The room was silent except for the soft hum of magic.
It was one of the deeper chambers inside El Dorado, far from the main halls, isolated enough that no servant or attendant would wander in by mistake. The walls were lined with frozen crystal, the floor polished smooth enough to reflect the pale light hanging in the air.
At the center of the room stood Loki.
And in front of him—
Was a body.
Perfectly still, suspended upright within a lattice of dark magic circles. It looked human at first glance, but there was something unnervingly clean about it. Too complete. As if every inch of it had been designed with impossible intention.
Loki stood with his arms folded, staring at it like an artist admiring the final brushstroke on a masterpiece.
His grin was impossible to hide.
"Yeah," he said quietly to himself. "That's beautiful."
He circled it once.
Slowly.
Proudly.
The vessel drifted in the air, bare skin catching the glow of the magic around it. Its chest rose and fell in the faint rhythm of breath. The fingers twitched once. Then settled again.
Alive.
Or close enough to alive that the difference hardly mattered.
Loki's grin widened.
"I'm a genius."
The door behind him opened.
Rain stepped inside without much urgency, one hand resting against the frame as she looked into the room.
"I heard you were hiding in here again," she said. "So naturally I assumed you were either making something dangerous or making a mess in someone else's space."
Then she saw the body.
And stopped.
The usual irritation on her face vanished.
Her eyes widened slightly.
She stepped forward without realizing she had done so.
"…What is that?"
Loki didn't look at her.
He kept his eyes on the vessel.
"Good, right?"
Rain moved closer.
Her expression had changed completely now.
Mesmerized.
As an artist, she understood beauty when she saw it. Structure. Form. Balance. A kind of impossible harmony between concept and execution.
And this—
This was exquisite.
The proportions were flawless. The energy flow threading through it was elegant. Every line, every contour, every layered circle of construction carried the same impossible sense of completion.
Rain spoke more quietly this time.
"What am I looking at?"
Loki finally turned toward her.
"It's an artificial body."
Rain blinked.
"…A what?"
"A body," Loki repeated. "Artificial. Made to host demons."
Silence.
Then Rain looked back at it again.
Longer this time.
More carefully.
The realization hit her slowly.
"…You made this?"
Loki placed a hand against his chest.
"Who else?"
Rain ignored him.
She stepped even closer, looking up at the suspended vessel as if afraid the slightest movement might ruin it.
"This…"
Her voice dropped.
"This is insane."
Loki grinned.
"I know."
Rain circled it once, eyes tracing the details, her gaze catching on each subtle pulse of power hidden beneath the skin.
Then she looked at him.
"How?"
That one word carried everything.
Curiosity.
The genuine hunger of one creator seeing something beyond her own level and needing to understand it.
Loki's expression softened into something far less smug and far more pleased.
He liked this look on her.
The one where she forgot to be annoyed and simply wanted to learn.
So he answered.
"The bodies were created through a controlled incarnation process," he said, "not simple construction."
Rain stilled completely.
Loki stepped closer to the vessel and raised one hand toward its chest.
"I started by condensing vast quantities of ambient spiritual energy into a dense core."
At once, a point of light formed over the body's sternum, showing the structure within.
A heart.
But not a natural one.
A nucleus.
Dark-gold and radiant at the same time.
Rain's eyes narrowed as she studied it.
Loki continued.
"That core acts as the body's heart and stabilizing center."
His fingers moved, and threads of light spread outward through the projection.
"It regulates energy flow, prevents collapse, and gives the vessel a continuous internal power source."
Rain followed the patterns with complete focus now.
Loki smiled faintly and went on.
"After that, I built the internal structure around it."
He traced the shape of the projected body as organs lit up one by one beneath the skin.
"Organs, nerves, musculature, circulatory pathways."
His tone was casual.
As if he were describing ordinary craftsmanship rather than something absurdly advanced.
"I didn't shape them all at once. I grew them in layers from concentrated magicules, like forcing a living organism through accelerated development."
Rain exhaled slowly.
"…You grew it."
"Basically."
He shrugged.
"Each layer had to be reinforced too."
He tapped one of the floating circles.
"Otherwise the body would tear itself apart the moment something strong inhabited it."
The musculature lit brighter.
The skeletal supports beneath it sharpened.
Loki went on.
"It needs to withstand extreme energy output. A normal artificial shell would burn out, rupture, or just collapse once a proper spiritual lifeform entered it."
Rain's lips parted slightly.
"…So this isn't a shell."
Loki looked at her and grinned.
"Exactly."
He dismissed the first projection and replaced it with another, showing the outer framework.
"Once the internals were stable, I generated the exterior."
Bones.
Connective tissue.
Skin.
All layered in smooth, horrifying precision.
"I compressed matter until it reached natural density and weight," he said. "Not symbolic density. Actual density. If the body feels wrong, moves wrong, or weighs wrong, the occupant will never synchronize properly."
Rain stared.
The vessel floating before them now looked even more terrifyingly perfect under that explanation.
Loki pointed toward the head.
"Sensory pathways were embedded too."
At once, channels of light lit up behind the eyes, through the ears, down the spine.
"So it can see, hear, feel pain, touch the world, respond to the world."
He tapped the projection of the skull.
"No distortion. No delay. It processes physical input as a living body should."
Rain's voice came out barely above a whisper.
"You made it experience pain?"
Loki tilted his head.
"Yes."
Rain frowned slightly.
"That's cruel."
Loki shrugged.
"It's necessary."
He looked back at the vessel.
"A body that doesn't feel real will never truly live."
Rain said nothing to that.
And, annoyingly, part of her thought he was right.
Loki let the projection fade.
Then placed his hand just above the vessel's abdomen.
"The last part was synchronization."
A pulse of power moved through the body.
Its heartbeat became audible.
Soft.
Steady.
Thum.
Thum.
Thum.
Rain's breath caught.
Loki's voice remained calm.
"Once every component was complete, I had to bring them into alignment. Heartbeat. Breathing. Temperature regulation. Regeneration. Autonomous function."
The body's chest rose again.
And fell.
It looked peaceful sleeping.
Like it might open its eyes at any moment.
"After activation," Loki said, "it stopped being an empty shell."
He looked at Rain directly.
"It became a true living body."
Rain stood perfectly still.
For once, she had no immediate comeback.
No sharp remark.
Only honesty.
"…That's a masterpiece."
The words came out before she could dress them up.
Loki's grin returned in full force.
"I know."
Rain looked at him sharply.
"Don't ruin the moment."
"I'm not ruining it. I'm agreeing with you."
She narrowed her eyes.
Then looked back at the vessel.
A few more seconds passed before her expression shifted from awe to suspicion.
"…What are you planning to do with this?"
That was the real question.
Because nothing Loki made was ever just made.
There was always intent beneath it. Some ridiculous idea. Some chaotic plan. Some gift that would become everyone else's problem by the end of the week.
Loki folded his arms again and looked back at the body with the expression of a man admiring a very thoughtful present.
"It's a gift."
Rain blinked.
"For who?"
Loki smiled.
"For a little ol' slime."
---
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