Chapter 8: The Eye in the Cube

[Prison Enchantment: Vermin Transfiguration]

“Clover! Get back down here this instant!” Julia hissed from the carriage window, but I tuned her out. She’d huff, puff, and eventually give up like always. Besides, I’d collect my bonus fee for this “trouble” later in the form of pilfered bacon and, with meticulous precision, exactly three separate occasions of depositing something slippery in her path to witness a most satisfying facial impact. Three times. Not one less.

But that was a future investment. My present focus was monopolized by the trait notification hanging in my vision, a tangible question mark materializing just above my hairline.

What kind of name is that?!

[Well, some spells do earn rather… exotic monikers. This one, however, is not precisely a spell. Classify it as an enchantment with a singular, active purpose.]

Okay… so what’s it do?

[Core Function: Forcibly transmutes a designated target into a cockroach and confines them within an enchanted containment cube. The transformation instantly reverses if the cockroach-body takes damage, unless they’ve already been sealed inside the prison cube.]

…Wow. That was a bit terrifying. And, dare I say, kinda overpowered.

[There are certain activation requirements I can’t access right now.]

Figures.

So… I can still tweak it, right?

[Enchantment mechanics aren’t like normal spells. Most enchantments are passive, which makes them harder to meddle with. Passive ones are basically locked for now. But this case is different, when an active enchantment kicks in, it behaves more like a spell. The difference is that the “caster” isn’t a person but the enchanted object. Still counts as a spell once it’s in action.]

That was… actually enlightening. Hmm. So those Alarm Wards Julia has layered on her private curio cabinets, the ones I can always feel buzzing, those aren’t enchantments?

[Correct. Those are active spells. They simply leave a potent magical residue after casting. The caster must periodically renew them before their energy signature fully dissipates.]

My attention snapped back to the present. The man, previously concealed behind the carriage’s bulk, was now easing into a predatory crouch. His focus was absolute, zeroed in on the Inquisitor. I had to admit, his stealth was impressive; I hadn’t heard so much as a shifted pebble. An Aspect Cultivator, then. The specifics of their craft were a mystery I desperately wanted to unravel.

My own trait, Trickery, was currently dissecting the strange, potent signature it had detected emanating from within the man’s coat pocket, that was the only thing about him that had pinged my magical senses. It was an enchantment.

So, we can identify this hidden weapon of his, but we can’t actually do anything to disarm or interfere with its enchantment?

[Likely because it’s already stirring. Probably an artifact close to meeting its activation requirement. You picked up on the mana flare. We can sense enchantments fine, the real limitation is whether we can alter them. Which, as I said, is usually a no… for now.]

I gave a slight nod, my eyes tracking the man’s slow, deliberate movements. He remained completely oblivious to my presence atop the carriage. Do people just never think to look up? Then again, why would they? I was, after all, the sneakiest of all sneaky foxes. Julia’s record at hide-and-seek was abysmal against me. Except, of course, for those times she’d resort to brute-force magic after hours of failure, like the cheating cheater who cheats!

But philosophical musings on Julia’s lack of honor were a luxury for later. The analysis was clear: we were spectators to this particular enchantment. Only one course of action remained.

The creepy cultivator finally emerged fully from his cover, and moved like a viper coiling to strike the unsuspecting Inquisitor. And that was simply not going to happen on my watch.

I let out my loudest, most earsplitting foxy screech, and the inquisitor’s head snapped around so fast it was a wonder her neck didn’t crack. The sneaky creep’s eyes went wide, shifting from surprise to the faintest hint of horror, right before he looked up and spotted me perched on top of the carriage like the reigning monarch I was. Queen of all floof, the undisputed ruler of fluffdom!

Naturally, the proper response would have been for him to kneel and pay homage to my glorious, floofy majesty. Instead, he just glared daggers at me. Rude. Was there an instant lobotomy spell in this world?

[…I have a fun idea!]

Keep it in your pocket, I thought. Need to play this one a little more careful.

His glare didn’t last long. A searing solar blast tore through the ground where he’d been standing, the shockwave rattling the carriage. He dodged, fast. Too fast. Faster than the death knights I’d seen before, and I’d considered them plenty fast enough to be unfair. In the same breath, his hand dove into his pocket and came back with a metallic cube, which he tossed under Julia’s carriage.

My eyes caught the gleam instantly, and right on cue, another ping lit up in my head.

[Now this is what I’d call an active enchantment. Here are the conditions I’ve got so far:

1. Requires a fresh blood sample from the target, or a close blood relative, to form a resonance key.

2. Cube must be brought within five meters of the target.

3. Cube has to stay in range for sixty uninterrupted seconds.

4. If all conditions are met, the spell triggers automatically.]

Well, that explained why it looked overpowered. It still was, but with those hoops to jump through, the only reliable way to hit someone with it would be if they were already bound and gagged.

The bastard froze for a second and glared at me again, his hostility practically radiating. Did I care? Not even a little. He had an inquisitor-shaped problem charging at him, and Inquisitor Agnes seemed like the kind of problem that didn’t go away until you were either dead or unrecognizable. That meant I had all the time in the world to taunt him and tinker with his precious cube.

