Chapter 33: The Riddle of the Smear Mark, Part II

Flashes of crimson light spilled into the surrounding areas of the swamp near a burning camp. Sitting on a stump near it, a young man was inscribing runes into the air. One by one, a ring of sanguine runes started to form.

This is the third time that I’ve attempted to form the rune-key. On my second try, I was able to inscribe twenty seven runes before the ring collapsed upon itself. I do not know how many runes it will take, but I’ll be damned if I don’t form the correct rune-key.

Unlike the previous attempts to form the rune-key, Kaz’s fingers were much slower. However, he focused much harder than before. After his second failed attempt, Kaz realized that trying to form the runes before he ran out of spirit power was not as effective as forming stable runes.

With the three additional evolved spirits, my spirit power is four times as much as before. Even though my innate talent is subpar at best, I can keep increasing my pool of magical energy with more high quality spirit minions.

Gritting his teeth, Kaz continued to cast runes in sequence. Kaz’s runic ring grew more and more complex. Beads of sweat pooled on Kaz’s forehead and ran down the side of his face. There was no sound in this area of the swamp. Only the occasional crackling of embers or the sound of sweat dripping down onto the muddy ground broke the silence.

The two leftover basic spirits that Kaz did not use up in evolving his upgraded spirits were used to bind two bone soldiers. These bone soldiers had long finished their task of clearing the foliage around the stump. The night sky was pitch black with the exception of the starlight shining down upon the world. Tonight, it was a new moon. In the darkest night of the month, the blood runes’ crimson light made them seem all the more ghastly.

A short moment later, the runic ring shattered once more. All it took was Kaz’s finger trembling when he was in the middle of inscribing the next rune. Sighing, Kaz leaned back and started to stretch. Even after failing for the third time in a row, the young necromancer was not as flustered as he was when he failed the first time. Each attempt saw further improvements to both technique and length of the runic ring.

Mm. This isn’t too bad. I was expecting to have failed my third attempt more than ten runes earlier. I don’t know how many runes it will take for me to form the complete rune-key. It is said in the Book of Blood that true masters of runic inscriptions were able to form rune-keys to smear marks with a single complex rune. Stringing together separate runes in comparison is quite...inelegant.

Sighing, Kaz decided to take a short break in order to refresh his mind and unwind after focusing for such a long period of time. Since he started his third attempt at forming the rune-key, it had been a total of two and a half hours. Sitting in a static position inscribing runes with no breaks would be strenuous for even advanced mages. Looking up at the night sky, the Star Plough was hanging low to the left of the North Star.

How long did I spend on that last attempt? I didn’t even notice the time pass.

Smiling ruefully, Kaz brought a water flask to his lips as he quenched his thirst.

The last time I’ve been this absorbed in an activity was when I was in the library of the Blood Citadel. Burying my head in the stacks and reading all of the new imports from the capital...I miss those days. There were no worries, and everybody was friendly. I still remember their looks of disdain at my Trial by Iron.

Shaking his head as he sealed the water flask, Kaz once again sat on the stump. Contacting the spirits that were out patrolling, Kaz was pleased to discover that there were very few beasts near him.

According to my patrolling spirits, there weren’t any obvious signs of human activity close to where I am. In addition, the memories of the Janaroian battlemages confirmed that they purged any native animal life they found close to the campsite. I’m not sure there was such a need to destroy the native fauna but then again they were following standard Janaroian explorer procedures.

Taking a deep breath, Kaz started to inscribe the rune-key once more. Having failed several times already, the young necromancer was adept at forming the skeleton of the rune-key.

Once I realized why my first attempt failed, I have managed to extend the length of my runic inscriptions until further instability occurs. Why did I ever think that the rune-key would be a single sequence of runes? Trying to combine the key portion of the rune-key with the skeleton is impossible at my current level of skill. I have to carefully inscribe the individual parts one at a time then combine them with one another.

Fifteen bloody runes were carved out of the air. Pulsing, the runes formed a circle as they floated in front of Kaz.

The skeleton is generally the same for rune-keys that are near each other in terms of difficulty. I guess that does make sense, why have individualized backbones for each rune-key when a template backbone would work just as well. Who was the person that came up with such an efficient system of magical inscriptions…

Stopping for a moment, Kaz let the skeleton of the rune-key float in front of him as he contemplated how to create the actual key portion of the inscription. According to the Book of Blood, the rune-key must be created so that the key portion complements the lock portion of the rune-lock. The smear mark, at least in terms of difficulty, was similar to the rune-locks in the apprentice portion of the Book of Blood. There were other pages, but they were all blank. Some of the pages started to fill themselves in as Kaz got more and more proficient with the contents of the tome. However, what he had unlocked so far was less than a tenth of the total pages in the Book of Blood.

Complimentary rune-lock….the runes that I inscribe in sequence for the rune-key must be the opposite of the runes already inscribed onto the smear mark. Having realized this detail on my second try, I have already progressed much further than I would have expected myself to. The reason that my third attempt ended in failure is because I lost focus for a split-second towards the end of the key inscription. Unfortunately, keeping the runic inscription waiting even a split-second longer is lethal to the stability of the rune-key.

