NOVEL WEB Fiery Friend
Ben had been intrigued when he saw the pitch-black snake hissing and staring at him with its ruby-red eyes and split pupils. It didn't take long for Ben to identify the snake, as it was the only venomous snake native to the UK and the only snake found above the Arctic Circle, The European Adder. It was quite unusual to spot one with completely black scales though, they were more common up in the mountains, not here in East London.
Since it was deadly and beautiful, Ben naturally had to add it to his harem of familiars. Well, that was not the only reason, the other and more prominent reason was, Parseltongue.
Yes, since he could communicate with his familiar through the mind, it should be able to teach him the language of the snakes, right?
Wrong! Turns out, snakes are not great listeners. While not completely deaf, they can only hear sounds up to a frequency of six hundred hertz; as the hissing frequency ranges between three thousand to thirteen thousand hertz, they can't really hear any of it.
Ben kept making all sorts of hissing noises and Karl just gave him a look that said,
"Bruh!! Are you for real?!!"
But when Harry had made hissing sounds in the movies, the snakes heard him just fine, this made Ben come to the conclusion that Parseltongue couldn't simply be another language like Gobbledegook or Mermish, and some kind of magic must be involved in it. But since he hadn't even heard someone speak Parseltongue till now, it was difficult to say exactly.
Apart from the death noodle, which was now peacefully coiled up on Ben's pillow, there were a few more additions of note.
Ash Shell: Targets that fail to resist are immobilized in hardened ash.
Detect Life: Detect nearby living creatures, even through walls. (Can not detect undead, machines or Daedra)
Telekinesis: Manifest your mind's power to interact with the world; you don't have to bend over to pick up the dropped soap.
Transmute: Transmute unrefined Iron ore to Silver, or Silver ore to Gold; a Mage must transcend material wealth.
Banish Daedra: Send them back where they came from; Banish weaker Daedra to Oblivion.
Bound Bow: Summons a magic bow and a quiver full of magic arrows.
--I'm not going to describe each spell here, there are a lot of them and most of them are self-explanatory, I will give a proper description when they are used--
The first spell Ben had wanted to try was [Transmute] and make some gold, he didn't have any silver ore, but he did manage to find a big rusty red rock lying around.
Ben used [Transmute] on the rock and to his surprise, the rock slowly compressed and turned blackish grey instead of the shiny silver he had been expecting.
"What was I even expecting, it's still an ore," he chuckled at his own stupidity.
In the end, Ben was left with half the amount of ore but its value had increased by more than a few thousand times.
Now the question was whether he would be able to turn it into gold. Ben used [Transmute] again and it was super effective. The silver ore compressed even further and once again halved in size, leaving a fist-sized rock.
Perhaps it was because there were too many impurities in the starting ore, or perhaps this was the limit of this spell, the resulting rock was a mix of gold and quartz.
Ben would still have to refine it to get pure gold, which was not as convenient as he had hoped. Ben decided to store it until he came up with a way to refine it further.
The second most awaited spell had been [Telekinisis] and it did not live up to expectations either. It was not as useless as it was in the game, but it was not much better either. It essentially produced the same result as the Levitation Charm, and Ben was much more proficient in that one by now.
One saving grace for [Telekinisis] seemed to be that, unlike other Adept level spells, it did not use as much Magicka and just like its description, it really was a manifestation of his mind's power.
Ben could feel its control and power increase with his every soul meal and perhaps one-day hell be able to go toe to toe with Jean Grey.
The final and possibly most anticipated had been [Banish Daedra] and it was because he had yet to summon an Atronach even though it had been months since he had learned the spell.
How were the two related? Well, subduing a denizen of the Oblivion was no easy task, it took considerable strength, both of mind and spirit to achieve it. No Mage ever dared to summon one without the supervision of a more experienced Mage; in Ben's case, he himself had to become that more experienced Mage.
Now that he had the [Banish Daedra] spell, he was a little more confident. Then there was the extra assurance of the Nirn Island itself; if anything went wrong and things went haywire, it would all stay confined on the island.
With that thought, Ben used [Conjure Flame Atronach] and the space in front of him rippled and ripped apart and bloomed like a flower. When the space reformed, a majestic being that looked like it was on fire hovered in the air in front of him.
It moved with the grace of a dancing flame and did sort of a summersault right where it stood; it was otherworldly. Ben had never seen something so graceful, not that any human could ever attain this level of elegance.
Its elegant movements, combined with a figure that could make even dead men rise, gave rise to a strange feeling in his stomach. But at the same time, its empty face reminded Ben of exactly what he was facing, a Flame Atronach, an embodiment of fire itself.
Its skimpy black metal armour fitted on a perfectly proportioned female form worked perfectly to distract you from its deadly claws, toes and swept-back horns. Its softly burning flame body that relaxed your mind with its faint whistling and crackling sounds was perfectly capable of reducing you to ashes in a matter of minutes.
"Summoned to do a mortal's bidding! Aeons must have passed since I last saw of your kind, mortal."
A voice that sounded like a mix of burning embers and whispering of flames rang out in Ben's mind.
