Pov - Umbra

The first thing Kendrick does is to take a quick look around, to get the lay of the land surrounding him. Then, after some quick deliberation, he walks toward his lab house. Opening the door, he walks in with only a slight bit of hesitation. However, once he enters the lab house, he sculks around looking for any sign of a living being. After searching the whole house twice, he lets out an audible sigh.

So first impressions from Kendrick, he is a cautious person, and well that's it. He has not talked once, which is kinda normal because there is no one else to talk to besides himself. Oh, he also does not seem crazy like some necromancers on tv but seems more like the cool necromancer protagonist you see in novels nowadays. Which is a plus in my books because if he was crazy, it would be a lot harder to get him to do things that I want. So how should I start our partnership? Because from what I gathered from the kobold, my creatures do not naturally know of me, so this is going to be awkward no matter how I approached it. I can’t just go in and say, I’m your creator and I wish for you to do yata, yata. I think the best way is to offer him an accord. I'm only saying accord because it just sounds better than contract.

“So how do you like your place of work” I mentally convey with my normal voice, trying to come off as casual. However, the second my words are spoken into his mind he seems to freak out, looking back and forth with vigor trying to find who just spoke to him.

After a few minutes, he seems to calm down and thinks about this situation more logically. Then he opens his mouth and says, “I find this place quite nice, but I wish to know who is speaking to me.” He says, trying to come off as calm, but I can feel an underlying layer of terrier coming from his words.

Without thinking, I say, “Who am I… Well, that's a complicated question. To put it simply, I’m a great spirit, who was shattered across multiple Demi-planes.” My god, what have I done? My plan has gone to shit, and it's all because I said something stupid. How could anyone believe what I just said? Great spirit! I feel embarrassed just remembering all of that. How am I going to form an accord now, that I just said something so stupid and childlike? Sure the kobolds call me great spirit, but that was their own decision, I can’t just go in and introduce myself as the great spirit Umbra, that just sounds childish to me. I feel embarrassed to even look at Kendrick’s reaction to my words.

“So, great spirit, do you have something easier you can be called by.” To my udder shock, Kendrick replies, fully serious.

So as quickly as I could, pull my mind together from the rambling thoughts as fast as I could, surprised about the fact that he actually listen to what I just said and took it as fact. Saying what comes to my mind again without hesitation, I say, “You may call me Umbra. Oh! And I wish to offer you an accord.”

Kendrick then hums for a few seconds then says, “So Umbra, what are the terms for this accord”

“The terms are simple, I’ll give you most things you request for, and in return, you must do some request of mine in the future,” I say, letting my dramatic contract demon side take over for this bit of conversation.

Kendrick then looks like he goes deeper into thought for a few moments and then says, “I’ll accept, as long as the missions you give to me in the future don’t harm me or force me into a situation that is deadly or especially harmful to me.”

“Good.” I convey simply already preparing to head out and find a place to well place the demi-plane book. I can’t just leave it out in the open like the first one. There must be a challenge involved to get the next one. I can’t have books just randomly popping up, people might suspect something I don’t want them to.

However, before I was able to head out with my thoughts filling my mind Kendrick then says, “First off I would like a notebook, a writing utensil, and some corpses for experimentation. Oh, and a blanket for the bed.” I mentally stumbled after hearing his words, not expecting him to immediately take what he wanted from my side of the accord.

But after hearing the last line, I remember that I forgot to place a blanket on the bed I made for him, but I respond with, “Alright, here.” Summoning several notebooks with a pen that never runs out of ink and a black blanket. “For the corpses, you can find them at the bottom of this ravine. Oh. And be careful down at the bottom because there is a creature you don’t want to mess with down there,” I say quickly after thinking of the perfect spot to place the book to be placed.

Seeing that Kendrick looks satisfied with what I gave him, I headed out of the book. However, when I leave the book, I finally notice the demi-plane book’s cover and overall design. It is made of a black leather with pristine white pages, the cover having plain white letters on it saying ‘My Journey to Lichdom’ signed at the very bottom with the name Kendrick Vanheart.

Well, I’m not sure if it's my thoughts or Kendrick's thoughts that influence the book design or if it is some weird time stuff, but at least the title is cool. Wait, I’m getting sidetracked, I am going to place the demi-book in the ruins in the kobold mines. I have been feeling like the reward was too small for beating the spider golem… Wait, I never got Akasha to go and inscribe some runes on it! I just drop the book right next to the Puzzle Box and quickly move my consciousness to Akasha.

However, Akasha talks before I'm able to say a word, “So you finally come to ask me to add some runes to your spider golem.”

I’m shocked that Akasha knew what I was about to ask her, and all I’m able to fumble out is a simple question, “How did you know?”

“That’s really simple. You just project your thoughts outward when you monolog to yourself. It may not project to the dungeon creatures, but through our bond, it is easy to sense.” Akasha says with a shit-eating grin on her face. Sure, it is the biggest emotion I have gotten out of her, but it still makes me angry looking at it.

“So you're saying that you knew I was going to ask you and forgot but didn’t feel like saying anything about it,” I say out of frustration while trying to calm myself down.

With the look still on her face, she says, “Yeah, now do you want me to do it or not.”

I let out a sigh and say with a little bit of regret, “Yes, I would like you to put some runes on my creature.”

I then move to the ruins as fast as I could to avoid any more of that conversation. Yet, to my surprise, Akasha's down there as fast as I was, and I’m just a consciousness, so how did she get here so fast? I’m just going to chalk it up to ancient fairy magic, or more likely our dungeon bond allowing her to teleport.

“Is this the thing you want me to add some runes on?” Akasha says while walking around the silver spider thing. “And do you know what runes you want on it?”

“Yes it is that thing and I don’t care about what runes you put on it, just make it as good as you can without making it impossible.”

“Yeah, that can easily be done,” Akasha says, trying to crack her knuckles but failing.

Akasha then begins walking toward the spider grabbed what looks like several carving tools from the empty space and saying, “Oh, and we're going to have to teach you some basic rune, so I don’t have to come down for this grunt work. But don’t get things twisted, I still want to work on the truly epic creations.”