Samuel gave Eric the strangest look when he came back, equal parts relief and worry.

“What’s up, Sam?” Eric said, painting on his friendliest smile.

The young man self-consciously stepped back, before chuckling awkwardly. “Sorry, Eric. It’s just that, well… shit. You look pretty damn intense, if you know what I mean.”

Eric took a deep breath, and let it out. “I can imagine. And I’m sorry. I got a bit cocky taking out some Spirit Boar, and it gave me a bit of a scare.”

Sam’s eyes widened, an anxious smile coming over his features. “Something scaring you? Eric Silver? Badass action hero and real life hero as well? Somehow, I find that hard to believe.”

Eric chuckled. “Got a bit cocky playing Braveheart and a certain boar made it clear that he didn’t give a shit if a massive wide-bladed bardiche had just ripped open its chest cavity and ruptured its heart. It was still going to complete it’s charge just long enough to toss me with its tusks before dropping dead where my feet had been before I was sent doing cartwheels in the air… which was exactly what happened.”

Samuel paled. “Shit.” Then he forced a hopeful smile. “But you’re here. In the flesh. Not a ghost. Right?”

Eric smirked. “Correct on all counts, with a wrist tattoo tingling like a motherfucker.”

Sam laughed at that. “Well then, let’s go animate ourselves a pig!”

Eric took a deep breath as his friend droned on, fascinated by the complex arrangement of sigils scribed in a circle of chalk he had patiently drawn with young Samuel’s instruction, with the corpse of his most recent boar placed in the center.

Sam, for all that he was a good-natured kid, couldn’t seem to help waxing long about the virtues of his craft, in addition to a rather pedantic lecture about the responsibilities and expectations to be had for any good student of the True Art, as he put it, before finally going over the purposes of the circle and the sigils connected to it, Eric quickly nodding his head when his friend finally took a breath.

“Okay, got it. The chalk sigils have the potential to preserve the vessel, trap the spirit that would possess our vessel, and contain basic commands to obey the summoner that the spirit is somehow signing as it takes over the body, so we’re not forced into a constant contest-of-wills when we finally summon our target. So, what’s the next step?”

He gazed down at the blood sigil throbbing with so much locked potency upon his arm, eager to see if he truly had what it took to stride along this new path of power.

His friend gazed at him for long moments, sighing and shaking his head.

“Eric, were you ewven paying attention? Seriously, man, Necromancy isn’t fire and forget magic. You actually have to study the flow of power between mundus and the spirit realm, or tartarus, hades, oblivion, or whatever realm you would channel. Even if Grim insists on tapping into the potency of only the safest realm that’s most attuned with our own, you still have to understand what the hell you’re doing. More than understand, you have to feel the ethereal currents blowing through all of us as our own spirits pull us through our lives, slowly wearing out our mortal shell.”

Sam flashed a wry smile. “In other words, aging. The first lesson every true necromancer learns is better understanding his own mortality. Because every moment we’re alive, every moment we exist in this shell, our souls are compelling and draining our vessels of flesh before we eventually break free once more, either returning to the realm from which we were summoned with the first spark of life, or for the truly inspired or learned, transcending to realms higher still! If anything, the disconnect for you, having sacrificed over 22 years to our art while having a body with a Vitality no mortal necromancer has ever had before should give you a clearer sense of your relation to the Spirit Realm than any but the most enlightened or gifted might enjoy.”

Eric grinned. “Sounds awesome. So my insanely stupid sacrifice might actually help me as a necromancer, in addition to whatever else it allows. So I take it that the next step is infusing these sigils with the power stored in this kickass tattoo?

Sam rolled his eyes. “Sure, Eric. If you’re really so gifted that you can already feel the flow of all of those sigils without us spending days mastering the intricacy of each sigil and finally how they all interconnect as a whole, then just cut open your palm or wrist and summon forth the power stored in your glyph.”

