'I will absorb this Curse and try to make it take my mental illness in exchange.'
This was an extremely strange plan, and perhaps no one ever tried to make a Curse, things so similar to Blessings coming from gods in power, do something he or she wanted to do. Yet, Nem didn't hesitate, now that his mind was momentary clear, he didn't want to go back to the state he was in the past month for one more day.
Resolutely, Nem closed his palm on the floating whirlpool. They were no force to repel him, and he felt a rush of emotions and sensation assault his mind. His nose was filled with a great cocktail of scents, his eyes with more colors and shapes than he had ever seen in his entire life, his ears with the sound of air and water rushing past him and his skin with fur, bones, grass, rock, metals, another person's skin and warmth...
Incapable of handling the mix of stimuli, Nem felt himself pass out uncontrollably. His expression hardened as he pressed both his hands together, triggering his highly concentrated state. He tried to focus on the feeling brought out by his mental illness, orienting the Curse towards it with all his mind.
Suddenly, his face started to itch, it grew more and more, almost impossible to resist. Nem's arms started trembling uncontrollably as he resisted the sensation.
'Just a bit longer... just a bit...'
Something seemed to click, and Nem instantly lost all sensations. It was like he was floating in the void, his body reduced to a grain of dust or a gust of wind. Then, a familiar face gradually emerged before in his field of vision. It was his new face, or perhaps Nartolem's...
Nem realized he could hear and that the face was talking. Also, his field of vision kept moving outside of his will. Overall, the scene before his eyes felt like he was watching a movie.
"Is it about time ?"
Nem then felt himself answer with a familiar voice. His voice from before reincarnation. He could remember it right now.
"Yeah Nart, I'll go alright..."
"That you will... Hold on, let me do a little something first..." Nart, or Nartolem, as Nem suspected, seemed to grab through Nem's body and pull something out. It was a strange sensation, and Nem didn't have any idea what happened, but he felt his "body" respond with a confused and alarmed voice.
"What did... What the hell ! Man, why did you just do that ? I already decided to completely lock..."
At the word 'man', Nem felt a strong feeling of imminent danger. His consciousness started struggling to pull himself away for the "movie". Nem apparently somehow succeeded, and at this last word resonated in the dark void, the scene seemed to jump and fast forward in an erratic fashion.
He heard Nartolem's voice say "You'll thank me..." before the surroundings condensed again. It was still Nartolem, but he seemed a bit worried as he spoke hurriedly.
"Look kid, you gotta remember to use the open reverse pentagram, alright ? Do you want to see the glorious builder of the Great Wall of Saxo, the demon who participated in the Battle of the 5 Empires and annihilated an entire army of minotaurians by himself die like a fish thrown out of water ? Re. Mem. Ber."
During this speech, a strange blurry circle gradually appeared in Nem's mind. Unfortunately, the 'movie' ended before it was complete.
Nem opened his eyes, which had apparently closed without his knowledge and saw his room, empty and dark.
'It seems night already fell. What was that, some kind of memory ? But where could I have possibly met Nartolem, between my death and reincarnation ?'
Even though his face stopped itching, Nem still tried to scratch it with his hand. However, when his fingers entered his eyes, Nem jumped in surprise and exclaimed.
"What the... !"
'Claws ?!'
In the place previously occupied by his fingernails, Nem now could see thin sharp ivory claws, seemingly capable of cutting open flesh. His eyes were wide with awe and he realized that he would probably have cut himself if he tried to scratch his face.
He tried it on his arm, and found out that he still needed a bit of strength to cut through the skin. They were sharp, but not still not too sharp.
'It seems I succeeded in becoming a Cursed. But... this is quite a thing awkward to have on one's fingers.'
As soon as Nem had the thought of getting rid of them, the claws seemed to retract, only leaving normal human fingertips. With another thought, he contracted some of his finger muscles and the claws popped out again.
'So, this is my power ? Kind of disap...'
When he wondered what powers he had gained, knowledge seemed to fill his mind. First, a word and then a series of sensations and images.
'This Curse has a name. Formless. I can now form claws on my fingers, change my eye and hair color and even blush on purpose. I also have more elastic muscles on my body and overall stronger hands. Finally, I seem to be able to notice more details, especially on living beings...'
'This is a little bit all over the place isn't it ?'
Nem started trying out every power in order. He couldn't see his own eyes but he could see his hair and he could indeed somehow change its color to brown. Brown was the limit, he couldn't become suddenly blond or more exotic colors.
Similar to the retracting of the claws, it felt like a new muscle had appeared and he could "flex" it to change his hair color.
Nem then attempted punching and jumping multiple times. His body felt more agile and his movement faster.
'Even though my strength didn't increase, the result is the same when I'm punching or kicking. If not for the weight difference, I would be able to punch as hard as an average adult male. If someone a bit heavy falls on me, I wouldn't even be able to move thought...'
'I need to rely on my speed and agility to win against a strong opponent, but against other children, just a punch would probably knock them out, this is a pretty good improvement. Still, it seems like a kind of "Jack of trades, master of none" kind of Curse.'
During this month, Nem had found more than one paper in the monastery. One of them described how a Tier 9 Blessed won a battle alone against 15 armed men attacking him at the same time. This was unthinkable for the current Nem, even if he suddenly turned into an adult.
As Nem gradually calmed down his excitement, he suddenly remembered the reason why he became a Cursed in the first place.
'Did it work ?'
He inspected his body to check if anything was missing and his mind for the same reason. He couldn't find anything, and he couldn't determine if he was still insane or not.
'I guess I'll have to wait until the meditation tomorrow evening to be sure. I do feel a bit different, but it could be the claws and everything else screwing with my mind.'
'About the "movie" that I just saw, the word "lock" that "I" used could refer to the very memories that I got a glimpse of... The things Nartolem talked about sounded a lot like delusions of middle school students... I don't know what he meant at all.'
'Also, wasn't there something about True Forms and Cursed ? I don't feel anything of the sort... Maybe it's because my Curse is called 'Formless' ? Makes sense, I guess.'
Nem never found anything about True Forms on the various paper he had found other the days. The only thing he had learned was that this orphanage was a sort of elite facility that used other smaller and more normal orphanages over the continent as a front to receive donations.
Also, Nem had been very interested when he read that the children were to be used as spies in various missions when their training had sufficiently progressed and they were absolutely needed. The only thing was that it didn't happen even once since the founding of the orphanage.
Perhaps the children were not judged trained enough or perhaps someone was a bit soft-hearted and decided to wait until they graduated. Anyways, this was important news for Nem, because he could use it to leave the monastery.
As for the fact that becoming a Cursed might bring him the hostility of the monks, he felt that the fact that nobody barged in his room to kill him was already quite nice. For the rest, he would have to see.