Black Magus

Amun.

***

"Ahh." I sighed in nostalgia. "This takes me back."

"Oh?" Zakira turned to me with a playfully teasing glint in her eyes. "I've never been to one of these before."

"Oh? You mean they don't have these…" Iris paused to raise her hands like claws and playfully say, "in Hell?"

"Argh!" Zakira growled, raising her claws in much the same way before they erupted in laughter. "Nah." She eventually said. "All the humans got cursed or made pacts and stuff a long time ago. Now they're Striflings like Zarzok. I've always been curious about how this works."

Iris sprinted away from us with that, shouting over her shoulder. "I'll show you!"

Through a variant of the same antechamber and archways I'd ventured through what felt like a lifetime ago, Iris sprinted. Showing just as much tact as the woman who raised her, she darted down the long catwalk to slap the crystal at the center. And only then did her head perk up and turn to blast the archway with her sorcery.

Filled with materials she'd ingested over the years, the blast of blue energy slammed into the arch. Not to destroy it, but to build upon it cameras that wirelessly streamed to the slates and screens in the adjacent rooms for our viewing pleasure. Technomancy; corrupted with my blood to become Technecromancy.

Similar to my case, her innate powers took the form of an intricate web of circuits and components in the basin of the Core Annex, creating a black, cybernetic heart that beat in tune with the deep blue pulses of the Mana Well forming above the crystal. A pulse of similarly colored energy signaled the depletion of her reserves, the force of which ejected a gentle stream to cascade over the many crystals embedded within the upper shell of the elliptical room. It turned out those crystals were no different from unprimed enchantment crystals, other than their shape being parallelograms. A subtle difference that made the material flow with an affinity granted from Telin rather than contain the magic imbued within.

In this case, the energy granted by the Creator was no different from the energy contained within Iris. Down, the bright blue fluid dripped to a halt before Iris' frame like a field of plasma contained within a magnetic field; a blue bean placed before her belly. Their reach was simultaneous. A handshake that resulted in a stream of particles that left Iris as dumbfounded as the rest of us.

"You cannot be serious." Etan shifted his gilded eyes from the screen to me.

"You already knew she could cast like us." I snorted. "Why are you surprised?"

"An innate ability to cast with mana is far different from an Affinity Core for mana," he snorted derisively.

"It suits her class." I shrugged, snickering. "Blame the blessing Telin gave me if it bothers you that much."

"Yeesh, Etan, you sound jealous." Zakira snickered.

"I am not jealous. I am unsettled."

"Same thing." Zakira shrugged. Then leaned forward just as the ceiling began to darken and shift.

Using my ostentatious and ridiculous Diadem of Empyrean Facultas, I used my omnipresence to look through Iris' eyes and see a violently spinning disk of energy and debris fall before her. Seeing that, I needed neither the tool nor the perk to understand the nature of her new affinity for Rotational Magic. A powerful- if not overpowered ability indeed.

"What, no words this time?" Zakira dramatically huffed at Etan.

"No." He simply said. "Her limbs rotate like screws when she conjures them."

"Fair enough." She mumbled from behind her chalice and remained sipping while a green mass of energy Bamfed before Iris' head in the blink of an eye. "What about that, huh?"

"She Warps all the time, Zakira." Etan sighed. "She has her own dimension, after all."

His annoyance turned to intrigue once the ceiling shifted again. This time into a sandy material that became gaseous in some places and liquid in others, even while it deposited before her for integration. "M…" It was almost like he didn't want to say it, the way Etan shied away from us. "Molecular Magic," he said flatly.

"Oh, she does that all the time." I gave him a playful slap on the shoulder. "Eats things. Changes her body. You know how it is."

"You're just mad you don't get to take naps."

Etan rolled his eyes away from Iris, striding back into the room as if she had just crowned herself Empress. "I cannot be mad about something I have never done."

"Boo ho-hoo!" We all turned with wrinkled brows at Zakira, who was shedding actual tears away with a handkerchief while she sobbed hysterically, and so convincingly that even I struggled to discern fact from fiction. "They grow up so fast!"

