《Gatekeeper of Death》 Chapter 1: awakening John Smith was an average 16-year-old boy. He was a few inches short of six foot tall. Average. He had short brownish hair. Average. His body looked to be kind of in shape, but not great shape. Average. The only thing at all unique about this incredibly average boy, were his piercing dark green eyes. They were eyes that looked wholly out of place on such an average person. But John Smith was having a wholly non-average day. He would even go as far as to say that today was the worst day of his life. John¡¯s day started early. Living east of Houston, Texas, he had to get up early to drive all the way to College Station where he was planning to go to university. The second largest university in Texas was in that relatively small town, and he was going with his family to take a tour of the campus. An hour and a half into this two-hour drive was when his bad day started. John looked in his old truck¡¯s rear-view mirror at his sleeping mother and sister (Natalie but she prefers Nat) in the back seat, then looked to his side at his slumbering father. He sighed quietly. He hated his truck, but it was all he could afford. it was big and loud and barely fit on this tiny road¡­ but at least he had a car. He kept driving. As he continued down the ¡®short cut¡¯ that apple maps told him would shave 2 minutes off his trip, he wondered if you could even call this a two-lane road. It was more like a one and a half lane road because if a car came down it going the other way, one of them would both have to pull into the grass on the side of the road to pass each other. Silently blessing the great god of cruise control, John just watched the road and moved the wheel slightly. But all of the sudden he saw something that made him think he was crazy. It looked like there was a rhino coming right at his car. But that couldn¡¯t be possible, this was the middle of Texas. He slammed on his breaks causing his family to curse at being so rudely woken up. Coincidentally on a separate plane of existence, said god of cruise control frowned as it felt the imminent danger of one of its devout followers. It started watching what was happening. As the old truck skidded to a stop. The whole family grew silent. Nat broke the sudden silence and asked, ¡°am I dreaming?¡± The rhino huffed in anger. ¡°No, you are not dreaming! What do you see?¡± came a feminine shout, startling everyone in the car even more. Amazed she got a reply, Nat told the truth. ¡°Uhm, well¡­ I see a Rhino the size of a van.¡± A few seconds of quiet passed. Then suddenly the voice started talking again, but much quieter this time. ¡°¡­ let them go, but they have seen too much. First time in 100 years that I take this form and there are witnesses¡­ They can¡¯t even comprehend druid magic, so they can¡¯t even really see me.¡± At this point John realizes the rhino is seemingly muttering to itself. ¡°They could write this off as a wild animal sighting¡­ But there is no reason for a rhino to be here at all. Hmmmm. I guess there is only one thing I can do.¡± John¡¯s face paled when he heard the woman/animal/rhino whisper darkly from in front of his truck. ¡°No witnesses¡­¡± The Rhino charged the old truck and with supernatural speed smashed the truck into the air. With startled screams coming out from the truck¡¯s occupants, the truck landed in the roadside ditch upside down. No one had any time to do anything. John hit his head and blacked out. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________ ¡°Ohh god everything hurts.¡± I felt like my body just had a run in with an industrial shredder. I groaned and opened my eyes. The world was blurry. After blinking a few times, I drew a shaky breath. Before me was an upside-down hell covered in blood. All windows around me were smashed and I was stuck hanging in the air by my seatbelt and what was left of the steering wheel. The thing that used to be my truck was crumpled around me. I glanced around. I was in the bottom of a ditch and was unable to move one of my arms. Blood ran down a gash on my arm to my fingertip and dripped onto the soaked roof of my old truck. I just sat there and stared below me. How was I still alive with that much blood down there? What was I doing here? How did I get in this situation? The fog around my brain started to clear out and I remembered who I was and why I was in the car. Where is my family? I panicked. With my left arm limp and bleeding, I struggled to get off my seatbelt, but the latch was jammed. I struggled for what felt like an eternity. Failing to get anywhere with my blood still slowly poring out of my body, I stopped and forced myself to calm down. Taking deep breaths, I listened to my surroundings. Then I heard a terrible sound. I heard my sister crying. ¡°Why are you doing this?¡± Nat gasped out between tears. ¡°You already took my wife and son! You can have me, just let her live!¡± Dad was begging someone to spare Nat? Wait, they thought I was dead. And mom was gone. No. This can¡¯t happen. Why? Then I heard it. A sickening crunch that stopped my heart. ¡°Dad!¡± Nat screamed. There was no way dad was dead, he was too strong. He was always there. I needed to get out I needed to help my little sister. But I couldn¡¯t get out of my damn seatbelt. ¡°HOW NOBLE! Your fathers last breath was to beg for your life. Too bad. You humans are miserable creatures. Your mages won¡¯t let the rest of us exterminate you, but right now¡­ your time has come.¡± ¡°I will make you pay for this. Somehow.¡± Nat spoke slowly with the voice of someone who has nothing left. It broke my heart. ¡­ ¡­ Her body slammed into the side of the pickup truck ¡­ ¡­ Her body fell down into the ditch, open eyes staring at me. Completely still. ¡­ ¡­ I broke. I screamed. In my head. I willed her to move, to stay alive, to stay here. She was too young. I kept telling her to move in my mind. Get up. Kill the thing that did this to our family. She didn¡¯t move. She couldn¡¯t move. I saw life leave her eyes. No, don¡¯t go! I was still bleeding. My vision blurred. Something popped up in front of me, but I couldn¡¯t see wat it was. I passed out. My sister was dead, she couldn¡¯t move.This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon. ¡­ ¡­ Then, she did. From an unimaginable distance away, the god of cruise control made some calls. This situation was unfortunate enough for him to ask for a favor. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________ ¡°Where is this alarm so that I can turn off?¡± I grumbled as I kept trying to turn off the incessant beeping on my right side. The more I struggled the more it started beeping. Wait. That¡¯s not normal. My eyes shot open and I immediately regretted it. ¡°Who put the sun right in front of my eyes!¡± I screamed at the bright light. I didn¡¯t get a response. I honestly wasn¡¯t sure I wanted one. My location: unknown. Why am I here: unknow- err¡­ Car crash? Maybe a rhino. In Texas. What? I reached up to rub my temples as a headache came on full force. Only one arm went up¡­ That arm found a neck brace. I moved my head¡­ I tried and failed to move my head. The damn alarm was going faster now. ¡°One step at a time¡± I whispered to myself. Step one: Current location. I cracked my eyes, trying to get them used to the sun above me¡­ Okay, not the sun. Just a bright lamp. Eyes opening more I realized that I was in a hospital like room staring straight at the celling. The room had weird blue text boxes that seemed to be floating. Holograms? Whatever, closing my eyes I took inventory over my body. Can¡¯t move my head or neck. Right arm mobile, left¡­ I can feel it, but it seems to be strapped down. Torso and legs¡­ hurts like hell but I guess pain is good. Pain means I am not paralyzed. The beeping slowed down. Opening my eyes again (slowly this time) multiple blue text boxes eventually came into focus. They read,
Congratulations you have awoken to the magical world around you. No longer will your vision of magic creatures and places be edited.
I stared at the screen in front of me utterly confused. How do I see the next bo-
Title gained: Overachiever
You have successfully killed a creature 10 tiers above you within one minute of your awakening.