So I did both, pulling the creepiest, most unholy face I could manage and locking eyes with him until he actually shuddered. Perhaps I had a talent for being scary. Not exactly my style, though. What good is a terrifying fox when you can be a fluffy one?

My attention drifted back to where the cube had landed. Magic here just kept getting more and more fun… especially now that I knew I could mess with it. The next logical step? Finding the most spectacular ways to break it.

Alright, hit me with the relevant modifiable spells.

Bloodline Resonance Glyph (Tier II Analysis Spell)
– Establishes identity lock.
– Differentiates between direct target and familial proxy.

Forced Transfiguration Matrix (Tier IV Transmutation Curse, Passive)
– Reshapes target into cockroach form.
– Cockroach form retains victim’s soul imprint.
– Any damage to cockroach instantly unravels the spell, restoring the victim (unless they’re already contained).

Containment Conduit Seal (Artifact Anchor, Passive)
– Links transfigured form to cube.
– Cube acts as a prison phylactery, sustaining transformation indefinitely when closed.
– Without cube containment, effect is temporary and unstable.

Failsafe Discharge Mechanism (Passive)
– Destroying the cube while a prisoner is inside ends the transfiguration with violent backlash.
– Backlash can maim or kill depending on containment strain.

So… most of these are passive, meaning you can’t tweak them. Right?

[Precisely. Only one active spell here. While an enchantment is made of many spells working in tandem—much like a ritual—the key difference is that most of its inner workings are passive. Rituals, on the other hand, run on all-active components. So in this case, only a single spell is actually running right now.]

Alright, show me the modifications!

[Here you go:

Recursive Resonance Loop
– Instead of “locking outward” to the target, the glyph folds the resonance back on the caster’s own blood.
– If the caster shares lineage with the intended victim, the prison targets them instead.
– Success rate: 98%.

Misdirection
– Instead of locking to the chosen target, the glyph grabs a completely random entity nearest to it.
– Could yank in bystanders, stray animals, or even hidden critters.
– Success rate: 93%.

Spirit Cross-Wire
– Reroutes the bloodline’s spiritual tether to a random nearby spirit-world entity.
– Result: the prison drags in an alien consciousness instead of the human target.
– Success rate: 90%.]

Huh… so what happens if we pick the last one?

[Exactly what the description says.]

It has that “anything could happen” vibe.

[Which we love.]

We do… but I’m trying to figure out how it would even work. Which already sounds like too much work for my small foxy head. I’m just going to double the bacon I illegally pilfer from Julia as my rescue fee.

Wait, one thing I never really got: what’s up with the success percentages for each option?

[Like I showed you before, though clearly you don’t remember, here’s the refresher on what I do:

• Auto-detect active spellcasting or ritual initiation within sensory range.
  • Analyze detected magic to increase comprehension.
  • Apply minor modifications to active, understood, low-tier spells or rituals.
  (Current Limitations: Single-target only, low tier ceiling.)

Those percentages reflect how much I understand the spell and how confident I am in performing the modification exactly as intended. It’s basically a probability score. The more outrageous or technically difficult the change, the lower the percentage.]

Oh, like when you told me to pick the most outrageous option during that ritual so it would blow up in their face?

[Yes, and I also said the results of that kind of gamble are fundamentally unpredictable. The one you picked earlier had a 73% success rate, and it worked. But if it had failed, we’d have lost all control over the outcome. Probably something bad for the one performing the ritual obviously, because rituals are inherently unstable. Enchantments, however, are different. If I fail to modify one, odds are nothing happens at all. Worst case, we just miss our chance to act.]

Alright, got it. The analogy clicked into place in head. So enchantments are like a sturdy, well-built house. We're trying to rewire a single doorbell while it's ringing. If we mess up, the doorbell just doesn't work right, or doesn't work at all, but the house doesn't collapse. Rituals are like a house of cards already teetering in the wind. Poking it doesn't just break one card, it makes the whole thing fall down in a chaotic mess. So picking an outrageous option here hoping for unstable chaos is not really on the table, because the system itself is designed not to provide it. Did I get it correct?

[Precisely!]

I puffed up my chest, whiskers twitching with immense self-satisfaction. I was indeed the most intelligent fox in all the lands! My logic was flawless.

So… does that mean there’s a way to increase those success percentages?

[For now, no. Maybe once you gain more power and boost your cognitive abilities, that might be the closest thing to upgrading me, since I’m essentially using your head and brainpower to do all the heavy lifting.]

Then how come I don’t know how you’re doing it? I tilted my head.

[Because I didn’t want to fry your poor little brain showing you the process. You were already overwhelmed when I dumped all those ritual screens on you.
Although… if you want—]

Yeah, no. Absolutely no need for that, I cut it off sharply. And don’t you dare try to ambush me in my sleep with a magical schematic slideshow. I wouldn’t put it past it. Then again, if our positions were reversed, I wouldn't have missed such a prime opportunity to torment my host. I made a note to stay vigilant.

