Necromancer

A Royal Road Fan Fiction

By: Halosty

Chapter 29

Quietus finally went to turn in the quest he had come to Twinsburg Heights for. He went to the morgue to see Alva.

“I’m done.”

Alva turned to look at him. “You certainly are. I’ve already heard news of how all the ghosts are gone from the Moaning Mines. Well, I guess they’re just “the mines” now.”

You have completed a quest!

Level up!

Level up!

Two levels, not too bad for a quest where he also learned four new spells.

“Can you direct me to more people who can teach me?”

“Well, most things you can learn on your own now. There are some people around who can teach you some more things, but you’ll have to find them on your own. They’re very secretive, most of the time.”

“Well, thank you for teaching me.” Quietus turned to leave

“You’re welcome. Say… before you go, I noticed you’re using that dagger still.”

“Of course, it’s a good dagger.”

“No doubt… do you know its origin?”

Quietus thought about it for a minute. “I heard it belonged to the apprentice of a powerful necromancer. Not much else.”

“What do you know about necromancers?”

“They make zombies?”

Alva laughed at his response. “Well, you’re not entirely wrong. However, if that were true, even you would be a necromancer. Actually, Necromancers study magic dealing with death. This involves things like creating undead, the specialty of Blood Necromancers. Blood Necromancers also learn to use magic to increase the strength of their undead. Then, there are Spirit Necromancers, who specialize in ghosts. They often create undead to use as vessels for spirits they control, but are not as specialized in that as Blood Necromancers.. A Mind Necromancer specializes in dark magic and curses, although nothing prevents them from being proficient at the creation of undead. As a warlock, you are not too different from a necromancer, although they are more likely to employ a staff to bolster their magical power than a dagger. In fact, Necromancers can come from any type of magical background.”

“So, was the necromancer who had this dagger a warlock?”

“No, actually. The dagger was meant to be used for sacrifices. Although it generally grows stronger in terms of physical use, it can be attuned to increase magical power instead.”

“Interesting. Who would know how to do such a thing?”

“The necromancers who live on the Plains of Despair may know. Some of them have left the Plains of Despair, as well, but I do not know where they have gone.”

You have received a quest!

Attune the Sacrificial Dagger.

Seek out the necromancers who lived on the Plains of Despair to teach you how to attune the Sacrificial Dagger of the Apprentice. The Plains of Despair are full of dangerous monsters, and may contain undead remaining behind after the defeat of Bar-Khan.

Difficulty: B

“I’ll seek them out.” It would still be quite some levels before he could do a B ranked quest. However, it would give him something to work towards in the future.

Quest accepted.

“I wish you well, Quietus.”

--------------------------

During the next few weeks, Mortimer was constantly busy. Besides training with Master Valrao and playing Royal Road, he also studied for, and took, his finals. He ended up in a very odd sleep schedule during this time. This was because of what was going on in Royal Road.

--------------------------

In Royal Road, Quietus spent a lot of time working on his level and skills. He had no immediate quest to work towards. What really caused his sleep schedule to go off of what was normal was Abaddon.

Quietus hadn’t forgiven him for killing his cousin, and Ruby. Maratis too, technically, but that was somewhat of an afterthought in the not forgiving. Abaddon was no longer marked as a murderer after being killed. To Quietus, this meant that he had to go around in disguise more.

Quietus killed Abaddon in various ways. He tried poison, but it was really hard to tell exactly how effective it was. All of his data was skewed by the bleeding damage. He sometimes killed him with Backstab, at least if he was in a hurry. After a few deaths, Abaddon started logging in at odd times, and less frequently. This is what caused Quietus to keep a strange sleep schedule. He would sleep whenever it was convenient between times when Abaddon could log on. Unfortunately for Abaddon, he was never able to log on while Quietus was in finals, not that he could have known they were happening.

After about a week in the real world, Quietus started seeing a lot of people with red birds on their armor or clothes. At first, Quietus thought nothing of it. Of course, this lasted only a few minutes, as the warrior and archer he saw attacked him. He wasn’t ready for something like that, and was killed. This happened shortly after he had killed Abaddon. This meant that he could still log on before him. He also learned something important. He could sense the location of Abaddon’s body when it was Soul Bound. Visually, it was like a pale line connecting the two of them.

This ability allowed Quietus to find where the two people with the red bird had taken Abaddon’s body. With the element of surprise on Quietus’ side, the archer died quickly. The warrior didn’t notice before he too was inflicted with a heavy dose of pain, caused by a dagger in his back. He survived this, but Quietus discovered that armor doesn’t do much to prevent dislocated shoulders, at least if performed properly.

Quietus clashed quite a lot with these people who had red birds. He now spent all his time sneaking about. Sometimes, he got the drop on the enemy and took them out. Once or twice he fell into a trap, attacking someone who was seemingly alone but being attacked by others. Sometimes he misjudged the strength of his enemies. However, he still had a pretty good record of killing versus dying. He also had the advantage of coming back to life more quickly… and not having a predictable respawn location. He was fortunate to drop no items he considered important. Well, one time he had lost some good boots he picked up, but he got those back the next day. Plus interest.

After a while, though, Quietus was starting to get tired of these people. They had started traveling in larger and larger groups, so he mostly had to avoid them now. Quietus had learned something important, though, because he was now a much better judge of players levels. It basically ended up with shinier equipment equalled higher level. This wasn’t the limit of his skills there, but that was the best summary.

Then, about a week into summer, Angelo messaged Quietus.

“I finished putting together the guild! I found a lot of people who wanted to join. You need to join too.”

You have received a guild invitation.

You have joined The Children of Light!

Angelo continued talking about the guild. “I got the idea for the guild after we were killed by that stupid wizard. We’re an anti-pk guild. We only kill those who have murderer’s marks. Well, unless they have histories of being a player killer. Speaking of which, we’re at war with a guild called The Crimson Raven. So if you see anyone with a red bird on their uniform, leave a message in the guild chat. Maybe some people will be nearby to help take them out.”

Quietus almost wanted to quit the guild immediately. Not that he had anything against killing players. He obviously had nothing against killing pkers either. It was just that he completely technically was a player killer. It had mostly been for quests though, so he didn’t feel bad about killing people he didn’t know for unknown reasons. Also, a couple people that annoyed him.

He couldn’t quit the guild though. Not without making his cousin upset. Instead, he decided he would just stay on the fringe. Also, although there wasn’t anything technically wrong with being a warlock, he would just pretend he was a rogue. It seemed simpler. Besides, he could do most of the stuff they did anyway. Not that he planned to group with members of the guild very often.

“Oh, one more thing. We’ve discovered they have a base. It’s nothing too impressive, but we’re planning to attack it next week. I’d appreciate you coming to that, although you don’t have to.”

Quietus would definitely be there. Although, he planned to check it out first. Maybe he could help weaken their defenses before the real battles would start.

End Chapter 29

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