Effect: Spell learned - Dimensional Storage Space
What the Hell is going on? Have I died and entered a videogame world? I angrily willed all the blue boxes in front of me to just go away. They did. Kind of surprised that willing them to go away actually worked. The beeping continued. It was a heart monitor. That¡¯s my heart rate. Why do I have a heart monitor? OH just the car crash¡­ That killed my family¡­ Panic attack. The heart monitor started screaming as my heart rate shot up. Unknown to me I grasped at my new power just like I did before I passed out. It was this strange power inside me and I reached for it in a panic. It helped center me, calm me down. This power was with me when my family died and I sure as hell wasn¡¯t going to let it go. I heard a door burst open, and someone shout. ¡°Woah there fella settle down now no need to do anything rash. You are in a werebear hospital. We patched you up but you have to calm down. I can take that neck brace off when you lower that threat level of yours.¡± ¡°¡­¡± ¡°Ok I¡¯m taking the brace off. I¡¯m just a doctor so don¡¯t take out any anger on me.¡± With the brace off of me I turned my head to thank him and¡­ He was a bear. Fur and everything. ¡°Please tell me I am not talking to a bear in a lab coat¡­¡± ¡°¡­¡± ¡°¡­¡± ¡°You have never seen a non-human before?¡± ¡°Nope¡± ¡°So you are a newly awakened mage¡± ¡°If that is what you call ¡®trying and failing to not freak out right now at a talking bear in front of me¡¯ then yes¡± ¡°Shit¡± ¡°I believe that is my line¡± ¡°¡­¡± ¡°¡­¡± The doctor/nice guy/bear/??????? ran out of the room. Must be weird reaction to some pain pills. Yep. Nothing weird going on here at all. In a (futile) effort to remain calm, I looked around the room. Hospital beige and white color scheme? Check. Incredibly bright lamp? Check. Calm and collected patient? Nowhere to be found. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________ An hour later a (human) woman in a suit came in and started explaining about the world I had ¡®Awoken to¡¯. I was in shock. So much shock I didn¡¯t even try to check her out. There was an entire magic community hiding in plain sight. Un-awakened humans just can¡¯t comprehend the magic in the world, so their brains change what they see to be something somewhat believable. It is not foolproof. That explains the rhino in the middle of Texas. Next, she talked about how all magical creatures could see what their power levels were. Some people even had spells to see other people¡¯s power level. Power levels ranged from 25 as the lowest to 1 as the highest tier. Apparently, power levels were not necessarily an absolute scale¡­ They just gave people and magical creatures a rough idea of how strong they were. Along with that information was some other information like titles and unique pools of energy that different classes and races had. As soon as she finished explaining the basics (I was going through information overload) she told me some agents needed to ask about my accident and walked out. As soon as she was out of the doorway two men (burly white dudes) burst into the room. They also wore suits, but these seemed poorly fitted and cheap even to my untrained eye. I told them what happened at the crash. They didn¡¯t believe me. ¡°How could you have not seen anything? You were there!¡± Big dumb man number one shouted. Quickly followed by big dumb man number two. ¡°Sounds fishy to me. There were four bodies! Only your parents were recognizable so there had to have been someone else there!¡± Sighing loudly, I responded with absolutely 0% sarcasm. ¡°Sorry, next time I am trapped in an upside-down car listening to my family slowly get killed I will make sure to try to see more.¡± They continued to yell and threaten but I tuned them out and tried to wrap my head around what was happening. Eventually the muscle heads left, and my grandparents came and picked me up. They were my gaurdians now that I was an orphan. I was silent on the trip to their house, but I couldn¡¯t get my mind wrapped around one thing. Those blue screens that were in front of my face were so weird, almost like a game. Magic, monsters, and probably more crazy things are real. Really real. I was way out of my element and had no idea what was going on.I wish there was a tutorial or something. *Ding* A small sound went off in my head, quickly followed by a blue box floating in my vision.
As a newly awakened necromancer you have three tutorial options available.
1. General magic tutorial
2.Necromancer tutorial
3.A gift from the gods- How to: This mental codex and you.
I frowned, and I could almost hear my mom whisper, ¡°Be careful what you wish for¡±. Chapter 2: Hitting the books. I smiled at the stars above me. There were no clouds in the sky, just stars and a crescent moon looking down at me as I sat by the fire pit in my grandparents back yard. The heat radiating from the flames was making me sweat in the already warm Texas heat. But, tonight was symbolic. After the car crash I sat around in a daze at my grandparent¡¯s house. First came the funerals. I was technically there. I let my grandparents handle the funerals and they set up a trust with the left-over life insurance money and the money from selling my old house. I went through the rest of high school like a robot. But there was a reason for this. I was busy studying. I kicked the pile of books next to me into the fire out of spite. Stupid school requiring me to buy text books I didn¡¯t even use. Graduating high school is a joke when you can just feed all the knowledge you could want into a codex just by glancing at each page. A codex is an ever-expanding book of knowledge, and for some reason I was gifted with my very own to teach me about magic. I could interact with my codex just by thinking about it. It was like a mental computer. It learned how to interpret my thoughts and put the information I wanted up in front of me. The codex was originally limited to magical knowledge, but I eventually (accidently) learned it could recall any page that I saw and help me understand it at an incredible speed. I spent about a week after school my junior year just looking at every page in the local public library to fill the codex with human knowledge. Because of this gift, I never paid attention to my classes and instead started reading up on the magic world around me. Whenever asked a question in class, I would just pull up the answer on my codex and keep studying the magic world. While I acknowledge that it was technically cheating, I really needed to study magic. The codex knew most everything about the nature of magic and the magic history of the world¡­ It was scary. After months of preparation (and finally graduating high school) I was 18 and finally going to attempt to raise my first minion. Why? Simply because I was scared and really needed a bodyguard. According to my codex, as a Necromancer I could raise a ton of undead. So much so that the old world hunted those like me to extinction. Before the Europeans found the new world, they thought the ¡®threat¡¯ of necromancy had been extinguished. But in the Americas the necromancers were the rulers of the various native tribes and were protected by shaman and druids. The magic races of the old world quickly went to work executing the magic races of the new world. Because genocide is apparently on everyone¡¯s to-do list, the non-magical humans did the same to the animals and non-magical peoples who lived here. Essentially, the Americas are the wild west of the magical community because nearly all its occupants were killed and there was plenty of new land to conquer. Considering most magical creatures and races lived for over 500 years, it hasn¡¯t even been a single generation for most, since the new world was invaded¡­ I mean discovered. The most critical point from all of this, the most important thing, is that necromancers were/are hunted. To (supposed) extinction. I am a necromancer. This was some shit luck. I spent most of my study time figuring out a way to not die because, you know, death isn¡¯t on my to do list. As an aggressively average person, I had no clue who could be a mage in my school and who was just a normal person. I stayed away from everyone out of fear. After two years of studying and practicing various spells I was going to take my big first step into the magic world. I was making a Flesh Golem. How? Well with human corpses. Ten of them to be exact. Not something I am looking forward to. The reason I chose to make a flesh golem?
  1. I am currently rank 24 out of 25. I am weak and tiny compared to all other magic creatures I have learned about. (I spent two years learning this over and over as I was finishing high school)
  2. Flesh golems are strong, and this spell is the strongest creature that can be made by a non-specialized necromance.
  3. I can hide one flesh golem creation much easier than I can hide an army of undead.
That¡¯s about it. The thing is, Necromancers can either focus on a few extremely strong minions or create an army of mediocre minions. Most Necromancers chose the army either because they didn¡¯t understand there was another way (thank you codex!) or because an army of undead is nearly unstoppable. But because an army of undead is nearly unstoppable, it creates a lot of enemies. I am trying to not get killed, so the option that creates even more enemies is definitely out. Before putting out the fire and beginning the¡­ unpleasant task ahead of me, I go over everything one more time. I thought to my codex, ¡®show me my class information one more time¡¯.
