Elemental Cats

After passing out from the fire, dancing wildly on and within his body, resonating and turning him into a living torch, Toz was enveloped by a sphere of fire. Since he had lost consciousness, Toz was naturally unable to tell what was happening to him or his body. But, his last thought before he passed out was that it was a shame to fail and die when he was so close to the finishing line.

So, he was understandably surprised when he regained consciousness in the middle of his body melting and reforming itself. At first, his mind was so hazy that he couldn't even tell what was going on. But he eventually managed to figure it out, despite his mind not regaining any clarity.

Well, Toz didn't know if he had figured it out since his mind was a mess. But he also didn't think he would have been able to make sense of it if he had been able to think straight. It was just too weird and nonsensical.

The magical fire and the fire mana inside his body had resonated and made the temperatures within and around Toz soar to unimaginable levels. Shortly after that, the magical fire had somehow created a crystal-like sphere that shielded his body from the mana storm. However, the sphere didn't protect his body from the heat of the fire. If anything, the sphere continued increasing the temperatures and flames wrecking Toz's body.

Toz couldn't understand why his mana and the fire started resonating or why that created a cocoon of fire. Maybe it was due to the remnant will within the fire he awakened, or maybe it was a chance occurrence that relied on the power of the mana storm. Considering how much mana the cocoon drained from the mana storm, it wasn't impossible that it was related to the eye of the storm and how it had basically been like a wall of fire mana swirling around him.

The cocoon was slowly flickering and swirling around in the same direction as the storm, so maybe they were related. The mana storm's eye responded to the resonation of fire that Toz was in the middle of experiencing or something. Toz didn't know. He could only try and piece together what had happened in order to distract himself from the sight of his body melting and turning into goo.

Thankfully, his mind wasn't clear enough to actively obsess over the fact that he would die without a body. He was more curious about why his body didn't burn and turned to ash or charcoal and instead started melting like rubber.

However, the realization that he wasn't inside his body as it melted made Toz take a look at himself. He saw a pair of translucent, colorless hands and the half-dissipated body they were attached to.

When his body got enveloped by the cocoon and started melting, it seemed like his consciousness escaped into the miniature clone and left the body. However, without his body, it had only pushed up the inevitable by a few moments.

The clone could somehow withstand the power of fire within the orb since the flames were connected loosely to Toz. That got Toz wondering how the fire was melting his body. But maybe that was why the fire melted his body instead of turning it into ash.

In any case, the clone could withstand the power of fire within the cocoon. But as soon as the cocoon died, the clone would be exposed to the outside world, where it would quickly begin to get eroded by the outside world's pressure. Even if Toz's clone had been strong enough to withstand the outside world, it wouldn't be strong enough to survive the mana storm or the magic and attacks from the Tribe of Death's combatants that might still be holed up in the Fortress next to the source of spatial fluctuations.

And without his body, Toz's clone wouldn't have any way to restore itself. The clone was already on the verge of dissipating due to how far beyond their limits Toz pushed his body and mind.

His consciousness using his clone to escape had indeed saved Toz's life. But what next? Could he find a vessel to inhabit and become a haunted weapon or something? He wasn't sure that the spatial storage items he took off and placed next to the Fountain had survived. Even if they did, Toz didn't think he had anything that was suitable to use as a vessel to store his consciousness.

Toz had a sword, but that was the only thing other than some food and the grimoires, which he hoped would be intact. And considering the sword only had the metal, darkness, fire, and lightning elements, it might not be suitable to contain Toz's consciousness since it could use those four attributes as well as space and void.

The only thing that Toz felt like it might be able to store his consciousness perfectly was the six-attribute sword still inside the forest on Taienra's back. But even before that, the one thing that could really take care of his mind and the clone was his body.

Toz looked at the molten reddish goop slowly bubbling on the bottom of the cocoon. It almost looked like molten metal.

At that point, Toz realized something. Maybe his comparison to molten metal was more accurate than he thought.

Maybe his fire magic had reached a level his body couldn't handle, and in response, initiated a process that could rectify it. His body couldn't handle his fire magic, so his fire magic had created an opportunity for Toz to transform his body into something that could.

It sounded weirdly lucky and optimistic, even his Toz's muddled mind. But it also kind of made sense if one followed the same logic as Toz's previous decision regarding his method of breaking through. And even before that, his choice to demolish the Fortress of Death and stay behind just so that he could keep the Fountain.

As he looked back real quick, Toz realized that things didn't have to be reasonable or make sense. Magic and the way the universe worked didn't have any constraints. If stuff happened, stuff happened, however weird it might be.

With a newfound realization of the universe, inspired by his own lacking sanity, Toz looked toward the bubbling liquid that was his body.

Nothing more seemed to be happening. And if his guess was right, now would be the time for Toz to dive into the liquid and use his consciousness and clone to act as the cast for the molten sludge that would become his body once again.