He was progressing toward completely finishing the spiral cord-the complex web of parasitic fibers he'd woven around her natural nerves-while thinking of the next step. The **Essence Leech** was already active, his body rhythmically drawing Varloon from the rich neural tissue of her spinal column.

  "Disappearing?"

  If this was a high-level facility, they would kill him before he got far. The alternative was to stay, but could he truly fill her position? He could perform human-like actions with mechanical precision, but he lacked her personality, her memories, her essence.

  While he watched the rhythmic pulsing of the fluid he was draining, a new idea formed.

  "I still can use her."

  She was currently just a terrified passenger, but if he consumed the entire spinal cord now, she would become a limp, useless doll. To survive here, he didn't just need her body-he needed her cooperation.

  He didn't need to destroy her mind; the brain was off-limits anyway. He just needed to own the path the mind took to reach the world. By eating the spinal connection, he became the gatekeeper-her thoughts would reach the base of her skull and find only him waiting to decide if they moved further.

  Using her hand, he pried open the mirror cabinet. He searched for something to write with and found a tube of lipstick. Gripping it with her trembling fingers, he scrawled a message directly onto the glass.

  "hey if you can read this nod"

  In the reflection, her head jerked in a stiff, terrified nod.

  "from tomorrow you will go to work like nothing happened , if you try to resist my order or call someone, I know and I will torture you" She nodded, tears tracking through the steam on the mirror.

  "good, sleep well"

  He delivered a precise surge of electricity to the base of her skull, a targeted overload that knocked her out instantly. Her body went limp and fell.

  He stayed still for a moment, enjoying the silence. For the first time, he didn't have to mimic her breathing or fight her subconscious twitches. He was the sole pilot.

  He used her arms to push herself up, marveling at how much easier it was to move now that he had consumed the major neural junctions. He walked her body over to the mirror, staring at her face-his face, now.

  “lumina?” he thought, "Now that I have a stable host, what are my host situation?"

  “is that the limit?”

  “Yes.”, lumina answered “you can’t integrate the mind if they are not accepting you or are not broken enough”

  “Open statue window”

  “I need some more traits, open shop and search for pain reduced traits”

  “what is adaptive pain threshold, neural signal suppression And sensory filtering?”

  “Damn, traits with debuffs?”

  “while it may look like this traits have debuff, they have been balanced for early progress , and will remove these debuff in future levels and/or turn them into strength”

  “Ok so buy ….” After a short thought he say “Sensory filtering and adaptive pain threshold with some skill that reduce the pain in general”

  “I can give pain resistance for you want, it reduces the pain without any debuff”

  “Purchase confirmed”

  “show me what I need for the next evolution”

  “based on your position you need 1200 and 5 host”

  “so many host?” he thought “alright let’s see what’s in the fridge, this body need more nutrition to stay alive now”

  She wakes with a violent start, gasping for air as if she'd been underwater. Her skin is slick with cold sweat, her heart hammering against her ribs. She looks around the Livingroom-everything is in its place, bathed in the soft, gray light of dawn.

  “A dream,” she thinks, a ragged sigh of relief escaping her. “Just a nightmare. “ She must have fallen asleep during the movie last night.

  Looking at the clock, it's 6:30 a.m but a strange, hollow hunger gnaws at her stomach-a deep, ravenous craving that feels far more intense than usual. She ignores it for a moment, she is focused on the lingering dread. She needs to wash her face. She heads to the bathroom, her movements feeling strangely fluid and efficient. She reaches for the door, her hand trembling slightly as the vivid memory of the "jolt" flashes in her mind.

  The bathroom is clean. The tub is dry. She begins to relax, reaching for the faucet-until she looks up.

  She freezes. There, across the glass of the mirror, is a jagged, waxy smear of red lipstick.

  The blood drains from her face. Her hand moves before she can even process the terror. It isn't a shaky movement; it is precise and mechanical. Her own index finger rises, pressing firmly against her trembling lips.

  "Hush," she hears herself say, the voice coming from her throat but carrying a cold, alien cadence that isn't hers at all.