Cenotaph of Bones: Chapter 45 (Patreon)

Chapter 45: Necromancer

The entrance was in shambles, and I was pretty sure it wasn’t all my fault.  Trash, dirty clothes, discarded weapons, scrap armor, and piles of random trinkets filled the room.  One corner had a pile of cores, and another was filled with jewelry and treasure that looked like it was actually worth something.  Everything else was useless.  It took me a bit to realize what I was looking at, but then it clicked.  This is what he had pulled off of the dead.

“Necromancer!”  My rage-filled shout almost tore my vocal cords.  I must have been hanging around angry trolls too much.  “Come and face me, you stars-damned piece of garbage!”

“Wait!  It isn’t what you think!”  Hadad came stumbling into the room, a gash on his forehead causing blood to run down the side of his face.  “It was this thing - a demon - and it possessed me!  I didn’t want to do all this.  It would be in control right now if you hadn’t knocked it out with that explosion.”

“I know all about it, Hadad.  That’s why I brought that little rock you left outside.”  I held up the pouch holding it.  The look of shock on his face quickly faded, replaced by relief.  “I take it you know how to get rid of the nox?”

“The demon calls itself a ‘scientist’, and it has been experimenting for months with formations.”  He pointed back toward the hallway behind him.  “I have been learning a lot while it was in control.  I think I found a way to contain it in a chunk of condensed dark qi.  At the very least, it should give me control over the undead, so I can stop everything that’s been going on.”

“You mean you can’t control them?”  I flexed my hand, the urge to just kill him before my friends could be overrun almost overpowering.  “My friends can’t fight those things forever.”

“They only listen to me if they don’t have any orders from the nox already implanted in their head.  I can’t stop them.”  I lifted my hand, preparing a wind blade that would remove his head.  “No!  Wait!  The formation will work!  All I need is five minutes.”

“You have three.”  I dropped my hand and tossed him the pouch.  “Better move fast.  Your life depends on it.”

He nodded quickly and took off running.  I followed right behind, walking down a hallway and into a room that looked like it had once been a study, considering the stone desk and empty bookshelves along one wall.  Hadad plucked the gem out of the pouch with a pair of sticks, and placed it delicately in the center of a circle of carvings on the floor that took up half the room.  The runes lit up brightly, and I was forced to look away.  Which is when I saw the scratches on the floor I was standing on light up as well.

“Wow.  I can’t believe that worked.”  The raspy voice of the nox caused me to look up sharply.  “Oh, please help me, I’m so innocent!”  Mad laughter not meant to be made by the throat of a human made me grit my teeth in frustration.  “If you think this host is worth saving, you have it all wrong.  His dreams are filled with conquest and destruction.  He already has plans to use what I have taught him to take over your tiny little empire the moment he breaks our pact.”

“And I’m just supposed to believe you?  You are literally a demon, nox.”  I tried pushing against the formation that trapped me in place, only managing to shock myself hard enough for my whole right arm to go numb.

“I wouldn’t recommend that.  Those runes are powered by death qi.  You will die the moment something vital touches the containment field.”  The nox sat on the edge of the desk that had been pushed up against the wall.

“Why am I still alive then, nox?”  I started spinning my cores, preparing to try something stupid.  “You could have just as easily built a lethal trap.”

“I’m not like my brothers and sisters, in case you couldn’t tell.  Don’t get me wrong, all of us are more concerned with ourselves than following orders from the higher ups.”  The demon shrugged.  “Some are trying to take this world for the Dark, but that’s so… boring.  There are so many things a world still in the Light can tell us, if we would just be left alone long enough to experiment.”

“What are you saying?”  I clasped my left hand over my numb right arm, pulling it tight against my body to hide what I was doing.  “Are you looking for some kind of alliance?”