Sixty seconds were nearly up, and despite the cube doing its mysterious work, I felt… nothing.

Agnes and the sneaky bastard were still tearing into each other, relentless as ever. Off to the side, Leonardo and the others had just about mopped up the feral berserkers. Even with spines severed, legs shredded, and guts trailing out, the things kept going—dragging themselves across the ground to claw at ankles. But the outcome was already decided.

The clown still hadn’t moved. But I could feel it: that cold, greasy stare aimed straight at the carriage… more specifically, at Julia.

Welp. Enough of this.

Pick the third option!

****

Over.
It was almost over.

Daniel counted every last second, and the moment the clock hit sixty, a dense surge of mana burst from beneath the carriage. A sharp scream followed, high-pitched, sharp enough to make him hesitate.

Fox or human? He didn’t have time to decide. Probably Julia. And no one here could possibly know what he had just done.

He glanced at his scorched arm, then snapped his glare back to the inquisitor. Another solar blast came screaming his way. He dodged, flicking a pair of daggers mid-roll; they twisted in the air, their paths bending unnaturally toward their target. But the inquisitor slammed her massive sword into the dirt, and a radiant shield flared to life, knocking them all harmlessly aside.

Yeah, no way he was winning a straight fight with a Sun Inquisitor.

Against her, all he could do was lean on his hunter’s agility, slip, weave, take small chips when he could. But it was a losing battle. His “boss” was nearly finished too, and once those puppets went down, not even he could stand against three of them.

Hell, even one was bad enough. The captain of the Sun Inquisitors was a nightmare, too durable to damage meaningfully, armed with infuriating long-range solar magic and a mastery of the blade that could cut through most defenses. Daniel was starting to think the Sun Aspect was the most broken of them all.

If only people like him could claim Sun Aspect organs, integrate them, and not burn alive from the inside. But the truth was ugly: the filthier your soul, the more the Sun rejected you. And if you somehow forced assimilation, madness came quickly. Only the “righteous” zealots could wield it without paying that price.

And it gave them absolute dominion over what the Church deemed “evil.”

Daniel bit his tongue. No point dwelling on it now. He grinned as the mana wave ebbed. Bingo. The prison cube had worked.

He slipped past another strike, and only then did the inquisitor catch on, saw him lunge toward the carriage, aiming to slide underneath and vanish into the forest beyond.

With his speed, no inquisitor was catching him.

He dove, snatched the cube, and was already moving before she could adjust. She tried to give chase, but her duty chained her to the carriage, guarding what she believed was still occupied, not realizing her charge was gone.

As Daniel broke into the trees, he still felt it, that unsettling stare. The fox was still watching him.

He glared back at the cursed thing. That oppressive weight he’d felt earlier, it had to be the lingering influence of the entity that had crushed Basil. As much as he wanted to skin it alive while it screamed, he didn’t have that luxury. So he ran.

And he kept running.

Only when he was certain nothing was following did he stop, leaning against a tree to catch his breath. A ragged laugh slipped out.

“Hah… that was too damn close.”

Basil’s death still gnawed at him, but the mission was done. His laughter turned hoarse, breaking into coughs before he slumped fully against the tree and let the soft grass take his weight.

The twin moons hung low on the horizon, green and red, both full tonight. It should have been tranquil. Dangerous as the forest was, he was sure he was far from any Phantom Lord’s territory, and full moon nights kept undead and ghosts dormant. For once, it was almost safe.

Something tugged at his leg.

He frowned, reaching for the pocket where the cube rested.

Maybe his prisoner was thrashing again. A cruel smile tugged at his lips, what could a literal cockroach do against him? She might be trapped, but she could still hear him. That made this all the sweeter.

He pulled the cube out. It had a silvery sheen, cool to the touch, with four small indentations that were just big enough to glimpse the unfortunate soul trapped within. He gave it a sharp, rattling shake.

“Oh, you bitch…” he muttered in a venomous tone. “I don’t know what those shady bastards want with you, but hopefully it’s something truly horrific. Which, from what I’ve heard, it usually is.”

At least the stories painted their employers as true monsters, inhumans in every sense of the word.

“I still got zero pity for you. A friend of mine died because of you today.” He shook it again, and the box seemed to shudder in response. “I can’t even mourn him right. My own ability sees to that. ‘Inner Peace’… hah. Every emotion is muted, flattened, except for the sheer anger I have to keep reminding myself I’m supposed to be feeling. And I won’t be letting go of that feeling anytime soon.”

The cube went suddenly, perfectly still.

Daniel chuckled. Did she finally give up? Had her spirit broken already? He still wanted to see, to witness the ultimate degradation of the woman who had cost him so much. He brought the cube up into the dual moonlight, angling it to peer through one of the viewports.

…Inside was not a panicked insect.

Inside was only a void of sheer, absolute darkness.

“What the f—”

The thought never finished. A single, vertically-slitted eye suddenly manifested in the center of the blackness. It was large, too large for the confines of the cube, and it was surrounded by a shifting, impossible maw of razor-sharp, shadowy teeth.

That was the last thing he saw before a blur of shadow erupted from the cube, and the world went black.