Chapter 34: Arrival at the Morbid Academy

After the bright green flash disappeared, Kaz looked at the unrecognizable piece of parchment. In his hands, the map of the swamp had transformed into a note. Rubbing his eyes, Kaz struggled to contain his surprise.

“Old man, what’s the deal with this map? Is unlocking the smear mark supposed to do this?” Scrutinizing the parchment, Kaz’s brow furrowed as he bit his lip. “It’s just a note now, written in ancient Janaroian. It’s going to take me some time to translate it.”

“Huh. To be honest with you, I was not expecting the smear mark to do anything like that. I thought at most a path detailing the best way to travel towards the Morbid Academy would be revealed. Tell me when you have managed to translate the note.” With a snort, Ahriman returned to the depths of Kaz’s mind.

Bah. I would bet money that Ahriman’s as curious as I am about what the revised parchment says. I don’t know why he is so reluctant to admit it. I guess it doesn’t matter in the long run. I’m not even sure as to how I can help him get his body back yet, seeing as that’s the entire point of this partnership. Never mind, let’s see what this note says…

Most of his writing charcoal had broken during the escape from Abaza, but the bone soldiers were able to salvage some additional supplies from the ruined camp. A large amount of mundane supplies survived the fire. When Kaz inspected the tent that the supplies were in, he noticed that there were protective runes inscribed onto the sides of the tent. These inscriptions had the Protect rune as the centerpiece while two lesser runes were chained to it. The two lesser runes were Fire and Water. Even though these two runes were not that strong, they still did their jobs in protecting the tent from the flames and rain. Found within the supplies were a large amount of thin charcoal sticks used for writing. Kaz snapped these charcoal sticks up without a second thought and placed them inside one of his knapsack’s pockets.

Retrieving his notebook from the brown knapsack, Kaz started to translate the mysterious note. Kaz jotted the translation onto the notebook with a thin piece of charcoal. After half an hour, Kaz finished translating the ancient Janaroian written on the note.

“Ahriman. What do you make of the translation? The message doesn’t make sense to me.”

“Brat, are you sure you translated this correctly? Half of the phrasing doesn’t make sense. Why did you spend time on doing this if the result is so lackluster?”

“Look, you can’t read ancient Janaroian so I translated the note for your benefit.” Kaz sighed in frustration. “You’re the grand necromancer, or so you claim. The least you can do right now is attempt to decipher what the note is saying.”

Infuriated at Kaz’s words, Ahriman immediately shot off a Mental Spike inside Kaz’s mind. Contrary to his expectations, Kaz didn’t show any sign of discomfort.

“Heh, don’t you try to blast my mind like before. I managed to create a basic Mental Shield that protects me from mental attacks. Although it can only stop basic tier mental attacks, my new mental shield is enough to stop your Mental Spikes from affecting me.” Kaz grinned in satisfaction. “Don’t be such a grump. Let’s find the Morbid Academy. There has to be somebody there who can help us restore your physical body.”

“IMPUDENT!” Ahriman roared in anger. “How DARE you use such a thing against me. I taught you EVERYTHING that you know. You would not even be alive if I had not deigned to merge my soul with yours. You ungrateful little bastard, when I gather enough power to break your Mental Shield, you’ll BEG me for mercy.”

Outburst finished, Ahriman retreated to the depths of Kaz’s mind. His mouth now in a frown, Kaz sighed.

“Well, I didn’t expect him to be that enraged. I don’t like getting zapped for disagreeing with him. I thought he might praise me for creating a new spell. Although I have to use Soul Power to maintain it, the Mental Shield is quite useful.”

“Translating that parchment took quite a bit of time, I should take short break before I continue analyzing the note.” Kaz put the notebook and original parchment away in his knapsack. Standing up, he stretched for a little while before walking over to the supply crate.

“Hmm, what else do the Janaroians pack for dry rations? The last time I grabbed something out of the crate, it turned out to be dried jerky. I guess cured meat is universal among military rations, but some extra variety would be nice.”

Rummaging about in the large supply crate, Kaz grabbed some dry rations. Sitting back onto the stump, the necromancer started to inspect what he had taken out.

Ah, what do we have here? There’s some dried meat, but it looks and smells...quite different than any cured meat that I have seen. Setting that aside, there’s this small sealed bag.

Kaz looked at the small brown bag in his hands, but could not find the opening. His interest piqued, Kaz explored the surface of the bag with his mana sense. The moment the mana sense hit the surface of the brown bag, a series of runic inscriptions lit themselves up.

A Seal rune revealed and activated itself. The surface of the brown bag unfolded itself, peeling back to reveal thick slices of a fruit. The fruit slices were bright yellow, and gave off a sweet scent to the surrounding atmosphere. Smelling this fragrance, Kaz’s mouth started to water.

This fragrance...how is it so fresh? I thought that these rations were meant to be stored for a long time and eaten later. I didn’t know that the Janaroians would spare the effort to inscribe runes of preservation for their rations. This...is something luxurious.