His friend smirked. “Of course it helps that you actually have skill in blood magic, or we’d be carefully saturating every line of chalk with carefully applied drops of your blood, and then we’ll still need to spend time actually infusing your blood with the power trapped in the tattoo on your arm. Not something learned in a single afternoon, I assure you. And finally, to top it all off, you need to exercise your will upon the blood-working as a whole. You have to concentrate every ounce of your focus, drive, and willpower to not only visualize the flow of spiritual power within or ritual circle, but to compel a spirit to hear your call and accept the bindings.

His friend’s smirk grew as he saw Eric frowning thoughtfully at the complex chalk diagram.

“See, Eric? It’s not as easy as all that. It took me weeks just to learn the theory, and months before I managed to raise my first undead mouse. And you’d have us start with a Spirit Boar?” His friend chuckled dryly. “I’m happy to teach you what I can, Eric. I know you’re gifted, but we’re talking about a lifetime’s worth of lessons. Right now, this is something to pass the time until it’s safe for us to leave, and maybe, if we’re lucky, figure out something regarding that cultivation manual those asshole goblins sold us, and if we’re really lucky and clever, figure out some way to claim at least one of those fire fruit! Or at least, get out of here with our skins intact.”

Eric gave a distracted nod, still staring at the complex arrangement, until it all suddenly clicked and he smiled. “Shit, this is basically just an arcane circuit board!”

His friend snorted. “Seriously? That’s what you see? Alright, close your eyes. Can you visualize even one of those sigils?” His friend’s bemused smile grew. “Even one, Eric. Surprise me.”

Eric shrugged before closing his eyes, frowning only slightly. “I’m not too good at visual memorization. My 13 Scholarship is that of a decent student, for a mortal, but most definitely not among the gifted elite. But I’m pretty good at getting a feel for things, like flows of power. My guess is once we infuse it with blood, I’ll get a good sense for the flow of things and be able to replicate it, just like I know I can the tattoo on my arm.”

Samual laughed at this. “Seriously, Eric? Your blood tattoo is one thing, but an entire bloodworking ...” His voice cut off when Eric carefully sliced a shallow cut in the palm of his hand before compelling his own blood forth, visualizing the locked potency trapped within his blood tattoo flowing out with the steady trickle of blood. A flow of crimson that rapidly spread through the chalk sigils like floodwaters filling bone-dry channels with hot crimson power.

Eric trembled with something close to awe as he felt the complex sigils that seconds ago he had to struggle just to get the tiniest feel for with his Arcane Perception now blossoming with sudden crystalline clarity in his mind’s eye.

It was as if the blood now infusing the glyphs was suddenly allowing him to look right through the engine block of his mother’s Lamborghini, seeing clear as day how gas was transformed to roaring power that allowed his sister to tear along a private racing track at 120mph laughing with joy while Eric just tried to keep from spewing all over the back seat.

Only now, it was his bloodworking infused with the power of half a dozen powerful spirit beasts and a bit of his own Potency, and he could sense so clearly, just like he could see his sister racing along the track, how the power flowed through each and every one of those exquisitely perfect sigils, resonating in perfect harmony with that realm of death and rebirth that was just a single step away from this tiny pocket world they now strode upon.

He could feel the pristine golden notes of his working ring through the ether, compelling endless powerful spirits to race forth for a chance at fresh life, roaring with unthinkable hideous power that Eric could feel like a mad static tingle against his skin even as he vaguely sensed Samuel panicking and crying out for Eric to do something… yet all it took was Eric catalyzing his sigils with the flames of his resolve and the howling cacophony from beyond the pale was instantly silenced… and suddenly the awful pressure that had threatened to rip through the sigils compelling obedience was gone.

The furious river of blood and darkest potency was suddenly unable to crest the banks, Eric somehow channeling that hideous glorious power exactly where he willed it to go, within the perfectly preserved corpse that was covered with Samuel’s crimson lines of warding and binding.