Class ¨C Necromancer: a master of death. A magic user that uses soul energy combined with mana to master all things to do with death and undeath. There are 6 paths possible for necromancers to follow (though only five have been seen on this world). These paths are: Mass Summoner, Strong Summoner, The Path of Blood, Path of Blackness, The Path of The Soul, and Gatekeeper of Death.
The catch is that mages can only choose half of their available paths. They choose these paths by simply casting a spell of those paths, but the path(s) they don¡¯t choose will be forever locked to them. For example, an elemental mage can only choose two of the four elements (Earth, Water, Fire, or Air). A holy mage can either choose the path of the priest or the path of the paladin. And so on. I chose my paths about a year ago, and I chose the ones I believe to be most useful in my goal of not being killed. Mass summoner was out. I in no way wanted a horde of undead around me, it would be like holding up a sign saying ¡®Necromancer here, please come kill me¡¯. Strong summoner was also out. It would allow me to summon non-humanoid creatures back from death to do my bidding. I could potentially call a dragon or a dinosaur to smite my enemies. But that shit was the complete opposite of keeping a low profile. Path of Blackness has to do with creating diseases and plagues and curses to slowly consume your enemies. I found it gross. According to the codex, this path was smelly and you had to have a tough stomach for it. That is saying a lot because all necromancers used dead bodies. The first of the three paths I chose was The Path of Blood to make my blood magical and enhance my physical abilities. With this I could absorb my enemies blood to heal myself and use my magical blood to enchant things better than a regular enchanter. I came up with a wonderful way to use this to help make my flesh golem stronger. I had a way to connect myself to my minion that would let my already tough minion get these bonuses as well. The codex even confirmed it would work. The only downside of The Path of Blood is that all its spells NEED blood.Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site. The Path of The Soul was my next choice because it gives me increased soul strength and the ability to talk/bargain with souls yet to pass on. It was even possible to try and dominate souls to my will, but that was something I wanted to avoid as it seems like a good way to make enemies. Mainly I chose this path because it let me do something special with my flesh golem. It let me manipulate my soul and put a small piece of said soul into the first minion I summon. The codex was VERY adamant that it had to be my first summoned creature. (Side note, a raised creature is different from a summoned creature. You can raise multiple creatures from one dead corpse, but these undead are normally mindless husks except under special circumstances.) Lastly, I chose Gatekeeper of death. It was the one undiscovered (on this world) path available to necromancers. It was regeneration. Extreme regeneration. When one uses magic to command death, they can use that magic to STOP death. I could use mana to cast it on others, but it is automatically powered with my soul power to heal myself. The ultimate healer, one who could turn dead skin alive again and regenerate almost anything. Druids could heal by using nature influence to increase the natural rate of healing. As a Gatekeeper of Death, I could force bodies to regenerate or degenerate however I wanted simply by touch. These three things together gave me what I wanted. I could enter the magic community disguised as a self-taught healer and enchanter. I could bargain with souls to help give me power and soul magic was incredibly potent for self-defense and attack. I have gotten very good at my soul shield and soul fire spells. I could (hopefully) not get killed in my first confrontation because of insane regeneration. Lastly, all these special paths would work together to give me a one of a kind flesh golem. A single minion made from human bodies (yuck) that was incredibly strong and I could link my soul to. As a summoned (not raised) creature it would be an intelligent life form. With a linked soul, it would be able to use my abilities like regeneration and the path of blood¡¯s melee combat bonuses. Best of all, with my regeneration I could sculpt it to look like a normal person. The biggest problem? Finding dead bodies laying around in 21st century Texas. I spent a year gathering the required ten dead bodies to create this golem. I robbed graves and walked the inner city at night to find people who had OD¡¯d on drugs. Using my Dimensional Storage Space spell (I call it DSS) that I got from the overachiever title (that I still have no idea how I got in the first place), I would shove dead bodies into the space. The spell wouldn¡¯t let me store anything living so I wouldn¡¯t accidently take someone living. I felt a little bad for doing this, but I was more scared of the people that wanted me dead (See: The entire world) than I was worried about my slipping morals. Because this is Texas, and everyone has a gun¡­ I learned and used my soul shield all the time while gathering bod- ¡­er materials. My soul shield used my soul power and my mana to surround me in a sphere. After almost passing out inside of it I eventually learned to manipulate it to add air holes. I also had to learn to make it follow along my body so that it would let me sit down and interact with the world without it looking like I was floating. It was slow going but I got it eventually. With the fire finished devouring what was left of my school books and the coals glowing in the darkness, I began the unpleasant process of magically cutting and sewing the bodies together. Taking the bodies out one at a time I started using my mana and a small amount of soul power to compress them together into a single form. It was disgusting. The goal was to make all the tissue and bone denser and stronger. The original bodies were not in excellent condition due to most of them being addicts. (getting caught grave robbing and learning that my soul shield can stop buckshot is not an experience I wanted to repeat). I did use my regeneration fix them even though my codex said it didn¡¯t matter what condition the bodies were in. Hour after hour passed as I droned on. ¡®The left leg connects to the¡­ other nine left legs¡­ and compresses into one leg¡­ eww¡¯. After an extremely long night of dry heaving while ¡®putting it together¡¯, I was done with the construction. Thanks to whatever god gave me this codex I had surrounded the area in a large soul shield while I worked. It hid the smell so it didn¡¯t wake up my grandparents. And everything with a nose within TEN MILES. As dawn came, I stared at the mass of flesh before me and wondered where I went wrong. It was hideous and unnatural looking. Obviously so. It was vaguely humanoid shaped but looked like something out of a nightmare. Trusting in my codex, it hadn¡¯t told me incorrect information before, I sat in mediation in front of my creation and began the last step. Moving a small part of my soul into my new¡­ friend? It hurt. It hurt a lot. Using all my mana and all my soul¡¯s strength, I slowly pushed a part of me into the monst- err the flesh golem in front of me. Whimpering from mana exhaustion and pain I fell asleep sitting in my meditative pose. I had no idea if my first summoning could be considered a success or not. ________________________________________________________________________________________________ ¡°John Smith! What in the FUCKING HELL do you think you are doing!?!¡± I woke to my grandmother screaming at me and a chill running down my spine. My grandmother never used curse words because they are sins. Last night came back to me and I realized I never gave any commands to my newly created flesh golem. Where was it? It was in that moment I felt a telepathic reply to the question in my mind. ¡®Master, I am behind you keeping you warm. I have taken the form of a potential mate to better blend in with human society.¡¯ Gulping, I got up and turned around. Behind me was a naked woman. My flesh golem had used my regeneration on itself to make its skin normal looking and took the form of what could only be described as a super model. Naked. In the back yard of my grandparent¡¯s house. Fuck. ¡°You are going straight to hell for breaking your vow of chastity young man! Jesus wants you to wait until marriage to lay with a woman! How could you do this to yourself! How could you do this to me! How c¡­.¡± She continued yelling at me as I thought to my minion, ¡®Why on earth did you end up looking like that?¡¯ The golem replied simply, ¡®I asked the codex what your preferred form was because you were asleep recovering from my creation. It showed me a series of images from something called the internet and¡­¡¯ ¡®Alright I get it. Could you please put on some clothes, so my grandma will stop yelling so loud?