Kaz picked up a slice of the fruit as he inspected it for defects. Turning it over in his hand, the yellow fruit seemed to be a slice of the sun itself. Seeing no visible defects in the fruit, Kaz threw the whole slice into his mouth. As his teeth bit down onto the slice, the fruit’s juices spilled onto Kaz’s tongue.

Mmm...it’s so….sweet! Gods, I have never eaten anything so good before. The temperature is cold, not lukewarm as I would have expected. The juices are so refreshing as they run down my throat.

Swallowing the remnants of the first slice, Kaz looked at the rest of the fruit still wrapped by the brown bag. Without a second thought, he devoured the rest of the yellow fruit. Mere moments later, Kaz was licking the fruit juices off of his fingertips. The young necromancer looked with longing at the now empty brown bag.

Where does this particular fruit comes from? It must originate from somewhere in Janaro, if not even further. Klavan does not have anything comparable to this scrumptious delicacy. That’s one more mystery that I need to solve if I ever want to taste that fruit again.

Kaz stood up and walked over to one of the water barrels that his bone soldiers had managed to retrieve from the ruined camp. Kaz filled up empty two water flasks, then used a small amount of water to wash the remaining fruit juice off of his hands.

Moving back to the stump, Kaz plopped down . Although the stump was uncomfortable in the beginning, Kaz had one of his reaper spirits sheer off the top layer of the wood with its mana sword. The result was that the stump had a flat top, and thus was much easier to sit on.

Humming to himself, Kaz pulled out the translated note as well as the original parchment. The necromancer held one piece of writing in each hand side by side. Kaz’s eyes darted left and right as he compared his translation with the original ancient Janaroian script. Seconds turned into minutes, and minutes turned into hours. Stopping only to drink water or to take care of bodily functions, Kaz focused on the notes like he was possessed. Several long hours passed by before Kaz jumped up with a shout.

“Hahaha! I’ve got it! There was no need to translate the note in the first place. What the smear-mark was hiding was actually an ancient chant.” Kaz’s face flushed with excitement. “The chant should activate some sort of spell. I don’t even need to understand the spell for it to work as intended. All I need is to supply the appropriate amount of mana or soul power and read the chant out loud.”

Kaz returned the notebook to his knapsack. Looking towards the chest of rations, Kaz shoved as much as he could carry into the knapsack. The necromancer thought about something for several seconds. Nodding to himself, Kaz recalled all his spirits that were on patrol back to him. Ripping the last two ghosts out of the skeletons, the two leftover bone soldiers were disposed of.

“I shouldn’t take any risks when attempting to read this chant. I’ll have my spirit minions on high alert, ready to take action immediately.” Kaz commanded his spirit minions surround him in a circle. Kaz looked over the ancient Janaroian words one last time. Taking a deep breath, he started to chant.

Ancient Janaroian does not sound much like New Janaroian now. Although some of the words may be similar, the transition from Ancient to Middle to New Janaroian is convoluted enough so that most Janaroians today would not understand Ancient dialect of the language.

Low, guttural sounds emerged from Kaz’s mouth as he started to chant the spell written on the parchment. At first, nothing happened. Kaz continued to chant, and he started to speak with increasing volume. The chant started as a whisper, but now had the volume of a public speech. As Kaz kept infusing mana into his voice, a large magical rune started to form underneath his feet. The magical rune was far more complex than anything that Kaz had seen before, but the necromancer did not notice as all his focus was on the chant.

The magical rune underneath Kaz’s feet was indistinct at first, but turned more and more distinct as he continued the chant. The magical rune that was formed from the chant started to draw more connections on itself as more mana was shoved into it. Kaz’s spirit minions underwent a surprising change. Instead of floating silently at attention, they seemed to fidget a little bit. None of the spirits moved from their positions or stopped being on alert, but they would sneak glances at Kaz or at the magical rune under them. Unfortunately for Kaz, he was unaware that anything different was happening to his spirit minions at all.

The more of the chant that Kaz spoke, the more complicated it became. Sweat trickled down the back of Kaz’s head and neck as he put his very best effort into completing the chant.

I have completed nine-tenths of this chant. I need to persevere and finish the chant. If I do not manage to completely speak this chant, it will fail and all my effort will be wasted. Devils, I have no idea what the cost of failure is! It could be nothing, or I could be severely injured.

Kaz wiped the sweat on his forehead away with his free hand. A moment later, Kaz’s voice cracked as he spoke the last words of the chant. Gasping for air, Kaz opened a water flask and drank from it. After speaking for about an hour, the necromancer’s throat was parched. Looking down, Kaz was started to realize that a large purple magical rune had formed underneath where he and his spirits were standing. The magical rune was pulsing in regular intervals. Spreading his mana sense over the area, Kaz could feel that vast amounts of atmospheric mana were being pulled from across the swamp towards the rune.