I couldn't help but snicker, as what she said had some truth no matter how cliche it was to admit it. Iris may have retained her childish enthusiasm and picked up a few habits from me and Zakira along the way, but she was no longer the little girl I picked up from an orphanage just a few days or relative years ago. Now, Iris Cole was a young lady standing proudly at 190 centimeters. She still had her trademark blueprint tunic draped over her frame, but now she had added a cropped jacket of black denim to complete her fit. Similarly, her Pacific-blue eyes highlighted her Saharan-tan skin like before. Only, it was covered in a diadem dissimilar to mine, being solid and filled with technology, rather than mana. Yet its function was more or less the same.

As advertised, she settled herself on a sofa between Zakira and me to begin integrating her new spiritual organs into her systems, uncaring entirely for the new arrivals entering the room.

"Ugh! Officers. Slacking as always."

"Now, now, Leary." Etan snickered. "You know how it is with her."

The goblin paragon flicked his yellow eyes between me and Etan before a shrug pushed a rasped sigh from his lungs.

Quite the interesting character Leary turned out to be. At times, I considered him nothing more than a green-skinned man with large ears; I was reminded of where he came from at other times; and at all times, he wore vestments of his armor to remind everyone of who he was. Bone fingers encircled his chest, forming an X-shaped brace that stretched over and under his arms, ultimately meeting a rat skull on his sternum. Osseous helmets or hats or hoods rested atop his head. The finest suits, tunics, and trousers were tailored to fit around his protruding spine and showcase his volatile ribs. He was... elegant.

"What about those beneath her?" Leary sighed again. "She has about thirty, you know."

"Several of whom are not human." Etan countered and subsequently turned at the sound of a violin abruptly cutting short.

"Aww! Don't tell me we're late?"

"You missed Iris' mind-breaking affinities, yes," Etan answered bluntly, never removing his eyes from the screens. "From what I can see, however, Blude and her Mafia are due next."

"And there's about seventy of them." Leary chimed.

"Still haven't learned to live and laugh, I see." Rickley hopped into her seat with a sigh. "Just give it a couple of centuries, Leary. You'll get it eventually."

"This will take forever, though, will it not? There are so many of them! I mean, it's impossible for Geri to make friends so she only has six, and only two of them are human. But, Freki? The boy is good. He has over fifty ravenous beasts! It'll be days if we go at this rate."

"Calm down, Leary! You'll be fine." Rickley said, reaching for my joint. "We've been working for years. Play is just as important."

"Oh, lady, my work is play."

"He has a point," I said as I sparked up another joint. "The ceremony is done twice a year in Maru for everyone who turned fifteen that year. There will eventually be billions in the Legions alone, however, so building a core Annex in each of our territories may not be enough. We may have to make it a tradition for people to awaken their cores on their fifteenth birthday. Or just… teach everyone to build them.

"But that's neither here nor there. Look." I pointed to what appeared to me as a Waterworld taking form before a much, much larger Blude. At 202 centimeters, she looked the part of the Amazonian everyone thought she was, and the Gerdian Abbot Eiriol claimed she was. Only her sorcery belied that appearance. A basin of silver misty water that represented her Silverstream Sorcery. That, however, was only the beginning, for that same water soon flow from above, forming a blue sphere of water, clouds, and ice that represented her affinity for Oceanic Magic.

With the absorption of her divine energy, the ceiling turned into a many-layered field of green that deposited an affinity for Kelp Magic into the matriarch. Followed soon after by the amorphous ridges of Coral Magic and the endless spheres of Bubble Magic. Then, as Leary proclaimed, the rest of her Mafia followed suit. As Leary implied, it was a lot. So, we elected to observe the Troupe's direct subordinates and alter the perceptions of time in our booth to skim through the rest.