¡¯ ¡®I have none master.¡¯ ¡®¡­¡¯ While this mental conversation was going on and grandma was still screaming about the devil possessing a certain part of my anatomy that I wish she wouldn¡¯t even think about, grandpa stuck his head out the door. He looked at my female (looking) companion. He took off his glasses and wiped them on his shirt. Putting them back on, he blinked a few times. With a smile and without a sound he slid back inside. Seeing this I couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh. That sigh in turn made my grandma even angrier. This was my first real step into a world of magic. Listening to the tirade from my grandmother, I realized one thing. This was going to be a long day. Chapter 3: A bloody good time Getting out of the house took a long time. I eventually convinced my grandmother to lend my minion some clothing. After she was presentable I loaded up my car with some things and got out of there as quick as I could. Pulling away from my grandparent¡¯s house in my small hatchback car I initiated a conversation with my minion. ¡®Basically, when I awoke to the world of magic some asshole druid killed my family. Some god somewhere apparently decided to give me access to this magic codex. It lets me, and now you, see the same status screens as everyone else. But it also lets us look up magic history and knowledge. I also spent quite a bit of time filling it with some modern human knowledge to help myself in the non-magic world. Basically, this ever-increasing book of knowledge is amazing¡¯ ¡®Sounds useful master¡¯ ¡®It is. Everything I have been doing is with the goal of not being killed. Now, we are going to go find out more about our local magic community and see if there is any way to register or something like that. This way they don¡¯t find me by accident and think I am an invader and decide to kill me.¡¯ My codex was not infallible. It did not tell me who the local powers in the Houston area are or even what form of governance they might use to keep the magical community in line. The codex said various systems had been used in the past, but I had no way of knowing what was in use here and now. I assume I need to go to some center of supernatural activity in the city of Houston and present myself to be registered or something like that. But I only had one way of finding out where that was¡­ Returning to the hospital I was healed in after my family was killed. That was the only place that I have ever run into magical creatures besides the rhino (pretty sure the rhino was a druid in their animal form). But before that, I had to get my bodyguard some clothes that were not from the 1950¡¯s because she didn¡¯t want to change into a more intimidating form. ¡®Are you sure you want to stay looking like that?¡¯ I mentally asked my extremely attractive and intimidating-for-all-the-wrong-reasons bodyguard. ¡®Why not?¡¯ it asked me. ¡®the smaller stature of this form does not diminish from my strength and makes me a smaller target to hit.¡¯ ¡®ok, whatever¡¯ I thought back as we pulled into the parking lot of some generic chain clothing store. ¡®let¡¯s go dress you up to look intimidating I guess.¡¯ After half of an hour of shopping I gave up and asked for some help from the staff. They were not paid enough to ask why I wanted to make this supermodel looking woman appear intimidating and I was glad I didn¡¯t have to try to make up an explanation. Sitting on a bench outside the changing room, I was busy wondering where I had gone wrong. Women¡¯s clothing sucked and was way too expensive. No two sizes of different brands were alike, and you paid double the price for the same amount of material. I not only had to pay for it, but also had to sit in a damn clothing store while my bodyguard tried on clothes. I tried to keep myself busy by mentally talking to my minion. ¡®You need a name minion. I don¡¯t like just calling you my minion, it is weird.¡¯ ¡®Alright master, can I choose my own name?¡¯ ¡®Yeah sure. And stop calling me master, it is also weird.¡¯ ¡®Well I would like the name Eve Pelis. Eve because I am your first and Pelis because it means skin in Latin and that makes me giggle.¡¯ ¡®Despite the poor phrasing on the first part of your reasoning, I approve. But how do you know Latin?¡¯ ¡®I have been using the codex to learn human languages so that I may better assist you. In the future. Is there something else I should be studying?¡¯ ¡®But you have only been alive (using that term loosely) for less than 24 hours¡­ Fine, yes. Study fighting techniques and tactics and ways to keep me alive! Everyone wants to kill me, and it is your job to keep me from catching a little disease called death. On an entirely different topic, can you speak out loud? I have not heard you speak yet and I should probably come up with a cover story if you can¡¯t.¡¯ From the changing rooms behind me I hear an extremely deep and demonic sounding voice say, ¡°Yes, I can speak. Wait why is everyone looking at me like that? Well I was done anyway. Come John, lets go because these humans are strange.¡± With a sigh we paid and walked back out to the car with the new clothes. The long drive to the hospital from the shopping center we had stopped at was spent telling Eve what she did wrong and why the store employees were looking at her strangely. Apparently, the codex had no knowledge on things like normal sounding voices or normal human interaction. It was up to me to teach the beautiful woman next to me what to act like in public. It felt like a trap, but I think I did ok with my limited knowledge of the opposite gender as most things were the same no matter what you are. Pulling up to the hospital, I started to notice some things that seemed off with the building. The building was in an old style that I don¡¯t know the name of, but it had the classic scary movie gargoyles that followed you with their eyes. No big deal. We got out of the car and walking (hiding) behind Eve we made our way to the front door. Inside was a receptionist engrossed in her work. The receptionist looked like a normal human. Gathering my courage to talk to a stranger, I walked up and proceeded talk as quickly as possible to the busy lady,This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. ¡°Hello, my name is John Smith and I was treated here two years ago by a¡­ bear of a man¡­ as my doctor. I was wondering if I could see him because I have some questions about my awakening and what I am supposed to do now.¡± ¡°John Smith from two years ago you say? That is your real name?¡± Seeing me nod she continued. ¡°Go sit down over on those chairs and I will see if I can find out who your doctor was.¡± I nodded again and Eve and I went and sat in the corner of the open reception area. I wanted to say more but I had no idea if she was a regular human or another awakened individual. After all, if I started spouting off about magic and she was just a regular human¡­ She would say I was crazy and I have no way to find the doctor and figure out anything about the magical community. With a few minutes to kill, I started studying my surroundings. The interior of the hospital was nice, looking almost like an upper end hotel. Tall celling and tasteful art and white cement floors. There were about 10 empty chairs sitting around of the receptionist¡¯s desk. It was very nice, but my quiet inspection was soon interrupted with some commotion from deeper inside the building. ¡°All you Damn furries are so backward!¡± A voice yelled from deep in the building. ¡°I refuse to be on the same floor as these humans! Someone will pay for making me share space with the likes of them.¡± ¡°Please calm down sir, we treat everyone who needs help. We are just a hospital.¡± This voice sounded somewhat familiar, but I could not place it. The voices were getting louder though. Shit. I am bad enough at dealing with arguing humans, I don¡¯t even know how to start with magical races. What if it is a dragon that is like 2000 years old¡­ The receptionist has a worried look on her face and looks at me with wide eyes. The first voice yells again and a bear in a lab coat and scrubs smashes through the double doorsthat lead farther into the building and flies to the front of the room. ¡°Die you damn bear! I don¡¯t care if this is a hospital! Humans are a plague on the land! They have destroyed all the wilds and will soon destroy the planet! Magic creatures are no longer the dominant force on the planet, so we need to start wiping the humans out now while they don¡¯t know we exist!¡± saying that monolog, a centaur walked¡­or is it clopped¡­ into the room. He saw me and the receptionist cowering in fear. Eve on the other hand was looking at the horse/man with interest. ¡°John, is that thing a male or a female? I cannot tell by its voice like you told me to try and I do not know what to look for on a 5-legged creature like this to determine its gender.