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Soul Perception: Allows the user of this ability to percieve spiritual/soul energy. Also allows one to percieve emotions as auras as well.
Soul Affinity: He who works with the spirit shall be touched by the spirit, allows the user to absorb a portion of a souls energy under the condition that they die by the user's hand
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It was soul energy.
They didn't have cores because they had souls instead. A core and a soul did the exact same thing, cores were in simple terms, the core hardware and programming of a creature.
A soul held the essence of a human or a living being, the Treant were closer to a human than an actual monster.
If the Treant could somehow manipulate their souls or at least the energy of the soul then they surely could hide their life signs even from his sensors.
"Wait, does that mean that they can perform soul attacks?" Steve asked as he pondered over his new discovery.
"Ehn, Mr Jin Chul, are you there?" Steve said into the earpiece
[Hello, I'm still here, what's going on?]
"No, nothing I just wanted to ask, has the Association ever encountered any creature that can manipulate souls?"
[Souls?]
"Yes, I mean like they can physically interact with souls and the likes"
[Oh, well there was the Non Morti in Italy but I am not really sure if that will fit what you want]
"Doesn't matter, what was it like?"
[It was an undead that could create more undead… We aren't really sure if it was manipulating souls or just animating the skeletons]
"Huh?… anyway thank you" Steve said as he cut the connection.
It seems he couldn't get any help from the Association on this one, he didn't need an if on this one.
Thinking about it again, he quickly turned to the large vat and took out a handful which he hardened and used to make new chips or cores for the Automata.
He couldn't lie to himself and say that he didn't need them, they were literally the only reason he had survived for so long.
If he didn't create First when he did, he would have died on the first night. He didn't have any past military or combat experience to use, he was a homebody so his habits still remained.
He slept as soon as it was 11:00 Am… Well not anymore but as of then he did but the monsters didn't so he would be dead by now if not for them.
After making the new cores, he immediately distributed it to the Automata. If they were going to be useful then they needed to be able sense and fight against these soul manipulating trees.
After that, he immediately put on the new suit as he felt a whole new kind of power permeate through his body.
It felt as though he was on top of the world, his strength was like nothing he had experienced previously and he had literally created three earlier versions of this same suit.
....
Happy new month to you all