The first direct subordinate of Blude's was Gwehn, a 192 centimeters-tall woman in a blubber jacket and shit-kicker boots. A woman who delved into the world of sports and somehow came out with affinities for Blubber and Fin Magic on top of her innate affinity for Sea Sorcery. Nevertheless, she took it in strides and returned to watch the half-elf of her pod take the stand. Lizlee, being one of the orphans from Chor, became Blude's bard and thus a master of media, granting her affinities for Ray and Echo magic on top of her Mist Sorcery.

Redd, like Blude, saw her Silversteel Sorcery materialize into a mass that looked both like ice and steel before a shifting sheet of ice and rock appeared before her, condensing into her core for Glacial Magic. When the ceiling illuminated once more, it did so as nearly a dozen ribbons of various colors. Rather than an organ, it formed more of a loop around her 195 centimeters of mass and assimilated for the cameras to display its name for the rest of us- Current Magic. Unfortunately, her other affinities weren't as eye-catching; a hardly perceptible field of air for her Pressure Magic and an ebbing and flowing mass of energy for her Tidal Magic.

Jayde was the Mafia's financial adviser. Standing at 189 centimeters, she was the second-shortest made member; slim and spectacled, and always dressed in a fine suit. Like her matriarch, her sorcery revolved around ice. Specifically, Iceberg Sorcery, and she was granted affinities for Plastic and Scale Magic. Sam, on the other hand, was in the middle in terms of height, standing 198 cm. She was as lean as I suspected she'd be but honed with the body of a monastic lifestyle. It was with her that we started to see the truly remarkable affinities.

Her sorcery granted her dominion over Silversteam, which had been compounded with her Geyser Magic. More eccentric, however, was her Vent, Temperature, and Victual magic. The latter of which sent everyone on a frenzy of hypotheses and what ifs as to its nature. I suspected the power only worked on prepared food, working to provide buffs and the like. And if it did produce food on its own, I imagined it wouldn't taste very well. Regardless, we grew eager to both see it in action and proceed with the awakenings. As was the Mafia, given the speed with which Emily ran to the pedestal.

As the absolute shortest human matriarch of the Mafia, Emily stood at 187 centimeters and had a perpetually messy mane of raven-black hair cradling her face. Being an alchemist and a witch, she was the primary drug-manufacturer of the Legio Noctis. Thus, I grew to know her quite well. Perhaps that was the reason she was granted three affinities atop her Sorcerous Clouds rather than two like Jayde and Gwehn. Regardless, she was granted Filter Magic in addition to affinities for Glass and Venom. Not poison, interestingly enough, but an ability presumed to inject a target with an energy that could produce any imagined effect.

Much to Leary's dismay, the made members of Blude's Mafia didn't awaken their cores just yet. Instead, the other titans of the Troupe made their way inside the antechamber. And from there, only three emerged.

The first was the Hateful Hoarder of Winter. A 210-centimeter tall pillar of lean muscle, braided white hair, and pale skin. Geri, the Winter Werewolf. Her power- and her brother's- was most extraordinary. Like everyone else, their powers held a dual nature. Unlike everyone else, however, they were celestial deities. And so, both- or rather, their only powers came from their sorcery.

The power of the Winter Wolf was represented as a basin filled with frozen fauna and frosted flora contained in a spherical jewel that floated above it like the moon. In darkness, it shone, but when shined upon by the light those flowers bloomed, those plants and animals thawed, birthing a beating heart of Spring on the far side of that organ. That was it. Geri had no more affinities to show for. But her subordinates, bitten to share in her curse, were spared from her arcane fate. They held the power of Winter and Spring as Geri did. But so too did Katheryn, her Bard, receive affinities for Amplification, Vibration, and Wave Magic. That made for a hypothesis that was all but confirmed when Rhonda, the mechanic, received affinities that would benefit her occupation as well. Electrical Magic, Weld Magic, and Lift Magic.