¡± Eve asked quite loudly¡­ There was a pause as everyone stared at Eve. The pause lasted a few seconds until the centaur charged Eve pulling a glowing pike out of seemingly thin air. He growled at her. ¡°Now the humans here insult me! Die you overgrown monkey!¡± Eve stood up from her chair and waited for the pike to get near her. She nonchalantly reached and grabbed the pike and stopped its movement almost entirely. Causing the centaur''sarm to be ripped from it¡¯s socket as he continued forward. Crying out in pain from his arm, his body continued and hit her. Eve was nocked backwards a pace but looked like she barely noticed the hit. The centaur crumbled in on itself and fell to the ground at Eve¡¯s feet with a series of cries and whimpers. ¡°Thanks for giving this glowing stick to me, but you didn¡¯t have to do it so quickly. You could have hurt john if I hadn¡¯t stopped you from hitting him.¡± Eve said as if nothing had happened. I just stared. What the hell is going on? Is Eve that strong? Are humans really hated so much? Am I double screwed because I am a human necromancer? Was I finally going to find someone who is willing to answer all of my damn questions about the world I thought I knew? Content to stay sitting down away from the bear and the centaur I glanced at the bear that was thrown out of the back. He (I assume he, as the bear¡¯s anatomy is not nearly as visible) has a hole in his chest. He does not appear to be breathing. I jump up and run to his side while yelling at Eve. ¡°Make sure the damn horse does not cause any more trouble and don¡¯t let anyone get in my way!¡± I kneel at the bear¡¯s side and immediately check if his soul is still in his body, because as long as his soul is there I can try to use my regeneration on him. His soul was just starting to slip away and his blood was starting to pool across the floor. I was absorbing some of the blood that I was kneeling in, making me stronger and giving me a boost to my mana regeneration. I grabbed onto his soul with my soul power and stopped it from slipping away. It was sloppy. I nearly crushed his soul before realizing I was using too much force and quickly guided it back into his mostly dead body. Using most of my soul power to keep his soul in him, I began using my mana to rebuild his body. First, I stopped his cells from dying. It was harder than I thought it would be, but I managed. Sweat on my brow, I started with the circulatory system. To heal, I changed the cells on the edge of the injuries into something like cancer cells. That is what my regeneration did, using my mana and/or soul power to make certain cells reproduce at an insane rate. They multiplied nonstop when near the edge of the wound and stopped multiplying when they were not near the edge. With me shaping where the different multiplying cells needed to go to fix the injury the wound slowly started closing. It is nowhere near perfect, but his body seems to almost want to be whole again, so I just use my limited knowledge of anatomy and try to fix everything I can see. With half his heart regrown it is back in one piece. Other veins fixed, now for the lung. I quickly realized it is getting easier as I go, like the more I provide mana to the right places of the body it almost does the work itself. The closer I get to finishing closing the wound the more the body helps correct the little mistakes I made at the beginning. As a Gatekeeper of Death, it is almost like my mana pushes through the bear¡¯s body unsure if I want to make it decay or regenerate until I will it to do one or the other. But there is a problem. My mana is not infinite. It is very finite. For the first time in my life I ran out of mana. The bear¡¯s soul is no longer trying to escape his body, good, but he needs more blood than he can replenish himself. I look up in a daze as my mind slows down due to mana exhaustion. The codex said mana exhaustion happens when you try to use mana when you have none left¡­ something I said I would never do. I mumbled out two simple words as I fell to the blood-soaked floor asleep. ¡°Needs blood¡­¡± Chapter 4: Answers I woke with a start and quickly opened my eyes only to find a familiar blindingly bright lamp staring down at me¡­ Eventually I will learn to give myself some time to let my eyes adjust when I wake up in strange places. Looking around at where I am, I noticed I am in a similar hospital room as my first trip to this hospital. This time, however, there were two beds in the room. The second bed was filled with none other than the furry werebear that was my original doctor, the same one I had just saved. I am really starting to dislike hospitals. ¡®hello John¡¯ Eve telepathically greeted. ¡®I am standing guard right outside of your door.¡¯ ¡®What happened after I passed out?¡¯ ¡®I finally let the doctors surrounding you and the bear get to you because I assumed your order to not let anyone get in your way stopped when you lost consciousness. They were amazed at what you had done and asked me a ton of questions, but I ignored them. They took samples and did a complete workup on Dr. Fuzzy and started giving him blood, but I wouldn¡¯t let anyone touch you. They were extremely worried about retaliation for what we did to that centaur though.¡¯ ¡®First, Dr. Fuzzy? Really? And second, he attacked us. We really need some answers¡­ Could you please find someone that was asking questions and tell them I am awake and want to talk?¡¯ ¡®Ok, I will see who I can find¡¯ Having nothing to really do but wait, I just lay in my bed and think. All my knowledge of the magic world is theoretical at this point. I have been reading how to cast spells and control mana from a book, but I froze up and just sat there when a centaur started charging in my direction. I really need a mentor, but for that I will have to pass as a different class. Time for some quick research. Ok, codex, can I cast the same spells as any other class?
No
... Well what about similar spells as another class?
Few classes have much in common with necromancers.
Well tell me what these few classes are in order of most to least alike, and I will see if I can manage passing as one of them.
1. Bloody berserker: A melee class that becomes overcome with blood lust in fights and uses strengthening techniques to increase strength and speed. Blood empowers you no matter where it comes from.
That is just like what the path of blood gives me. Why is it a separate class?
The Path of Blood and the Bloody berserker class are quite similar because the Path of Blood was created by a necromancer who was studying a Bloody Berserker and copying it to let him empower his minions.
So, plagiarism¡­ of a magical class¡­ into a single path of necromancy. Seems stupidly overpowered, but I already gave away the fact that I can heal others so that won¡¯t really work. What¡¯s next?
The next three closest relate to summoning and the paths of necromancy that you don¡¯t follow; would you like to see them anyway?
Nope skip it, give me something I can use.
5. Soul Mage: A mage that uses the power of souls to help usher lingering souls into the afterlife. A soul mage can see and communicate with souls but can not force them to do something against their will as a necromancer can. With no power to force souls, Soul Mages make contracts like warlocks do for their demons.
Wait, I wanted to make contracts with souls, but I haven¡¯t found any yet. What is the catch, what am I not getting?
As a Necromancer, souls will inherently distrust you because you have the power to bind them in slavery. A contract system where you bind your soul to your word might appease some souls, but most wont trust you because of what you are. This is why you have not seen any souls around anywhere, they run when they feel you near. The Path of the soul was made by a necromancer that wanted to enslave souls and put them into their minions. After studying the interactions between captured soul mages and their contracted souls, the necromancer finally succeeded after years of trying. Said necromancer basically copied all of the soul spells she could from soul mages.
Ohh. I feel like I should have figured that out on my own. Feeling dumb, I sarcastically asked the codex if there was anything else I should have figured out by now. It responded immediately and made me feel like whatever god(s?) had given this codex to me has been shaking their head(s?) in disgust at how little I had accomplished.The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
Yes, you should have found out that you can increase your mana pool in several ways, none of which you have tried or asked about. You can feel and emit a threat level of sorts to project your potential power as a warning to enemies. You have learned almost no offensive spells when you have some you could theoretically cast. You picked The Path of Blood and gained enhanced physical abilities and superior enchanting capabilities but have not practiced with either one of these. Do you wish me to continue?
