Book of The Dead

When he woke, Tyron knew that he was not the same person as he had been before. He lay on the grass, staring up at the clear blue sky, unsure of how long he had been out.

As soon as the ritual had ended, his head exploded as the Unseen filled him with knowledge, pouring it into him like a jug being filled with water. Despite his best effort to hold it all, he still felt as if he had begun to overflow in mere moments, precious information slipping out of his grasp and disappearing into the depths of his mind. Only prodigious effort and long hours of study would unearth it again.

Of course, his body had also changed, but compared to the changes in his head, they seemed insignificant. It felt… roomier, as if his thoughts were allowed to stretch wider than before, his imagination capable of stretching into much larger space.

His unobstructed view of the clear sky was disturbed as a horrifying black skull eased into view, looking down at him.

“Soooo. How does it feel to be one of the supreme existences in the world?” Dove asked him. “And, I’m just curious, were there any options to regrow your body? Even a single limb is enough. A specific limb. Some would say the most important limb. Not everyone, of course, but most people. People like me.”

“Dove…”

“Can I get my dick back if I reach platinum? It’s a simple question.”

Groaning at the weight in his head, Tyron sat up, pushing the skeleton to the side. His vision swam for a moment as he clutched his temple. Filetta was still nearby, the rest of the horde assembled around him in a defensive formation.

“How long was I out?” he asked.

“Just a few hours,” Filetta replied. “Hey, hey! Answer my question, Tyron! My hopes and dreams are riding on this, you prick!”

“No, Dove,” Tyron groaned, “I do not believe there is a way to regrow your body, or genitals, via the platinum rank status ritual. Alright?”

Having to say it out loud was somehow degrading. As if the experience he had just gone through was diminished in some way.

“Fucking damn it!” Dove exclaimed, kicking hard at the dirt and ‘accidently’ shooting sod at the seated Necromancer.

Tyron blinked before brushing the dirt from his robes.

“Although, I did get to listen to the Unseen describe the secret mysteries of magick and the realms. So that was nice.”

“Aha! I fucking knew it!” Dove declared, spinning on his heel and pointing a bony finger in Tyron’s direction. “There had to be a reason why the Divines wouldn’t allow anyone to reach platinum. I never believed it was just about control. Well, I believed it was mostly about control, but there had to be more! Of course there was more! If we had platinum ranked slayers running around, we’d smash the kin into smithereens. They’ve let the world burn down around them rather than let people know the secret!”

Eagerly, the skeleton plopped himself down on the ground, cross-legged, right in front of the Necromancer.

“So, what is it?” he asked, leaning forward, the purple light in his eyes shining brightly.

Tyron looked at him, puzzled.

“What is what?”

“The fucking secret! You… wait… no. Do not fucking do this to me, you ball-sucking daddy’s boy! No way you aren’t going to tell me!”

Agitated, the skeleton reached out and prodded Tyron in the chest, yet he barely felt a thing.

“Tell you what, Dove?” Tyron said, allowing himself a slight smile. “I’ll happily tell anyone who doesn’t purposefully make themself a boil on the backside of everyone around them exactly what I learned from the Unseen.”

“Will you tell me?” Filetta asked, pointing to herself.

“Of course,” Tyron smiled magnanimously. “Gladly. After all, you’re so helpful, and not annoying, and don’t make me grind my teeth in irritation all the time. How could I possibly refuse you?”

Turning back to the onyx skeleton, Tyron found Dove staring at him malevolently.

“This is low, boy. Even for you,” the skeleton ground out.

“I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”

“You fucking… you’re going to tell me eventually, right? Make me suffer, twist in the wind for a while, then tell me? Why not just say it now, save us all some trouble?”

“Because,” Tyron said, his face set in a serious expression, “there has to be a consequence for being an insufferable prick all the time.”

The author’s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

Dove leaned forward again.

“I’ll be an even more insufferable prick until you tell me. You think this is as bad as Dove can get? You haven’t seen anything. Give it a week and you’ll be begging me to listen. I’ll say things that no amount of magick can ever erase from your mind.”

Tyron raised a hand, then snapped his fingers.

“What was that for? Oh shit.”

Dove tried to run, but he was seized by a gang of skeletons who hoisted him up into the air before running away with him in their clutches.

“Have fun, Dove,” Tyron said, waving from where he sat.

“Fuck youuuuu, Tyroonnnnnnn!” Dove raged as he was carried into the distance.

Filetta watched him go, a bemused expression on her ghostly features.

“That was cruel, even for you,” she told him.

Tyron shrugged.