With a determined look in his eyes, Kaz raised his right index finger and started to inscribe the key sequence of the inscription. Compared to his previous speed when inscribing the rune-key’s skeleton, Kaz’s speed of inscription slowed down to a snail’s pace. Much more complicated sequences of runes were being inscribed in the air. A red thread connected each rune with its previous rune, keeping them in order. Spreading his mana sense all over the smear mark, Kaz’s extreme slowdown in inscription speed was due to the fact that he now had to pay close attention to what runes he needed to carve out of the air.

Sword, Hearth, Bone, Tree, Stone, Water, Earth, Water……

Reading the next rune from the smear mark with his mana sense as he was inscribing the current one, Kaz was able to anticipate what runes he needed to inscribe next. The back of the necromancer’s shirt was once again soaked in sweat as Kaz felt the pressure of having to multitask at two difficult activities.

In this manner, two hours passed as Kaz mechanically inscribed runes into the air one by one. Finally, the second set of runes shuddered and melded together into a ring like the skeleton did previously. Panting, Kaz’s eyes were shining in excitement.

I’m almost there! I have to merge the key portion with the skeleton portion, and I will have formed the rune-key to the smear mark. Thank the Gods that each step is more independent than the individual runes themselves. Without this breather, I would fail instantly once I tried to merge the two rings.

His right hand raised in the air in order to supply the rings with a low amount of mana, Kaz commanded one of the bone soldiers to uncork a water flask. Shuffling over, the bone soldier’s hands were swift as they completed the task.

Grasping the water flask with his left hand, Kaz drank several mouthfuls of the ice cold water. Pouring the remaining fifth of the water flask over his head, the refreshing coolness kept Kaz’s fatigue at bay for the moment.

Taking a deep breath, Kaz started the process of fusing the two runic rings into the completed rune-key. Using both hands, the necromancer began to overlay the key ring onto the outside of the skeleton ring. The key ring that had formed was two times as large as the skeleton ring. Using his mana sense, Kaz started to compress the key ring.

As the key ring began to shrink in size, its color started to get brighter and brighter. At this point, sweat was pouring off of Kaz’s chin as he struggled to compress the magical energies contained within the key ring.

Trying to compress the key ring is akin to forcing more jam into an already full jar. Devils take this damned key ring! I cannot stop the process or even slow it down once it has started. I have a mind to take a axe to the head of the creator of this blasted shrinking technique for magical energies…

Eyes bloodshot, Kaz grit his teeth as the key ring finally shrunk down until it was smaller than the skeleton ring. Overlaying the key ring onto the outside of the skeleton ring, Kaz started the fusion process. Strands of magical energy erupted from the skeleton ring and sunk into the key ring. As more and more strands of crimson threads latched onto the key ring, the key ring was pulled closer to the skeleton ring. Once the key ring was completely overlaid onto the skeleton ring, Kaz’s emotions wavered. Too excited by what he thought was impending success, the magical energies that he was using to complete the fusion flared up.

Gods, NO! NO! I WAS SO CLOSE!

With a silent howl of frustration, Kaz’s face contorted in agony. He was unable to salvage the almost fused runic ring as it exploded instead of shattering like before. Waves of magical energy were blasted into the swamp with the stump as its center. Instead of feeling nothing this time, Kaz’s mind was overloaded with magical energy as he was unable to shield his mana sense in time.

Pain ripped through the necromancer’s mind. His eyes rolling up into his skull, Kaz coughed up a mouthful of blood before he fainted.

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“Ugh..Devils take me…”

With a groan, Kaz opened his eyes. The sun hung low in the sky, indicating that most of the day had already passed. Touching his face, Kaz realized that he had coughed up blood all over his chin and neck. Pulling himself to a seated position onto the stump, Kaz commanded the nearby bone soldier to hand him a full water flask.

“Heh, had enough? You took one hell of a nap, brat.” Ahriman’s cackled within Kaz’s mind. “The mental strain you experienced was enough to jolt me out of my meditative trance. I only wish I could have seen the expression on your face when you realized that you failed again.”

Without a single word or thought of acknowledgement, Kaz washed his face with the ice-cold water from the flask. Curious as to why the water was still as cold as ice, Kaz probed the water flask with his mana sense. A series of runes were inscribed onto the flask itself.

“Purity, Cold, Shield.” Running his fingers over the runes inscribed along the body of the water flask, Kaz studied the connections between them. “The reason that the third attempt failed is because my proficiency in merging the connections between runic inscriptions is too low. I should look through the rest of the Janaroian equipment for anything inscribed with runes. Studying how their mages form the connections between inscriptions could prove extremely useful.”

Kaz moved towards the pile of salvaged equipment that his bone soldiers had managed to collect from the remnants of the Janaroian camp. Looking at the pile, Kaz recognized several intact pieces of armor that were inscribed. In addition to the pieces of armor, Kaz managed to save the two staves that Diana and Erza carried.

Taking the staves back to the stump, the bone soldier also brought over the pieces of armor after a second trip to the pile.