Nope, I am good. Please remind me about that stuff later. Getting up, I walked over to the werebear and touched his arm. I was pleasantly surprised that from that little touch I could sense that his body was ok. Better than ok, it was doing great. Unfortunately, I was unpleasantly surprised that my light touch woke the sleeping man. He screamed. That made me scream. My scream made Eve plow through the doorway holding a certain glowing lance at her side. That made the door splinter (because opening doors is for normal people) and get knocked off its hinges with wood chips flying all over. This made both men in the room scream again while we heard more screams from outside the room. __________________________________________________________________________________________ Ten minutes later with everyone calmed down and two large security guards leaving, I sat and started a conversation with the doctor. He was the whole reason I came here and was my only real contact to the magic world. He was also the only person in this hospital I had seen that was obviously a werebear. He looked like a grisly bear but his face was slightly more humanoid shaped. Everything about him screamed half human and half bear. Hands that had little brown pads on them and huge claw like nails that looked to be neatly trimmed. He was the size of a normal bear (I think) but for some reason I didn¡¯t think this is what a fully transformed werebear looked like. The codex quickly came up with the answer that this was a ¡®Half transformation¡¯ that only strong werebears could use. ¡°So¡­ Um¡­ What¡¯s up?¡± Social awkwardness might just be another power of mine. ¡°¡­ Thank you for saving me. Though no one seems to know how you did it.¡± Hearing this I immediately began to word vomit at him an explanation. I was out of breath by the time I finished. People are hard to deal with. ¡°Well ok. That was a lot more information than I asked for. Why don¡¯t you start with how you healed me?¡± ¡°Oh, I¡¯m a soul mage so I used soul power to keep your soul in your body and force your soul to heal itself.¡± I lied easily there. It was close enough to the truth anyway. ¡°I thought soul mages were just legends. That is amazing! If only I could do that I could help so many more patients!¡± ¡°So that means finding a teacher will be hard?¡± ¡°Um, that is to put it mildly. I do not know if there are any soul mages alive currently. In legends they tend to keep to themselves and harness energy form their contracted souls.¡± ¡°Hmm, ok. Are you the only werebear here?¡± ¡°No, all of the staff here are werebears. I am just the only one strong enough to take the half form that I''m in right now.¡± He replied while raising one eyebrow at me. It is strange to see a huge bear like creature raise one eyebrow. I continued with my questions. ¡°What about books? Can I find any books about my class?¡± ¡°The only races on this continent that might have something like that are the different elven races or the Dwarfs. Dragons might also have some, but they would probably eat you before giving you a book.¡± I paled at his words. The codex told me dragons were born at a power level of 2 and reached the power level of 1 within their first century of life. They were the number one creatures on my ¡®Run away as fast as possible if seen¡¯ list. ¡°Hmm well what do I do now? I have no clue about the world and don¡¯t want to get killed by some random asshole. Is there a governing body I can report to or what? Do magic races use different currencies and how do I make said currency¡­ Also¡­ I never got your name¡­ and I know nothing about werebears¡­¡± After sighing the werebear began talking about the magic world. ¡°Well, my name is Arto and I am a senior member of the werebear clan. I can try to answer any questions you have, then you can decide what you want to do. The magic community in the Americas is currently in a feudal system with separate groups constantly fighting for land. Houston does not currently have a leader though¡­ The previous leader was a lizard man and he was assassinated last week. The magic community here is in chaos and the centaurs are being incredibly aggressive. They are attacking anyone they think they can win against to steal their territory. Because of what your bodyguard did to that centaur, this hospital almost certainly a target.¡± Arto sighed and continued. ¡°The werebears have been neutral running this hospital for over 200 years now. We treat any injured we can and now because that centaur was killed here we are all in trouble. You did not mean to cause trouble, but it seems that trouble has found you.¡± I sat quietly and listened through his entire speech, and all I could think was one thing. I said it out loud. ¡°Well this sucks, and not at all in the good way!¡± Arto just looked at me and I reluctantly continued. ¡°I guess I will try to help defend the hospital and all the werebears, but I expect to be paid well and for you to answer all of my future questions. You defiantly owe me one.¡± ¡°Well we will welcome the help, but I am unsure of how much help a strange soul mage and his extremely strange bodyguard will be. Either way,you can help heal the injured in the hospital. I really want to see how your healing works.¡± I have no clue if I can be much help defending the hospital, but I need allies. I might as well try. What is the worst that can happen? Chapter 5: Honor vs. Stupidity I stared flabbergasted at the group of elders in front of me. ¡°You all are telling me that the centaurs fight by using cavalry tactics, but you never thought to use a pike line and some shields to counter them? How else do you deal with cavalry?¡± ¡°Well silly human, ¡­¡± the oldest elder spoke down at me. ¡°¡­ there is no honor in hiding behind spears! All our warriors are honorable men who fight with hands and claws!¡± I just stared at the group of elders in silence. After my conversation with Arto he made some calls. Many werebears started making their way into the hospital seeking safety from roaming angry centaurs. I was left with Arto, asking questions continuously, until the seven elders arrived to speak with him because he runs the hospital. In werebear culture they follow a pack mentality. There is one alpha who is the leader of the pack but there is also a council of elders that advise the alpha and are democratically elected by the pack. They are also all rather old and stuck in their ways. ¡°I don¡¯t even think spears will work. This is just a silly human child, why Arto even listens to him is beyond me.¡± All the elders nodded and agreed with the statement. ¡°This is our last stand against the centaurs, if we lose here we will have to leave Houston. They have been attacking us and pushing us away over the years. We have occasionally won against the centaurs in battle, but it only happens when we swarm them with numbers. There is no other way.¡± With that I had had enough. ¡°Alright if you want to send your people to die when they don¡¯t have to fine, but I¡¯m leaving.¡± I wrote my cell number down and gave it to Arto, then walked out of the room and made to leave the hospital. Eve started following me, and when we arrived at the hospital entry way there were over 20 werebears siting around nearly naked (actual loincloths in the 21st century) with what can only be described as war paint on. All were currently in a human like form, very hairy, but human(ish). They had grim acceptance on their faces and looked ready to face death. While Iwas looking around, more warriors slowly made their way into the room. Still angry at the elders deeper in the hospital I scowl at the faces around me. ¡°Good luck, I¡¯m getting the hell out of here.¡± The werebears around the room glance at me then look back at each other with indifference. It is not like they care about two simple humans. ¡°But why are we leaving John, didn¡¯t you say we would help?¡± Eve asks me out loud. Part of me wonders why she didn¡¯t just use the mind link between us to ask like she normally does, but most of me is too angry to care. ¡°We are leaving because the elders would rather preserve honor than life. If they want to kill their pack that is fine by me, but I won¡¯t be part of it. Fucking old men being stupid and the younger generations pay the price. Always the same through history.¡± I finish my grumbling as we get to the door and as I am about to push it open one of the warriors puts a hand on my shoulder. ¡°You don¡¯t get to speak poorly of our elders, human.¡± His deep bass voice rumbles out and his hand tightens on my shoulder. ¡°They have lived many of your lifetimes and make the best decisions for the pack.¡± Then with a voice as cold as ice I hear Eve speak. ¡°You don¡¯t get to touch John, weakling.¡± While saying this I hear the man gasp and let go of my arm. I turn around to see Eve holding the werebear above her head. ¡°He knows more than any of those elders despite his age, and is rather good in the field of not getting killed. Blindly follow if you want, but if your elders used a magical thing called the internet they would be able to find many counters to mounted fighters besides just swarming the enemy.¡± Finishing her speech, the tiny human(ish) Eve tossed the huge warrior ten feet into his companions. ¡°The internet is a human creation, what would the humans know of fighting centaurs?¡± Some warrior askes while everyone gapes at Eve¡¯s casual strength. ¡°I will show you right here.