“An alliance?  I think we can both agree that there is no need for me to offer such a thing.”  The demon waved at the stone sitting in the middle of the formation.  “What I’m offering is the life of your friends, in return for your body.  I can contain your soul inside the stone, and be rid of this weak form once and for all.  No struggle for dominance, no poorly balanced body unable to manipulate other elements.  I can experiment in peace, and you can spend the next few centuries asleep.”

“Besides the lives of my friends, I’m not seeing much in this for me.”  I was almost ready, all I needed was another minute.  “Why should I sign up for a death that doesn’t even allow me to return to the wheel of reincarnation?”

“Oh, returning your body once I’m done with it won’t be a problem.  I’m sure once my brethren finally quit their power struggles long enough to band together and crack this realm open like a rotten egg, I won’t need it any more.”  It motioned to the stone again.  “Being inside there for so long would actually help you!  You would be able to survive in the new world, without your body melting into goo from all the power fluctuations that would result.  I know of several places you could go and live out whatever life you had left in peace.”

“You know what?”  I looked at the stone, and activated the spirit wood ring I had been cramming full of life energy for the past few minutes.  The spear form cut straight through the energy holding me in place, and I jumped clear before it could reform.  “I’m going to have to decline.”

“Fool!”  The nox jumped back, dodging the thrust of my spear.  “Fine, I’ll just have to force you!”  He waved his hands, forming a dome of metal qi that protected him from my attacks.

“Nope.”  I spun one more burst of wood qi into the spirit wood, and tossed it into the formation that held the solid gem of dark qi.  “I don’t think so.”

The spirit wood ring had been with me for a long time, and I felt a pang of regret for overloading it.  Its structure could only contain a certain amount of energy, and I had just surpassed that limit by almost double.  Another bright flash of light erupted from the formation, and the spear detonated.

I was thrown through the stone wall next to the doorway, creating a new Jim-shaped exit.  The shields on my armor overloaded, and I felt the malachite strands burn out all at once.  Climbing back to my feet took some effort.  There was blood running out of my ears, the explosion bursting my eardrums.  They popped as I spun more wood qi through my body, healing the worst of the damage.  More than one rib had cracked, so breathing was a lesson in agony until they were healed as well.  Now that I was back in one piece, I inspected the damage.

“How are you still alive?”  The necromancer was laying in a heap on the opposite side of the room.  There was no sign of the gem at first, until I noticed shards of it embedded in his face, along with splinters of wood from my spear.  I pulled out an adamantine spear and hefted it in my left hand.  My right still wasn’t working yet.  He opened his eyes as I approached with the spear raised.

“Wait!”  Hadad’s croaking voice made me pause.  “It worked.  The spirit of the demon is trapped in the shards of the stone.  You don’t have to kill me anymore.”  He sat up, rubbing at the wounds in his face.  The splinters of wood fell free, but the shards of gem stayed in place.

“Was what the nox said true?  Do you have plans to take over the empire?”  I watched his eyes and his aura, looking for any signs of deception.

“I-I don’t!  I mean, I thought about it a few times, but I would never do that!  In fact, I’ve already ordered the army to stop attacking your friends!”  He swallowed hard, the lump on his throat bobbing in fear.  “I’m not a monster like he said I was.”

“Okay.”  I lowered my spear.  “One more question.  What was the nox planning to do with all the gold and jewelry in the other room?”

“The gold?  He didn’t have any plans for it.”  He looked at me with genuine confusion.  “Why do you ask?”

“Because only someone planning on needing a war chest would bother looting the gold off the people they had killed.”  His face twisted in anger, and he raised a hand to form an attack.  I thrust my spear through his eye before he could act, pinning his head against the wall.  His twisted aura faded away as his life drained away.  He had been lying.

I turned to leave, pulling my spear free and letting him slump to the floor.  I paused at the door, burning him to ash.  Leaving a necromancer in one piece was asking for trouble.  Before I walked out the door to rejoin my friends, I made sure to take all of the treasure he had collected.  I did have a war to fight, and every little bit helped.  Saving the world was going to be expensive.