Book of The Dead

With his horde renewed and the number of wights and demi-liches brought up to a more respectable level with the addition of the old souls, Tyron was now as ready as he would ever be to bring the conflict in the Southern Province to a head.

If he tried to drag out the battle, he would only give the Empire more time to organise and hunt him down. If they sent too many of the Golden Legion, even his current undead army wouldn’t be enough. He was counting on the reinforcements from the capital being small enough in number that they wouldn’t overwhelm his troops, giving him time to wear them down.

He was also hoping that by moving north to fight, then doubling back south, he might catch the locals with their pants down, so to speak. Once the capital had fallen and he had destroyed the Magisters’ tower, the Slayers who had achieved Gold rank would be able to resist their brands well enough to properly rebel, throwing the entire province into chaos. With another tower full of Mages and all the resources he would seize from the capital, Tyron would be able to strengthen his horde to an enormous degree, preparing it for the battles to come.

But even that wouldn’t make him ready to move on to the Central Province yet. Marching into the heartland of the Empire and challenging the Emperor in the seat of his power would require far more than that. Enough to reliably defeat platinum Soldiers.

“I never thought being in an army would mean this much walking,” Filetta complained from beside his platform.

They’d left the city of Kallas behind, turning it over to the people who had remained. Somewhere behind them, the Golden Legion was pushing to catch up, doubtless making incredible time as they marched with their inhuman levels of strength and endurance.

Luckily for Tyron, his army also possessed inhuman endurance. Everything was packed and prepared, the constructs were inactive and in some instances, fully disassembled. Nothing could afford to slow them down.

Riding on his platform, Tyron himself wouldn’t tire, and he planned to make use of the time spent travelling to work on his magick.

“How did you think an army got from one place to the next? They don’t fucking fly,” Dove retorted.

“Can you be quiet?” Tyron grumbled. “I’m trying to work.”His new platform, floating above the ground in much the same way the demi-liches did, in fact, using the exact same properties, was so much more stable than his old, spider-legged walker. With this level of stability, he could put a small desk on it, along with a chair, and actually sit comfortably as he worked on spellcraft.

It probably looked ridiculous, but he didn’t care.

“When are you not trying to work?” Filetta said, rolling her eyes. “You could be half dead and the first thing you’d think of was scribbling in one of your books.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s happened more than once,” Dove reflected, stroking his skeletal chin. “This guy has a one-track mind. Just like his teacher.”

“I’m pretty sure you have something other than magick on your mind,” Filetta replied.

“No, it’s the same,” Dove insisted, gesturing to himself. “What I can do with the ladies is assuredly, magick.”

“What you could do, and I very much doubt it.”

“That’s hurtful.”

“I’m sure you’ll survive.”

“No, no I think I’ve gone and died. You’ll need to make it up to me.”

“Would the two of you shut up?” Tyron glared at the bickering pair. “I’m trying to work on some Soul Magick, and it is exceedingly difficult to focus with you two jabbering at each other.”

“Are you trying to make another new spell?” Dove inquired, suddenly interested.

Tyron had worked on several new spells since he had created his first, testing the limits of his own ability while searching for new magick that would help shore up his weaknesses and augment his strengths. However, he constantly ran into an issue that frustrated him endlessly. He needed more Soul Magick!

Now that he knew what it was capable of, the way it and death aligned energy were able to work together to augment their power, he grew more and more frustrated that he didn’t have enough of it to work with. His limited supply, generated from the orb he had created in the Realm of the Dead, was barely sufficient to create the odd lich and improve his wights. Spell experimentation? Absolutely out of the question.

It wouldn’t be as much of a problem if, everytime he tried to work on something new, he wasn’t constantly reminded of how much better it would be with the addition of magick that he simply didn’t have.

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It was aggravating in the extreme.

As such, he spent far too much time theorising, creating array after array in his notes, long and detailed series of sigils that he couldn’t actually implement or test. It was a waste of time in some respects, as these were spells that he couldn’t use properly, but he was managing to advance his theoretical understanding of Soul Magick. When he finally managed to seize a reasonable supply of the stuff, he had dozens of avenues he could dive down for the purposes of research, all prepared and sitting in his notes.

“Yes, Dove. I’m trying to make a new spell.”

“Shouldn’t you just perform the status ritual? You conquered two cities, surely that’s enough for a level or two.”

“I will,” Tyron replied, gritting his teeth, “soon. Now shut it.”