¡± I go to the receptionist computer and google ¡®How to stop a cavalry charge¡¯ and click on the first video. The video is about a strategy game and it shows that through using stakes or pikes close together, horses can¡¯t charge though. After the video is over I ask the men surrounding me and Eve, ¡°Think it would work against centaurs?¡± The one Eve threw immediately speaks up, ¡°No, it wouldn''t. If we clump up like that, their mages will decimate us! The only way to counter their mages is to get close so they would have to hit their own to hit us.¡± ¡°None of you can crate a magic barrier of any kind? I thought it was the most common spell out there?¡± The codex told me barrier spells were incredibly common. So common in fact, that almost all classes could make some form of barrier. This makes mages extremely hard to kill when they are on the defensive.Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. ¡°This is why the elders look down on you, you don¡¯t even know that lycanthropes can¡¯t cast spells. We are magic creatures and have enhanced reflexes and strength, but we don¡¯t have any mages.¡± ¡°You are saying that if I can come up with a way to shield you all from their mages you will try using weapons and tactics to fight instead of a blind rush?¡± ¡°Yes human, I speak for the warriors here and if you could pull that off we might as well try.¡± ¡°Awesome!¡± exclaims Eve while dragging me out of the hospital. ¡°Come onJohn, lets go get these dumbasses something that works as a pike." ________________________________________________________________________________________________ I drove to the nearest hardware store and bought all their 8-foot steel pipe, a bunch of gardening stakes and a bunch of zip ties. We were getting strange looks when checking out and even stranger looks when people saw Eve was doing all the heavy lifting. I was getting used to it though. I charged it all to my credit card and kept the receipt. I wanted to be reimbursed when my plan worked damnit. Loading the car took some creativity, but we did it. Loading 8-foot pipes in a hatchback is not easy. Eve started working on zip tying the stakes to the end of the poles on the drive back. ¡®John, do you think they will actually try to use the weapons? This is too tedious of a job to do if they decide they don¡¯t want to use them.¡¯ ¡®I certainly hope so, but you never know. I plan on shielding them from the enemy mages with my soul shield and making a deal that anyone who dies will let me use their souls to strengthen the shield and help fight the battle to save their friends. After that hopefully I can convince some of the souls to stay and help me longer.¡¯ ¡®They seem to hold honor in high regard so if you make them promise beforehand, their souls hopefully won¡¯t run¡­ or float¡­or whatever loose souls do¡­ away from you.¡¯ Pulling back into the hospital parking lot, I notice it is empty. I park in a corner away from the building and walk quickly into the hospital with Eve on my tail carrying the makeshift pikes. Inside are all the soldiers, about 40 of them, the elders, and Arto. Many voices are shouting and arguing. ¡°We don¡¯t stand a chance fighting them!¡± ¡°Fight like we always have, and we might be able to win!¡± ¡°Honor is not worth our lives!¡± ¡°Honor is worth everything!¡± I cleared my throat and shouted as loud as I could ¡°I like shouting and getting nothing done too!¡± some of the people look my way but most keep arguing so I continue. ¡°If only there were a way to talk about problems in a calm manner. Then there might be a way to get something done and think logically about problems.¡± Most of the room is looking at me by now. I continue anyway. ¡°I mean, WHY WOULD WE BOTHER COMING TO LOGICAL CONCLUSIONS WHEN WE CAN KEEP SHOUTING!¡± At this point I am the only one shouting and Arto interrupts before I can continue. ¡°You have made your point boy, please stop.¡± ¡°Ohh are we not going to talk over each other anymore? I think that is¡­.¡± Suddenly interrupting, one of the elders screams at me. ¡°Shut up you damn human and learn to respect your betters!¡± With that he transforms into a ten-foot grizzly bear and jumps and slashes at me with his giant claws. His claws smash against my chest, but instead of killing me his attack simply nocks me back into Eve. My soul shield took the blow and my mana and soul power jump down a small amount. The room is silent. Eve helps me up and I begin to speak again, with all humor gone from my voice. ¡°Eve, please remove his arm. He needs to learn there are consequences for being a condescending asshole when you don¡¯t have the power to back it up.¡± The werebear in front of me just stared at the place he hit me in shock. ¡°No human mage should be able to shrug off a hit like that¡± Arto said in shock. ¡°John is no normal mage, and you just decided to piss him off. Probably not a good decision.¡± Eve said calmly as she walked up to the giant werebear in full bear form in front of us. She had dropped all the makeshift spears and calmly reached for the bears arm. The bear growled and slashed at her as well, but she caught his arm. She grabbed his shoulder with her other hand and pulled. A sickening sound was heard all around the room as the werebear¡¯s arm came out of his socket. Then there was the even worse sound of tissue ripping and his arm came off with his blood flying everywhere. Every one of his heartbeats sent more blood squirting out of the wound. The werebear transformed back into his human form (minus one arm) and cried out in pain. ¡°wha¡­ What have you done! My arm!¡± I couldn¡¯t resist the chance, I immediately replied¡­ ¡°Now that the situation has been disarmed, we should get to the important planning part.¡± The room was still in silent shock at the little human girl removing a giant werebear¡¯s arm with ease¡­ except for the crying of the one armed manbleeding all over the floor. _____________________________________________________________________________________________ After hours of talking, I only got half of what I wanted. Of the roughly 50 werebears that were prepared to fight, 23 decided to fight with me. Among them were Arto, one council member, and most of the warriors that were there when I left for the hardware store. My job was to keep up my soul shield as a barrier to prevent magic and range attacks. Also, I was to do what I could to harass the enemy from afar. The only thing I made them promise, was that if they were killed their souls would come to me and help give me more strength to save more of their kin. I gave my group the ¡®pikes¡¯ Eve had constructed and gave them rough orders. The plan was to line up, two deep, and point pikes forward. Then wait for the charge. The extra pikes would be thrown into the mass of centaurs by Eve. The pike men would hold the pikes during the charge and if a pike broke they would change into bear form and hold formation while swiping at any centaur that got close. The idiot¡¯s... rest of the werebear¡¯s plan was to stay behind my soul shield until the charge, then just swarm the enemy in bear form. Their plan was to literally take a cavalry charge head on. With one okay plan and one terrible plan we were ready. All we had to do was wait for the centaurs to show up. Chapter 6: to battle It was quiet until dusk. Just as the sun was going down we heard the roar of horse hooves galloping into the parking lot. The werebears grouped up outside the hospital and waited as more and more centaurs massed on the other side of the parking lot. The centaurs seemed to be semi-organized and waiting on something. The first thing I had done upon going outside was manipulate my soul shield into a large dome covering the two groups of bears. All my practice manipulating the shield to follow along with my moving body to avoid notice was really coming in handy. The pikemen lined to my right and a mass of bears grouped up on my left. The council along with Arto, Eve, and I are standing in the middle of the two groups of bears. Both the centaurs and the werebears seemed to be content to sit there and wait for a leader to step forward. Realizing this I couldn¡¯t help but ask a question that has been bugging me for a while. ¡°How come I have not met the alpha yet? I would think a leader would join in for a fight for survival.¡± ¡°He is a coward that would rather let his pack die than face danger himself.¡± Arto huffed out a response, obviously not holding their leader in high regard. Hearing this, Eve butted in with a very good question. ¡°Then why the hell is he in charge of anything? Your tribe seems to value honor above all else, so if your leader doesn¡¯t have any why is he your leader?¡± No one seemed to have a response to that and taking advantage of the lull in conversation I began to stroll towards the centaurs. It was surprisingly difficult to concentrate enough to cover the group of werebears and myself in separate shields, but I managed. When the elders behind me noticed my casual stroll, they started screaming at me to stop and wait for the centaurs to come forward first¡­ but I used a made-up skill called ¡®ignore the old people¡¯ and it was super effective. Reaching the center of the parking lot I looked around at my surroundings taking everything in. The north side of the parking lot was filled with Angry centaurs. The south side was filled with proud werebears. Turning to the centaurs I shout at them. ¡°Why are you just standing there?