Congratulations! You have successfully summoned A greater spirit into host body!

Greater Spirit attempts to burst your bindings!

You have successfully infused your Bloodworking with the Essence of Fire and Dominion!

You have successfully subjugated a Greater Spirit!

Spirit Mastery is now Rank 16!

You have successfully imprinted Standard Summoning and Binding Ritual!

Rituals of Summoning and Binding is now Rank 19!

Eric couldn’t help grinning as he gazed upon the boar now twitching in the center of the Ritual circle as Samuel gazed upon him in wide-eyed disbelief. In truth, Eric could hardly believe it himself, as awed by the sudden sense that he now knew this ritual of Summoning and Binding as intimately as Rica’s smile, able to sense every twist and curve in every sigil that comprised the whole. Feeling it more like a tingling pulse of power he could now sense just as clearly as he could the now empty tattoo on his left forearm.

Successfully Imprinted indeed, he thought with a sad smirk, pushing away thoughts of Rica as he focused anew on the interplay of power between all the sigils, each of them now having a meaning in his mind, their placement and design akin to a recipe written in a cook book, his mind now understanding how to translate that particular recipe of summoning with perfect placement of all the components. As natural as putting on his clothes in the right order, he thought, for all that Samuel was gazing at him in slack-jawed disbelief.

Eric couldn’t help grinning at his friend’s dumbstruck expression as the boar began to glow with pulsating sigils of blood as it lurched to its feet and gave a mighty roar.

“No way. No fucking way!” The boy hissed

“So, how many weeks was that supposed to take again?” Eric said with a smirk, delighting in his friend’s look of awed disbelief.

And then he felt it.

A cold shiver of dread that turned exhilaration into horror as the power channeled by his bloodworking continued to flood into the prepared vessel.

A massive spirit boar that was now pulsating oddly, gazing at Eric with eyes that flickered with eldritch flame as the sigils on its body when from a faint glow to a retina-searing intensity. And Eric suddenly understood their peril.

Because even if it was Eric who had infused the chalk sigils with the power and potency of his blood, Essences of Fire and Dominion compelling and controlling any spirit that would dare walk between realms… the sigils upon the boar itself had been scribed by another.

The boar began to squeal and thrash, it’s body expanding and contracting to hideous effect as its swelled with unholy power.

And Samuel just stood there, flatfooted, frozen with either awe or horror.

“Sam, we have to move. We have to move now!” Eric roared, realizing that he too was just standing there like a fool.

But he wasn’t such an idiot that he wouldn’t MOVE when he realized that he was acting no better than Sam, desperately grabbing the boy and ignoring his startled protest before racing for the entrance of their cave for all he was worth, praying he’d make it and LEAPING for the bright light of the entrance as a massive shockwave slammed into his back, sending him flying out the entrance. And it was all he could do to brace a screaming Sam in careful arms, like he would a fragile child, as they were sent flying like a popped cork from the entrance, and it took every point of Finesse he had for it to be him the one landing square on his ass as opposed to poor Sam as a loud hidous roar turning to an awful metallic screetch of twisting steel washed over them from the cavern mouth before dying away entirely.

You have successfully saved versus concussive blast!

Finesse check made! You have successfully cushioned your companion!

You have taken 10 points of temporary damage and no significant wounds!

Sam? Sam! Are you alright?” Eric cried out in sudden panic, looking down at his dazed friend with a rivulet of blood trickling out of his ear before snarling and quickly getting his bearings, realizing that they had either leaped or had been thrown free of the cavern entrance by a good fifteen feet, just at the edge of their claimed clearing, at the lip of their own protective bloodward, and of course there were already two tuskers nearby, glaring at Eric and Sam with hostile eyes, no doubt eager to gore and trample the humans daring to invade their territory during the brief moments they were stunned.

You have critically struck boar with flame-tipped javelin! Experience earned!

Surviving boar has fled!