“Why are you looking at the connections on these trashy pieces of inscribed equipment?” Annoyed, Ahriman snapped at Kaz. “Doesn’t your precious Book of Blood teach you methods to connect inscriptions as well?”

Rotating the stave in his hands, Kaz scrutinized the runes at the top of it. “It’s not detailed enough. The Book of Blood isn’t exactly a text on the mastery of inscriptions. It’s a book on..hey. Why can you not read the Book of Blood over my shoulder when I’m reading it? You can’t be that lazy as to not look at a forbidden magical text?”

“You think I would be asking you these useless questions if I could read it?” Ahriman grunted. “If I could read the book over your shoulder I would tell you everything that related with it so I don’t have to listen to you mutter to yourself as you think.”

“So you can’t actually read the book?”

“No. It appears that only you can read the text. I can’t even tell what language it’s written in. The only thing that I see when I look at the pages when you have it open are blank pages. Truly, my inability to read the Book of Blood is one of the great injustices in this world.” Sighing, Ahriman returned to a meditative trance.

That’s so weird. Why can I read the pages but Ahriman can’t? Eh, that’s a problem for another time. Perhaps it’s even a blessing in disguise. But this problem is not important right now.

Turning back to the inscribed equipment, Kaz wasted no time as he set to dismantling the inscriptions on the equipment. Tracing lines of crimson magical energy, Kaz tore apart the inscriptions on the first stave.

The most complicated rune is the one for Stability. There are also more basic Amplify and Vortex runes connected to it. Stability is so that spell failure happens less. Amplify seems to bolster the power of the mage’s spells by a small amount. Vortex….if it is anything like the vortex on my spirits when I’m trying to force an evolution, then its function would be to increase the absorption of the the ambient mana from the air. All in all, the inscriptions are indeed quite useful. The Stability rune seems to be the most useful.

Throwing the now useless stave off to the side, Kaz picked up the second stave. Glancing at the inscriptions on the second stave, Kaz sighed and set the stave aside. The second stave’s inscriptions were an exact match for the inscriptions on the first stave. Even though he could have dismantled the connections between the inscriptions for practice, Kaz set it aside since dismantling the exact same connections would not have been that helpful towards his understanding of inscriptions.

Looking towards the devastated pieces of armor, Kaz was surprised to discover that the inscriptions were undamaged. Eyes shining in excitement, the necromancer made one of the bone soldiers hold up the breastplate for inspection. The armor was scratched and charred from the desperate fight a day ago, but the inscriptions were undamaged.

Ah, it’s fascinating how robust runic inscriptions are. Even though there is a tremendous amount of surface damage, the inscription underneath still works. Let’s see...what can I find here...Protect rune. That’s a...Deflect rune? Why would there need to be two different reinforcement runes? Oh, that’s an Absorb rune. All of these runes are connected to a Iron rune. That’s it! These three runes must be in place to reduce the amount of physical punishment that the bearer takes. The reinforcement runes must deal with direct impacts while the Absorb rune disperses the energy of the strike. Let’s take it apart and see the connections…

With a single minded determination, Kaz tore apart the inscriptions on the breastplate. After a short while, the breastplate crumbled into pieces of scrap iron as the runic inscriptions preserving it were removed. Sitting with his back straight, Kaz fell into a meditative trance as he contemplated the inscriptions that he had torn apart. Several minutes passed by in total silence before Kaz jumped up into the air from excitement.

“That’s IT! Why didn’t I think of that before? Instead of trying to fuse the two runic rings by themselves, I could add a third connecting layer as a sort of magical adhesive. The runic inscriptions on the breastplate were connected in this fashion. If there can be a skeleton for the rune-key, why can’t there be a skeleton for the connection? The difficulty would not even increase that much. An inscription adhesive doesn’t have to be specific, generic rune templates work as well in theory!”

At this time, the sun had already set and the nocturnal animals within the swamp started to come out. Even though the beasts within the swamp could tell that there had been a serious disturbance, the ghastly energies coming from where Kaz was deterred all of them from coming closer.

“I can’t possibly fail to form the rune-key on my fifth try! Heh, this damned smear mark thinks that it has gotten the better of me, but I’ll show it who’s the real boss around here.”

Plopping down onto the stump once more, Kaz’s fingertips grew crimson as he formed the blood runes with blistering speed. Shortly after, the skeleton ring was formed. Not stopping, Kaz continued to immediately start forming the key ring. Faster than before, the key ring was formed in half the time that it took previously. Pausing to catch his breath, Kaz started to form the adhesive ring.

A third runic ring formed between the key ring and the skeleton ring. Compressing the key ring like before, Kaz started the fusing process. Strands of magical energy latched onto the adhesive ring from both other rings. When thirty six strands from both outer rings had connected with the adhesive ring, the three rings pulsed once and fused together in a flash of crimson light.

Seeing the completed rune-key in front of him, Kaz forgot to breath for several seconds. Unable to wait for another moment, Kaz whipped out the ancient map that contained the smear mark. Manipulating the rune-key, Kaz pressed it down onto the smear mark. The smear mark swallowed the rune-key when the two inscriptions touched. With a small hiss, the smear mark disappeared from the map. The next moment, Kaz was blinded by a flash of bright green light.