{The main task was to minimize the rodent's resistance to Synergy. I have three options... To apply any formation of the personal weapon, thereby changing the frequency of oscillations of its body to mine. To enslave its soul with Synergy as in the case with Juno. To play with death…}

Kyon proceeded to the first option. He already knew the answer, so the unsuccessful result wasn't surprising at all. The rodent's soul, even without any development, makes the body oscillate with a frequency that outpowered any formation.

{Theoretically, if I was some phases higher, I could make its body oscillate with my frequency.} – The thought was quite frightening. How would the soul react? Would it fly off? How was it to exist without a soul? Would the memories remain? Or would the body turn into an empty sh.e.l.l?

He had discarded the first option in the end.

Kyon considered the second option to enslave the rat's soul. However, he quickly gave up this idea. It was an extremely strange, mysterious and probably dangerous phenomenon when he was with Juno in the illusory world. Besides, if successful, the burden of the rat's soul would fall on his being. Kyon was still experiencing the impact of capturing the little demon's vile soul... It wasn't an option.

He had discarded the second. There was the third left.

A wicked sparkle flashed in Kyon's eyes. He was going to kill the rat. Kyon highly valued only intelligent life. The less intelligent and self-aware forms of life lost their significance in his eyes. The people were the highest value, monkeys were less significant, farm animals were even less important, insects were worthless. Thus, the rat, this small living creature, was of less value to him than the possible fruits of his experiments.

He infused the rat with Synergy and instantly stopped its heart.

Hypoxia lasted several minutes when the brain began to lose its functions. The soul somehow felt the mental disconnection with the body and decided it was time to die. It immediately began to affect the brain, bringing irreversible changes.

According to the books, Kyon had read, the soul takes life experience from the brain, the skills and memories, and leaves an empty sh.e.l.l. Then it disconnects the channels from the keys and flows off somewhere into the depth of the planet.

As soon as the soul gets detached from the body (the physical world), the organism begins to collapse at the cellular level with a gradually increasing speed. It's almost invisible from the outside, with chaos erupting inside. The nerve cells fell apart, the muscles lost their functions, the blood vessels got covered with microcracks... The terrible death of the empty sh.e.l.l!

Kyon swallowed. When the soul gets detached from the physical world, all the energy with the frequency of this soul is deleted from the list of the universe and begins to disappear. The formations slowly dissipate, the techniques, the barriers, the enchantments fall apart, the body (that has the soul frequency from birth) decomposes at the cellular level. Matter created by the earth benders fades away in the blink of an eye. It's the main reason why mining will always be in demand. Any traces of the soul get deleted from the universe, through any s.p.a.ce. Awesome!

Kyon plunged into the dark pit of his thoughts. Eureka!

The small size of the rat allowed it to have a single key of pure force (a sphere with a diameter of 1 cm). Kyon destroyed the key with an accurate and not too gentle flick. The soul lost touch with the physical world at once and plummeted somewhere on a hunch. It failed to take the rat's life experience as it had lost the connecting threads. Therefore, the brain was completely healthy and viable, not an empty sh.e.l.l like before. It' was an achievement! But Kyon didn't rejoice ahead of time.

At the same second, the rat's body with the frequency of vibrations of its soul since the day it was born began to collapse. Kyon infused it with Synergy and tried to reverse or stop the process of self-destruction, making the cells work again. It was to no avail. A certain force that came out of nowhere intervened in the body and destroyed it with increasing speed.

Everything with the vibrations of the soul that has lost the connection with this world gets crossed out. That's why the body perishes. It's a fundamental law comparable to the quantum entanglement of particles.

The task failed. Even Synergies couldn't fight the laws of the world, especially at the peak level of the Newbie's degree.

Kyon grunted, took another innocent rat and repeated the destruction of the key. The brain and the body stayed intact while the soul stormed off. When the body began to collapse, Kyon created a formation inside it that would change the frequency of the rat to his own like a personal weapon.

After a while, Kyon exhaled disappointedly. Even a soulless body longed to maintain a frequency of vibrations. The power of the formation could not suppress such a strong desire. If Kyon was a phase higher in development, he could have faked the body vibration frequency, and it (most likely) would cease to decompose. He would create his first zombie, a living organism with a mind but without a soul.

Kyon understood that he was dealing with very dark things. According to human laws, this blasphemy was punishable by death. However, he couldn't give up. He needed extra eyes and ears.

Kyon a.s.sumed that he could change the frequency of a small rat (without a soul) if he was about one and a half phase higher. Theoretically, if he was dealing with a person, he would need a higher level of development. Was it possible to create intelligent zombies? It was a terrible idea... He imagined a powerful foe destroying his keys, detaching his soul from his body, instantly faking his body frequency bypa.s.sing the fundamental law of self-destruction, creating him into a soulless body with mind and memories. It would be dreadful! What if this dark process already existed in this world? Could some formacists have carried out such illegal, immoral experiments and achieved success? On the other hand, it was easier to impose a controlling formation, right? The very idea was scary, anyway.

Kyon was absorbed in his thoughts like an ancient philosopher. He knew that the body gets at birth the frequency of the soul vibrations. If the body suddenly changed its frequency, the soul would disconnect and fly off. It would decide the body had died. If the soul suddenly changed its frequency, it wouldn't recognize the body and would fly off too. "Changing addends does not change the sum." Then why could Juno's soul recognize her body after Kyon had captured her? Why didn't it fly off? Did it adjust to the new frequency of her body? No... It didn't work that way. The change was too drastic. Then why? It didn't add up.

He had only one explanation. Synergy worked it out and changed Juno's frequency, saving the girl's life. The bright flash he saw immediately after returning from the illusory world only confirmed this. Synergy of the sixth degree had changed the frequency of Juno's soul and body at once. That's how she had survived!

{Bingo!} – Kyon figured out what had happened and made an important conclusion. Synergy could change the frequency of vibrations in living beings and non-living objects. Exploding spheres (money) was a good example of this.

After his insight, Kyon took another rat and destroyed its key. Then he instantly infused its body with Synergy and tried to change its frequency to his own (he couldn't have involved anyone else's frequency, anyway). About ten seconds later, he succeeded. The rat's body hadn't started decaying yet. Its mind had retained all the memories. Now it was a body without the soul. It was living and intelligent. A zombie!

{I DID IT!} – Kyon's eyes glittered with satisfaction on his triumphant face.

The rat stood on four legs and twitched its cute nose.

Kyon picked up the animal and played with him. He soon noticed something strange about it. The zombie rat was aloof as if it did not understand how to live with external stimulation. It didn't seem to have its own will. The brain was trying in vain to reach out to the essence, the soul. It got more and more confused and hesitated before making any decision.

{What the h.e.l.l…} – Kyon frowned.

Moreover, the rat moved indecisively and sluggishly. It breathed for a while, then stopped. Then the animal came to its senses and breathed again. The heartbeat was irregular. The muscles contracted erroneously, and the rat looked drunk. The beady eyes were empty, there was no sparkle of life in them.

Anyone in Kyon's place would be scared to death, but he only grimly rubbed his nose. Yeah... Life without a soul is only a shadow of a miserable existence.

Kyon infused the rat's brain with Synergy and began to control it. The movements became clear, the heart contracted in a smooth, synchronized pattern, the organs worked flawlessly.

He applied a simple formation, the signal transmitter, on the rat's head and closed his eyes. He could see in his mind everything that rat saw. He could hear the sounds it heard. He could feel its tactile sensations.

Kyon had become a rat.