Chapter 25：Subsoul

It was a decision the blue soul had planned impromptu when the teacher passed near Jyorta, coming under its range. The bodies of every adult it had witnessed till date seemed to be protected by a barrier, preventing it from sensing their souls. Now, when the teacher neared it, the blue soul could sense it, the murky soul bigger than itself, present in her.

It could also sense another foreign soul lodged in her back, almost similar to her soul, with a trace amount of variations, slowly synchronising. Maybe after a month, there would no longer be any difference between the two if it tried to sense them.

'Is it that when the two souls look to be the same superficially, a barrier forms around their body, preventing my senses? Or, is there something else?' The blue soul thought, extending one of its blue tendrils into the teacher's spine, connecting with the soul that looked like the wisp of a newborn. There was a small shudder across the surface of the wisp, like a calm lake where a boulder had been dropped, producing ripples.

'Success, I made a connection with it. Now, I should make use of this opportunity and see if I can take over its soul.' The blue soul thought, extending the other blue tendril, and attaching it to the wisp. After sensing the two souls in the body of the teacher—one belonging to her that looked bigger than the blue soul, emitting a foul stench and covered with a murky substance, while the other was a tiny transparent wisp—the blue soul made a decision.

'Based on my experience accumulated by trying to take over Jyorta's soul for a decade, it is practically impossible for me to take over the soul of the teacher. There is a high chance that her soul might devour me. But, it is a different case altogether for the tiny wisp.' The blue soul thought, silently chanting the verse imparted to it by the Creepy-Haired man. Immediately, an exchange of memories took place between the blue soul and wisp. When it lost some energy, the blue soul replenished its reserves by absorbing them from Jyorta's.

It didn't care if its action of absorbing the energy from Jyorta's soul would affect him. As long as the foundation of his soul wasn't damaged, his soul would recover after some rest. After all, his soul was constantly nurtured by the body, replenishing it in case of deficiency.

The teacher had reached the infirmary by now; as she opened the door, Jyorta looked at her, a puzzled expression etched on his face. "Teacher," He hesitated, "Are you having trouble getting pregnant?"

"What?!" The teacher growled, shock and anger clouding her face, so much so she almost dropped the boy in her arms. "Who told you that?"

"I-In the morning; s-someone was talking about it near the staff room." Jyorta became scared as he quickly concocted a lie. He didn't know how the thought came into his head, but he unconsciously opened his mouth and felt the words flowing out on their own. Lies weaved into sentences whose credibility couldn't be verified, but creating a feeling of truth.

"Concentrate on your studies." The teacher said, her gaze turning cold as she pushed open the infirmary door, entering it. She glared at Jyorta, filled with malice. Jyorta got a bit scared, following after her, thinking of ways to placate her anger.

'I just gained this information from the wisp and Jyorta has already accessed it. Dammit.' The blue soul thought, urging the two tendrils to invade faster. Thinking for a second and weighing the pros and cons, the size of the blue soul began to shrink, making the two blue tendrils swell up in size, wrapping around the wisp.

"Nurse, this boy fainted in class. He seems to have caught a fever; can you inspect him?" The teacher said to the nurse, placing the boy on a nearby berth when her hands froze. There was a confused expression on her face as something within her seemed to have changed, but she couldn't point it out.

'Haha, success!' The blue soul cheered, pulling out some energy from Jyorta's soul to recover. It had invaded the wisp and gained full control over it. A large amount of information gushed into it through the two blue tendrils, condensing into blue patterns, filled with new knowledge.

Subsoul!

The blue soul felt a permanent connection form with the subsoul, no longer having to connect with a tendril. The small wisp was now another Kaushik!

The blue soul retracted its two blue tendrils, inspecting the changes surrounding it. Seeing the blue patterns that had appeared in its soul, the blue soul fell into deep thought.

'The subsoul is capable of surviving on its own; I don't need to maintain an active connection with it. It is an independent entity of me, operating based on my thought process. Though, it seems I am unable to share information with the subsoul without forming a connection using the blue tendril. I will have to experiment more in the future. Now, I have to digest all the memories gained from this encounter.'

The blue soul rested, having zero intention to act further. The alarming rate at which Jyorta kept accessing its memories was like a noose tightening around it. If it progressed conventionally with its invasion, then it would face its doom soon.

3:30 pm, the trio returned home. The small circus act during the language class was naught but a pastime joke between the three friends.

"Jyorta, tell the truth." Laila turned her head, revealing a slight smile, "The only reason you followed the language teacher was to waste her time right?"