The magical rune was several meters in diameter. It was wide enough to completely encompass Kaz and all of his spirit minions as well. Kaz’s insatiable curiosity provoked, he crouched down as he studied the large magical rune.

The chant must have created this rune. There is not another explanation for it. But, to be able to inscribe such a chant and bind it behind a rune-lock….the Morbid Academy is diligent. I wonder which master inscribed this piece of parchment.

At this moment, a third of the magical rune changed color. The outermost third of the rune blinked several times, then converted its color from purple to cyan. Shocked, Kaz spread his mana sense towards the outermost layer to investigate the reason for the color change. After several moments of silence, Kaz sighed in relief.

It seems that the reason for the sudden color change was that the outermost layer of the magical rune has been saturated with mana. I think that the mana infused into my voice when I chanted was to create the magical rune in the first place. For the magical rune to perform its function, vast amounts of magical energy must be used. Since this amount is greater than most amateur or apprentice mages can give, the magical rune is designed to take the needed amount from the surroundings.

Kaz sighed in admiration of the inscriptions master that came up with this particular magical rune. Such an ingenious rune must have been the life’s work of an inscriptions master. Even though he understood the general principles behind such a rune, Kaz had no confidence that he could inscribe it personally. Looking around, Kaz realized that the stump was directly on top of the rune’s center. Chuckling to himself, Kaz walked over and plopped down onto the stump.

Ah, the simplest things in life do give the most pleasure. If this stump was not here, I might have been uncomfortable the entire time I was here. Sure, I could have commanded a reaper spirit to cut down another tree. However, that action might have caused a great disturbance and garnered unwanted attention to myself. It’s good to be subtle instead of announcing my presence in a blatant manner.

Kaz felt dehydrated after exerting so much effort in chanting inscribed spell. The necromancer sipped ice water from his water flask as he watched the mana gather. Soon, the middle ring of the magical rune blinked several times then turned cyan. After each section turned cyan, the magical rune became brighter. Originally, the magical rune was glowing. After the outermost layer turned cyan, the magical rune’s light was comparable to a candle. After the middle layer turned cyan, the magical rune’s light turned as bright as a campfire. Seeing this, Kaz licked his lips. Tapping his fingers against the side of his thigh, the necromancer was impatient to see the final form of the magical rune.

The middle section took longer than the outermost layer to change color even though they are the same size. I think that this means that the different sections of the magical rune have different mana capacities. If this is true, then the inner third of the magical rune will take the longest to change color. I cannot wait to see how bright the final form of this magical rune becomes.

After several hours of waiting, the inner third of the magical rune finally blinked. It blinked once unlike the other layers. The color change from purple to cyan was much slower than the outer and middle layers. The purple of the inner layer changed to cyan at a rate visible to the eye, but this speed was far slower than the near instantaneous change of the outermost and middle layers. Kaz shot up from where he was sitting down.

When the inner layer finally completed its color change, the magical rune turned as bright as the sun. Kaz grimaced as he closed his eyes. The magical rune started to rotate on the ground, but this was not noticed by Kaz. It was night now, and there were clouds blocking the moon.

“Gods Above! Why is this light so bright. I better still be alive when it fades away…” Cursing to himself, Kaz spread his mana sense into his surroundings to watch out for any dangers. His spirit minions did not have sight like living things, so they were unaffected by the blinding radiance of the rotating magical rune.

Within seconds, the magical rune’s rotation sped up. The blinding light of the rune shot up into the air the form of a pillar. The pillar of cyan light pierced the clouds as it went up. The cyan light lit up the swamp for miles around Kaz’s location.

The pillar of cyan light ascended high into the sky, and stopped for several minutes. Then, it started to collapse upon itself. Slow at first, then speeding up, the pillar of cyan light shrunk as the mana within compressed itself. Standing directly below this compression, Kaz’s mana sense could feel the crushing pressure of the cyan pillar as it descended. Kaz grit his teeth and decided not to run outside of the magical rune’s interior.

I’ve spent too much time and effort on this endeavor to abandon it now. For good or for worse, I’m staying right here in this magical rune until the effects end. It would be such a waste if I ran away now.

Kaz braced himself right before the cyan pillar crashed into the magical rune. The moment the pillar collapsed onto the rune, the magical rune flashed once before exploding.

Kaz felt a weird sensation in his body when the rune flashed. Opening his eyes, the necromancer’s eyes popped out when he took a look at his surroundings. He was no longer in the swamp. Instead, Kaz was in a giant stone cavern. A gigantic green mana crystal hung on the ceiling of the cavern. Spreading his mana sense, Kaz could feel that the cavern was more than a kilometer high, and several kilometers across. Looking toward the center of the cavern, Kaz saw a small city surrounded by a wall containing glowing runes.

Kaz felt his knees grow weak, but he steadied himself. Walking forward, a big smile lit up the young necromancer’s face.