Ember of Invention

The two of them emptied the last sack of mushrooms and Lindle stepped back as Thalia drew her wand. She took a deep breath, closing her eyes before pointing Lotus Thorn ahead. There was silence for a few moments before the druid began to mutter under her breath, and under Lindle’s Ethos sense, he saw a large knot of life ethos grow inside of her, traveling from her center where her personal Ethos burned up to her wand. Passing through the artifact, it somehow grew in depth, an extra layer of power added to the blob of energy, before being expelled into the air and settling over the small field of mushrooms, perfectly in line with the circle Thalia had made. The area glowed, and as one, the mushrooms all began to grow.

There was a look of intense concentration on Thalia’s face, but so far the ritual seemed unexpectedly basic. It just looked like she was dumping a bunch of life Ethos over the mushrooms. Thalia had said it wasn’t going to be particularly complex, but aside from sheer power, this honestly seemed simpler than casting a normal spell, controlling his mana to cast a normal tier 1 spell was less straightforward.

Ah, mana. Lindle would have let out a sigh to himself if he didn’t care about disrupting Thalia. Lindle couldn’t see mana, he could see the Ethos inside of the ritual, but his feat and the mechanics of the spell worked on different layers so to speak. He had gotten used to thinking in terms of his artifacts and ingredients, so because he could sense the spell, he had attempted to inspect it in those terms, but all he could tell was that its Ethos was aspected towards life, without the intentions he pushed into his artifacts. The fact that he could sense a spell at all was useful, he hadn’t thought to test doing so before, but he’d have to remember that he’d likely be blind to the internal workings of any spell or aura technique aside from his own. An aura sense or a mana sense, like Dorothea and he assumed Thalia had, was useful for identifying the nature of a hostile spell or technique. Seeing the outside world in terms of Ethos would be like seeing everything written in a completely different language to what was common, at the very least it was a very intuitive and symbolic one.

Lindle was jolted from his internal musings as he heard Humphrey let out a low whistle, a signal they had agreed on earlier. He looked up to his Humphrey gesturing ahead with an arrow nocked. Lindle frowned. Undead were already converging on their location, attracted to the mass of life energy Thalia’s ritual was creating, though he didn’t seem alarmed, so it couldn’t be an overwhelming amount. He fingered his pouch, debating on whether or not he rush out to intercept before they got too close. He didn’t want to leave his friend's side, but Humphrey was much better positioned to keep watch over her without anything sneaking past.

He pulled out a Str enhancement potion and started running in the direction Humphrey signaled. Seeing his intentions the ranger quickly held up three fingers. Good, he could handle that many. Lindle poured on the speed as he drew on his Str and Dex stats, running past the wilted trees. It wasn’t long until he spotted a flash of bone white against the sickly green brush and grey-brown trees.

Lindle activated [Flow] as soon as he saw the monsters, taking the time to figure out what he was dealing with. Three undead, one of which being a familiar feline skeleton, but accompanying it were two zombies, likely early victims of the horde when they first burst out of the ground. An elk, its antlers reminding him grimly of Humphrey’s but since it was one of the common species instead of a dire it would be easily handled. Lastly a Wooly Razorback, the biggest threat of the trio, but one he could take without issue if he took down the other two quickly. They were moving at a steady pace, but not fast enough to indicate they had noticed any prey yet.

The trees were a bit too bunched together and soaked with miasma to make him comfortable using a fire bomb, luckily he had built up a good bit of momentum, and he had a good idea on how to use it. Lindle downed the potion and began sprinting even faster, channeling aura to his legs, not for [Trek], but to use [Power Strike].

When the sound of his footsteps reached the undead, they had only begun to turn slightly in his direction before both of his boots slammed into the skeleton’s neck and ribs, shattering bone as he dropkicked it to the Beyond.

Lindle was ready as the two zombies immediately charged at him, tusks and antlers lowered to gore him. Leaning on his Dex stat and [Flow] he twisted before he hit the ground and leaped to meet the zombie elk, stopping it as he grabbed it by the antlers and allowed the Razorback to rush past him. He pulled and twisted the elk’s neck, a grotesque crack ringing out, and grimaced as it continued to move. HP would have prevented a fatal injury like that in the first place for a living creature, but on an undead it simply allowed it to remain animated. Lindle pulled it by the antlers, bending the neck at a horrifying angle as he brought his knee up in another [Power Strike]. Blood covered his knee as the zombie slumped over, shattering its head having caused its HP to bottom out.