“To be honest, the secret isn’t anything special. Magick is killing our realm, we knew that. Platinum ranks are so adapted to magick that they’ll die without it. That’s new but not all that important. Then he provided knowledge of how to destroy magick and drain it out of the realm, which I sort of knew how to do already.”

He was simplifying things by quite a bit. What he’d learned from the Unseen about the other realms, tracing the infection back to its source and the hints regarding the terrifying transformation that awaited his home and the enemies which would eventually find them had been shocking revelations.

Dove was wrong. Even if they had platinum ranked Slayers, even if they conquered the worlds beyond the rifts, it wouldn’t matter in the end, the magick would corrupt and destroy everything given enough time.

“So the Divines themselves will die if the realm is stripped of magick?” Filetta asked him.

“Yes,” Tyron said, leaning back into the grass so he could once more look up at the sky. “I think The Divines reached platinum, received the revelation, then decided to try and have their cake and eat it too.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think, though I can’t be certain, that they did want to save the realm by destroying magick, but they didn’t want to die in the process. So they reached a compromise. Maybe if they became strong enough, perhaps reached adamantium at level one hundred, they would be able to find a way to do both.”

“But they didn’t.”

“But they didn’t,” Tyron agreed. “In fact, they were more dependent on the magick than ever before. Desperate, they tried everything to find a way to survive, while still cleansing the world, which eventually led them to The Three.”

“You believe they thought that by becoming gods, they would be able to live without magick?”

“Exactly. If they were able to take a portion of divinity from The Three, combine it with the power of the Unseen, they would have the best of both worlds, and ascend to a place of power that would allow them to finally save the world and survive the process. Except it didn’t work. Now, they are so dependent on magick they can’t possibly live without it, and are completely bound to this realm, unable to leave.”

“So they ruined everything for us, and for themselves?” Filetta laughed bitterly. “The entire world has been reduced to ruin because they can’t let themselves give up the power they have, and they refuse to die?”

“Pretty much,” Tyron said. “They’ve allowed just a few people to reach platinum, barely enough to keep the world from collapsing, but put tight controls on them. Things have slowly gotten worse over thousands of years, and I bet they’re still wriggling around, trying to find a way to live. Or maybe they’ve given up on that and just want to sever their connection to this realm so they can leave it behind. Anyone who learns their secret and tries to gain enough power to harm them is put down by any means necessary.”

He shook his head slowly, still looking at the sky.

“Magnin and Beory would have hated having their fate determined by such selfish creatures. I’m sure they were looking for a way to grow stronger and destroy them, which is why everything went the way it did.”

This was all just supposition, and he could be wrong, but he felt it was likely close to accurate. Perhaps The Five Divines had been the first people in the entire realm to reach platinum rank after the rifts had opened. After all, there would have been fewer kin and less magick back then, progression would have been much harder than it was now.

How many had died, how much suffering had been endured over thousands of years, because of the selfishness of five people?

That alone would have been reason enough to kill them, but Tyron only tangentially cared. For what they had done to his family, they were destined to die, regardless of what else they may have done.

“What about your new Class?” Filetta asked him. “Will you be strong enough to survive? What can you do now that you couldn’t before?”

Tyron smiled. Details of his new Class hadn’t been displayed on the status sheet, but he had instinctively known them the moment he had looked at the sigil in his vision.

“Ascended Skeleton Artifex,” he told her.

“That… sounds strong? What can you do?”

“I can make better skeletons.”

“Uh… is that it? Please tell me that isn’t it. We are going to need much more than that if you’re going to win!”

“Oh, I don’t know. I think it’s a decent start.”

Tyron closed his eyes and focused on the new knowledge implanted into his mind. The wealth of information contained within was staggering. As if he’d been reborn as a new species, Tyron felt like the limits that had been placed on him were gone. Infinite possibilities seemed to unfold in his mind’s eye. Capabilities well beyond human conception were within his reach, all he had to do was stretch out his hand.

Every ability he had placed into the crest had been empowered by his new Class.

Raise Dead had changed to Raise Greater Undead.

Bone Animus had become Bone Artistry.

Master Death Magick had become True Death Magick.

Ascended Bone Forging had become Aphotic Bone Shaping.

Advanced Conduit Magick had become Dimensional Conduit Magick.

All five no longer held a level, or even a maximum level. Rather, the crest held it for all of them. When he improved one of those abilities, he improved them all, empowering the crest towards its own maximum level, which was immensely high thanks to the Skills he had put into it.

With this knowledge and power, he would be able to craft far more powerful skeletons than he ever had before. Which meant he would need to start remaking each and every one of the skeletons in his existing horde.

“The work never ends,” he sighed.