The moment he received Vicente's order, Casey made his four pentagrams appear in front of his Magic Gem in the shape of a third eye.",
Mana vibrated on his forehead, making it seem as if there really was an eye there, gradually opening as he looked into Lauren's opaque eyes.
Little by little, he put ordinary visual information aside, seeing the mental structures of the black-haired girl in front of him, but also her memories.
What Casey first saw were Lauren's memories of the last 13 years or so. It was the time she officially joined Nixlas' Shadows and grew up in that headquarters, with the many missions she had carried out in those years.
They had taken Lauren to the Nixlas' Shadows headquarters, where she had been brainwashed by the sect and then learned the essential training of sect members. After two years, she left for her first missions in the south of the continent, where the sect usually sent its most talented junior disciples, given the lower risks of the area.
In Seidel Kingdom, she had spent several months carrying out missions, obtaining over 10,000 kills using the Book of Death, which had earned her the title of Miss Death.
She had practically wiped out crime in an entire province of that kingdom, where she had begun her journey of cultivation by targeting people with bounties on their heads.
Lauren had climbed the ranks of Nixlas' Shadows quickly, having had doors opened for her to move on whenever she reached a new peak in her journey.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64ce79d606107d003c23ea27", id: "pf-5140-1"})When she had to hunt pentagrams, her superiors chose their targets in advance and kept them restricted, waiting for her. They did little to help her kill the creatures that had given rise to her pentagrams, but it was really convenient not to have to hunt her pentagrams so hard.
That was basically Lauren's life in Nixlas' Shadows, a lot of training, cultivation, and missions outside the sect. She had spent so little time at the sect headquarters she had hardly faced any competition.
The little competition she had was in her first year in the sect. Back then, she took part in the sect's competition, and by the end of that year, she had emerged victorious by eliminating all of her competitors.
However, Casey could not recollect any details about her life before undergoing brainwashing.
He deepened his investigation as Lauren gradually convulsed, worrying Vicente.
"Casey, what's wrong?"
The young man analyzing Lauren's memories frowned as sweat formed on his forehead. "They've damaged parts of her mental structure that are related to the good feelings we all have. Without that, it can be very difficult for her to love and very easy for her to hate.
But about her old memories, I can't access them. There's a seal of darkness here. I'll need your help so we can explore her situation further."
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64cc9e79c7059f003e4ad4b0", id: "pf-5109-1"})"Do you think that will be effective? She's convulsing. Are you absolutely certain that there will be no negative consequences for her?" As he held his sister's body, Vicente's worry consumed him.
"I can't guarantee it. We'd need a good 5th stage doctor on our side to better assess what can be done and what might happen. But it's almost certain that if we try anything now, her condition will worsen." Casey was sincere while still analyzing Lauren's mind.
He added. "The problem with everything is that if we force the seal off her, I don't know what might happen. Maybe she'll remember the past, maybe not. Maybe she'll become stupid, maybe not."
"Then let's forget about it for now. Let's do what I told you earlier." Vicente sighed, not at all willing to risk his sister's situation.
He then let Casey look at his memories, allowing this tanned-
skinned, long-haired guy to see a bit of his past, restricted to his first few months of life and his tenth birthday, just before Lauren awakened her powers and was taken away by Nixlas' Shadows.
Casey saw how things had been for Vicente and Nina after they left Martell Village as a family to go to Saltstar City, how happy they were at the start, but how they became miserable.
Casey had already lived through his own tragedies, but he felt a heaviness in his heart when he saw these memories, remembering more deeply the end of his sister, almost unable to hold back his tears.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "663633fa8ebf7442f0652b33", id: "pf-8817-1"})But he was strong and continued his work, transmitting these memories of Vicente to Lauren, transforming them into a kind of memory that, she would realize, was not hers, but which, in part, she could not distinguish so easily from her actual memories.
Casey could transform Vicente's memory into a memory of Lauren, making her occupy the space of the memory relating to Lauren in what Vicente had shown her. This would make her see herself in the place of these parts of her brother's memory.
This was the most he could do to help his friend today, so he spent about two hours manipulating their memories so that she could see a little of what she was like before she was taken to Nixlas' Shadows.
When he had finished his work, already exhausted, Casey looked at Lauren while Vicente laid her on the floor to rest.
"She should sleep for about two or three days. You should cultivate and try to recover from the previous fight in the next few hours before we get ready to leave." Casey advised, aware that Vicente would like to spend as much time as possible watching Lauren.
Vicente accepted Casey's advice and soon moved to enter meditation, letting his sister sleep under the observation of Onyx and Torne.
Over the next few hours, Lauren would sleep soundly, at first recovering from what Casey had done to her, but then having dreams and nightmares that she had never had in the last 13 years.
She would see and feel things related to her mother, which she had felt after meeting Vicente on her last journey to the south of the continent. But now that strange feeling would become even stronger!