Lindle turned around to see the zombie Razorback coming back towards him. The last time he had seen one of these giant boars charging at him, Lindle had fled, but this time he held his ground. Idly he tried to target it with [Hunter Gatherer], but he didn’t feel any real motivation to make use of any parts of the zombie, so no surge in any of his stats appeared, but that was fine. He eyed the Razorback's tusks as they bore down on him, but when it came to tusks, Lindle’s was much bigger.

Taking a few subjective moments to make sure the angle was right, Lindle dropped to the ground on his side, bracing the mammoth tusk strapped to the side of his pack against the ground, the tip pointed straight at the zombie, allowing it to impale itself on its own momentum. It struggled for a few seconds before expiring.

Lindle smiled as he deactivated [Flow], standing up and pulling the corpse of the mammoth tusk before he started running back to rejoin his friends. With how he had gone about destroying the undead, he had a bit more fun than was strictly necessary, but after how nearly disastrous fighting the mammoth had been it had felt nice to take an easy victory. Not everything had to be done in the most efficient way possible, though that did sound like something Madam Holly would say. Maybe she was rubbing off on him.

Once he got back, he saw Humphrey give him a thumbs up from his perch with an amused grin, which Lindle returned. He had likely been able to see Lindle’s fight. The ranger followed up by holding up a finger and pointing an arrow in another direction, which Lindle took to mean there had been another undead, but he had taken care of it.

It seemed like the only things around were stragglers, good for them, but Lindle did find it a bit worrying how far spread out that meant the undead were. Taking care of the wellspring meant that the undead would weaken and limit the number of corpses they could raise severely, but it was starting to look like it would take a lot longer than expected to clear the undead from this section of the Black Wood entirely, probably several days to track down each one. That was much longer than they had planned on the quest taking, between their limited rations and the increased risk from more undead like the White Mammoth potentially appearing, Lindle figured their best option after Thalia finished would be to head straight home and report that the wellspring had been stronger than reported and that it was likely that there would be small groups of undead wandering around the forest. The quest should be considered complete once the wellspring was gone.

Speaking of which, where before the wellspring had been a large bare crack in the ground covered in small shrooms, there were now mushrooms almost as tall as Lindle sprouting in front of Thalia, filling the crack and covering the withered trees and snow in a dense miniature forest. His eyebrows raised in surprise at the explosive growth, and in real-time Lindle could see the miasma and Ethos aspected with undeath get sucked into the mushrooms, getting converted to life energy.

For the next few minutes, Lindle watched, keeping an eye out for danger, but most of his attention was consumed as the mushrooms spread beyond the ritual circle Thalia had drawn and filled the area with life. Even the trees regained their natural color and splendor as the mushrooms grew around them.

Eventually, Thalia stopped chanting and the mushrooms stopped growing, the flow of life Ethos Lindle could see coming from her wand cutting off. Humphrey quickly, and loudly, his antlers rustling as they banged against several rejuvenated branches, climbed down to join them, both the ranger and Lindle looked around them and at her in awe.

Thalia turned around to face them, her lips quirked upward in a prideful smile at their expressions, but with a raised eyebrow. “I know I said to make sure I’m not disturbed, but I meant make sure nothing attacks me. You guys didn’t need to stay completely silent the entire time. It was honestly kind of creepy.”

“Ah…” Lindle wasn’t sure what to say to that.

Humphrey opened his mouth to talk, but immediately inhaled some of the spores Lindle noticed were beginning to fill the area and bent down into a sneezing fit. “Ah-choo!”

Lindle felt his nose begin to run, and he started wiping at it furiously.

Thalia rolled her eyes. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”

Chapter 1 of Necronomics/Bohemian Necromancy

Today was the day I planned on dying, but it seemed like I might get killed before that could happen.

