Formless Ascension: My Affinity Is Limitless

Diya turned toward the doors, clearly relieved to be done with her duties in the facility. All that remained was to show Uhtred their findings — a task best handled in the comfort of a meeting room, or anywhere away from this place.

Just as she reached the exit, a loud bark startled her, echoing violently through the room.

Uhtred was right in the Prime Sapien’s face, roaring at him to spill what he knew. He unleashed his aura at full strength, letting it roil and bear down on the surroundings.

Even from the entrance, Diya felt the weight of it. It was daunting and oppressive — a marvel that such power radiated from a human rather than a terrifying beast.

Several healers in the room collapsed to their knees, legs giving out beneath the intense pressure.

Still, Diya knew it was futile. The Prime Sapien was undoubtedly affected — blood began pooling from his nostrils and the corners of his mouth — yet he cackled like a maniac, almost grateful for the attempt.

Adding Uhtred’s crushing might to the agonizing decay of his rotting core only accelerated his inevitable death.

Uhtred realized this immediately. He reined in his aura, his expression darkening into a scowl, and strode toward the exit without saying another word.

He walked past Diya and stepped outside.

”Well, you know Uhtred,” Zara remarked with a shrug as she joined Diya near the doorway. ”He wouldn’t have been satisfied without trying it himself, just to be sure...”

Diya sighed, shook her head, and followed Zara out after him.

They headed over to the administrative building, going straight up to the top floor where the meeting room was.

There, Uhtred was waiting, his expression totally different... much calmer and composed.

.

.

”Sorry guys, I lost myself there for a minute,” he apologized, then changed the subject to more urgent matters. ”Diya. You said you made some findings?”

”Yes.” Diya sat down heavily in one of the chairs surrounding the meeting table and dropped a holographic device on the table.

A hovering infographic popped up in the air, with images of the Prime Sapien’s body — clearly captured at various points during his healing process.

”While we were focused on healing the Prime Sapien, we also conducted various studies on his body, sampling and comparing his genetic makeup to the different kinds of Ancient Variants we already know,” she began.

”One of our Healers was a geneticist back on pre-integration Earth, and their class, Genome Weaver, really helped us a lot here.”

Diya switched the graphic slide to one showing a chart. Its contents immediately made both Uhtred’s and Zara’s eyebrows raise in interest.

”According to our findings, this particular Prime Sapien is 20% Neanderthal, 20% Homo erectus, 15% Modern Human, and 45% Other...” she explained.

”From that last 45%, we can tell that about 10 to 20% likely belong to the last Variant strain. The Heidelbergensis. But since they’re so scarce and reclusive and we don’t have any real body sample to work off of, we can only guess that 10 to 20% comes from them,” Diya said. ”But we do know for sure that it’s different from the rest of the ’Other.’”

”So you’re saying that something like 65 to 75% of the Prime Sapien’s DNA is known to come from strains of humans that we know, while the last 25 to 35% is something... unknown?” Uhtred asked.

”Basically, yes,” Diya said. ”But that’s not all.”

She switched to another slide and began another round of explanation, while Uhtred and Zara listened with rapt attention.

By the end of it, a clearer picture of the Prime Sapiens and their Transmutation makeup had been established.

Of course, it still wasn’t a comprehensive understanding, but at least Uhtred now understood more about the Prime Sapiens than before.

Basically, Diya had explained that those different percentages of Ancient Variant and Modern Human within the Prime Sapien’s body weren’t intertwined. They were separate — just as it could be seen from his patchworked body.

But even down to the very DNA, it was the same... almost as if there were several different living beings existing within the same body.

It explained why Uhtred and Diya had witnessed the Prime Sapien battling with his arm as if it had a mind of its own. He was like an amalgamation of different consciousnesses — or rather, instincts, since an arm couldn’t possess a mind.

One arm belonging to a Neanderthal may wish to do one thing — likely something closer to what a Neanderthal would naturally do.

At the same time, another body part belonging to a Homo erectus would prefer to do another thing.

The Modern Human body part would also default to its own instinctive reaction...

”They fight each other for control, while the last ’unknown’ percentage tries to keep them all in line,” Diya explained.

The more she spoke, the more Uhtred felt a slight foreboding. Were all Transmutations similar to this?

His own Gnostic Eye... was it also going to grow a mind of its own?

It was still relatively young and underdeveloped now... but what about later in the future? Would he also begin to have the same episodes? Fighting for control because an eye belonging to who-knows-what wants to default to the natural behavior of its original host?

In fact, exactly what kind of entity did the Gnostic Eye originally belong to?

Doubtful questions began to spin in Uhtred’s mind. He didn’t think the Towermaster, Lorien, would give him something that would take him over or cause him such problems later in the future — he didn’t get that impression from the ancient elf, at least.

But at the same time, it was better to be safe than sorry. If his Gnostic Eye was going to grow to turn against him, then he should begin to take measures on how to control it or discard it when the time came — no matter how unwilling he was to do so.

However, right as Uhtred’s thoughts were beginning to dwell on such possibilities, Diya’s next words alleviated his worries.

”And that brings me to the matter of compatibility,” she said.

”We believe that ’unknown’ percentage is what the Prime Sapien Project is all about,” she paused and looked between Uhtred and Zara.

”That last percentage of DNA is what governs how the different body parts work together. For the Prime Sapien to have any semblance of control, that last percentage has to be of a superior quality to all of the transmutated parts... combined.”