"I was planning to do it if you hadn't stepped up before me." George laughed, slumping his hand over Jyorta's shoulders. The two stopped speaking when they saw Jyorta's serious face, seemingly in deep thought.

"Guys," He lifted his head, gazing into the eyes of his two friends, his expression one of confusion and concern. "Who's Kaushik?"

"Umm," George squint his eyes, racking his brains for a good one minute; failing to recall anything of value, he shook his head. "I have no idea who that it."

"I don't know who that is either. Is he someone famous?" Laila questioned.

"I… don't know," Jyorta shook his head. His head was starting to hurt the more he thought about the name, as if it was something he shouldn't recall.

"Maybe, he's another one of your characters; from that… dragon basket?" Laila said.

"Dragon Ball," George retorted. "Anyway, I am hungry. Today is the day I am going to beat the two of you in Dungeon Rush. Let's go, two versus one."

"It is impossible for you George. Only I can win in a two versus one fight." Jyorta reverted back to his playful demeanour, greeting Laila's mother as he rushed towards the bathroom to freshen up.

9:30 PM, under the chiding of Laila's mother, the children finally dropped their consoles. They brushed their teeth, wore soft pyjamas, and headed for the bed.

"Are you guys okay with sleeping alone? Or, what say we all sleep together?" Laila's mother proposed.

"As long as I don't have to become Princess Yellow, I am okay with it," Jyorta said, mimicking the princess pose from his memories. Laila's mother chuckled on hearing his response; she finally couldn't hold back, pinching his cheeks. She then herded the talkative children to the master bedroom, struggling to prevent them from jumping on the king-sized bed.

After running around the bed, jumping on it while performing comical poses, using its springiness as a trampoline, and bickering with each other about their sleeping spots, the trio finally settled atop the bed.

Laila slept to the very right, while her mother slept to her left. To his right was Laila's mother while George fell asleep to his left, occupying the edge. After playing Dungeon Rush for the entire evening, the three children were tired. They fell asleep in a matter of minutes.

The moment Jyorta fell asleep, the blue soul immediately connected to his ears and brain, hurriedly trying to digest the memories obtained from the wisp that became its subsoul. The more it digested the memories, the greater its sense of fear and excitement became.

Fear due to the danger and risk of the Wisdom Parasite, and excitement due to the superhuman powers that resulted from them. After digesting the memories, Kaushik, the blue soul could conclude that the subsoul he gained was the soul of the Wisdom Parasite inhabiting the spine of the language teacher.

'Breakthrough, ravings, and loss in control; I could try to make use of them. The language teacher had broken through to become an Amplifier just recently, the only reason why the Wisdom Parasite inhabiting her was weak. Moreover, it had only been alive for a little over 2 years; even in terms of a parasite, it was still only a child, equivalent to a three-year-old human baby.'

The blue soul thought, coming up with a plan to gain complete control over Jyorta's body. The subsoul was only an appetiser. Only by gaining full control over Jyorta's soul would the blue soul be able to do whatever it needed in the future. Moreover, the longer it delayed, the greater the chance that Jyorta would devour it.

'What I am planning to do next is really risky. There is a high chance that I might die but, if I don't do anything, I would lose my ego to Jyorta. Even if it goes against my ethics, I don't plan on dying a futile death and allow others to profit from my life's work. My situation doesn't allow me to maintain my ethics anyway; after all, I too am but a parasite.' The blue thought in a self-deprecating manner as it went through the details of its plans, making changes according to the memories.

'As long as the injury is not to the brain, and the heart, and as long as the host doesn't instantly die, there is a 100% chance of making a complete recovery. There are mysterious healing powers present in this world, their effects outclassing modern medicine by leaps and bounds.' The blue soul thought, finally deciding with a plan of action.

After it was done, the blue soul continued to use Jyorta's brain to think about Dragon Ball, Naruto, and followed by One Piece until dawn. This was to mask its thoughts and plans under this abundance of filler knowledge. It had gained some understanding about how Jyorta could read the memories in his brain, so it tried to add a layer of useless memories above all important data.

So, suppose Jyorta thought about the language teacher, the memories jolted in his brain will correspond to her lectures, diverting to Tsunade from the anime Naruto, then to Kakashi, etc. it wouldn't lead to the memories the blue soul had obtained from the language teacher's Wisdom Parasite. This was only a stopgap measure. As long as Jyorta kept thinking, he was bound to unravel all the memories related to the plan sooner or later, but Kaushik didn't plan to delay that long.

It was a race against time!