I flick my eye around in a slight panic, attempting to observe everyone at the same time. Athena! Can you hear me?

Mother?

Yeah, your mother. Sure. Can you speak to Lola? Tell her I want to help, but I don't know how. What's wrong with Isaac? Who's that small person? What's going on?

Many! Athena wails telepathically, trying to catch up with my barrage of questions. I roll my eye. Fine. Just ask her what I can do to help.

She looks up at Lola, eye wide, and my young master - no, partner - responds anxiously. "Codex, I can't talk with you right now! We need to help Father!"

Really? I hadn't noticed.

Surrounded by what I presume to be medics, Isaac looks unresponsive from the glances I can make out with my severely limited ocular capacity. Lola tries to push through, to no avail, and cries, "That's my father! Let me through!"

One of the healers, somehow utterly unaffected by Lola's Charm, turns to her apologetically. "I'm sorry, miss Bourgeious, but he needs immediate attention, and from professionals. Luckily, he seems to just be suffering from mana overuse. It's good that you want to help, but I'm afraid you just can't right now. Why don't you check up on your friends?"

Sighing nervously, Lola turns, her satchel swinging and my vision swaying as a result. She walks towards the group of her fellow students, who are hunched around something. Her curiosity beats out her anxiety, as I'd expected, and she picks up the pace, asking, "What is it?"

They were all leaning over the small figure from earlier, whom I must admit I'm more interested in than I thought. What could the Compendium possibly want with anyone? It's plenty powerful from what I understand.

Powerful? Lol, that's an understatement. You ain't seen nothin' like his level. I mean, you would not believe his stats, dang it.

...What in the world does 'lol' mean?

Wait, WHAT!?

What is it? What'd I say? It means laugh out loud, I swear!

You can see what his abilities are? And you can talk about them?

Huh. I guess I can.

Wait a second, I can talk about his stats! I can tell you his weaknesses... if he had any.

Everyone has a weakness. You just have to tell me what his are, all right? This could make all the difference!

Ehhh... you're going to get depressed.

Hmph. He can only be so powerful. Besides, Lola's mana pool is absurdly huge. I'm certain we can exploit his low points somehow.

If you say so...

A flood of information fills my head, and a wavering black status screen pulls up in front of me. Excitedly, I begin scanning it from top to bottom.

He was right. I'm getting depressed.

Arachnis Arcanus Compendium - The Artificial Living Grimoire: Lvl 149

Health: 7390/12297

Mana: 104397/118204

Endurance: 2701

Agility: 139

Strength: 980

Intelligence: 71

Charm: -1049254

Spells: ERROR: File too large to display.

Mutations: Magic Eye (9), Arachnesis Limb (8), Multiplied Brains (3)

Perks: Flawless Perception (MAX), Amplified Mana (MAX), Spider General (MAX), Artificial Might (MAX), Mana Compressor (MAX), Power Amplifier (MAX), Supreme Caster (MAX), Aura of Terror (MAX), Deliberate Obliteration (MAX)

Titles: Progenitor of Fear, Arachnid Supreme, Lord of Destruction, Thaddeus' Creation, Cosmic Touched, Blight of Xanem, Humanity's Bane, Overlord of the Dead, Bindmaster

Familiars: 9140926589 (Small Spider, Ordinary Spider, Venomous Spider, Acidic Arachnid, Toxic Manylegs, Giantsbane Destroyer, Mana Eater, Deep Devourer, Arachne Aurofax, Maganamous Arachnethes)

My eye widens further and further as I continue reading down the list, a sickening feeling building up. What in the world had that book done to acquire this level of power?

...Yeah, the things that book did to get to that rank were... disturbing. I'll just say that even though I can see everything, I've never seen anything go to the extent of torture, black magic, and sheer destructive experimentation quite like the Compendium. I don't think I need to tell you that I was surprised you made it out of that alive.

I honestly agree. How in the world did we... what's this?

Carolin just reached down and pulled back the cloak of the strange figure, to reveal... a skeleton?

No, not quite. The bones are visible, yes, on an obviously humanoid form, and yet an almost perfectly transparent layer of gray skin is stretched over them. In the eye sockets are two green orbs, black dots dilating as... oh, they're eyes. The overall appearance of the facial structure leads me to believe that the strange person is in fact female, as opposed to the masculine identity I'd applied to her originally. Currently, her eyes are flicking around in a panic, and she scoots back, pulling her cloak back over her head. "NO! Please, no... I'm sorry, I'm sorry, don't send me back!" Her words are strange, pale, wavering white.

Carl unhelpfully poses, and his tiny lion copies him. "Worry not, fair lich! We have no intention of delivering you anywhere, and you have nothing to apologize for!"

Carolin glares at him. "Carl, that's... actually pretty helpful. And wait, you're a lich?" She asks the final part to the young skeleton child, who nods nervously, tucking her knees up. Carolin frowns. "I've never seen a lich so young."

"It is forbidden to raise children from the dead."

If I hadn't seen the green mana clearly form into the words, I wouldn't have believed it was Dawn speaking. Her words look angry, spiky, and shivering with what I can creatively imagine to be rage. Her hands are clenched into fists, her eyes focused laser-like on the lich (lichling? Lichling). "I am so sorry for you."

After everyone gets over the shock, Lola (to no one's surprise) wraps the lichling in a hug. "You're safe now! I'm Lola, what's your name?"

Ungratefully extracting herself from Lola's magnificent hug, she rubs her shoulder uncertainly. "I don't remember. No one told me what it was."

Lola pouts. "That's so sad! But - but now you can pick your own name! It can be whatever you want!"

The deer-horned boy - right, Forrest - had been looking back and forth nervously from Lola to the lichling, but at this he interjects. "How about Marrow?" Everyone turns to look at him, and he shrinks back. "Sorry..."

The lichling's eyes glow gently, and the skin in front of the lower half of her curves into a faint smile, the first one I've seen from her. "I like it." The response elicits a huge grin from Lola, and as a direct result, Forrest.

A very important-looking woman wearing long robes walks over to us. "Excuse me, may I speak to you?"

Marrow had been relaxing somewhat, but at this, she tenses up again. Body language is fairly obvious to interpret. "Uhhh... can we do it here?"

Undeterred, the woman nods. "Fine. What exactly are you doing here? Moreover, who raised you? Necromancy isn't discouraged, but you're required to have a license if you want to practice it on humans."

Marrow shrinks, pulling her knees up. Lola pats her shoulder. "...I was running away. The Compendium was the one who brought me back."

The woman frowns, confused. "Why would you run away from the being who brought you back to life? The little research we have regarding afterlives indicate that the positive ones are not easy to get into, and the others are... unpleasant."

Wincing, Marrow spoke quietly. "He's Binding himself to everyone he can manage. He's trying to reverse the process, to make it so he's the one in charge."

No one says anything for a long moment.

Cark.