Overlord (LN) - Volume 15 - Chapter 3.5

Intermission

The progression of a magic caster’s career could proceed in a myriad of ways.

However, mortals—no matter how creative they were—tended to fear wasting the limited time they had on this plane more so than their desire for greater power. Consequently, most would walk down a known path than experiment on their own.

That was why, without any external intervention, every single civilization that mastered magic would end up creating schools and systems to teach the most well-known of paths.

One could then infer these systems should store information in some form and they would be correct. Vast archives of tomes, parchment, and other paper-based media were the most common form of information storage, but they were not the only ones. 

A small portion of magical secrets was etched into crystals that stored spells, invisible to those who did not know where and how to peer into the Abyss.

There were those who could extract that information, the casters of the South. The most talented and brilliant of all mortal casters, the progenitors of Magi-tech, the ones who had overcome the limits of their flesh by exploiting the limits of their machina. 

They called it “dayta.” Contained within those crystals were ways to gain power no one would have ever attempted otherwise. Who knew that you could empower certain spells by walking forward two steps, walking backward two steps, alternate walking left-right a step each twice, yelling “BA,” and casting the spell?

Utterly ridiculous.

Yet it worked.

The 7 Night Liches that constituted the inner circle of the organization known as the Corpus of the Abyss gathered once more at the lair of {that one}, a True Dragon Lord that held dominion over them. It was a symbiotic relationship, {that one} provided them with dayta stolen from the South and they in turn gave {that one} the fruits of their research.

In attendance were:

“The Abyss.” The original founder.

“The Saintess of White.” The only female member.

“Crimson-Eyed Duke." The only unnatural Night Lich, a former human.

And “The Death Rider,” “The King of Decay,” “Wise Wolf," “The Elder of the Hosts," “The Eaten," “The Revenant of Yellow.”

What was odd about this gathering was {that one’s} insistence on The Saintess of White’s attendance. Nevertheless, they entered the underground structure.

They were greeted by {that one} in the Great Hall, in the middle sat a curious contraption that held at its peak the largest crystal they had yet seen. It wasn’t jagged and uncut like the other ones. In fact, they never even knew that a cut magic crystal could still function.

“Is that…an arcane incantation?” Banejieri, The Abyss, asked.

“I’ve seen this script in the past, but was never able to learn it. The minotaur I captured assured me that it read ‘p-n hb’ though as you can see, saying it out loud does not invoke any magick, so I must assume that it is not an incantation.” {that one} replied.

“Why was I summoned specifically?” Grazn, The Saintess of White, inquired.

“The minotaur told me that we would require at least one humanoid female to complete the rituals inscribed upon this crystal.” {that one} again replied. “Well then, let us unlock the great mysteries contained with this item.”

Banejieri, their representative, approached the device and touched a button that had the shapes of a triangle and two lines etched upon it.

A brilliant flash of light exploded forth from the contraption, blinding everyone in the room. 

After the lights died down somewhat, pale blue eidolons of sorts hovered over the device while sounds emanated from it.

They had encountered dayta stored in the form of sound before, but never something like this.

The specter-esque image depicted 8 humans, 7 men and a woman. They spoke in a language unknown to anyone in the room, none of them looked like they were mages either. But, stranger things had happened, so they would at least give this ritual a try.

Minutes into the relay of information, Krunui, the Crimson-Eyed Duke’s pale face was suddenly flushed red. He excused himself from the gathering and ran away in a hurry.

“What’s his issue?”

“Perhaps too much of his human side still remained, so he cannot bear to witness the savagery on display here.”

“I knew we shouldn’t have allowed a former human to join our ranks, no matter how powerful he was.”

Down a member, the rest of the Corpus of the Abyss continued to study in detail until the lights completely vanished.

“Hmmmmm, this does remind me of something the Brightness Dragon Lord had shown me once in the past.”

“Did he also complete this ritual to gain power?”

“Possibly, but I remember him telling me that his humanoid partners never did survive the affair most of the time, perhaps it would be wise for you all to try it first before I have a go at this.”

With {that one’s} blessings, the six began to disrobe.

They tried their best to emulate what they had just seen, which was particularly difficult for the Night Liches as they were in various states of decay and lacking certain fine motor functions that appeared to be mandatory.

They completed the ritual to the best of their abilities, but upon testing, none of them had gained any power.

“So what do we do now?”

“I believe the ‘abuspreetzin’ mentioned at the end is a necessary part of the ceremony, that does not appear to be something you undead can do. Very well then, I, one of the living, will attempt this ritual. Are you ready Grazn?”

“Allow me to apply defensive magic first.”

“Hnnnng, I’ll show you why they call me the Deep Dick Dragon Lord.”

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(T/N: I know it's bad, I ran out of ideas okay? Anyway, below is the real intermission)
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