As was stated, the same was true for the Mocking Marauder of Summer. At a staggering 223 centimeters of rippling muscle, wavy black hair, and solar eyes, Freki was easily the tallest member of the Troupe. His Summer and Autumnal Sorcery was something he often used with reckless abandon. Albeit not to its fullest extent. However, the grains, flowers, and fungi that ripened as his sun set before him were something he needed to see to believe. Only for his farm worlds was his Autumnal Sorcery ever used; which was more than his sister could say, at least. At any rate, they returned to the antechamber just like the Mafia before them, and it was through that crowd of titans that two tiny giants emerged.

The first was a frail young man standing perhaps 170 centimeters tall. Brooding, even from behind his hooded lab coat and goggles, his rumbling complaints echoed through the chamber as he slapped a skeletonized metal hand onto the crystal and tapped his foot impatiently. Although he wanted to return to his labs, no one could blame Wilson's impatience, for we were on the edge of our seats in wait to see what he was granted. And my first Undying Fiend was granted a lot.

From our pact, he was permitted to use an energy that saw a black smog fill the basin; from which emerged a fire of a similar color to my arcana. Necromancy, but without the shadows. On the contrary, the domed ceiling began to hiss and steam as vibrant and putrid fluids seeped, dripped, and pooled to form a quite vile affinity core- Corrosion Magic.

It was the first of such vile powers, for indeed, the fluids changed in both color and viscosity once the core was absorbed. Some fluids bubbled while other liquids frothed, foaming into eldritch shapes that all condensed into a core for Chemical Magic. Worse, it got, as the fluids dried into a husk that threatened to pull the very chamber to the ground. Only for rubble to condense from the ambient energy and take shape into a core for Decay Magic.

But yet again, energy poured from the ceiling. This time, a violent tempest was conjured next to stampeding avalanches and other chaotic scenes born from mana to create a core for Disaster Magic; truly a world-breaking power for such a frail man. But even those were tame in comparison to the last one standing in the antechamber.

She was a half-elven woman, standing 175 centimeters tall. Lithe and petite, she was, with skin that seemed unsettlingly doll-like; especially around her neck and hairline. Reina, the corrupted druid one-upped the Eldritch Artificer in terms of power, for she was given Sorcerous Twilight to make her dual druidic powers possible. While Rickley also obtained Twilight, Reina's was more... pure. The heavenly glow she poured into the ceiling merged with her yellow arcana as it cascaded into the ceiling to out pour the most putrid of fluids. From that juxtaposition, an affinity for Disease Magic was born. And once it withered into a cake of soil above those crystals, it gave rise to a verdant field of Flora Magic.

From those fields of flowers, the foul again arose to take the form of flesh. Blood and bile and guts and gore filled the space above, churning with sickening sounds to present an amorphous beating blob for the druid to take with pleasure. Yet, as if Telin was imposing some metaphor on me, the vile sight of her Flesh Magic Core gave rise to the most pure magic of all.

It appeared as a light that boiled the field of blood off the stone. Into the air, it evaporated and condensed into bright pink particles, eventually creating a comically drawn heart that beat with the drums of Life Magic.

Such a revelation made for a night of revelry. Even while the hundred or so staff officers awakened their cores, we ate and smoked and drank and absorbed ourselves in recreation. Making general conversation based on the interesting abilities that arose or asking questions based on the most curious entries in their Tomes. The calm before the storm, it was; and ended with Iris perking up to inquire about the Maruleans awakening their cores.

"It's all part of the list I had them start building," I told her.

Etan, however, was the one to reply. "I am curious. Are we to obtain as many prestige classes as you have?"

"Oh, no." I snickered knowingly. "Your work thus far, and those tomes of yours put you on the path toward something much, much better. Legendary Classes. Not that I'll tell you what that means."

"Oh! What about the ordinary people?" Iris cheekily asked. "If every city has a tree and regular people eat fruits, will they get ordinary classes? Like, Merchant. Or Farmer?"

"That's ridiculous." Etan rolled his eyes.

"We're ridiculous." Iris tutted, pointing at me. "He's the God of such wondrous things."

"I- ugh. Whatever."