact that Leou mentioned some videos depicting a so-called 'Molten Blob of Steel'. … Maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea to get my hands on a few of these things myself. It might just show me something interesting. First, I needed to find a way to solve my eye colour situation.

I am Leou's bodyguard when she goes in public, even if I keep my hood up, it is inevitable that some people will take notice of my eyes–As such, I went and found Mari. This girl had really leaned wholeheartedly into mechanistry. She dressed like a mechanist all the time, and kept the goggles on her head even when not working–Also, it seemed like all that hauling around of steel and such, had encouraged her to do some working out.

Her arms were noticeably a slight bit more muscular than they used to be, which was easy to tell as Mari had been rather frail. … Which she still is, I don't think she has the means to actually build up proper muscles. She will only slightly tone up at most. Inspecting her body a lot, are we? She's supposed to be my personal mechanist. Of course, I'm going to be checking how she's doing in the physical department. Mari had definitely made a lot of progress in a short period of time.

It made me confident that this was indeed the correct path for her. She had been sent my way for this purpose–Her hidden talent in this area had sent her on a trajectory aligning with mine. Which was certainly a bit odd, she had been given her compass thing to find me as a reward for being the very first to survive a final trial, but in the end, the one who was actually collecting a reward was me. The one who had lost that very same final trial.

Regardless, Mari had not yet actually made any upgrades for me, and it was dubious if she could manage some of the more complex stuff, but right now, I only wanted her to mess around with the two dots of light that served as my eyes. They should be a fairly simplistic portion of my mechanical body, so I believed that Mari might be able to do something with them to make them shift in colour. Mari was clearly quite nervous about actually helping me attain a new upgrade for the first time.

"I… I'll do my best!" When the upgrade attempt started, Mari had to breathe in and out profoundly to calm herself down. I had removed my clothes, and apparently, my skeleton-like steel frame was a sight that made her feel restless. I swear… This girl is a very odd character, but that's fine as long as she can put her mechanistry to my service. The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. Once calm and focused, she worked with precision.

To get started, she opened up the back of my head to take a look at what was inside, attempting to locate the mechanism that caused my eyes to glow like this. Alas, the inside of my skull didn't contain anything. The two dots seemed to just function on their own, despite the fact that I had taken 'Forward Shine' a while back, even with an upgrade affecting the eyes, nothing had appeared connected to them.

"Mmh… This makes things more complicated" The apprentice mechanist had hoped that a framework would already be present, as it would have made the job much easier, as she would have only needed to identify what each part did and how they functioned before simply altering things a little bit. Of course, Mari–Being as maniacally obsessed with me as she was–Wasn't going to give up because of this.

She had been consuming all of the books I had copied over from the Dreamscape like they were religious texts, and I had to put Xlown on sleep duty, otherwise, Mari would stay up all night practising mechanistry. As such, she seemed to already know what to do to solve the problem. If there were no structures controlling the eye colour, then she needed to build one herself.

If she did it correctly, then it should normally have pretty good chances of being registered as a proper upgrade and becoming integrated into my body.

"Aherm… Please don't move, Miss Maya!" Mari scrambled around to find the various pieces she needed to make this work. Her workshop was a bit of a mess, but she seemed to know where everything was located, somehow. The actual construction process was nothing grandiose. There weren't sparks or high-stakes precision work here. It was just a matter of hooking something up to the eyes. To make things easier for her, I went into my state of dormancy for a little while. I awoke when Mari stepped back from me.

"Alright… Alright… N-Normally, if I press this button, your eyes will turn white instead of purple!"

"Do–Don't be so nervous–ous, Mari. Failu–ure isn't a big deal for a fi–first time""First time?! Oh, the upgrade stuff…" This woman needs to get her head out of the gutter. Mari closed her eyes and looked away before pressing the button, probably afraid that it wouldn't work out at all. I suppose it was natural to be worried. My eyes worked on their own, so whether they could actively be affected by a mechanical device attached to them was dubious…

But at the end of the day, I wasn't just a hybrid, I was three different things at once. I am a Vengeful Spirit. I am a Living Curse, and I am a machine. The last one being the most important here…

You have acquired a new upgrade: 'Alternate Shine' Alternate Shine - The colour of your eyes can be changed and adjusted A simple upgrade, one that I definitely wouldn't be willing to pick if it showed up in a list that I had to pick from, but one that was nonetheless going to be quite useful due to the current circumstances. Congratulations on acquiring your first original upgrade! The mechanist responsible for it has officially become your Personal Mechanist Huh? That's a thing?

Nara picked up where the system panels left off.

According to available information, the title of 'Personal Mechanist' can only belong to a single person at a time, and is acquired by being the one to grant you an original upgrade, or in other words, grant you an upgrade that wasn't part of the system's list Mari will need a few days to acclimate, but a Personal Mechanist is a great boon While there is a stringent and harsh time limit between attempts at adding a new upgrade, Mari will be able to view possible upgrades amongst the system's list at certain times, has a much higher chance of succeeding at granting original upgrades, can know which upgrades have further upgrades, or which upgrades can be associated together for further gain …

That's glorious! I can even feel that a slight connection has been established between her and me. I might just be able to get her inside the Mindscape at one point, which would be practical to have my mechanist within arm's reach at all times. I tested my new upgrade, and while the device Mari had installed had seemingly vanished out of thin air, my eyes could indeed change colours as I saw fit now, I could even change the shade, meaning that I could make them very dim.

They were still quite bright, but it was better than nothing when trying to sneak around in the dark. I decided to keep them white for now, this would be my new eye colour–At least until footage of me stopped appearing out of thin air. I was quite proud of my unique eye colour. I would much prefer being able to flaunt it, but lying low was more important right now.

"Good j–job, Mari" Mari squirmed a little bit under the praise and failed to actually say anything in return. Come on, give her a little reward! She's your Personal Mechanist now, so her staying around is no longer in question, right? Mari is part of the gang, so… I know what you want, Nara, but I guess you are right that she does deserve a reward, and you are also correct that she'll be sticking around for certain now–Alright. I placed my hand atop Mari's head and used the 'Voice Box Recorder' to speak clearly.

"Good. Girl. You did a. Great Job" Mari looked up at me and… Fainted. I definitely could have caught her before she hit the ground like a sack of rocks, but it took me by surprise. Does this girl have to be so dramatic? It was just a small praise. I literally say that to my little sisters and daughter all the time–Hell, I even call Coco a good boy. It is a common two-word phrase that I use. She should have seen it coming, or at least, not been so utterly affected by it…

I'll need to train her to keep her emotions in check. This is ridiculous, even for an obsessed stalker. … Anyway, I'll put her to bed, and then, I guess I'll go do some cooking... I did get new kinds of meat from my expedition to the Northern Wildlands.