In truth, he had killed surprisingly few people during this invasion. The Province was clearly attempting to starve him of materials and levels, a sound strategy, which had forced his hand and led to the attack on Kallas to begin with. The death toll numbered in the thousands, perhaps as many as ten thousand, but if he had been massacring the populace along the way, that number would be in the hundreds of thousands, almost a million.

Even if a regular person wasn’t worth as much experience as a hardened warrior or mage with high levels, they would still grant more than a weak monster or kin. Killing that many would have certainly granted him a good number of levels. Yet, ultimately, it would have been self-defeating. If he acted in that way, the populace would firm in their resistance, throwing their weight behind the Empire and making his life that much harder. By sparing them, he drove a wedge between the people and their rulers, fuelling the flames of rebellion and bringing potential allies to his side.

Already his bard was out there planting the seeds. If he was right, it wouldn’t take long for them to bear fruit.

Still, he was planning to perform the status ritual once they had crossed the halfway mark to Mirasmus. A little more time to work on new spells might lead to something he wanted to add to a crest if he had the opportunity.

Confident that Filetta and Dove were finally going to be quiet, Tyron turned back to his notes, dipped his pen in the ink and leaned forward, mind already spinning with possibilities.

It seemed they had been waiting for that moment.

Tyron noticed the mantle react, the souls trapped within stirring to life and whipping around him before he’d even put pen to page. The next thing he knew, he was spiralling through the air, his head ringing from the force of a heavy impact and the taste of blood in his mouth.

Chaos spread in an instant.

No words needed to be said. Panic spread through the conduits at the speed of thought. Wights relayed what they had seen to the others, who each reacted in different ways. Blocks of infantry began to march towards the nearby woods, while others moved to fan out and some tried to tighten the formation and draw closer, looking to defend their master.

“What… was that?” Tyron wheezed.

At least, he tried to, but what came out was a garbled mess of words. That’s when he realised his jaw was broken, the pain radiating out through his head and neck.

“Fluck,” he garbled, leaning to the side and spitting blood onto the road.

Still dazed, it took him a few moments to piece together what had happened through the noise that filled the conduits linked to his mind.

An arrow, not a spell or he would have sensed the magick. Fired from kilometres away, he hadn’t noticed a thing until the mantle had reacted. Without that interference, it likely would have pierced his temple and killed him instantly. As it was, it had been deflected downward and pressed the mantle into his jaw before shattering.

That’s what he got for not wearing his helmet. Running his tongue around the inside of his mouth, he was relieved to find he still had all of his teeth. Regrowing them would have been a pain, and any change to the internal dimensions of his mouth could have effects on his spellcraft.

“Tyron! Are you alright?!” Filetta was crouched over him, blade in one hand, the other on his shoulder and pressing him down to the ground. Anger and fear warred with each other in her eyes.

It warmed his heart. A little.

Rather than speak to her directly, he chose to use the conduits. His presence boomed through the magickal channels, rolling over the horde in an instant. As if cut with a blade, the chaotic chatter was severed in an instant.

I’m fine, but my jaw is broken. I need healing, otherwise I can’t cast verbal spells. Someone get my helmet and pull the formation tighter. We won’t be able to catch them, but we need to ensure they don’t slip through our ranks.

Elsbeth would need to heal him, which meant conjuring the Ossuary in order to bring her through to his location.

“How is this possible? There’s nobody close enough to hurt you. You’re in the middle of an army, for fuck’s sake!”

Filetta was still somewhat panicked, an odd state of mind for an undead. Tyron raised a hand and placed it on the ethereal flesh of her arm, ignoring the harsh cold of her touch.

If they were closer, I would have been dead for sure. What is possible at platinum rank might seem ridiculous to anyone else. That was a platinum ranked archer, I’m sure of it.

Imperial Blades. The Emperor’s killers, they’d finally come for him. Tyron only knew they existed thanks to his parents. Magnin had been asked to demonstrate his swordsmanship for them, apparently.

This was their first attempt, but there will be more. I let my guard down.

How foolish, to take off his helmet just because it made writing easier. A mistake that wouldn’t be repeated.

We have to be more careful going forward, he told Filetta as he lay back down, resting his head on the stone road. He had already begun to conjure the Ossuary through a demi-lich,so there was nothing left to do but wait. They could sneak past ten thousand skeletons and slit my throat before anyone noticed they were here. I’m lucky they decided to try the arrow first.

He was pulling his ghosts in closer, creating a solid wall of spirits around himself. Nothing would be able to step through without him noticing.

“What can we do? Surely we can hunt them down,” Filetta fretted.

Tyron shook his head.

We just keep moving. Until we draw them into the open, we’ll never have a chance of catching them. Once my jaw is repaired, we resume the march.