¡± ¡°Well insignificant human¡­¡± a large centaur steps out from the crowd and pauses to look me up and down. ¡°It is fitting that such a weak species has a representative from an even weaker one come talk to us. I am Drolath the king of all centaurs, tell me why I should not kill you where you stand!¡± Not saying another word, I cast my only offensive spell at him. Soul fire. A ball of eerie, white, ghost like flame erupts from my hand that is pointing at Drolath and flies to him at incredible speed. The soul fire hits the muscular centaur, making him scream out in pain and surprise. The codex¡¯s description of soul fire shows just how potent the spell is. ¡®Soul fire: A spell with huge destructive potential. The caster burns some of their soul power to ignite some soul fire and send it flying at a target. This soul fire burns anything it touches as long as there is soul energy to power it. What makes this spell so dangerous is that it can use the soul energy of anything it touches to power the spell. The ghostly flames cause immense pain and anything they touch to crumble in a short amount of time and will keep burning until the soul that is powering the flames withers away into nothingness or the connection is severed. The only ways to sever the connection are to remove the flames physically from the main portion of a body and hope the soul is strong enough to heal, or for someone that specializes in manipulating souls to constantly sever all connection the fire makes to its host¡¯s soul and let it burn itself out.¡¯ I cast the spell two more times into the crowd of centaurs and watch as panic and the ghostly fire spread. Soul fire is amazing, but as a necromancer mine is slightly different than a soul mage. The difference between a necromancer¡¯s soul fire and a soul mage¡¯s soul fire is the type of physical damage done. A necromancer¡¯s fire will cause physical decay into dust and a soul mage¡¯s fire will cause crumbling into sand. The difference was slight, but it was there. Before I can do anything else a lighting bolt strikes my shield. The strike was surprisingly strong and took quite a bit of my soul power to block. I think to Eve, ¡®NOW!¡¯ and Eve throws one of the extra pikes across the parking lot and it slams into the centaur that hit me with the lightning bolt spell. The pike goes through the mage¡¯s chest and gets stuck in another centaur behind the mage. I calmly walk back to the group of werebears and put a fake smile on my face. Looking over my shoulder I see what is left of Drolath. It is mostly dust and many of the centaurs around him have also caught fire. I shudder a little and look away. Eve looks at me with concern. ¡®What is wrong John, why are you not happy that your spell worked so well? You took out their leader and I took out a mage before the fight really even started.¡¯ Centaur screams continued in the background. ¡®It is not that I¡¯m unhappy about the spell Eve, I just don¡¯t know when I became so desensitized to killing. That soul fire is burning away the souls of anything it touches, and I created it. Shouldn¡¯t I care more about the lives I am taking? I am helping the werebears for my own selfish gains and because the centaurs seem to be assholes who kill indiscriminately. But does killing them first make me a hypocrite? Should I care?¡¯This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there. ¡®I do not know John¡­ I am only a few days old and have not studied morals at all yet.¡¯ She sent a genuine smile at my fake one. ¡®Besides, I am glad we get to beat these guys up. They are way too cocky and I don¡¯t like them looking down on you.¡¯ Seeing the chaos my soul fire caused in the centaur¡¯s group, a few of the elders yell out, ¡°They are disorganized! Charge!¡± But there is a slight (re: HUGE) problem with this plan. The soul fire is still burning. If those dumbasses touch it, they will die a painful death. I had warned them about it when we were waiting for the centaurs to show up. With a heavy sigh I turn to Arto and raise my voice so that everyone can hear, ¡°I¡¯m glad I told everyone beforehand to avoid the white fire or it will cause a painful death! I wouldn¡¯t want anyone to forget and charge into certain death.¡± The charge slows and gradually stops before anyone gets to the middle of the parking lot. Walking back to where they had been standing many give me an evil eye. ¡®Eve, do you think all werebears are this stupid? I always thought I had average intelligence, but a lot of these bears just seem super stupid.¡¯ ¡®Arto is a doctor, so not all werebears can be that dumb.¡¯ ¡®I guess you are right.¡¯ We continue to talk telepathically as we wait for the flames and screams to die down. ________________________________________________________________________________________________ Ten minutes later the fire was out, and the centaurs were very not happy. They were trying to regroup and had started throwing spells and launching arrows at the massed werebears. All were blocked by my shield covering the group, but I was running low on power. The werebears were tired of sitting around and with the fires out there was no reason to hang back any more. ¡°Alright let¡¯s start walking forward.¡± The werebears advanced slowly at first. Seeing their enemies advance the centaurs pulled out their lances and spears and started their own charge. I hung back with Eve, keeping the shield up for as long as possible. The crash of centaurs against the mass of bears was loud. Centaurs and bears both screaming out in pain. The pikemen were holding much better than the werebears without pikes. I could tell because I could see souls slowly leaving from the battlefield and floating upwards. The number of centaur souls flying upwards was somewhat constant, but the number of werebear souls going up was much higher on the side without the pikes. The first werebear soul floated over to me and telepathically spoke to me. ¡®I promised that I would come help you if I died in the fighting, but I feel like I need to run from you.¡¯ ¡®That is because I am not actually a soul mage, I am a necromancer. Souls naturally want to flee when they feel my presence. Necromancers can enslave souls they find, but that seems like a shitty thing to do. I would prefer to make contracts.¡¯ ¡®Why are you telling me this?¡¯ the soul asked in fear. ¡®Well, I don¡¯t want to explain this again. If you will willingly lend me your power and explain to the other souls what I just explained to you, I will use that power to shield myself and boost Eve¡¯s power. With me funneling extra soul power into eve she will be able to finish this fight fast.¡¯ ¡®Alright, do you swear to release us after the battle?¡¯ ¡®Yes, as long as you want to go.¡¯ During our chat almost 20 werebear souls had started to gather a little away from me. They were too scared of me to approach, but honor bound to try to keep their word. The first soul started to bind itself to me and I realized that I had complete control of its soul. But instead of focusing on that, I sat on the ground and put a soul shield around my body. Then I focused all my spare soul power into the part of my soul inside of Eve. She started to glow a white color and dashed into battle at insane speeds. Slowly more and more souls bound themselves to me and I used the power they gave me to boost Eve¡¯s strength and speed progressively higher. She had a soul shield constantly adjusting to her form with small holes built in to let her enemies blood get absorbed. The blood strengthened her even more and she just became a blur on the battlefield. An unstoppable tank in the form of a supermodel. Within a minute of that first soul deciding to help me and willingly submit to me, the battle was over and Eve had decimated the centaurs. ¡®John, it is over. You can stop powering me up now and rest.¡¯ Eve sent to me to break me out of my meditative state. I stopped, but I kept shields around both of us just in case. Next, I started talking to the 24 werebear souls that died in the battle. ¡®I am going to release you now, but I would ask you not to leave yet.¡¯ I gently separated their souls from my own. It took a little time but soon they were separate. ¡®Why do you wish for us to stay? Our instincts are telling us to run as fast as we can away from you.¡¯ The first soul that approached me seemed to be the spokesman for the group. ¡®As you can see souls all run from me. They are a huge source of power for me, but I don¡¯t want to enslave them. What would it take to form a contract with you?¡¯ Having said that, 10 of the souls immediately left. They all said they did not want to stay here anymore and wished to pass on in peace. The remaining 14 were silent, floating in front of me for a time. They were obviously having a discussion. ¡®We have come to a decision. We are willing to work for you for a time on two conditions. The first is that you release us if we ask, and second is that you do not harm any werebears if you can help it.¡¯ ¡®I will agree to that, except instead of promising to release you whenever you ask¡­ could we make it five year contracts with an option for renewal? That way it protects me from you if you suddenly decide mid-fight you don¡¯t want to help me anymore.¡¯ The answer came when three more left the group of souls in front of me. ¡®All 11 remaining have decided to agree to your terms.¡¯ With that they merged with my soul again, increasing my power significantly. Standing up from my sitting position I walked over to the wounded and began healing the many injured werebears.