B5 Chapter 34 – Lessons and Homework

“This is… quite the piece of work.”

The spectre of what had once been Master Willhem, the greatest Arcanist of the Western Province, ran his bony hands along the sketches Tyron had created. Covered in dense layers of sigils bound tightly in interlocking arrays, it was the most complicated bit of sigil work the Necromancer had ever created.

He wasn’t even sure if it would work.

“The numbers I was dealing with were… challenging,” Tyron was forced to admit. “I’ve done the best I can, but I need to run your ruler over it, if you could, Master Willhem.”

The demi-lich turned his crystal-filled sockets toward his former student. It would have been nice, if there was some flicker of the person he had been before in there, a hint of his irascible nature, his greed, or his pride. However, there was nothing. A demi-lich was a skeleton filled with Arcane Marrow, a red crystal-like growth that bound itself to a soul. Remnants of the old Arcanist’s personality did persist, but they couldn’t be seen through his ‘eyes’.

“You want me to mark your assignment? I haven’t done that for a while.”

Tyron blinked, then coughed. He was tempted to remind his former Master that it was exceedingly rare for him to directly involve himself in the work of his students. While learning at his shop, Tyron had gotten more attention from the Master than most due to his dedication, but even then, Willhem would only give him direct guidance every few weeks.

“Well, I would be grateful. I’m not as familiar with dimensional magick as I should be to work on something like this.”

“Looks like you’ve got a fair handle on it to me,” the demi-lich mused, still running his finger along the sigils on the page. “Although, I may need to speak to another in regards to this matter. Is that acceptable?”

“Someone else? Who?” Tyron was confused. Who would Master Willhem possibly need to consult? The answer came to him the same moment the demi-lich confirmed it.

“Master Halfshard made a detailed study of the sigils related to dimensional magick while she was still a student. If she hadn’t allowed herself to get distracted in such esoteric fields, she would have graduated faster than you.”

Of course it was Master Halfshard. Having seen her work with his own eyes, Tyron knew she was an Arcanist close to the level of Willhem. He had nothing but respect for her skill.

“If you can convince her to look at it, then I would be grateful. She still isn’t my biggest fan.”

“That is putting it mildly,” Master Willhem confirmed. “However, I believe this thing will pique her interest. Where is this dimensional portal supposed to go?”

“The Realm of the Dead,” Tyron said, refusing to hide the truth. “It connects this realm to the Realm of the Dead.”

If a demi-lich were capable of blinking in surprise, Master Willhem would have done so in that moment.

“I… see,” he said finally. He turned his gaze back to the page and looked over the arrays one more time. “Yes, yes I suppose that does make sense. Is this… safe?”

“I don’t know,” Tyron replied, again with total honesty. “But we aren’t capable of holding out against the Empire as we are now. I need a method to get stronger, and this is the best one I can find right now.”

Master Willhem nodded slowly.

“Very well. I will speak to my former student. If she agrees, our work will proceed much faster. Even so, it will take time to create something of this magnitude.”

“It takes as long as it takes. I’ll help myself, as often as I can.”

With that, Tyron reached out a hand, and after a pause, his former Master extended his own. Shaking hands with a skeleton was a delicate process, but even so, there was something humanizing about it. Excusing himself from Willhem’s workshop, he stepped out into the street and thought for a moment.

As people recognised him, they stepped away, giving him space. From fear or respect, Tyron didn’t know, nor did he really care.

Trying to decipher the sigils that would allow travel to the Realm of the Dead had been much harder than he’d expected, even with the help of Dove and Yor. Not that Yor was much help. He’d bargained for her assistance, but if she feigned ignorance of a particular sigil, how was he to know? Despite the difficulties, he’d been able to piece together enough of the theory to finish the work himself.

Then, he’d had to take that theory and try to create a functional ritual that would enable him to make the journey. He’d quickly realised that a simple ritual would not be enough to contain the volume and complexity of magick required to perform this feat. As such, he’d been forced to design enchantments to help supplement the spell, which he wasn’t skilled enough to create himself.

It would take weeks for the work to be done. Even if they rushed, the complexity of the enchanting meant testing would be required and likely significant reworks, not to mention the sheer volume of magick required to complete the cast. The Realm of the Dead was not an easy place to reach, and Tyron honestly felt he was not ready to take on such a challenge, but he was out of options. At most, he could squeeze out another level by sending his skeletons to the plains and sweeping up kin before the Empire returned. He didn’t have enough time for anything more than that.

For now, though, he had things he needed to take care of. First of which, he had a class to teach.

It took a few hours to get his three apprentices free from their own obligations, in which Tyron refreshed himself and took a brief nap. He had promised them a lesson regarding Mysteries after he had awoken at the rift, and he had delayed a long time, distracted by more pressing matters.

Richard, Georg and Briss were busy little bees these days. There was a small army of undead-related workers beneath the ruined temple, experimenting, progressing, teaching and learning to advance the knowledge of their arts. Other than providing his own instructions in the form of his volume of notes, Tyron hadn’t done much direct teaching, rather leaving it to these three to deal with.

Somehow, his apprentices had proven themselves to be an effective team, working with the Necromancers, Bone Smiths, Corpse Weavers, and Spirit Speakers to try and develop a unified art of Necromancy. Tyron had advanced many of these fields himself, crafting with bones, creating undead, forging constructs, communing with spirits, but now he was happy to see how these more focused Classes handled some of these tasks.

In particular, he was keen to see if they disagreed with any of his conclusions. If he was on the wrong path, he would like to be corrected as soon as possible. For now, they were too low level for such a thing to be likely, but eventually it may come to pass.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

The bottleneck was always materials. They needed dead bodies and souls, a lot of them. When people living in the ruined city died, they had the option to donate their remains, and many did, out of gratitude or some other motivation, but that still wasn’t enough.

Briss’ eyes sparkled as she struggled to sit still in her seat. It was clear she was excited for this lesson. In fact, even Richard and Georg were looking unusually enthused. Richard with his pen and paper at the ready, looking at his teacher expectantly, Georg with a straighter posture than usual, eyes focused as if he were about to learn something profound. Maybe he would, maybe he wouldn’t.

There wasn’t much light in Tyron’s sitting room. A relatively small space with a crackling fireplace and four chairs placed around a low table, it was… cozy, and comfortable, but not especially well appointed. Tyron sat himself in his own favourite chair and sighed. His body had become so hardened he almost couldn’t feel the softening of the cushions anymore. There were drawbacks to being too sturdy.

“Alright then,” he said, “Mysteries.”

All three of the students leaned forward eagerly. Tyron shrugged.

“What do you want to know?” he asked them.

The students slumped.

“What do you mean?” Briss demanded. “I thought you were going to teach us about them.”

“Ah, yes,” Richard stumbled. “I was hoping that you… would be… ah… forthcoming?”

What did that even mean?

Georg eyed him a little suspiciously.

“Are you intending to hide something from us? We don’t know anything about Mysteries, so we don’t know what questions to ask.”

Tyron held up his hands.