The timing was horrible really. How would you react, if, while you were eating lunch, a trio of strangers burst into your room, pointed weapons at you, and declared that your evil schemes were at an end, before launching spells and arrows at you? Well, I reacted by dropping my sandwich onto the ground as the wards built into my cloak and mask flared to life, protecting me as I stood frozen in shock before I regained my wits, diving for cover before they could be overwhelmed.

I mourned my sandwich as I hid behind the large stone coffin I’d been using as a kitchen counter for the last few months. I hadn’t been planning on eating again after today for a very long time, if ever, so I had used the last of the food I’d been saving for a special occasion. I’d even used real beef and honey!

A bit of frantic laughter escaped my lips, my body shaking. I just almost died, and I was thinking about my lunch.

“Surrender foul necromancer!” A loud confident voice boomed out across the room. I peeked my head over the altar, seeing the heavily armored man standing in the center of the trio pointing a mace at me. “Submit to the gods’ judgment, and they may take mercy upon your soul.”

We stared at each other for several seconds, before I slowly shook my head no. The other two, a slender-looking man wearing chainmail and holding a bow, and a short woman in leather armor and a cloak with a mage’s staff, lowered their weapons slightly in confusion, but the man in the center simply narrowed his eyes, a look of anger coming across his face. “So be it!”

He gripped an amulet around his neck and closed his eyes, muttering to himself. My eyes widened as I sensed a horrifying amount of radiant energy gather around him. Instead of waiting to see what he was going to do with it, I immediately turned around and ran. A blinding gold beam of light and radiant energy slammed into the altar seconds later, blowing it to bits.

My initial shock blossomed into full panic as I sprinted down the dark stone halls, lit only by flickering blue lanterns. The church knew I was here, and they had sent a paladin! How?! Why?! I had been so careful. I never attacked anyone with undead minions or tried to take over any villages. I haven’t even raided any local cemeteries for corpses! I sourced all my bones and parts from an abandoned underground catacomb deep in the swamps that only I knew about.

My underdeveloped muscles started to ache as I continued running, but I didn’t dare stop. They’d be right behind me, and with how painfully unfit I was they’d catch up in no time. I’d have no chance if they caught up to me, so I needed to slow them down.

I turned a corner and headed deeper into the catacombs, reaching the room where I kept some of my old experiments. I gathered a bit of my magical energy in my hand before snapping my fingers. It wasn’t a true spell, but a signal I had prepared ahead of time.

Around me, ancient skeletons stirred to unlife, pale blue flames appearing in their eye sockets, clambering off worktables and crawling out of the comb-like storage shelves. On each of their skulls were scribbled numbers ranging from 728 to 852.

“Hold them off,” I said gasping. “Delay them for as long as you can,” I ordered the skeletons. They moved to obey wordlessly, streaming back into the hallway behind me as I continued running. That would buy me some time, but not a lot. A horde of basic skeletons would barely faze a paladin, he’d tear through them like paper, but I didn’t have anything better.

Not that I wasn’t a good necromancer, I considered myself pretty talented when it came to magic, I’d just never needed a reason to keep any powerful combat undead around before, that wasn’t exactly my focus. I was a researcher, not a stereotypical raider, I wasn’t planning to raise an army. I knew enough magic to defend myself, and necromancy in general was pretty lethal to living creatures, but against a group of trained warriors led by a paladin? Nope, absolutely not, I’d go down in ten seconds flat.

If I was going to survive, I had only one choice, I needed to die. And then undie.

I reached my destination, slamming the doors shut behind me, activating the wards, and then layering another few wards on top of that with some hasty spells. This room had been a chapel of whatever faith had built this place, repurposed for a new cause, though one I wasn’t sure the original owners would approve of.

Around me, the collection of months and months of continuous research filled the room. Books of my notes and old grimoires lay open side by side next to walls worth of magical calculations. In the space where the church pews had been, I had dug two large trenches, filled with black blood, or as it was colloquially known, oil. At the back of the room on a stage was a massive ritual circle, in the center of which was an altar covered head to toe with runes I had made.

