Cloning Magic

Lilithia wasn’t sure if similar spells existed in this world, but creating actual living beings—only Life Magic could achieve that.

Influenced by certain stories, people often assumed cloning magic excelled in combat. After all, it meant ganging up on opponents. That made sense.

Yet Lilithia believed cloning was best suited for cultivation.

But this raised two problems: whether the clone’s cultivated power could transfer to the original, and whether the clone could remain stably controlled. A wise person would prioritize these concerns.

Her clone’s sole purpose? To be a blood reservoir. The clone named "Cain" shared Lilithia’s physiology—consuming blood would make it grow. A manifestation of power. Later, Lilithia could simply absorb the blood gathered by her clone, rapidly boosting her strength.

Which led to the second issue:

The clone needed intelligence.

It had to fight and hunt blood to grow stronger. Without wisdom, Lilithia would have to focus entirely on controlling it, leaving her original body in a near-dormant state. What was the point then? The accelerated cultivation would be worthless.

Just as she’d hit a dead end, Lilithia obtained the military’s forging techniques—and found a solution.

Previously, she could only craft staves for Intermediate Mages. After breaking through to Intermediate Mage herself, she managed staves for Advanced Mages… but no further. Material limitations were one hurdle. The other was…

*Soul.*

A weapon with a soul.

Archmages wielded staves imbued with a kind of intelligence—weapons truly called "soul-bound." Same for powerful warriors’ blades.

*So Fiore’s sword has wisdom too?*

"Soul-bound" sounded like a misnomer, yet Lilithia grasped the methods. Roughly three approaches existed.

First: High-level Life Mages could create special life-stones brimming with "wisdom and vitality." But those stones were prohibitively expensive. Lilithia couldn’t afford them. She’d heard a famous nation’s siege weapon—the "Megalith Golem"—ran on such stones.

Second: The traditional method she’d once guessed at—users infusing their weapons with their own souls. Supposedly, these bonded perfectly with their wielders, but the conditions were absurdly strict. It required merging the user’s "will"… *What nonsense. Like some trashy novel plot.* Lilithia flipped past that page.

The third option seemed reliable: forging weapons using living creatures, then binding their souls inside via magic.

*Do souls even exist?* Lilithia could answer that definitively—yes. Otherwise, how would she explain her own transmigration?

*Soul-binding magic, huh…*

The first method cost too much. The second demanded impossible conditions. Most likely, the third prevailed.

It didn’t require powerful souls. Weaker, cleverer ones worked better—Lilithia glimpsed unsettling possibilities but had no interest in probing the Empire’s darkness.

Treating her clone as a humanoid weapon, she’d use this method for its core. That would create an intelligent humanoid.

High intelligence wasn’t necessary.

Lilithia knew exactly what her power-boosting blood reservoir needed: fight, then drink blood.

A true Vampire.

Perhaps this body would grow smarter with each feeding, eventually becoming the legendary creature recorded in history?

She looked forward to it.

First, she’d embed multiple countermeasures inside it—never just one…

*Well… it’s a bit cruel,* she mused, yet felt nothing. Such acts didn’t stir her emotions.

She recognized her own heartlessness. She felt little connection to anyone here. Only the sun was special to her.

Her father in this world was dead. Her mother had remarried. Back then, she’d been utterly alone. Without the sun’s warmth, she’d have long since sunk into darkness.

But moonlight was always cold.

Leaving her forge room, Lilithia sought a secluded spot. This act was undeniably sinister. She understood her own actions clearly. If certain people discovered her, they might report her out of malice—or worse, some scum might ambush her with *"You wouldn’t want others to know about this, would you?"* She wanted none of that.

*When doing shady things, caution comes first…*

*Wait—could Fiore have seen me?*

*Would he spy on me when bored?*

*Huh… actually, if Fiore saw me, it might not matter. If he disapproved, he’d come stop me himself.*

*And if I refused to listen… he might…*

Lilithia snapped out of her bizarre daydream, slapping her cheeks. "Ugh. This body’s maturing too fast. Fantasizing about weird stuff already? Unacceptable. Maybe I should bleed out and revert to loli form…"

She didn’t. Instead, she slipped into the forest, dug a large pit, and built a hidden underground chamber—just like last time.

*Underground is safest for dirty work.*

Two floating flames lit the space. She hadn’t studied Light Magic—it overlapped too much with the Church’s domain.

*And Demons?* From Fiore’s descriptions, they seemed like all brawn, no brains. They had magic, sure, but nothing impressive.

She left a ventilation shaft. The stench of blood wasn’t pleasant, even if she’d grown used to it.

In her hand, she held a rabbit.

*What a shame. I’d planned to eat it for dinner. But after reading those forging techniques… it’ll have to be my test subject.*

…

Verutan wanted to go home. As an Intermediate Mage, she was already among the mainstream adventurers—a fact she could proudly claim.

But Lilithia was growing unsettling.

Her mind stayed sharp—her arithmetic lessons were ruthlessly efficient—but something was *off*.

Her gaze sometimes turned cruel.

Verutan, constantly near Lilithia, noticed strange shifts in her eyes when Lilithia wasn’t looking: sometimes like a savage beast’s, sometimes like a serpent’s.

People often had dark thoughts, Verutan knew. Future Empresses learned to hide them.

But Lilithia… Verutan sometimes doubted if she was even human anymore.

*That pitch-black Demon King’s blood she absorbed… did it change her? But…*

Verutan felt no affection for Lilithia. Quite the opposite—she despised her. This woman had pinned her down, forced tutoring on her, made her vomit blood!

Lilithia thought they got along well. But Verutan, future Empress or not, was still an eleven-year-old girl. She felt no gratitude for being "helped." Only resentment.

She endured only because of *"an Empress’s magnanimity."*

*Once that woman fully becomes Demonfolk… killing her will be my first bloom on the imperial standard.*

For that, she needed to prepare.

Just then, Lilithia returned for Verutan’s daily lesson. "Listen, Verutan. Arithmetic is merely a human necessity. But as a ruler—as Empress—you must master sacrifice. Master choice."

"What do you mean?"

A girl-shaped figure entered. Her eyes darted curiously around the cold stone walls, as if fascinated by the mundane.

A sword of solidified blood materialized in Lilithia’s hand. She offered it to Verutan.

"Kill her."

Lilithia’s voice was melodic, like chimes. Yet her words were ice. "Verutan, an Empress who cannot kill… is no true Empress."

She whispered in the girl’s ear: "Go on. Pierce her body with that blade. End her."

It was brutal for any child.

But Verutan was a future Empress.

Lilithia had debated this long and hard. And technically, it was no different from slaughtering a rabbit—the raw material *was* a rabbit.

"Let me see if you possess an Empress’s resolve."