Supreme Magus - Chapter 115

Chapter 115: 115
The energy seeped into the ground, and countless skeletons, both human and animal, emerged from below . Their mouths were agape in a silent scream, fighting their way out of mud and roots .




Several hands grabbed Lith's feet and ankles with an iron grip . In a few seconds he was surrounded by a small army of undead, each emitting an ominous aura that sent a cold shiver down his spine .
Lith knew they posed no threat to him . A single lesser undead was nothing more than an annoyance, even that many couldn't harm someone like him . Worst case scenario, he would simply take off and attack them from the sky, leaving them no possibility for retaliation .
But his body seemed to ignore all that knowledge . The only things he felt from their shiny red eyes were innate fear and revulsion .
He kept his cool, keeping those emotions sealed in a corner of his mind, while exploiting that contact to use Invigoration on them and understand how did Kalla manage to do it .
Lith discovered that each of the skeletons grabbing him had now a small red mana core .
Invisibles to the naked eye, countless tendrils of energy departed from it, keeping all the bones together and allowing them to move and feel . Unlike normal cores, though, they had black stripes, pulsing and growing every time the undead moved .
"In this world the dead outnumber the living by hundreds . An expert Byk will bury its preys and turn them into a weapon . The shock they cause and the sheer numbers can easily turn tables, if properly used . "
With another tap of her pawn, the skeletons crawled back underground, and through her use of earth magic, no trace of their passage remained .
"Necromancy can be roughly divided in two branches: lesser and higher .
Lesser necromancy, which I just used, allows to temporary turn any corpse into an undead . It doesn't require much energy, but the effects are short lasting, and its creations are incapable of thought, they can only obey simple orders .




Higher necromancy, that you foolishly attempted, though, is an entirely different matter . "
With a flick of her snout, Kalla conjured near her the ashes of the Lith's monster, stirring them with a darkness imbued claw, biting her own other pawn to let some blood drip on them .
Horror struck Lith when he saw the ashes turn into a semi liquid state, coiling around the claw and using it to stretch closer to the blood source .
"That thing is still alive?" He unconsciously took a step back .
"No . I'm just playing with the residual energies, just to show you how powerful necromancy is . " As soon the Byk stopped infusing dark energy, the blob turned back to ashes, despite the blood still dripping on it .
"Higher necromancy allows to create lesser undead capable of lasting forever, or even superior creatures, capable of independent thought . Yet no matter what you do, higher necromancy has a flaw compared to the lesser branch .
After I called back my spell, the skeletons were still intact, and if I or anyone else were to raise them again, they would still serve their master . The same would have happened if I kept them around until the spell wore off .

But when something is created out of higher necromancy, the unbalance is too severe .
If the caster doesn't feed his creatures with the proper amount of light energy, the dark magic that animates them starts to corrode their bodies, until they turn into dust . "

The Byk sighed sadly .
"I tried countless times, but my inability to use light magic prevents me from truly mastering necromancy . All my creations have the lifespan of a butterfly . Undeath is no life, to sustain it a price has to be paid .
The better the necromancer, the less energy the creatures require . But no matter how little it can be, raising a permanent army would either drain the caster or require an external source . "
"Do you mean taking lives?"
Kalla nodded .
"Skeletons are simple, they require raw energy, it's irrelevant to them the source it comes from . Other creatures can be pickier, and require living flesh or blood to sustain their existence if the necromancer's energy is not available .
And that usually means that lots of people have to die . "
"Wait, are you telling me that an undead army has to 'eat' regularly? Isn't that a contradiction?"
"Contradiction?" Kalla snorted . "Have you ever found anything, alive or not that moves without needing energy? Humans need to eat, and so do plants . For a stone to roll, someone has to push it .
Or else both humans and magical beasts would only fight with undeads . Imagine an army that does not rest, eat or fear, that grows in number with every battle . No, Scourge, that would be nonsense . "




- "Kalla is right, otherwise necromancy would ignore the first law of thermodynamics, energy cannot be created or destroyed . Only be transferred or changed from one form to another . But that poses another question .
Then how can magical objects never run out of juice? What is their energy source?"
"The magician . " Solus observed . "That must be the reason why the imprinting process is necessary before using one . Is not only a safety measure, but also a way to feed them . That would also explain why magical items can be reused after their master's death . " –
"I have a question . According to what you say, undead should obey the necromancer . Why the creature attacked me?" Lith asked .
"As I said, I haven't mastered necromancy, yet . But the most likely explanation is that your clumsy spell didn't bear your mark with it . Because of that, it didn't recognize you as its master, but only as a prey .
Especially so if it hated you when it was still alive . "
"What do you mean with mark?" Lith was clearly lost . "And why should a dead man feelings matter?"
Kalla snorted even harder, causing Nok to chuckle at his expenses .
"By the Great Mother, how could your parents let you walk alone in this world being so ignorant?" It said shaking its huge head in desperation .
"Based on what Nok told me, you used higher necromancy, turning someone that was still alive .
It wasn't a mindless corpse, but someone that died cursing you with his final breath . Even if your attempt failed, the creature was bound to carry with itself the deepest emotions linked to its death .
Not having a mark, its primary instinct was likely to exact revenge . Are you finally starting to understand the foolishness of your actions?"
Lith nodded, recognizing that being so powerful and yet so ignorant in the ways of magic was a terrible combination .
"Do you at least know how to raise a single undead?" She then asked .
"No . What happened earlier was an accident . " Lith didn't like admitting his incompetence, but having worked in the science field, he knew that knowledge could not be faked . Either you accepted your ignorance, or studied to fill the gaps .
They walked up to Rodimas' corpse, then Kalla started explaining .
"If you were to simply use darkness magic on a corpse, it would rot and disappear . What you need to do, instead, is to let the necromantic energies fill the body or the skeleton, like this . "
The Byk placed its claws on Rodimas' hollow forehead, while Lith used Invigoration to see the stale blood turning black because of the dark magic, the veins bulging out .
"Once it's saturated, add a speck of light magic, even first magic is fine . That will be your mark, the only life force the undead will respect and obey to . "
Rodimas' corpse eyes opened again, the chestnut colour replaced by the bright red . Kalla was about to withdraw her energies, but Lith asked her to wait a bit . That way he was able to notice that the creature had no blood core, just a red one striped black like the skeletons did .

Note : Please download the sponsor's game to support us!