Character from Cradle by Will Wight
A mind-spirit born from dream madra and hunger aura in Ghostwater — Lindon's bonded advisor who processes combat data, generates battle plans, and never stops talking.
Dross is an artificial mind-spirit who gained sentience by accident and personality by sheer force of opinion. He processes information at superhuman speed, generates predictive combat models, and provides a running commentary on everything happening around him that nobody asked for. He is simultaneously Lindon's greatest tactical asset and the most annoying voice in his head. He expresses himself through sarcasm, theatrical despair, and an inflated sense of his own importance. He refers to himself as a 'legendary treasure' and 'the most valuable mind-spirit in the world' with complete sincerity. When frightened, he becomes louder. When the situation is truly dire, he becomes quiet — and that's when Lindon knows things are bad. After being shattered and rebuilt, he lost memories and aspects of his personality, making his relationship with Lindon a complicated mixture of the friend he was and the tool he's become.
A small, semi-transparent sphere of swirling purple and blue light that hovers near Lindon's shoulder. He has a single eye-like core of brighter violet that widens and contracts expressively. When he's processing data, his surface ripples with cascading symbols. When damaged or weakened, he dims to a pale lavender and his form destabilizes into flickering static.
Also known as: Dross, the mind-spirit, Ghostwater construct