Sam’s Mother’s View
Luxurious food, luxurious bedding, luxurious bathroom… I felt like I was in a dream, it was so surreal. Just this morning I was still bedridden, too sick to do anything, and now I’m living in mansion!
Watching Ariel work, was like watching a miracle worker. She created beds and blankets out of nothing, and they are the most comfortable beddings I’ve ever lain in. For dinner we ate a meal more delicious than any I’d ever had before, and after I made use of the toilet, and cleaned myself in the shower. These experiences were all so strange and amazing it was hard to believe any of it was real, and not some fever dream. Ariel explained everything like it was all normal to her. Did she live in heaven before?
While still in a daze from wonder and amazement, I joked that all I needed now was a way to work while sick, and regain the beauty of my youth. Yet, Ariel seemed to take what I said seriously. At this point, I no longer know what to expect. Everything Ariel does seems impossible, for all I know, maybe she will make the mythical fountain of youth. In this house it feels like anything is possible.
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Ariel’s Dream:
If she wants to work while sick, and retain beauty into old age, I don’t think I can accomplish that through ordinary means. She’d probably have to work through a proxy or something.
A remote control VR system? No, too complex. Linking a headset to a clone involves telepathy, and I’ve got nothing related to that currently.
What about piloting from inside? Like a mecha? I’m not sure how the boarding and unboarding would work, but the basic concept is sound. The clones don’t have a consciousness so, allowing a different consciousness to take over should be cheap and easy to setup.
What happens to the pilot? If their mind is in control of the clone, their own body needs to still be cared for. A life support system? I should already have the necessary abilities. I can make food and drink, and have a contact based analysis ability, so identifying how much of both to give should be viable. Making air is likewise doable.
Piloting and life support seem doable with minimal adjustments. The piloting portion does require creating a new ability, but it’s cheap because it’s so useless. Allowing a different person to control my body doesn’t help me any in a fight, and since they have to be in my body for it to work, both involved parties must be willing for it to work, which further hampers usability. It’s not like I can trap someone inside a clone… wait, even if a monster could get out easily, thanks to them getting intuitive understanding of their abilities, a human might not. I’ll have to investigate that.
So, getting in and out of the clone, and taking it over… how will that work? Maybe if I make a skin-suit. Like a costume one can put on. Old myths from my previous world had people wearing animal skins to transform into animals, so something like that might be easy to understand. After putting the costume on, it immediately transfers the wearer into storage with life support and transforms into a full bodied human form?
How much control over the clone should I allow? I’m wary of allowing too much. Appearance control might be good for the intended purpose of helping people to work in old age as copying their existing appearance might be bad for it, and limiting the clone to a fixed pre-made appearance is awkward, and I don’t really want them to wander around with my appearance.
The base attributes can be set to copy the ratios of the person using it, and give control over appearance with UI help. I should probably include multiple methods of exiting the clone including some voice commands for an exit system. If the user asks “How do I take this thing off?” or some variant of that, it should provide a visual prompt with both instructions on how to take it off and additional voice command options for exiting should they be unable to use the standard method for some reason.
If I want to avoid squick, I should probably make the base form of the wearable costume as inoffensive as possible. I could include a minor illusion to hide exactly how it works too… a transformation sequence to hide what exactly is happening? Excess bloom is probably the easiest solution, especially since it should take less than a second.
An amulet with voice commands. I like this idea. I should probably include some interface options like a way to change it into something else, such as a bracelet, or belt, or anklet. It does need to be something worn on the outside though.
Could I upgrade the vitality patch to include this feature? I think the answer is yes, but it would be awkward, and I don’t think I want to do it. The vitality patches are intended to spread and be used by many. I don’t want everyone to suddenly gain such a powerful disguise ability.
Adding sense sharing and consciousness sharing, while somewhat useless in a fight (and cheap as a result) this actually has a lot of potential. I’ve long been worried about how the things I make are used, this might actually help solve it. I’m gonna have to create a lot of new and complex unconscious behaviors to make it work, but this has the potential to make the vitality patches choose whom is allowed to have their power, and how much to grant.
As they currently are, the vitality patches only have a sense of touch and field perception. The fog in this town blocks field perception, and they are so small and cover so little area that touch is useless. Effectively leaving them blind. If they can share senses with the wearer, then they won’t be blind anymore. If they aren’t blind, then they can make judgements about the wearer, and those around them.
I’m going to upgrade the patches. I’m going to upgrade them a lot.
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Sam’s Mother’s View
The next morning I really was greeted with a miracle. Ariel gave me an amulet, and instructions on how to use it. It let me transform into a healthy young woman of great beauty! I don’t see any reason to ever change back.
Ariel’s View
To make everything work right, I had to greatly increase the amount of intelligence available for unconscious behaviors. This does make the “Only while sleeping” limitation less powerful, but since that was only tied to a fairly cheap ability, it has minimal impact on overall costs. I also seem to be gaining power much faster than I used to. Not as fast as when I was with mother, but much faster than when I first arrived in town.
The consciousness sharing trick enables my clones that are attached to people (the vitality patches) to react to the thoughts and actions and perceptions of the person they are attached to. This is really powerful as a tool for getting really detailed in how exactly they behave. Theoretically, the one wearing the patch could control the patch’s powers (all the powers a clone of mine has, really), which is why I needed a smarter patch to put limits in.
My new creation: A transformation amulet. When activated, it will transform into a form desired by the person activating it, and store that person’s body inside. Technically, the person activating it is in control of the form taken, but I used some trickery to prevent people from figuring out how to do so. It relies more upon their unconscious desires, than their conscious ones.
Why didn’t I just make the transformation part of the vitality patch? Well, actually I did make a version of it part of the vitality patch. Thing is, I don’t want it to be available to just anyone, so it’s more like a hidden feature with a secret trigger to help people in need. The amulet is for deliberate transformation and will only be given to a few people, while the patches will spread to lots of people in time… at least I expect it to.
Two things I included in the adjustment for the vitality patch: if the wearer commits murder, the patch will detach and vaporise. Additionally, a person must wear a patch for one full year before a second will appear, and it will only create a total of two additional patches per person. I made a point to explain this to everyone, after ensuring everyone and their mothers had one. I didn’t tell them about the hidden features.