I hastily rechecked all my notes and made sure everything was in place. I had planned on going through the ritual with the gravitas and caution it deserved, but now I was on the clock, so I’d have to hope that the older me hadn’t messed up somewhere. I grabbed the vials of my own blood I had saved up and poured them all into the bowl atop the altar. The minute holes in the bottom of the bowl leaked my blood into the grooves I had carved.

I then pulled out a much larger potion bottle, filled with a vile-looking swirling substance. I took off the stopper, plugged my nose, and began chugging.

To anyone familiar with necromancy, what I was doing might be recognized as the beginnings of the ritual required to ascend to lichdom, but they might note that there were several things off about my ritual. For one, there were no screaming victims surrounding me for me to sacrifice their souls, I had no idea why the grimoires I had read specified that they should be screaming, I didn’t look too deeply into that part. There also usually would be profane symbols dedicated to various dark gods and other entities liked to sponsor new liches, Nyxatoth was a popular choice. In their place, however, the symbols seemed to be a lot closer to those used by light-aligned gods, like Haldrios. Most important, however, was the lack of anything that seemed like an obvious soul cage.

Traditionally, achieving lichdom would involve me ripping out my soul and stuffing it into a receptacle infused with the souls of my victims so it would be capable of holding it, keeping my essence safe and sound, and granting me new undead bodies each time my old one was destroyed. I had felt I could do better than that. Plus I had ethical and logistical concerns about the whole sacrificing a bunch of innocent people’s souls thing, so I had come up with a different idea. There was something a lot more powerful and much more plentiful I could use to power my ritual instead, and I knew for sure it would be able to contain my soul, in fact, it would become my soul.

I tossed aside the bottle, my face scrunched up in disgust as I tried to ignore the taste and focused, placing both my hands on the desecrated altar. I poured every drop of my magical energy into the glowing runes as I began casting. In front of me, the black blood bubbled and steamed as it was rapidly consumed to help me fuel the ritual. A black haze began to fill the air.

“Gods above and below, hear me. My name is Ozymandias, he who would be lord of the dead, gaze upon me and tremble as I ascend beyond death and make myself its master.”

Words continued spilling from my mouth, the ritual itself made me sound like an arrogant narcissist, but some arrogance was probably necessary for what I was doing, and the ritual reflected that. I simply had to hope my spell would allow me to back up the hot air I was spewing and any deities that happened to be listening wouldn’t be offended.

I was halfway through the ritual when I heard thumping at my door. I sped up. The thumping got louder as the doors shook, my wards keeping them together. My words began feeding into each other into a single continuous noise, the deep and dramatic voice I had practiced in the mirror for weeks breaking into a high-pitched squeak.

“Beholdmypoweranddespair!”

I finished the words and scrambled for the last thing I needed, and by far the most important piece of the ritual, my athame, when the doors exploded. Stone and wood shrapnel filled the air and a particularly large chunk of door flew straight at my face. My wards attempted to hold it back valiantly but were overwhelmed and I was sent twirling to the floor.

Dazed, I felt something warm begin running down my face from my forehead. I felt upwards and my hand came away bloody. Numbly I realized my mask had fallen off as well. I looked around but didn’t see it. I did, however, spot my athame on the ground, the blade seeming untouched by all the dust and rubble, the silver steel and feathered design of the hilt as pristine as the day I had found it.

I reached for it when I heard footsteps behind me, and a gathering of magical energy indicating a spell.

“Stop! Turn around and face me.” A woman’s voice commanded me.

Slowly, I rolled onto my back to see the woman pointing her staff at me, a fire spell ready to burn me to ash.

“You have nowhere to go, surrender peacefully and-” Her red eyes widened in shock. “You’re… just a kid?”

I was 19 thank you very much, I thought somewhat hysterically, though my fear kept me from speaking the words aloud. It wasn’t my fault food wasn’t readily available to me after my village ran me out after I had tried to bring my dog back to life as a child.

“What are you doing Sybil!” The paladin marched up to her furiously. “End him now!”

The mage, Sybil, hesitated and turned her head to look at him. “But…”

Their distraction bought me just enough time to break out of my fear. I grabbed my athame.

“No!” The paladin roared, and raised his mace, glowing with radiant power to smite me. Too late.

I plunged my athame into my own heart, and the world burst into a swirl of black and white. Then I died.